He took her hands in his, drawing her to him. “My life feels hollow without you.”
There was her heart, taking that all-too-familiar trip up to her throat again. Breathing was becoming a challenge. “Excellent.”
“And I love you.” There, they were out, the fatal words that bound him to her.
This time it took her almost a full minute to drag air back into her lungs. Her heart beat wildly. “Very good,” she whispered, her voice almost cracking from the weight of emotion.
“Will you stop grading me, Dakota, and tell me I’m not making a fool of myself?”
She could only parrot what he said. “You’re not making a fool of yourself.”
A warmth began to spread through his limbs. He’d made it, made it out of his lonely hovel of an existence, and crossed the chasm to hers. “And that you feel something, too.”
She couldn’t focus, couldn’t think, could only feel. And it was wonderful. “And I feel something, too.”
“Dakota—”
Humor danced in her blue eyes. She could have sworn that she was having an out-of-body experience. The only extraneous thing she felt was the cameo. It felt as if it was glowing against her flesh. “A whole lot of somethings,” she told him.
He shook his head, rejecting the paltry offering. “Too nebulous. Words, woman, give me words. You’re the one who knows how to use them.”
She laughed. “And yet, suddenly, I’m tongue-tied.”
“Look, I know this is a lot to spring on you all of a sudden like this, but—”
If he was going to take it back, she didn’t want to hear it. Dakota placed her finger against his lips. Stopped midword, he looked at her in surprise.
“No, it’s not. I’m just surprised, that’s all. It’s been a whole month, Ian. You didn’t call, you didn’t write, there wasn’t even a carrier pigeon on my windowsill. Thirty-two days, nothing.”
He knew exactly how long it had been down to the second. “I was trying to get over you.”
She cupped his cheek with her palm. “I’m not the flu, Ian. You don’t have to ‘get over’ me.” And she prayed that once “infected” he never would. “People spend their whole lives looking for love. I know, I’m one of them.”
Ian waited for her to say more. When she didn’t, he prodded. “And?”
“And what?”
“Do you think you found it?”
A smile feathered along her lips. “I might need some persuading.”
“I’ll see what I can do.” Taking her into his arms, Ian kissed her. Long and hard and with all the feeling that an entire month’s worth of abstinence could generate. Until that very moment, he hadn’t realized just how much he’d missed her. And how much he never wanted them to be separated again. The loneliness he had lived with for the last month disappeared in the heat of their contact.
Finally drawing back, he looked down into her face. “How’s that?”
“Very good,” she whispered, then cleared her throat to try to regain some kind of control over at least her voice. Her body, she acknowledged, was pretty much a lost cause. “For an opening argument,” she qualified mischievously.
For the first time since he’d walked into her dressing room, Ian grinned at her. Maybe this was going to work out after all. “I’ve got a hell of a closer.”
She tried not to laugh. Delight felt as if it was shining out of every pore. “I just bet you do.”
Unable to help himself, Ian kissed her again. As the kiss grew, weakening them both, he knew that at any moment, he was in danger of giving in to his desire to make love with her. But as much as he wanted to, the minutes were ticking away and she was due on the set. So he held himself in check as best he could.
And pushed his argument forward.
“I’ve decided to take an executive advisory position at the firm.”
Her head was still spinning. Why was he talking about work at a time like this? “What does that mean?”
“It means the only body I’ll be guarding on a regular basis is yours.”
He’d already talked it out with Randy. There was no way he was going to take assignments that would keep him away from her, night and day. That was for people who didn’t have a reason to come home at night. He had a feeling that he was going to have a reason, a very good reason, very soon.
“I want to marry you, Dakota.” Her mouth fell open. Very gently, with the tip of his finger, Ian pushed it closed again. “You don’t have to answer right away,” he cautioned, afraid that she would turn him down. “Think about it.”
“How long do I have to think about it?”
He couldn’t read her expression. Nerves surfaced. “As long as you want.”
“Oh. Okay.” She pressed her lips together, then whispered, “Yes.”
He couldn’t believe his ears. Or his luck.
“Damn it, Dakota, I can’t hear you.” MacKenzie’s voice came barging in through the door. “You’d better have said yes.”
She laughed softly, shaking her head as she looked toward the door.
“I said yes.” And then she looked back at Ian. She was relieved that he didn’t look annoyed or upset by her friend’s intrusion. “We have an audience.”
