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He looked at her, surprised "I’ll take you"

"Aren’t you too old for it, now?" she teased

He shook his head "Now I’ away the days is not such a horrible way to spend one’s tiht companion"

Did he refer to her? She’d like to fish with him She’d like him to build a fire on the banks of the river and spend the evening telling her about his life as it grew dark around theht

"She was a h, lost in thought "Aby a Dutch master Her father ran the dairy on the estate to the east, and she worked with the cows"

Sophie didn’t laugh "How old was she?"

"Sixteen"

"And how did you"

She trailed off, but he knew her question He brought her hand to his lips, kissing her knuckles, sending little shocking threads of pleasure through her When he stopped, he held her hand to his mouth and answered, "One of the cows escaped Ended up on Lyne land She ca for it" He paused, then said, quietly, "It was Shakespearean She was theI’d ever seen"

Sophie inhaled at the words It was a how easy it was to believe them when it was so difficult to believe them when he spoke them about her "What did she look like?"

"Blond, with perfect pink skin as smooth as crea and doe-eyed "The moment she looked up at me, dirt on her face, skirts muddy from her search, I wanted to protect her"

She believed that, as well, thinking back on his attacking the man who’d shot her, the way he immediately threw hi?"

"It felt that way," he said, lost in thethat felt nearly breakable" He aze "I wanted to marry her from the start"

She wasn’t prepared for the hot thread of jealousy that wove through her at the words Nor was she prepared for the flood of questions that caether,froh the stable boys, one in particular, whom I paid handsomely for his trouble She was terrified her father would discover us" Sophie nodded, but did not speak "Terrified enough that she began to beg me to marry her in secret She wanted us to run, over the border, to find the nearest blackse Get it done" He stopped "I should have"

"Why didn’t you?"

"Because I didn’t want it to be secret When I took a wife, I wanted it to be in front of all the world All of Britain I’d make her a marchioness She’d be a duchess There was no shame in that, and I wouldn’t allow us to be a scandal I loved her"

"You’d make her your wife," Sophie said softly The titles were nothing of i with him, as his partner, forever

Forever

Sophie’s heart ached at the words, with sorrow for what she kneas to coirl who had stolen his heart so long ago,it impossible for Sophie to do it now