Page 66 of The Heir's Fortune
“At least you have your parents with you,” she said, keeping her hands to herself even when he offered her his arm to walk beside him. It hurt too much to touch him.
“Madeline,” he said, stopping when they were behind a hedgerow, keeping them hidden from both the house and the wind. He placed his hands gently on her elbows, holding herthere in front of him, his touch light enough that she could move away if she chose to do so. “Why are you acting as though we mean nothing to one another? That we are not promised to each other?”
She took a breath, telling herself to be stoic, to be strong, not to show him how devastated she was going to be when the time came to part.
“You have to return the treasure,” she said, unable to hold his gaze for a moment, having to turn her head to look off toward the tree line in the far distance where they had raced when she had first arrived, when she had begun to see him as more than Cassandra’s brother. “That means that you are once again in the same position. Of needing to marry for a dowry. A dowry that I most certainly do not have.”
She tried to smile but her lip trembled instead, and she had to bite down on it to prevent him from noticing.
It appeared, however, that she had failed.
“Madeline,” he said, shaking his head, the smallest of smiles gracing his face. She was so enraptured with how handsome he was that a tear fell from her eye. It took her so by surprise that she didn’t have a chance to wipe it away before he reached out and did so for her. “There is no reason to cry.”
As it was too late to hide her feelings from him, she let the tears flow, unable to prevent them from falling anymore.
“Of course there is reason!” she exclaimed, reaching up her hand and swatting him on the arm with it. “I do not know what I truly mean to you, but you—you meaneverythingto me.”
He stilled, his eyes darkening.
“Truly?”
“How could you not know that?”
“I knew I meant something to you,” he said, his blue eyes glinting at her as they widened. “But… everything?”
Embarrassed now, Madeline began backing away from him. She hadn’t meant to tell him how she felt. She had agreed to meet with him with the sole purpose of telling him that she was done with him before he had a chance to do it first, but instead, here she was, baring her soul.
“Madeline,” he said softly. “Where are you going? I have never heard anything better.”
“You… what?” she repeated, blinking at him. He was not the type of man to make light of such feelings, but why would he say such a thing?
“You said that nothing has changed, that everything is back to as it was before.”
“It is true, is it not?” she said stubbornly.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Not even close. Before I knew you, yes, but I wasn’tawareof you and all of who you are. I hadn’t seen what life could be like having been with you. Then when there was the possibility of you being taken away from me, I realized that life wouldn’t be worth living without you. Before, I wasn’t in love with you.”
She heard the swift intake of her breath before she even realized what she was doing, and then found herself blinking rapidly up at him.
“You… you love me?”
“With everything that I am,” he said, the corners of his lips widening into a smile. “I think I loved you from the first moment that you allowed Scout to lick you across the face and you didn’t back away in disgust. For all these years, I have known you and yet never saw the woman you truly were, and how perfect that you were for me.”
She already began shaking her head, blinking away the tears that threatened her again. “That was my fault. I kept you at a distance, after Cassandra?—”
He cupped her face with his warm, strong hands, brushing away her tears once more with the pads of his thumbs. “You have every right to feel as you choose to feel, and I did do something to Cassandra that was so insufferable I do not blame you for having doubts about me due to it. Besides, perhaps it all worked out for the best. Timing is often more crucial than we imagine.”
She searched his face, trying to see if he harbored any regrets or insecurities about their match, but she could find none.
“Are you saying this only because you do not want to break your word?” she asked imploringly. “Because, Gideon, I cannot live like that. I would never want you to resent me or our marriage.”
“Never,” he said fiercely. “I worried at first that I would be making a wrong decision one way or another, but I realize now that there is no wrong decision as long as I am with you.”
“What about all of your responsibilities?” she asked. “It was the very reason we could not be together before.”
“I know,” he said, the first sign of concern crossing his face. “And my family’s rather precarious position remains, as does all that is required of me and the people who are relying on me. But I am moving – slowly – in the right direction, and I do think that with you by my side I could get there that much faster.”
Madeline took deep breaths as she tried to calm herself, hating how emotional she was becoming, but knowing that Gideon would never judge her for it.
