Page 24 of His Wife, the Spy (His Enterprising Duchess #4)

A nnabel had never understood why her mother considered the theatre scandalous. For her, it was a book come to life. Time both stood still and passed too quickly as she’d watched her favorite characters repeat oft-read words in front of intricately painted scenes.

While the canvas backgrounds had always been disappointing, the actors rarely let her down. Tonight was no exception. Watching Beatrice and Benedick’s reluctant romance grow provided a pleasant distraction after the drama from the past week.

Even Jasper seemed to forget himself as the play unfolded beneath their box. His deep laughter rolled over her as the couple bantered their way into love, and he paid rapt attention to Don John’s plot to ruin the happiness of every party.

Hero’s funeral signaled the intermission, and the lights came up in a wave. Jasper turned to her with a smile on his face. “Fitting that we should both enjoy a play about gossip.”

“You never fail to surprise me,” Annabel said. “I wouldn’t have imagined you, willingly, at the theatre.”

He shrugged, though his grin turned wicked. “Perhaps I’m enjoying being out of the house and in something other than my dressing gown.”

It was nice to forget their concerns, if only for a few hours. However, they were likely the only box with an armed guard in the shadows. “And to have something to eat other than soup?”

“God, yes.” Jasper looked longingly at the empty refreshment tray. “I wonder if I could bribe an attendant for another visit.”

Annabel stood. “I should visit Lady Carmichael while we have time, and I believe I saw the Duchess of Rushford.”

“I’ll go with you. Though we should avoid being seen with the duke and duchess.” He winked at her. “After Stratford’s arrest, we draw attention when we’re seen together.”

She nodded, though she shot a glance across the theatre at the Rushfords’ box. As much as she wanted to visit with Thea, they needed to avoid the attention tonight of all nights.

Once in the hallway, and in the crush of people wishing to be seen and heard, Annabel regretted their decision to leave their seats. She went to move to the outside, meaning to protect Jasper, but only succeeded in stepping on his toes.

He draped his arm around her waist. “Relax, dearest. We’re fine.”

The weight of his hand shifted with every step, tightening when he swung his left leg. Annabel looked over her shoulder, fearing an attacker masked as a friend.

“The secret is to not look afraid,” Jasper whispered. “We’re just another couple at a play.”

“Lady Ramsbury,” Ellen Harrow cried as she approached with a smile. “I was just coming to your box.”

“Lady Carmichael.” Annabel reached for her friend, grateful to see someone she knew wasn’t a threat. “I’m lucky you found us in this crush. I was just coming to you.”

The crowd jostled them, and Jasper’s hissed curse sent a ripple of fear through her.

“Are you well?” Ellen asked.

“I’m fine, but we should get out of this hallway.”

“You both look worn through,” Ellen said as she took Annabel’s arm. “We’ll go to the retiring room for some quiet. My husband is at the bar, Lord Ramsbury.”

Annabel looked over her shoulder as she left Jasper behind. His height kept him visible longer than most would be, and his smile gave her the courage she needed to keep up with Ellen’s quick pace and steady stream of gossip.

The retiring room was at the end of two hallways, the shorter of which connected the wings of the building. Annabel looked into the shadows to ensure their safety and saw a flash of light blue silk fly around the corner. A muffled cry followed.

The hair on Annabel’s neck rose. “I’ll be right in, Ellen. Excuse me a moment.”

Halfway down the hall, it was clear there was a struggle at the other end. One a lady was losing. Armed with nothing but her fan, Annabel wasn’t certain how she could help.

“Annabel.” Ellen reached her in two strides. “Where are you going?”

Thank God. “The Rushfords’ box is on the other side of the theatre,” Annabel all but shouted. “I’d like to pay my respects.”

Heavy footsteps thudded down the adjoining hall, just as they made the turn. All that remained was a shuddering girl in a lovely dress.

Annabel reached for her shoulder, meaning to offer comfort, but the girl flinched away with a gasp. Annabel mirrored it when she recognized the victim.

“Miss Bainbridge?”

Charlotte gathered her shawl to her shoulders, but not quick enough to hide the finger-shaped bruises on her arms.

“Shall I fetch someone? Perhaps the viscount—”

“No!” Charlotte drew a deep breath. “No, thank you. I’ll be fine in a moment.” She bobbed a curtsy. “Thank you for your concern, Lady Ramsbury.”

