Page 28 of Enticing Odds (The Sedleys #5)

He would never cease to love her, even if she refused his company.

She’d saved him.

They’d returned immediately to Rowbotham House once they’d found Viscount Caplin and his friend. Middlemiss was a bit worse for the wear, having been relieved of his shoes, watch, hat, and jacket, much to Viscount Caplin’s delight.

At least the thieves had allowed the lad his shirt and trousers.

Matthew stood with Rickard in the towering entrance hall. The lamps were offensively bright, having been relit after they’d already been put out hours before. A very unhappy footman had been roused to tend to the lot of them, along with Cressida’s maid and Viscount Caplin’s own valet, whose job was to see to the jumpy and underclothed Middlemiss. Soon, Matthew knew, other staff would wake, to begin tending hearths and kneading dough.

How strange it was, Matthew thought, to stand here in this massive, glittering, well-staffed manse, bidding Rickard a good night and many thanks as if he were its lord.

But he wasn’t. And he never would be.

He didn’t fit into this life. He knew he never could. His manners and sensibilities were far too middle-class. Why, he’d sooner die from hunger than wake a servant at this hour. But Viscount Caplin possessed no such reservations, and had yanked the silk bell cord, entirely nonplussed.

Rickard withdrew a gold pocket-watch from inside his coat; Matthew knew it to be a gift from his wife. His wife whom he’d be returning home to, along with his darling daughter. Matthew swallowed, wishing he might swallow his uncertainty as easily.

“She’ll be waiting up for me,” Rickard said.

Matthew nodded, placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder. He patted it.

“Thank you. Thank you, thank you,” Matthew sputtered. “I don’t know how I might begin to repay you… I… I know you’ve put these sorts of entanglements behind you, and I regret—”

Rickard scoffed, cutting him off.

“Have you forgotten?” He reached up, yanking down his collar with one hooked finger. A white scar ran along his throat. “You saved my life, Collier.”

Matthew smiled sadly and shook his head. “Ah, but any field surgeon worth his salt would’ve managed the same. The trick of luck was that the bullet missed your carotid artery—”

“Always so humble,” Rickard said with a long sigh. “You ought to accept it. I’m not very free with my regard.”

Matthew smiled.

“Goodnight, then.”

He went to the door and fiddled with the locks, trying to open it for Rickard. The footman would surely give him a deathly cold glare, were he here, but Matthew did not wish to call him for the small task of opening the door.

Rickard paused at the threshold. He turned.

“What will you do, then?”

“What do you mean?”

Rickard looked toward the stairs behind Matthew. The stairs Lady Caplin had climbed immediately upon their return, proclaiming that her clothes must be burnt.

Matthew lowered his head.

“I see,” Rickard said.

“I mean to…” The deed to Cookham Place in his coat seemed to emanate heat, but perhaps that was just the worry and fear coursing through his body. “I mean to ask her.” Again .

“You might not like the answer,” Rickard said, his tone uncharacteristically conciliatory.

“Perhaps,” Matthew replied, lifting his head. “But I cannot live with myself if I do not.”

Rickard studied him for a moment, then nodded.

Matthew watched his friend descend the steps and enter the waiting carriage. He shut the front door, doing his best to latch it properly.

Then the gravity of the next moments hit him as squarely as a locomotive tearing across the countryside. His future hung in the balance; he would either end the evening as hopeless and lonely as he’d ever been, or… well.

Matthew was not hopeless. Not quite.

He looked up at the massive staircase before him, a wide, curving, gothic thing.

Standing at the top was Cressida, her hands folded, her hair hanging loose and damp, clothed in a simple wrapper, looking somehow even more elegant in her simplicity, freed from her jewels and trimmings.

Not Lady Caplin; just Cressida. The woman he loved with all his heart.

His body flooded with warmth as he took the first step, his touch light upon the banister. In the dark her eyes appeared even larger, reflecting the light from the lamps around them.

She’d risked a massive amount of money for him, not to mention her safety in the odd corners of the city. Gaffed dice were not a certainty—they did not land on the same side every time; their weighting only increased the odds that they would. She’d staked a significant portion of her and her sons’ living on one throw of them.

And she’d done it for him.

He ran a hand through his hair as he reached the top, pausing a few steps below her so they stood nearly eye to eye.

“Dr. Collier,” she said with a slight smirk.

He took her hands in his, his chest rising and falling rapidly with each shallow breath.

“Cressida…”

She opened her mouth to speak again, but he shook his head.

“Please, allow me, for if I don’t express everything… all that’s in my heart and the truth written upon my soul, I fear I never shall.”

Her eyes widened.