He took it in stride. All that mattered was that she’d said yes. “I figure, you being who you are, we always will.” His arms tightened around her. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t create our own world away from them if you’re willing.”
He loved her, she thought, and he wanted to marry her. Everything else could be worked out.
“So willing you have no idea.” And then, suddenly, surprising him, she swatted at his shoulder. “I could kill you for putting me through this.”
Nothing was going to spoil his mood. “You have the rest of our lives to make me pay.”
“Don’t think I won’t.”
He grinned. “I’m looking forward to it.” He pressed a kiss to her temple. “I can’t wait for Scottie to meet you.”
The full import of his words, of what was happening, hit her. She could hardly believe it. “Wow, a husband and a son, all in one big swoop.”
Concern surfaced. Was he going too fast for her after all? “Too much?”
It was perfect, all perfect. She framed his face in her hands. “Just the beginning. I love kids.” Rising on her toes, she teased his lips with hers. “And I love you most of all.”
For the first time in his life, he felt truly at peace. As if from here on in, everything was ultimately going to be all right. He was too much of a realist not to believe that there wouldn’t be storms along the way, but together they could weather anything. “I’m going to need proof.”
“After the show!” MacKenzie’s voice came through the door again. There was a pleading note in it.
But it fell on deaf ears.
Epilogue
September 1, 1863
Amanda abandoned the dress she was attempting to make over for her younger sister. It had been hers once, but she no longer cared about dressing up in finery. With Will on the battlefield, the reason for music had gone out of her life.
Susannah was still young and needed to feel that there was a future, where dances would be held and young men would return to whisper in her ear—young men who now faced the risk of being devoured by a war whose tide had turned against them.
In the distance she saw her father riding toward the house. Alexander Deveaux was on horseback now, where once he would have taken a carriage. But the carriage was as broken as his spirit was, its carcass left to rot in the field because there was no clever hand to fix it. Her older brother, Jonathan, had fallen at Chancellorville, and the light had gone out of her father’s eyes.
Dismounting, Alexander handed the reins to Old Jacob. The latter had elected to remain even though he was now emancipated and free to make his way wherever he chose. Old Jacob told anyone who would listen that he had chosen here.
Her father strode toward the front porch. “Amanda, there’s news.”
>
Amanda jumped to her feet. Her heart slammed against her chest. “A letter? Is there a letter from Will?”
She searched her father’s face, praying that the solemn expression she saw there was just his concern about the state of the economy and their swiftly dwindling fortune. That it had nothing to do with her fiancé.
Her hand closed around the cameo she never took off.
Will had been away for nearly three years now. Three years that were broken up only by the arrival of much-stained, much-creased letters. They had been few and far between, many, she suspected, having been lost in their journey from his hand to hers.
The tone of the letters over the last year had worried her. Hope seemed to have left Will’s soul. But there had been no letters these past few months. Not a single missive, nothing to set her fearful heart at ease. She had no idea where he was, if he was cold or hungry or even—please God, no—wounded.
She would not allow herself to think anything worse. It was hard enough grieving for her brother.
“There are lists,” her father said. He slipped his arm around her shoulders to ease the burden of what he knew they were about to bear. “Lists of our wounded,” Alexander began.
Her heart froze within her breast. “Is his name on there?” she cried. “Does it say Will’s wounded?”
If he were wounded, would he be coming home to mend? Tyler Banks had been wounded in the very first battle, and he had come back to his wife and children. Wherever Will was, she made up her mind to go to him, to be with him and tend to his wounds until he was well again. Mama wouldn’t want her to go, but that didn’t matter. She’d go anywhere in the world, so long as Will needed her.
“And of the missing,” her father continued stoically. He looked down at her. “William Slattery’s name is on that list.”
A strange pulsing began in her ears. “Will?” she repeated in disbelief. It couldn’t be true. He was too alive, too full of life to be missing.
Her father nodded, his hand tightening on her shoulder. “They could not find him after the battle of Gettysburg.”
Amanda’s heart sank like a stone. The world around her shrank away from her until there was nothing left but a pinprick of light.
And then that was gone, too.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-7043-9
BECAUSE A HUSBAND IS FOREVER
Copyright © 2005 by Marie Rydzynski Ferrarella
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