A Week to Be Wicked (Spindle Cove #2)(96)

“This is what you truly want?” she asked him. “To just pretend none of this happened?”

“No matter what occurs, you will never lack for anything. Once I gain control of my accounts, I’ll quietly settle some money on you. Enough that you’ll be able to live as you desire. Set up house in any place you wish. Devote your life to your scholarship. You and your sisters will always have my protection.”

“Your protection? Am I to be your mistress, then?”

“God, no.”

“Oh.” She swallowed a sob. “Not even that?”

With a muttered curse, he crossed the room and sat beside her. “Minerva, I would never degrade you that way. After all the pain I’ve caused you, I wouldn’t blame you if you banished me from your sight.” He dropped his head to his hands. “Don’t make me list all the ways I’ve failed you.”

“Then I’ll list everything you’ve given me. Hot tea and blankets. A day at the fair. An apple, an orange, peaches, cherries. The chance to win twenty pounds in a shooting contest. The courage to sing in a tavern. My first honest compliments. Breathless passion, and enough adventure to last a lifetime. Just think, in this one week alone I’ve been a missionary, an assassin, a long-lost princess . . . and, we can’t forget, a sword swallower.”

“Believe me.” Looking up, he gave her a half smile. “So long as I live, I will never, ever forget that.”

Her heart warmed to see that flash of his familiar good nature. This was the Colin she knew and loved.

She shrugged. “After all that adventure, perhaps being a simple geologist would have come as a disappointment.”

“Don’t. Don’t lie to me, Minerva.” His hand went to her cheek. “I know how much it meant to you. You can’t tell me you’re not disappointed.”

No, she couldn’t. And she couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. He held her in his arms while she had a good little cry for poor, pulverized Francine and all those smashed scientific ambitions.

After a few minutes, she wiped her eyes. “I just wanted to leave a footprint. Make my own lasting mark on this earth, the same way Francine left hers. To post a little sign that will survive for generations to come: ‘Minerva Highwood was here, and the world is just a little different for her presence.’ I just wanted to make an impression.”

“Yes, and you should have done.” He rose from the divan and strode to the hearth, where he tapped the mantel with his fist. “You would have done. Your only mistake was joining up with me.”

“That wasn’t a mistake.”

“Of course it was. Haven’t you noticed, Min? I leave impressions everywhere. Except in my case, they’re not footprints. They’re more like craters.”

With a single finger, he nudged a porcelain shepherdess toward the edge of the mantel and then—

Smash it went on the hearthstone.

“Oh look,” he said dryly. “Colin Sandhurst was here.” He sent another figurine careening to its doom. “And here.” A third crash. “Here, as well.”

As the melody of destruction trailed off into silence, Minerva took a deep breath and forced herself to be calm. “Colin, do you . . .” She steeled her nerve. “Could you love me?”

He stared at her. “For God’s sake, don’t ask me that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I can’t answer you. Because no matter what I say, I’ll make a hash of it somehow. I can’t even get your plaster lizard footprint to Scotland. How could I ever be trusted with something so precious as your heart?”

Drawing a blanket about her shoulders, she pushed to her feet. She crossed the room and moved to stand at the opposite corner of the hearth.

“Colin, if you could love me . . . nothing else would matter. You’re worth so much more than a science prize of five hundred guineas.”

“Oh, do you think?” He cast a pointed glance around the magnificently furnished drawing room. “Yes, I’m worth a great deal more.”

“That’s not what I mean, and you know it.”

“But this was never about the money. I know how much it meant to you. You were so driven to attend that symposium. You’ve risked everything, Min. Security, reputation. Your very life. And I destroyed those dreams.”

She touched his wrist and waited until he met her gaze. “You didn’t destroy my dreams. You broke me out of my shell. There was bound to be a bit of a mess.”

He brushed a light caress against her cheek and whispered, “Min.”

She smiled and wiped a lingering tear. “Despite everything, this has been the most exciting, magical week of my life. I’m only sad that it’s ending this way.”

“I know, I know. It’s just wrong, isn’t it?” He took up the poker and stirred the fire with agitated motions. “I had this idea, you see. More of a foolish hope, I suppose. That all through this mad, tumultuous journey . . . we’d been writing the story of our future.”

She laughed a little. “Do you mean we were actually going to become missionaries in Ceylon? Or join up with a circus?”

“No, no. I don’t mean that we’d been foretelling our future. I meant, I hoped we’d been writing the story of our future. The tale we would tell and retell, over goblets of wine at dinner parties, and on dreary spring days when it’s too muddy for lawn bowls. Do you know what I mean? That it would be our story, Min. One we’d remember and laugh over for years to come, even tell some bits to our . . .” His voice trailed off as he replaced the poker in the andiron.