Page 24

C assian woke before dawn the next morning after a sleepless night.

In his mind, he replayed the moment when Daphne walked away and the ache of it was as sharp every time.

Yet he admired her for it. She did not plead or persuade.

The most lovely, loyal, spirited woman he’d ever met had offered him her heart, and all he had to do was give her his own, and she’d be his. She’d said as much.

And yet here he was rushing across the field beyond Hillcrest like a man trying to outrun his demons.

He’d once doubted he had a heart or was capable of tender emotions. Daphne had proved to him that he did, for the damned blood-pumping organ had never troubled him as it had since the day he’d collided with her.

Under his father’s fists, he’d taught himself to be hard. Yet even then, he’d loved his mother. He’d adored his brother. He’d treasured Bartlett, who’d shown him that men could be strict, yet also cool-headed and kind.

Perhaps there had been some tenderness in him, despite their father. But did that mean he could deserve the love of a lady like Daphne? God, he wanted to try.

Somewhere in the grassy acreage abutting the manor, he slowed his strides. Then he heard the quick, steady beat of horse hooves and turned to look behind him. In the distance, a man approached, galloping straight toward him.

As the rider grew closer, he recognized the Duke of Edgerton and one of the horses from Hillcrest’s stable.

Edgerton slowed the horse as he grew nearer, then dismounted quickly, his brow bent, expression fierce. “A word, Captain?” he said as he approached, the horse’s reins clutched in one gloved hand.

“Of course.” Unless Cassian wanted to make a run for it, there was no avoiding the man as they were alone and miles from Hillcrest, but for a few grazing sheep.

“I think you must have some notion as to why I’ve run you to ground.”

Cassian nodded. “I do, Your Grace.”

“I didn’t quite understand why your brother invited us to Berkshire.

In fact, I had no wish to accept the invitation, but my wife, clever as she is, knew immediately what your brother had in mind.

” Edgerton took his measure, scraping a look across the unshaven, wind-tossed, rumpled state of him.

“Windham seems keen on playing matchmaker.”

“That I did not ask for,” Cassian told him. “Indeed, I didn’t know you were coming until you’d arrived.”

Edgerton narrowed his eyes as if dubious about that claim. “And yet you benefit from our visit all the same.”

Cassian couldn’t deny it. Seeing Daphne again was a gift he’d neither expected nor felt worthy of.

“Daphne is kind-hearted. My wife would say she’s the sweetest of all her sisters, so we are keen to protect her from ne’er-do-wells.”

Cassian bowed his head, then nodded. “And you fear I may be such a man?”

“Are you?” Edgerton tipped up his chin the slightest bit, and it felt like a dare.

“If you’d known me years ago, you might think so,” Cassian admitted.

“I might think so now.” Edgerton’s expression hardened.

“Because, you see, Daphne has also always hoped for a love match. I think all the Bridewell sisters do because their parents’ marriage was such a loving one.

They have a shining example to aspire to.

I did not. I suspect you may not have either. ”

“No. Quite true. Not at all.”

Edgerton’s eyes seemed to lighten a bit, and he merely observed Cassian a moment and said nothing.

“My duchess and I want to see her happy,” he finally said, a bit less sharpness in his tone.

“As do I.”

Edgerton glanced over his shoulder, toward Hillcrest. “She seems quite…taken with you, Captain Rourke.”

Cassian’s throat worked against the lump rising there. He looked away, unable to summon a response that wouldn’t betray too much of what had passed between him and Daphne.

Edgerton’s gaze was unrelenting. “And you? What are your intentions toward my sister-in-law?”

Cassian opened his mouth to speak, but no words came.

The duke didn’t wait for a reply. “One would imagine a man who’d won such a lady’s favor might have already made his offer.”

Cassian snapped his head up. Edgerton’s words echoed Julian’s.

The duke arched a brow. “Yet you have not, Captain. So I’ll ask once more. What do you intend?” The duke drew in a sharp breath and added, “My wife and I are of a mind to continue on to Derbyshire with her sisters.”

“When?” Cassian’s pulse pounded.

“Tomorrow,” Edgerton said, his voice like flint. “So I suggest you either act…” He paused to make sure Cassian looked him square in the eyes. “Or you must let her go.”

With those words, Edgerton mounted his horse, turned the stallion, and headed back toward Hillcrest.

Cassian stood as if thunderstruck, the duke’s words rattling through his mind.

Let her go .