It was the proper thing to say, but it wasn’t what Annabel had expected to hear from Charlotte. Nothing about this terrified girl resembled the young lady who had celebrated her engagement just last week.

Jocelyn Fletcher’s tales of Viscount Raines tumbled into Annabel’s brain and combined with what Annabel now suspected of him. The result put her in front of the young lady, blocking her escape. “Charlotte, do not marry a man who hurts you.”

The girl blinked. “I’m sorry?”

Annabel touched the bruises as gently as possible. “No man—no title—is worth this.”

New tears pooled in Charlotte’s eyes. “You don’t understand. It’s too late. The party, and the announcements, my dress. The settlements have been drawn up.”

“Surely your father would not want you married to brute simply to save paperwork,” Ellen said from her side of the hallway.

Charlotte used her handkerchief to dab the tears before they fell, but her lips still trembled. “No one else will have me after…” She put her hand over her mouth to muffle her sob. “Please. I can’t…”

“You can , Charlotte,” Annabel insisted. “It will not be easy, and it will require a great deal of bravery. Your friends—”

“My friends would step over my ruined body to get to him. They would feign support over tea and then spread the gossip across London before dinner.” Charlotte sniffed. “I know because I’ve done the same.”

Annabel imagined Rachel in this same situation and knew what she would want her sister to have. “Then you make new friends, more powerful ones.” She tilted the girl’s chin and helped blot her tears. “You know where Lady Carmichael or I can be found when you need us. Knock on the door or send word, day or night.”

“Charlotte? What is taking so long?” Belinda Wallace called from the other, brighter, end of the hallway. “You don’t want to keep Melton waiting.”

“Just a moment.” Charlotte’s cheerful answer belied her shaking fingers as she grasped Annabel’s hand. “Thank you,” she whispered before stepping past and around the corner.

Annabel and Ellen followed after the girls’ voices faded, and walked in silent solidarity toward their husbands, who were waiting near the Ramsbury box.

Though she was in no mood for social conversation, Annabel managed a brief interchange with Lord Carmichael. All the while, she was conscious of Jasper’s fingers on her waist and his steady gaze.

Once they were alone, he escorted her back to their seats, nodding to Frederick as they passed his post at the door.

“What has happened?” he whispered once they were settled. “You look angrier than I’ve seen you in a while.” He snorted a laugh. “At least in the last two days.”

She tapped his knee with her fan. “You can be a very vexing man.”

“I wasn’t vexing in the retiring room.” He took her hand and waited for her to meet his eyes. “Are you frightened?”

“No.” She was never frightened for herself when she was with him, yet she was terrified of life without him. Since her marriage, her days had been full of laughter, warmth that had nothing to do with fireplaces, and color that was more than furnishings and the dressmaker’s. Even London had been brighter. With the exception of the last week, she didn’t know how long it had been since she’d seen a cloudy day.

“Why didn’t you just tell me about Claudette?” she asked.

“Because you were in no mood to believe me.” He watched the activity on the floor below them as he shrugged. “You needed to discover it for yourself.”

Annabel wanted to protest, to tell him he was wrong, that she was not as judgmental as he believed her to be. But the truth was, he was right—to a point. She had always believed the worst of him and then been proven wrong.

She thought she’d married a debauched, drunk womanizer who might be a traitor to his queen. Instead, her husband was a rather bookish, sober gentleman who was fighting a war against corruption within his own ranks.

“I’m sorry I hurt your feelings.”

“Bah.” He brushed aside her guilt with his free hand. “I have very few to hurt. Just ask any woman in any random ballroom.”

She did not believe him for a second. “Jasper.”

“You wounded my pride more than anything.” He finally glanced her way and squeezed her fingers. “You do not need to carry guilt for that. It’s a stumbling block that’s led me into my own rash behavior.”

“Like not telling me you ripped your wound open?” She raised an eyebrow as she met his stare. “Claudette asked if you were worse again . Why didn’t Stapleton send for me?”

She could see Kit leaving her clueless about her husband’s health, but she’d thought the butler liked her.

Jasper’s grimace made her gasp. “You sat there arguing with me while you were bleeding and didn’t say anything?” she said. “You let me leave the house …” That realization was almost worse than finding him outside Claudette’s door. Claudette, whose husband had died while they had been separated. Who hadn’t had a chance to say goodbye. “Why?”

