is paid well and provided with housing, and Betsy will benefit from the dry air. Quit being selfish, Georgina Meredith. You know they were delighted with the chance to leave. Janice has been raising that family for years. It's time for her to have a life of her own."
Georgina considered sulking at his proprietary tone, but she was distracted by her surroundings. They had walked past the old neighborhood in which she had grown up and were traversing the recently laid streets of a new development. Gaslights had already been installed, and the streets were not only wide and straight, but sidewalks ran alongside of them. Several new houses were already occupied. Tender leaves shivered on young trees. Older trees had been left at the rear of the houses, and these provided shade for the wraparound porches and second-story turrets of the lovely homes. Georgina stared around her in surprise. She'd scarcely known this area existed.
"Daniel, are we lost?"
"Nope." He steered her up the walk to a modest, two-story, yellow house ornamented with white gingerbread scroll work. The deep front porch already sported a swing, and trailing ferns hung on the shady side porch. Georgina glanced enviously at the rose bed along the decorative iron fence. It wasn't anywhere near the size of her parents' garden, but it was a start. She wished it were hers.
Biting her lip at such a selfish thought, she followed Daniel up the steps. Daniel had given her everything she had ever wanted except a home of her own. She couldn't blame him for that. He owned part of his nanny's house in St. Louis with Evie. He owned part of a ranch in Texas with Evie's cousins and father. He even owned a share in Tyler's plantation in Natchez. And there was always the Mulloney monstrosity to call home if he wished. Then, of course, they were already living in her father's house. Why would he need still another home?
There really hadn't been time to even talk about such things. What with consulting with her father about the factory and working with Peter on Mulloney Enterprises and fighting on a daily basis with his father, Daniel scarcely had time to breathe anymore. Even his press had been packed up and put away, and she knew that was his true desire.
So she didn't quite register the fact that Daniel produced the key to unlock the front door. It wasn't until Daniel swept her into his arms and crossed the threshold that Georgina gasped and clung to his neck and allowed herself to hope as he swung her around to inspect the front hall.
"Daniel! Put me down! What on earth are you doing?" But she continued clinging to his neck even when he set her feet on the polished wooden floor. Her gaze greedily took in the exquisitely carved wooden molding around the ceiling, the delicate etching of the glass-covered lamps on the walls, and the pattern of colored light from the stained-glass transom. She had never seen anything so enchanting in all her life.
"Do you like it?" Daniel watched her face worriedly, holding her waist between his hands as she looked around with an expression of wonder.
"It's magnificent. I've never seen anything so lovely. Oh, Daniel, who does it belong to? Do you think we could buy it? Please, please tell me it's for sale and we can afford it." She bit her lip suddenly and let her arms slide from his shoulders. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. There isn't any way we can afford a place like this, not with Daddy's place to keep up, too."
Daniel relaxed and caught her hand to pull her into the parlor. "The factory is starting to produce again. Your father can pay his own bills as long as you don't ask him to pay the mortgage. I can afford this on my own income, but you'll be wanting pretty gowns and servants, too. So Peter and I have come to an agreement, and whether my father likes it or not, he's going to have to accept it or find himself without anyone at all."
Georgina stared at her husband with rising hope and no small amount of trepidation. "You aren't playing the hero again, are you, Daniel? I'd rather we stayed with my father than to risk you in some other mad scheme."
Daniel's smile was slightly lopsided as he gestured at the sun-filled parlor. "Do you like it?"
"I love it, and you know it. Just tell me