To Have and to Hoax(106)

“Afraid?” Violet asked uncertainly, her throat feeling oddly tight.

“I was afraid of other people, afraid that none of them could be trusted, afraid that even you, you who told me you loved me—that you could be lying, or you could be taken from me somehow.”

“And that day,” she said softly, understanding. “That day, when you overheard me in conversation with your father—when we were discussing what he and my mother orchestrated—”

“I should never have jumped to conclusions,” James said swiftly. “There’s no excuse—none at all—but all I can say is that it confirmed everything I had been led to believe about life until that point. That if I loved something, it wouldn’t last. You had given me no reason at all to distrust you, and I still instantly believed the worst of you. You seemed too good to be true—and there you were, proving my point.”

“I hate your father,” Violet said with quiet intensity, and there must have been something in her voice that had never been there before, because James drew back slightly, a look of surprise in his eyes. “I hate what he did to you. And to West,” she added, because she didn’t think James’s elder brother had had much easier a time of it.

“I went to see West before I followed you, too,” James said.

“Good heavens, did you pay a call on everyone in London?” she asked teasingly, and was pleased when she was rewarded with a slight curve of his lips.

“No, only those with the surname Audley,” he said, squeezing her hands gently. “Some families take tea together, but the Audleys go in for angry confrontations instead.”

“Please don’t tell me you and West quarreled again,” Violet said warily. The rift between James and his brother had gone on for much too long, as far as she was concerned—and it was all the more frustrating since, as best she could tell, there was no real cause for it. They had quarreled in the past, it was true, but never out of proportion to other brothers. Never so badly as she and James had quarreled during the first year of their marriage, even.

“No, nothing of the sort,” James assured her. “I had rather the same conversation with him I’m having with you now.” He shot her a wicked grin, and her insides grew heated in a way that only he could cause. “Without some of the displays of affection, of course.”

“I should hope so,” she sniffed, and he laughed out loud at that, the sound of it sweeter to her ears than any music she had ever heard. She could have listened to him laugh forever.

“Violet, please tell me what I have to do to win you,” he said, all laughter leaving his voice as quickly as it had arrived, replaced instead with a tone of stark desperation. He dropped her hands, reached up to seize her face, rising up on his knees so that he could press his forehead to her own, her entire world becoming the green of his eyes.

“I’ve been a fool, I don’t deserve you—but I want to. I would do anything, truly, if you would only trust me with your heart again.” His voice cracked, but he continued speaking. “I love you so much—I want to have children with you, raise them with all the love that West and I never had. I want to embarrass them when they’re older, when their father can’t stop sweeping their mother off to darkened corners for scandalous embraces. I want everything I didn’t think I could have—and you’re the only one I want it with. So please—please. Tell me what to do.”

Violet realized that she was crying, and didn’t know how long she had been doing so. James leaned forward to taste one of her tears, his tongue darting out to stop its progress down her cheek.

“You don’t need to do anything,” she whispered, trying to steady her voice into something calm, strong, when she felt as though she were about to burst into a million pieces, radiant joy and a desperate urge to weep fighting a battle within her. “You followed me here. You didn’t let me walk away again. You fought for us, trusted us.”

“I will never, ever let you walk away again,” he said, and even through her tears she could see the intensity of his gaze, could read the truth in his eyes. “I want to be the man who deserves you, because you deserve everything.”

“We deserve each other,” she said, and leaned forward to kiss him gently. The kiss slid from loving to heated in the space of a heartbeat, his head tilting slightly to give him a better angle, his tongue tracing the seam of her lips until she parted her mouth to allow him entry.

He broke the kiss with a muffled noise that sounded like a half laugh, half groan, but he did not remove his hands from where they cupped her cheeks. “I want to promise you things—everything,” he said heatedly, his breathing gratifyingly unsteady. “It has to be different this time.”

“It will be,” she said with a certainty that she had never thought to feel about him ever again. “We understand each other now.”

“You helped me understand myself.” He placed another soft kiss on her lips. “I promise never to take someone’s word over yours ever again.”

“I promise not to let you walk away from a fight again,” she replied, then kissed the tempting expanse of his throat, just visible above his collar.

“I promise never to walk away again.” He slid his hand down from her cheek in a slow, loving caress along her neck to her breast, cupping its weight in his hand, rubbing his thumb across the peak. He paused, thoughtful. “And I promise to tell you the next time I’m in a riding accident.”