“I was angry,” he said. “I wanted you to choose to stay and listen to me.”

Annabel fought his tight hold. “Do you realize what could have happened to you? That I would have been halfway across the city with no idea that you were…” She corralled her thoughts before they ran away with her tongue. “You should have told me, Jasper.”

“I should have, yes. But if you had stayed with me, Rachel would be betrothed to some liver-spotted man three times her age. It all worked out in the end.”

Her sister would be ecstatically happy, but her husband would have bled to death without her. “That is not a fair trade.”

The orchestra signaled the end of intermission.

“Neither of us are saints.” He lifted her hand to his lips. “That seems to be something else we have in common.”

The list grew longer with every day. “Not to mention our fierce tempers.”

“That, too.” His gaze held hers, and his smile crinkled the corners of his deep blue eyes. “In the grand scheme, this is nothing but a rock in the road. We cannot let it distract us from what is most important.”

The gaslights sputtered as they dimmed until the stage was the only focus.

“My mother always insisted the theatre was scandalous.” Annabel scanned the stage and the crowd. “I wonder why she thought that.”

He adjusted his chair, coming close enough that their knees touched. “Sex.”

A shiver went through her, ending with her hard nipples pressed against her corset. Every breath wound them tighter. “There’s none of that in this play.”

“Not in the play. In the building.” His husky laugh heated her to her toes. “Why do you think boxes are so popular?”

The actors returned for the second act, and the crowd quieted. Within minutes, Annabel was once again lost in the story.

“Look up three boxes and two boxes to your right,” Jasper whispered.

Curiosity compelled her to look through her glasses in the direction he indicated. A lady she didn’t recognize was alone in her box, though her knee was against the rail in a most unladylike pose. She seemed focused on the play, but her mouth was open in a gasp that had nothing to do with the action on the stage.

“Her lover is on his knees under her skirt.” Jasper traced a finger across her bare skin along the back of her dress.

Annabel pressed her thighs together, embarrassed by the heat flooding through her at the memory of Jasper doing the same thing. “How does she stay quiet?”

“Practice.” Jasper made the word sound like sin itself. “The thrill of illicit sex is the possibility of getting caught, but no one really wants to be caught.”

Cheeks hot, Annabel took one last glance at the lady in the throes of passion, her bare hand over her mouth to muffle her cries. An odd sympathy bloomed in her chest. She had to use a pillow to hide her wails as Jasper tormented her with his tongue, and she still wasn’t certain the whole household couldn’t hear her.

A small trickle of dread followed in the wake of Jasper’s finger on her skin. “Is that why you like coming to the theatre?” While she enjoyed sex with her husband, she couldn’t imagine having it where people could look up and see them in the act.

“It can be fun to watch if the play is boring, but otherwise no.” His palm was warm on her shoulder, reassuring. “There is a difference between an eagerness to be together and a fetish.”

Laughter from the crowd drew Annabel’s attention back to the stage, but after a moment she found herself scanning the boxes opposite them. Jasper’s soft laughter raised gooseflesh on her arms.

“Fourth row up, to your left,” he whispered. “Find the box that looks empty.”

Annabel lifted her glasses and found the box without a problem, noting that one of the chairs was turned away from the stage. The longer she watched, the more the details came into focus. Fingers curved around the seat of the chair; the lady’s skirts clung to the legs.

Her companion was a shadow behind her, though his buff trousers occasionally caught the light from the stage. The chair rocked in a familiar, intimate rhythm.

Another round of laughter took Annabel by surprise, and she dropped her glasses into her lap. Everything inside her ached with an emptiness that began at her center. Her clothing tormented her too-sensitive skin. Jasper’s solid thigh was her only anchor, but she couldn’t remember having reached for him.

His stare glittered in the dim light.

Embarrassed by her display, Annabel withdrew.

“Leave it.” Jasper pulled her back and curled his fingers around her palm. “Please. I like it there.”

She liked it there too. But every shift of his muscles reminded her of the man across the way. It made it difficult to focus on the stage, but she managed. It helped that she’d read Shakespeare so often she could recite it with the actors.

As the play ended, they stood with the other audience members for an ovation. Her hand was cool without Jasper’s, but anticipation hummed beneath her skin.

