“I have heard that Edinburgh is a very fair city,” she said. “I believe the shops are almost as good as London’s.” The fear brushed her again. She could not help it. “Oh, Alex,” she said, her breath catching, “we are all wrong for one another, you know.”
“No,” Alex said. “We are different from each other, that is all. Don’t be frightened of it,” he added. “If a marriage is worth having then it is worth the fight.”
Joanna leaned on the rail and felt the spray against her face and tasted the salty tang of it on her lips. It should not work, of course. She was the darling of the ton and she needed the lights and the diversions of town. Alex loved traveling the world. And yet neither of them was that straightforward. Alex had shown her wide horizons and taught her how it felt to be truly alive. He had shown her that there was far more to see, far more to experience, than she had once thought. And for her sake, Alex was prepared to go back to England and build a home. That, surely, was a measure of his love for her.
“Well,” she said, “I am not sure that I am prepared to follow you to the ends of the earth, but I will come with you to Scotland.” She touched his cheek lightly, feeling the stubble rough against her fingers, reveling in the intimacy at last. “I have a small taste for travel now,” she continued demurely. “Perhaps I might like to see other lands if you are with me. Or we could come back to the Arctic in winter and our boat will get trapped in the ice and we will lie in the snow and watch the northern lights. Alex darling,” she added, and smiled, “and this time I do mean it.”
Alex’s arms went about her gently and he drew her to him so that she could hear his heart beating strongly against her ear.
“The shirt that they gave you at our wedding breakfast,” he said softly, “the one we are to wrap our firstborn child in for luck. Do you still have it?”
Joanna nestled closer to him. “I do,” she said. “I could not destroy it, or leave it behind. It felt…” She hesitated. “It felt like the tiniest ray of hope.”
Alex turned her face up to his. “Then,” he said, “let us go and stake our claim on that future.” He kissed her with sweetness and promise, and the hope unfurled in Joanna’s heart and she felt the spark of it catch and grow, never to be extinguished again.
“Since you have left all your clothes behind,” Alex whispered, against her lips, “I fear there is only one way in which we may pass the voyage home.”
ISBN: 978-1-4268-6893-1
WHISPER OF SCANDAL
Copyright © 2010 by Nicola Cornick
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