Matthew caressed her hands in his. They felt warm, no doubt from her bath, which had also lent a girlish pink to her cheeks.

“You nearly forfeited so much of what you hold dear. I know I’ve no title, no noble heritage, but I damn well know the value of a pound. That you would risk your comfort, your happiness—hell, your sons’ happiness—for me…” He paused as his voice began to tremble, and he waited, studying her hands in his, until he felt he could speak steadily. “I asked you before, and I daresay you saw it as the last act of a desperate man and rejected me out of hand, but I assure you…”

He looked up, his eyes glassy. He couldn’t help it. The emotion within him demanded it, and he found himself incapable of stamping it out.

She should see it. She should know how he felt.

Cressida watched him, her face inscrutable.

“I assure you I wish for nothing but your happiness. And to be the man to provide you with that happiness, to do whatever you ask, but to be at your side, to be your husband, to be with you, to merely be … with you…”

He trailed off, surprised by the force of his words. He cleared his throat, then reached inside his coat and withdrew the papers.

“Never would I ask you again to wed me as I had stood these months past, a humble doctor with a surgery in Marylebone. I’m not a fool; I know very well what that would mean for your reputation, your social standing. But perhaps this,” he said as he handed the papers to her, “this would do a bit to redress the balance… if you would have me.”

She began reading, then almost immediately glanced up to him, that one brow raised warily.

“Go on,” he urged, his voice rasping.

She looked back, her face softening as she read. His heart was in her hands now. May God have mercy on me .

And then she looked up, grinning coyly.

“Cookham Place?”

“In Sussex,” he croaked mildly. “It’s supposedly a lovely clime for gardening. Very temperate.”

“You… purchased a home?” She lowered the papers.

“Er… won it, actually. Admiral Braden offered it in lieu of the debt he’d incurred to me. He praised the house, called it charming, exceptionally appealing, though I’ve yet to visit and—”

“An admiral?” she interrupted, tilting her head. “What was the game?”

“Whist,” Matthew said, feeling as if the wind had been knocked from him.

“Well,” Cressida said, reaching for his hand, inviting him up the final steps to join her on the landing. “Very well done, you.”

“It’s yours,” Matthew said, unable to bear this torture any longer, wanting to bury his face against her neck, her chest. “No matter your answer.”

“Really?” Cressida laughed and looked back to the papers.

“Of course,” he said, squeezing her hand. “Although you might not return the sentiment, I… Cressida. You must know, by now. I love you. I adore you. I would do anything, anything at all, only say the word.”

He lifted her hand to his lips and shut his eyes as he placed a devotional kiss upon it.

“Please, say the word,” he murmured against her fingers.

“Matthew,” she crooned. “You cannot think me so simple-minded as all that.”

He squeezed his eyes tighter, readying himself for a devastating blow.

“My sweet doctor,” she said, and he felt her hand upon his cheek, gently guiding him to turn, to face her.

He did, and when he opened his eyes, he saw a wide, joyful smile upon her face, those sweet dimples and warm toffee eyes glittering with excitement.

“I would never dream of wagering my reputation on something as capricious as weighted dice if I didn’t mean to marry you anyway and put any threat of blackmail well to bed. How better to cut him down than to accept your offer? Why, you ought to have sorted it out at the first, an intelligent man such as you.”

His heart nearly stopped.

“You’d… already decided? That you would?”

“Of course I had,” she scoffed. “The rest of the evening was my pièce de résistance . A gamble, to be sure, but one that paid off handsomely, I’d say. For Charles Sharples surely feels as foolish now as he once made you feel.” She narrowed her eyes. “Which was my intent.”

“But… you would give it all up?” he murmured. “The balls, the parties… for me?”

“I shall,” she said. “It’s become awfully boring, all these meetings and societies. Too many soirées, too many operas.”

His heart leaped.

She stroked his cheek and wet her lips.

“Truly?” he whispered.

“Of course, you fool. I love you.”

She slid her hand behind his neck and pulled him down.

When she kissed him, not a single thing else mattered. Nothing that had gone before; not the person he’d been, the things he’d done, the things he’d misguidedly hoped for—a meek and mild wife, the hollow recognition of membership in an exclusive club. He reached down and hoisted her up against him, her sweet, clean floral scent enveloping him as easily as her arms did.

All that mattered was that he was hers. That she had chosen him.

Matthew broke away from the kiss, laughing.

“What?” Cressida breathed. “What is it?”

“Only I can’t believe my luck.” He grinned at her. “Months ago I had nothing.”

“And now?” She smiled coyly, taking his chin in her hand.

“Now I have everything,” he breathed.

He kissed her again. Hard, fierce, and long.