Page 79 of Kiss Me Lady One More Time
“Allow me.” Tensford stepped in and reached for the gun. “You have better things to fill your hands with.”
Penelope lifted her head. “Hope?”
“Outside. Fuming at being left out there. I’ll send Ruby out to fetch her in, now. Smart girl, that one. She followed you in, sent for help and hid close enough to see how this bastard opened the secret door.”
Penelope began to shake. Sterne picked her up and carried her into the library. He took her to a far, dark corner and sat with her in his lap and held her close while she quietly came unglued. She didn’t cry. Not this time. She just shivered and shook while he held her and barked for hot, sugared tea. When it arrived, brought by gawking servants, he held her and plied her with the hot drink and stroked her hair.
He held her while Hope hugged her and while Whiddon scolded her furiously. He held her while she told Tensford everything Lady Lowell had said and while she thanked Ruby for being so brave and bold and heroic. He held her while she whispered in Mrs. Caradec’s ear for a long while and when that good lady squeezed her hand and said, “I’m sure we can manage something.”
And then he held her closer still while he stood and said, “I’m taking Penelope home.”
He didn’t wait for anyone to comment or object, just walked out with her in his arms. She snuggled in, more than happy to be there.
The carriage she’d come in sat waiting outside, among a number of others. “Where are the Curtis brothers?”
“They found the lot of us arguing like fiends at the Pelican. They told us exactly where we needed to be—and how fast. Then, I suspect, they set out for Gloucestershire.”
“I suppose I must pay them as I promised, although I’d also like to knock their heads together,” she grumped.
“I heard what you said in there,” he whispered. “Thank you for championing me.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” she said on a sigh. “It was all true.”
“It was true to you, and that is what matters.”
She might have fallen asleep a little, burrowed into the crook of his neck. The next thing she knew, the carriage had stopped, and he was somehow managing to climb down with her in his arms.
He strode into the house and took her straight to Hope’s parlor. Letting go of her at last, he sat her in a highbacked, comfortably stuffed chair and pulled the other close, so that they sat facing each other, only inches apart.
“I want it to be here. Here, where I first knew that I was never going to be alone again.”
She gave him a look and he chuckled. “My heart knew it, at least. That’s when I really started to believe. It just took my head a while to catch up.”
The words were lovely, but her gaze narrowed as she stared at him. “Hold a moment. Is that awhite stripein your hair?”
He looked sheepish. “Yes. I predict it is going to be a colossal effort to get it out. Derby mixed powder and—
She clutched his hand to make him stop talking. She took in his black coat and breeches and his dazzling white waistcoat. “Barrett Sterne, did you go to the masquerade dressed as abadger?”
“Well, yes.”
“Never alone? That’s what you just said?” Her heart skipped a beat. “That get up looks like a very different message. Together, but apart—isn’t that what you said about badgers? Is that what you thought to tell me, with this costume?”
“It’s how I felt, back when I ordered the damned thing.” He spoke with an air of confession. “Back when I thought I’d be forever separate, watching you from afar while you lived your life and found another love.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Exactly. I’ve been an ass.”
“I daresay we could find you that costume,” she muttered.
“I would gladly wear it,” he declared. “It would be the least I deserved. I was a fool. I couldn’t see that I was carrying old views, letting them shape my thoughts, my reactions, my life. You and Tensford, you made me realize that, like my parents, I’d been seeking some arbitrary perfection. I thought that friendships and love looked a certain way and that I could not give, or give in to, anything different. Not without disappointing those that I cared for the most.”
She sat back a little. “I am not perfect. No one is.”
“You are perfect for me.”
“No. I’m not perfect in any way. I suppose I should make my own confession about my costume.”