Once in the hallway, they moved with the crowd toward the doors. Frederick stayed on their heels. They reached the way out, and the crowd separated, everyone looking for the shortest route to fresh air. All but two men, off to the side, who were in a heated argument. Reginald Spencer and Charles Melton, the Marquess of Graydon.

“Jasper.”

“I see them. Keep moving so we don’t draw attention to ourselves.”

Once outside, they hurried to their coach. Jasper helped her inside. “Take the long way home, please, Lawrence. Through the park.”

He closed the door and extinguished two of the lanterns, throwing them into near darkness.

“Spencer and Graydon.” Annabel tempered her glee at the key discovery. Jasper had hoped the marquess wasn’t involved in this scheme. Bits and pieces of collected information shuffled in her brain.

They stuttered to a stop when Jasper’s mouth claimed hers in a hot, deep kiss. She returned it eagerly, hungry for him in a way that would have shocked her only a few months earlier. She had missed the thick silk of his hair under her fingers and the sweet, wild scent of his skin.

His greedy hands roamed her body, stoking the fire between them.

He pulled away, his chest heaving with every breath in a most complimentary way. “I promise we’ll pick through every detail, but I won’t be able to concentrate until I’ve had you trembling beneath my hands.” He delivered another shocking kiss. “At least once.”

He removed his gloves with a violence that should have ripped them to pieces and then struggled from his coat. His broad shoulders and strong arms stretched the fabric, reminding Annabel of how he’d felt under her hands and the pleasure they’d given each other.

She loved this man. If they separated after their mission was concluded, she would still love him. It made her ten times a fool, and considering sex with him doubled it.

Despite all that, Annabel peeled off her gloves. Excitement coursed through her, pooling at her center. It was foolish, yes, but she’d have memories like none other. “Travis said you shouldn’t exert yourself.”

“He has no imagination.” Jasper sat back on the opposite seat and swept his gaze around the carriage, as though he’d never seen it before. After a moment, he refocused on her. Her favorite wicked smile spread over his face. “I’m about to scandalize you.”

Yes, please . Cool night air brushed her ankles.

He ran his tongue along his bottom lip. “Stand up and turn around.”

Annabel obeyed his whispered command, pitching unsteadily with each roll of the carriage wheels. Then, mimicking the lady from the box, she bent at the waist until her elbows were on the seat and she was clutching the edge of the upholstery. She had to spread her legs to keep from toppling forward.

Her corset stays dug into her breasts and her waist, making her wish she was naked. In a coach, rocking down the streets of London, where one shift of the curtains could expose her to the ton. It should have been shocking, but all she could think of was the man behind her and his touch on her skin. How eager she was to have him.

“You never cease to amaze me,” Jasper said as he ran his hands under her skirts, gathering them as he went. The air chilled her knees, then her thighs, and finally her behind, but his fingers left trails of heat in their wake.

It was nothing compared to his hot breath over her hip before the rasp of his teeth and the wet flick of his tongue.

“Spread wider, love. I’ll need more room.”

The action pushed her breasts against the cushion and her behind higher in the air. It would be horribly embarrassing if she stopped to think about it, but she had no time to consider it.

Jasper stood behind her. His trousers teased her thighs as his knuckles brushed her hip. In this close space, she felt his buttons give way. Then he was there, prodding her center. She bit her lip to muffle her needy whimper.

A thud against the wall of the carriage startled her.

“Just me,” Jasper rasped. “This damn thing wasn’t made to stand up in.”

He pulled her to him with one hand and filled her deeply. Annabel’s groan of relief ended in a smile as she heard him echo it.

He withdrew and returned with greater force, hitting a spot that shattered her relief and replaced it with hot, shivering pleasure. She buried her face in the upholstery to muffle her scream.

It continued stroke after stroke, again and again, the same cushion rescuing them from discovery tormented her breasts with delicious pressure. Her nipples were likely wearing a hole in her corset. Her head nudged the wall, and Annabel braced her hands there, pushing away to avoid breaking her neck. The result brought him deeper and ripped a cry from her throat as her toes curled in her shoes.

“God yes, like that,” Jasper growled. “Take me, Annabel.”

She did, answering every delightfully brutal stroke with one of her own, coming apart as her husband snarled and swore above her. Her throat was raw, her dry tongue stuck to the velvet, and her shoulders trembled from exertion. She’d be on the floor if not for Jasper’s bruising hold as he poured himself into her.