Letting her go would be like giving up on breathing. Some part of him—the shadow that reminded him he was nothing—warned that he was not deserving of her. But then Daphne’s own voice rang in his head.

You have a right to be hopeful, to love and be loved .

If he was going to listen to any voice, it should be hers because she had reminded him who he was—a man with a heart. A heart that belonged to her. And, somehow, in some immense blessing that he’d never expected, she’d offered him hers, if he but had the courage to claim it.

Courage to push away doubts, to have hope greater than his fears.

With her, for her. Could he do that?

He had to, or he’d lose her.

That he could not do.

All it demanded of him was grasping what was right in front of him. She said he had a decision to make, and yet part of him knew it had been made the minute he’d crashed into her in that damned ballroom. He’d never been the same since the moment.

Now, he couldn’t imagine a future without her.

He started back across the field as clouds swept in. Eagerness built in him, love drove him, and he lengthened his stride until he was all but running through the tall grass. As the land tipped downward and Hillcrest came into view, cool drops of rain began to fall.

By the time he was close enough to see through the glass of the conservatory, his clothes were drenched and his hair dripping, but none of it mattered as much as finding Daphne and telling her what was in his rusty, racing heart.

Then he saw a flash of pink through the glass of conservatory walls.

He rushed around the structure and strode through the entrance, and his lungs drained of air.

She stood at the far edge of the conservatory, eyes wide, clasping her right hand. Blood seeped through her fingers.

Cassian rushed to her, pulling at the arm of his shirt until the seams tore. He pulled a strip of rain-soaked cloth free. “Let me see.”

“It’s nothing. A small cut.”

He worked quickly, dabbing at the cut with his damp shirt, then wrapping the clean strip around her hand.

“What happened?” he asked quietly as he gathered two ragged edges of the cloth and tied a knot.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I wanted to explore, and I broke a pot. When I tried to pick up the pieces…” She glanced over to where one of the clay pots he’d collected for seedlings had tumbled off a low tiled ledge along the conservatory wall.

“I don’t care about the pot. I care about you.”

“I…found something,” she said, then looked up to him. “I wasn’t being a busybody. A tile broke, and I spotted it in a hollow below the tiles.”

She pulled out of his hold to retrieve the item she’d found.

“I opened it. Read a bit. I was curious. I hope you’ll forgive me.” She lifted a slim leather-bound book up to him.

“What is it?” But the moment he took it in his hand, he knew. A memory came of his mother bent over the book, scribbling notes. He’d thought she was making notations about the plants she grew.

“You mother’s, I believe,” Daphne said quietly. She still wore a look of guilt.

Cassian stroked her arm. “You did nothing wrong. Please don’t apologize or feel ill at ease.”

“She loved you very much,” she said with a soft smile.

Cassian tightened his hold on the journal, then lifted the cover to look inside. He flipped slowly through the pages, catching snippets of his mother’s neat handwriting.

And his heart, which had felt near to bursting as he rushed back to find Daphne, now ached for his mother.

Because the pages held no notes about her garden.

They were all about her sons. On each page, she’d detailed their thoughts, their activities, their burgeoning personalities, cataloging all she saw and treasured in each of them.

Today, Julian said the most amusing thing. I adore his smile.

The boys are growing so fast.

They raced each other across the field, so far I could barely see them on the horizon. And when they came back, they were red-faced, breathless, sweaty, and grass-stained. But happy. Their laughter is a balm.

This morning, Cassian snuck out to help me prune the rose bushes.

They are so different. Julian’s heart is open. He is all laughter, loving everything, but lightly. Cassian’s heart is guarded and he tends to brood, but when he loves something, he does so fiercely.

Cassian smiled, his chest full of warmth, and he sent up a silent thanks to his mother. Then he closed the book, set it on the ledge, and turned back to the woman he loved fiercely.

“Does it hurt?” he asked about her cut as he reached for her.

“Not at all.” She slipped a finger between two buttons of his wet shirt to stroke his skin. “You got caught in the rain.”

“I did, but it’s good for clearing the mind.”

Both of her brows winged up. “Oh?”

“I love you, Daphne Bridewell.”

Tears welled in her eyes and she smiled. “And I love you, Captain Rourke. So…you’ve decided?”

Cassian grinned. “I have.” Gently, he swept the pad of thumb against her cheek to catch a tear, then reached down to clasp her hand. “But now you have a decision to make too, my love?”

“What decision?”