“Henry,” he corrected without inflection. “So you don’t think I’m a coldhearted bastard, eh?”
Was he jesting? Or serious? She tapped his chin. “I know a man who goes out at night to stable a goose of all things because he cannot abide the downtrodden look of another is not unfeeling. A man who befriends a lonely, blind woman—”
“Now you stop it! How dare you term yourself such?”
For one so smart, he’d fallen into her trap quite nicely. “You just termed yourself a cold bastard, did you not?”
He cuffed her wrist and slid her arm down until her palm sheltered his rapidly beating heart. “Does this feel cold to you?”
“Nay.” It was a whisper.
“I’m on fire for you, have been since the moment you declined to dance with me. A common occurrence I’m none too pleased to note.”
She flexed her fingers against his chest then crawled them higher to pluck at his neckcloth. Once a fair amount of skin was exposed, she tucked her face into the curve of his neck. “I’ll never refuse you again.”
“You better not.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Impudent wench.”
“Aye…sir.”
The last was sighed and Nicholas, finally feeling the weight of his own guilt lessen, expelled a matching one. That was when he noticed the sash twined within his fingers. On a whim, he lifted the silk to his forehead and knotted the fabric after securing it over his eyes.
Sensing his odd movements, Isabella propped herself up on his chest—or so the dual points of her elbows told him. “May I ask what you’re doing?”
“You may indeed.” Blindly he reached for her hand and brought it to his face, realizing as he did so how very significant the impulse of a few seconds prior. “Think I’ll wear this the remainder of the evening, and again once I get you home to Frostwood Hall.”
Her searching fingers quickly discovered the sash. “Whatever for? Have you knocked your noggin askew, you crazy man?”
“I think it’s only fitting I occasionally take the time to view the world as you see it.”
As his meaning sank in, so too did her body atop his. “Oh, you wondrous, wondrous man.”
“Aye, I’m beginning to believe I just might be, thanks to— Mmm.” Her mouth devoured the rest of his sentence, which was fine with Nicholas.
Only after more words, more cuddling—and many more kisses—did the challenging events of the evening take their toll and sleep overtake her…his Issybelle.
Holding her in his arms and against his heart soothed any number of cold, lonely nights he’d endured as a boy. Erased any number of solitary, soused evenings he’d spent wondering why a French cannonball hadn’t put an end to his guilt, along with the rest of him.
Cradling this precious woman, feeling the innocent wafts of air as she peacefully exhaled, breathed forgiveness and new life into an old existence and left him smiling deep inside as he too drifted off to snowy dreamland.
“Are you ready, my child? To say goodbye ere we begin the next stage of our journey?”
“Am I! I’ve been waiting ever so long…”
“I’ve been waiting ever so long for the right woman to find him!”
Radiant, a young girl tugged forward the man behind her and presented him as she would a peer to the royal court, curtsying deeply. She rose regally and held out his hand. “I give him to you now and forevermore, Miss Isabella Jane Spier.” The child clapped her hands with such abandon, a burst of air wafted forth. “Soon you’ll be Isabella Winten, Countess of Frostwood! How splendid is that?”
And in the perplexing, mystifying manner of dreams, Isabella observed herself as she stood and offered a curtsy of her own to the immaculately groomed, breath-stealingly handsome man before her. “Lord Frostwood, I presume?”
How did she know?
“Call him Nicky!” cried the child just before she flew off—on wings!
Wings Isabella hadn’t noticed before, her interest totally arrested by the man who graced her with a smile brimming with such love and caring—and bracketed by such adorable, discernible dimples—had his visage not already stolen her breath, the look in his eyes would’ve rendered her mute.
Time ceased to advance, giving her all manner of opportunity to absorb every detail of his appearance, which she did, all the way down to the slight droop on one side of his tailored jacket—something in his pocket, perhaps?—then returning upward to marvel at the breadth of his chest…the deep brown fathomless eyes that gazed so intently into her own…the tiny nick marring one eyebrow…the shadow of whiskers framing his jaw…