It was incredible.

*

“Did I hurt you?”

Jasper found it difficult to do more than whisper as they rode through Hyde Park, piled together as though they were in bed. He was sated, exhausted, and more than a little in awe of his wife.

She brushed his cheek with a kiss. “I may have a bruise or two, but it was worth it.”

He’d have a crick in his back for days—and he’d smile with every twinge.

“How did you know?” she asked.

“I watched you in the theatre.” He’d almost taken her then, sent Frederick to fetch the carriage and pulled Annabel into the shadows against the wall. But he didn’t like public sex, and she would have had to be quiet. Neither of them would have enjoyed that.

She was as honest about her enjoyment as she was with everything else. Just thinking about it made him want her again.

“I’ll admit I thought it would be easier to do than it was.” He looked to the dimly lit walls and inconveniently low ceiling. “We need a larger coach.”

Annabel snuggled against his chest and pulled the blanket to her chin, which only worked to expose her feet. “We need a longer blanket first.”

We . The word warmed him from the center outward in a way he’d never expected. Jasper pulled her closer and pressed a kiss to her disheveled hair. As much as he liked her perfume, he enjoyed the scent of the real her, crisp and slightly sweet, with just enough salt to remind him of a few moments ago. “Certainly.”

When he’d thought about marriage, which wasn’t often, he’d always considered it a necessary thing in a longer line of necessary things. Title. House. Lords. Wife. Children. Done. He’d had a vague idea of what he expected from a wife. Pretty enough to catch attention, smart enough to not be embarrassing, and good enough at running the household. They’d see each other enough to create a peaceful home and go out enough to be interesting.

Good enough . He’d have had a life that was good enough .

Annabel had saved him from that.

His chest tightened, making it difficult to breathe, much less speak. “Dearest?”

“I know you’d hoped Graydon wasn’t involved,” she said at the same time. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugged as best he could while reclined against a seat with his arms full of his wife. “I just didn’t figure him for paying the queen’s money to his friends.”

“They aren’t friends.”

“Just because they were arguing? I hate to tell you, but male friends argue more than they have civil conversations. We save civility for other people.” He and Kit fought like devils at times. Perhaps that was because they were related.

“Spencer doesn’t have friends, Jasper. He has chess pieces.” She eased from his hold and straightened, putting them eye to eye. “Not all of us are pawns.”

She was no one’s pawn. He traced a finger down her cheek to the point of her chin. “You believe Spencer has something on Graydon.”

“I know he does.”

Her intelligence and her certainty excited him, but he envied her ability to form coherent thoughts. His brain was still after-sex fuzzy. “What do you know?”

“Jocelyn Fletcher threw Viscount Raines out of her…house for assaulting a girl.”

He liked Jocelyn Fletcher, trusted her, but she was as tenacious about protecting her staff as she was about ensuring her information was accurate. “Annabel, the ladies at the White Rose are paid for sex however their customers want it, within reason. If Raines got heavy-handed—”

“Not a lady, Jasper. A girl .” She put her finger to his chest. “And it shouldn’t matter who it is. Women have the right to be safe and respected in their own homes, whether they are paid for or bartered off for their dowry.”

The flash in her eyes reminded him of the night she’d scolded him at his own party. He’d suspected even then that, given the chance, she would fly. A smile stretched slowly across his tired face. “Yes, Lady Ramsbury.”

“Don’t patronize me over this. Under the super-fine and the horses, he is a brute and a bully, and—”

He pressed his fingers to her lips, and her breath warmed his fingers. “Tell me what you’ve learned.”

“Spencer was there when Jocelyn banned Raines.”

The road beneath them changed from the park’s gravel to city cobbles, rattling Jasper’s teeth and clattering through his head. He pushed himself upright.

“So he knows what happened.” His mind began to spin. “And he was already backing Graydon’s bid for lord high treasurer.”

“But he was appointed to the Exchequer instead,” Annabel said, continuing the story. “Because the queen wanted the ability to dismiss him if need be.”

God love a woman who understands Parliament. “That position carries a great deal of honor. A scandal could tarnish it.” He thought for a moment before shaking his head. “Getting barred from a brothel is still a weak excuse for blackmail.”

