Page 15 of The Elusive Phoebe (The Widows of Lavender Cottage #1)

Chapter Eleven

S omething about being outside in any manner of frivolity brought back such poignant memories of Archie, that Phoebe had a bit of melancholy later that afternoon.

When Archie and Phoebe were younger, there was nothing they could not do, nor any trouble they escaped.

Not the deeply troubling trouble, just the innocence of youth, the dirty hems on her dresses, interrupting classes of the school in town, running too quickly for polite eyes and many many hours alone in a barn or at the top of a tree, or tossing a string in the stream hoping for a fish.

They played as children do, even long into their formative years when they should have perhaps been more careful of such things, when they could have spent more time in drawing rooms and dinner tables.

Perhaps their parents assumed they would be together and therefore had little need to prepare them to impress someone else? Or, looking back, it was equally likely their parents had troubles of their own and had left their children to themselves out of necessity.

Whatever the reason, she had not complained and neither had Archie. At first he was her greatest friend before she knew what love was and then he became the person she could not imagine living without.

Her lips tugged into a reluctant smile as she remembered the very moment they both realized they were no longer compadres of the mud and tree world, but nurturing a tender love.

They’d hidden from the stable hand after keeping the horses out too long.

He would surely have had some instructions from the house and neither was ready for their day to end.

Lessons, dinner, and evening conversations were not nearly as satisfying as their freedom in the out of doors.

They were out of breath and had climbed deep into the trees that grew between their properties. From past experience, they knew servants would only go so far into the brush .

Archie led them through their well worn and mostly hidden path through patches of trees, tall shade grass and even some bramble. But they stuck to what they’d discovered as a deer path and she avoided tearing her skirts.

She giggled as they picked up their pace.

“You’re going to give us away.”

“No one is following anymore.”

A twig snapped behind them. And Archie broke into a run. She followed closely at his heels. They leapt over logs, ducked under branches and brushed webs out of their faces as the forest more densely blocked out light from overhead.

After a few more minutes, Archie stopped with a finger to his lips.

Everything around them was silent.

But they waited. They listened, frozen in place until the noises of the woods began again. A bird sang. A rabbit crept out of her hiding place. A frog croaked.

Pheobe let out a long breath of relief.

Archie’s smile lit his eyes, the mischievous glint bringing heat to her cheeks. She’d long thought him handsome but never more so than when they were guarding their freedom.

He reached for her hand.

The area around them opened up to a small clearing. Soft shade grass grew beneath their feet in the brightest shade of green. Tall trees towered overhead with nothing but massive trunks to their right and left.

He tugged her closer to the center of the space, their hands linked in the most natural way, as they always were when they were alone.

But today, a certain energy burned between their palms. It shimmered its way up her arm and made her want to stand closer, made her wish for more parts of her to touch him.

Their arms brushed, soon she was at his side.

The whole clearing spread around them as space to stand, but they were glued together, a vibration pulling them closer still, a force she was unable to resist.

He turned to face her. “Pheobe.” His voice was a whisper but it managed to tickle her core, to send waves through her in recognition of his ownership of her heart.

She wasn’t sure exactly when, but that was the moment she realized that long ago, she’d given him her heart and that now, she wanted him to do something more with it.

“Archie.” She breathed out his name in wonder. She turned to face him, studying his face.

His eyes were serious, but full of caring. This moment was important, but what would it yield? What was coming next? Would he declare his love? Would they kiss? She swallowed and ran a tongue over her lips.

His gaze dipped to her mouth immediately, then lingered along the skin on her face, following her mouth, her jawline, up to her eyes.

His expression held nothing but hope and caring, a feeling so deep she didn’t know what to do with the response growing in her chest, the pounding that shook her.

With shaking hands, she stepped closer and placed her palms on his chest and lifted her chin so that she might stare into those eyes. What was he trying to say?

“Archie, I…”

He placed a finger on her lips. “Wait.” He cupped her face in his large palm. She leaned into the warmth of his skin, running her lips over the callouses there.

He pressed his finger along the softness of her lower lip. “I want to kiss you.” He leaned closer, so that their breath comingled at their lips, his words inviting her to sink into him, to wish to be embraced by him forever.

She stood taller on the tips of her toes, hoping to reach him.

“This will change everything.” His eyes searched hers. “Are you ready?”

She didn’t need to vocalize her response, hopefully her eyes said it all, the pounding of her heart, the hands gripping his shirtfront. In that moment, she would have crossed the ocean with him, run away, done whatever he wished.

He brushed his lips against hers in the barest flutter of a touch.

She closed her eyes and smiled.

Then his mouth covered hers with more urgency, and she responded immediately.

Hungrily, she kissed him back. She held him as closely as she could, wanting more and longer and forever.

She wanted forever. “I love you.” The mumble came out as a thought, as a feeling, as truth, but she had not planned to say the words.

Her face burned furiously and she looked away.

The forest was again quiet, and Archie said nothing.

She dared a look back up into his face.

His eyes were watching her with something intense in their depths. He brushed a strand of hair off her brow. “I’ve loved you for years, Phoebe. I love you now and forever. I will love you if we’re far or close. You are the love of my heart and my life.”

His words had sunk deep then. She’d been filled with wonder at them. They’d kissed many more times that late afternoon in the forest and she’d returned with pleasantly swollen lips and a scratchy chin.

Now, years later, those pleasant memories brightened her day. But could she rely on his promises? Could she really think that Archie still loved her? Could she trust him?

The day that her father had taken her from her life of hope and love and thrust her into the awkward strangeness of marriage to a man she’d never met, was the day she’d chosen to move past her childhood thoughts of Archie.

She had to.

He was not her husband.

He hadn’t cared enough to run away with her.

He’d left her to be taken.

And then all those many months in the far north, in complete isolation, with no rescuer, she’d come to blame him, just enough that she felt truly estranged from the Archie she’d known.

But how would she have an opportunity to once again know him? How could she trust him? Did she want to invite him into her life? Did she wish to open a correspondence?

She also had no wish to married.

The thought of losing herself, her freedom, her say, her legal standing, her new cottage, was so abhorrent to her that she shuddered .

No, marriage was not for her.

It was with these thoughts for company that Phoebe arrived at Lady Joanna’s home for her second meeting with the Widows of Somerset, this one more formal than the last apparently.