Page 62 of Nature of the Crime

Telling them the truth, however, would only wound them more deeply. This secret was one that Audrey knew she would have to take with her to the grave.

Hugh’s thumb swept along her jaw. “You have a good heart, and I love you for it.”

He didn’t tell her not to feel guilty, to move on, and let it go. He would never presume to. And for that, she loved him.

“I don’t want to always feel like we’re hiding or waiting for the truth to come out,” she said.

Yes, they had agreed that if St. John was caught, and he exposed the truth about Philip, they would not lie by denying it. They would not obstruct justice for the deaths of Mr. Vaillancourt, Lord Burton, and Grayson with more falsehoods. But then, St. John had been silenced before he could breathe a word about anything to do with Philip.Audreyhad been the one to silence him. A part of her felt relief for it…and that frightened her.

Hugh settled back against the pillows again, and she resumed her place, tucked against his side. Just having him hold her made her feel warmer than all the tea and hot baths in the world could have done.

“Our predicament is…unchartered,” he said after a moment. “And our choices are limited. We can either weather this situation together, or we can do so apart.” Hugh tensed his armaround her back, hefting her a little higher against his side. “I choose together.”

Last spring and summer, she’d been certain in her fear that Hugh would walk away once he knew the truth about Philip. She’d believed as much because he’d made it clear to her in the past that he would not share her with anyone, even with a husband who was a husband in name only. But she had been wrong. His feelings on the matter, and on her, had been neither so cemented nor so narrow.

“I choose together too,” she said.

He beamed, and in that moment, she saw what he must have looked like as a young boy, when happiness could be unrestricted and pure. It shone straight into her heart and even with no blankets or woolen stockings, she would have been warmed through and through. He dropped a kiss to her brow and brought up the blanket, tucking it around her like a fussy Greer.

“Edmunds gave me something,” he said, and when she peered up at him quizzically, continued, “Our letters.”

Audrey shifted in his arms, startled. “Did you read mine?” She felt hot with embarrassment over what she recalled writing, when she was boiling over with hurt and confusion. So, when he shook his head, she felt only relief.

“I burned them,” he said, startling her yet again. “I hope you aren’t angry. But I didn’t want to read how hurt you were over not receiving any correspondence from me. And I didn’t want you to read my own frustrations. I’d like to leave the last five months behind and never revisit them.”

She couldn’t have agreed more. Knowing the letters were now reduced to ash in a grate relieved her. She nodded and rested her head against his chest.

“So, we move on. We return to London, and we endure the next few months that remains in your mourning,” he said.“Unless you wish to be thoroughly scandalous and marry me while you’re still wearing grays and purples.”

Audrey stared up at him with a look of mock astonishment, while inside, she nearly burst with delight. “Is that your idea of a proposal of marriage, my lord?”

He made a show of getting up from the bed. “If you do not like my offer, I shall take it elsewhere.” Audrey pulled him back and pinched his arm.

“You will not,” she laughed, then smiled with a pure and unrestricted happy thought of her own. “Stay. No Michael, no innkeeper…we are practically alone.”

“Except for a driver, a maid, a surly boy, and an annoying friend, yes, totally alone.”

She pinched him again. Then asked, more seriously, “Were you in earnest?”

Hugh did not keep jesting, though the glint of humor still lingered in his rich brown eyes. “I will make a completely respectable and formal proposal once your mourning is over. And yes, I will stay. Just try kicking me out of this bed, Your Grace.” He kissed her, though it was chaste. Without having to say anything, she knew he intended to stay dressed and that they would simply sleep in each other’s arms.

“I don’t need a formal proposal,” she said, eagerly anticipating waking up next to him. It felt like the most precious of gifts. “It might be too conventional, and when have we ever been that?”

With his body bracing hers, and their legs and feet intertwined, he kissed her temple. “Never. And I hope we never are.”