“Not if it ruined his son’s chance to choose the diamond of the Season and her lucrative dowry,” Annabel countered as she angled to face him.

“Which it hasn’t.” Jasper squared off against her, rising to the battle.

“They aren’t married yet,” Annabel said. “She may surprise you.”

A shadow crossed her eyes, merely a flicker but enough to raise questions. “Annabel?”

She shook her head. “We will not use this story in our scheme.”

The carriage slowed for the turn into the rear lane and then eased to a stop. “Home, sir.”

“Thank you, Lawrence,” Jasper called up. He stared at Annabel for a moment, taking in her half-down hair, loose pins, and wrinkled gown. “Ask Frederick to stay atop, please. I’ll see us into the house.”

Jasper lowered the stairs and stepped down before offering his hand to Annabel. As she reached the middle step, he met her gaze. “Then we’ll find a way to stop him.”

They were at the base of the stairs when Jasper decided to share his last piece of the puzzle. “The queen and the prime minister suspect embezzlement because funds are not available for improvement projects she had promised.”

“But only in the poorest districts,” Annabel said. “At least, that’s what I’ve read in the news.”

“You’ve read correctly. The prime minister has investigated every supplier and contractor.” He snorted a laugh. “It’s likely the only time someone has hoped for graft.”

“Which only leaves the treasury,” Annabel said as they entered his room.

Jasper paused at the door and watched her move about his space as though she’d never left it.

“Taxes.” She looked in the mirror and gasped. “Why did you let me walk through the house like this? If your mother had seen me…” She filled the basin with water and set to work cleaning her face.

If Mother had seen you, she’d have been relieved that I’m trying everything I know to save my marriage. Not to mention his country and his queen.

Annabel had found a purpose in the capture of Collins, Spencer, and Raines. That shared challenge had let the two of them form an easy truce. They were friends. They always had been. Good marriages were born out of worse.

She dried her face and began fumbling through her ruined curls to find the pearl-headed pins that caught light whenever she moved. “Reports say so many shillings are flowing into the queen’s coffers that it’s difficult to count them all.”

Jasper pushed away from the wall. “We’ve thought the same thing.” He tugged an overlooked pin free and offered it to her. “But we’ve looked at the books and can’t find a discrepancy.”

The laces at her back gave way under his fingers, revealing his favorite corset. Satin stitched peonies winked at him, their delicate pink matching the marks under her shoulder blades. They’d be bruises by morning.

“You said I didn’t hurt you,” he whispered as he traced the undergarment’s unyielding curve. Her shiver made his mouth water, and he prayed she didn’t stop talking and remember where she was.

“You didn’t.” The shy look she gave him over her shoulder bested the flirtations of any experienced mistress.

Friends would never be enough. A good marriage would be a betrayal of everything he knew was possible with her. Jasper unbuttoned his waistcoat and shrugged free of it. Then he hooked his thumbs under his braces.

Annabel lifted his hairbrush and tugged it through her thick hair. It stopped halfway down, barricaded by a mass of tangles. “This will take forever. Whose receipts are you using?”

He gave her his comb. Anything to keep her from going to the dressing table in her room. “Everyone in Lords has—”

She looked at him like he was the slow boy in maths class. “Jasper, he’s not going to skim from anyone who has the right to review his ledgers.” She smoothed one section of hair and moved onto another. “We need to find a different group.”

“A shilling here and a sixpence there?” He tossed his shirt aside. “It would take forever.”

Her touch stopped him in mid-reach for his trousers. Her fingers traced what would be a permanent reminder of how much danger he’d placed her in.

“See?” He met her warm brown gaze and thanked whatever Fate had placed her in his path. “Perfectly fine.”

Annabel untied her corset as he unbuttoned his trousers. Her shift fell to the floor as he extinguished his candle and slid between the warm sheets. She joined him a moment later and curled against him in the dark. Her hand against his chest was as comforting as the fire in the grate.

Her toes brushed his calf, and his breath left his body in a sigh that emptied him to his heels.

“We need a group of business owners who pay significant amounts but whom Graydon doesn’t know.” She yawned. “I believe I know who to ask.”

“Of course you do.” He kissed her forehead and smiled as her breath fanned over his skin at an even, slow pace. His hand shaped to the curve of her hip, as the firelight turned her hair a warm gold.

His wife was a rare treasure, and he wasn’t giving her up without a fight.