what will placate your conscience, far be it for me to stop you.”
He huffed the ghost of a chuckle against her hair as his arms tightened. “All right, my little minx of a wife…I’ll admit I’m new to groveling. How does one go about it?”
She took a full minute to pretend to consider. Not to punish him, per se, but to enjoy the circle of his protective embrace. To feel their heartbeats synchronize as she pressed her head against his strong shoulder. To nest in the one place she’d truly felt alive. And at home.
From the first night she’d given herself to him, a stranger.
“I imagine foot rubs are excellent groveling techniques,” she ventured.
“I imagine you’re right.”
“And long Sunday mornings in bed.”
“Now,” he tutted. “That’s a reward, not a punishment.”
“I suppose, groveling is neither of our strong suits.” She buried a smile in his shirt. “I want to reward you.”
“You are my greatest prize,” he said, stiffening a little as the chaos of emergency sirens and the clattering of horse hooves against the planks shook the docks beneath their feet.
She pulled from his embrace with a weary sigh, drawing her hand down his arm to lace her fingers with his. “This life of yours, it will always be thus, I gather.” She gestured to the warehouse full of chaos, the advancing lawmen, the curious milling crowds. “Whether you’re the Chief Inspector or the Knight of Shadows.”
His eyes glimmered with concern, a frown pinching his brow as he looked toward the approaching tide as if he would send them away. “You deserve more than—”
She turned him to face her. “If I’d have you promise me anything, it’s this. I know you are a hero to many, but you are only husband to me. I will not be your mistress while the law is your wife, and your children will not be bastards. I cannot live in an empty house and sleep in an empty bed and love a man who has been drained empty by the demands of this city.”
“I know,” he said.
“That being said, I’m proud of what you do,” she soothed. “Of who you are, and I’d not change that. I will send you out that door every day. But you must come home to me. I must hold you and love you and make love to you. You must eat properly, and rest appropriately, and find a bloody hobby, do you understand? Something that wastes time, but you enjoy for no reason.”
His smile tilted over to a perplexed grimace. “A hobby?”
She just shook her head. “We’ll have that row later.”
He seemed to accept this with a Gallic sort of sobriety as he turned toward the streets. “I can send Farah and the ladies to come get you. You don’t have to face all this.”
The offer was tempting, but she shook her head, looping her arm through his. “We’ll face it all together.”
Just like they would everything from now on.
As a family.
Epilogue
Four Months Later
Morley lounged in bed with his cheek against his wife’s creamy shoulder, gazing down at the mountain of her belly. He was only half listening as she, stretched on her back and naked beneath the sheets, read a Knight of Shadows penny dreadful aloud, stopping to giggle at a particularly unbelievable passage.
This Knight of Shadows business was certainly getting out of hand, but luckily, he’d recruited a few promising men to take up the occasional mantle. It was interesting to hear the conflicting reports of criminals and civilians alike who’d a chance meeting. Sometimes he was average height, lean, fair-haired and agile. Other times, a dark-skinned mountain of a man, able to meld with the shadows. He was a youth, or mature. Spoke with an exotic accent, an Irish one, or his own on Tuesdays and every other Friday.
He’d kept his word and it hadn’t been difficult for a moment. Their quiet nights together soothed his soul and excited everything that made him a man.
They made ceaseless love in increasingly creative positions, as her stomach became an impediment. Then they’d talk, or laugh, or read until one of them, usually her, drifted to sleep.
Tonight, she seemed unusually restless and uncomfortable, so they’d mounted pillows beneath her knees and he’d promised to suffer while she amused herself with one of the new rash of novels written about his exploits.
Rain tapped on the windows, casting the shadows of rivulets upon the bed. The optical effect lulled him as did the lively rendition of his wife’s voice.