The kiss ended as gently as it had begun, and for a moment, neither of them moved. Jonathan remained close enough to feel the unevenness of Nora’s breath, close enough that the slightest shift would bring them together again, yet he held himself still and let the quiet settle around them. The weight of that cruel day receded until there were only the two of them there, her eyes bright with tears and her hand still resting against his cheek.
“Marry me?” he whispered.
Nora’s eyes widened, and Jonathan felt the whole of his future balance upon that small stair. He had asked too quickly. Too bluntly. But after so much waiting, the words forced themselves free of their constraints. Jonathan’s patience was still a growing thing, after all.
“Please,” he whispered. “If you wish me to wait, I will wait. If you require time, I will give you all the time you require. But I cannot pretend that friendship is all I wish from you.”
The fear and worry lingered in the widened shape of her eyes, in the faint parting of her lips, in the stillness of her hand against his cheek. Yet beneath it, something warmer took shape. Not certainty rushing recklessly ahead, nor the fragile hope of a woman desperate to be rescued, but a quiet unfolding that moved through her features by degrees until the fear no longer held them so tightly.
“You may come to regret it—” she began.
“The only regret I could ever have is losing you.”
Nora looked at him as though she were seeing both the risk and the promise at once, no longer weighing it with panic but the tender solemnity of someone finally allowing herself to imagine a future beyond survival, and the warmth in her eyes deepened.
“Please, Nora. Marry me.”
For one breath, she did not answer. Then her hand slipped around his neck, and she leaned into him with a tenderness that stole the breath from his lungs. When her lips met his this time, the trembling remained, but the uncertainty had altered into something sweeter, and Jonathan closed his eyes and happily fell into the embrace.
When she drew back, her eyes remained on his as she whispered, “It seems I must pack.”
Chapter 50
The Morning Post
Thursday, September 21, 1882
HATCHER—EDEN.On the 20th of this month, at St. Stephen’s, Islington, the marriage was solemnized of Jonathan Hatcher, eldest son of Mr. Jonathan Hatcher, of Highbury Terrace, and Nora Eden, eldest daughter of Mr. Virgil Eden. In accordance with the wishes of the bride, the ceremony was private with only the immediate family present.
Epilogue
Two Months Later
Jonathan had never considered his hands particularly interesting. They were practical things. Nothing more. Yet for the third time that morning, his attention drifted to the plain gold band resting upon his finger. The sight of it still flooded his heart with such warmth that Jonathan was certain it was visible upon his cheeks.
A quiet miracle had slipped into his ordinary life and taken up residence there, catching the light each time he reached for his pen.
Shaking his head, Jonathan bent once more over the letter before him. There were suppliers to reassure, contracts to negotiate, and more than one investor requiring careful handling (something that was common of late). Work had not ceased simply because his private life had altered so fully, and if he did not attend to the letter half-written before him, it would soon say something entirely different from what was intended.
Yet even as Jonathan forced the words into order, his thoughts strayed to home with a persistence that made concentration nearly impossible. Nora was at home.Theirhome. The notion still carried a sweetness so unfamiliar that Jonathan scarcely knew what to do with it.
Nora at breakfast, teasing him over the grimness of his reading material. Nora’s books appearing beside his papers, her gloves left upon a chair, her voice carrying from another room. The world had not simplified because he’d married—quite the opposite—but those complications were far better than any of the quiet nothings that had pervaded his days before.
Jonathan rubbed his thumb lightly over the band, a ridiculous swell of contentment moving through him. The most astonishing, maddening, courageous woman he had ever known had chosen him, and every time the gold caught his eye, it reminded him anew that she was not a dream conjured from loneliness and longing.
A knock on the door frame had Jonathan snapping upright, the foolish grin on his lips vanishing as he looked up to find Mr. Vane watching him with raised brows.
“Am I interrupting, sir?” Though the clerk’s tone was utterly polite, there was a gleam in his gaze that was anything but, and Jonathan narrowed his eyes on the young man.
“Yes,” he replied, forcing his attention to his letter—only to discover several large ink droplets marring the sheet. Growling at himself, Jonathan waved for Mr. Vane to get on with it.
“Mr. Harold Bixby is here to see you. He wishes to speak about investing.”
Setting aside the evidence of his distraction, Jonathan nodded, and Mr. Vane ushered in an older gentleman who entered with the air of a man who had never wasted a minute in his life and saw no reason to begin now.
“A pleasure to meet you,” said Mr. Bixby, extending a hand before following Jonathan’s direction and taking a seat. “I am looking for other opportunities and am very interested in investing some money in Hatcher & Byrnes.”
Jonathan’s brows lifted before he could fully check the reaction. The offer did not astonish him precisely, for Hatcher& Byrnes had not collapsed beneath the strain of the past months as he had once feared it might, but neither had matters improved enough to send gentlemen wandering into his office with money in hand. Investors remained cautious still, watching the market and one another with equal suspicion, and any company even faintly touched by the Eden scandal had become something men preferred to watch from a distance.