So Pure a Heart (Daughters of His Kingdom 4)

Joseph stood and spun to face her. “I came to tell you I was ready to marry you. That very day.” Shock pulled his brow low and his posture straight. “I came to tell you I didn’t care what your father or anyone might think—that I knew we had done wrong but I wished to make it right. I wished to be your husband as we planned. But he…” His face reddened and fists curl. “He told me you hated me. That you despised me and blamed me for what had happened. That you never wished to see me again.”

“Nay!” The ugliness of such a lie jerked her from her seat. Her head shook, the disbelief consuming to such a degree ’twas as if her body attempted on its own to fling the bitter revelations from her mind. “I never hated you. Even after I lost our son…”

“You never hated me.” Tender and draped in longing, Joseph’s whispered statement cracked her fragile composure.

“I wanted you.” Her chin quivered, and she pressed a hand over her mouth, the pains she harbored for so long finally bursting free, unwilling to stop their wild run to freedom. “I believed you would return to me.” She moved her hand to her chest and met his gaze. “’Twas that belief that kept me living. I almost lost my life along with the child, but I saw you returning so many times, and such a dream, however vain, was what kept my soul from slipping away.” Her voice wobbled. “For three years that hope lived within me. I could not believe you could have loved me so strong only to abandon what we had shared. But then…you never came.”

Motionless, Joseph stood rigid, his arms at his sides, eyes red rimmed and jaw ticking madly. Rage prowled in the back center of his stare. “I am taking you away. Away from this place, away from him.”

Pools of tears filled her eyes, then drained over her cheeks in hot streams. “You really loved me?”

In a single stride he was beside her, his arms encircling her as he held her firm against him. Lips and nose against her hair, he whispered through a voice fraught with love. “My darling, I have only ever loved you.”

My darling.

Hannah closed her eyes, feeling the very fissures in her heart mend at his words. He had always loved her. He hadn’t left her for lack of wanting—but for lack of knowing.

And ’twas all her father’s doing.

A whimper of sorrow echoed through her throat, and she gripped him tighter, when suddenly he reached behind and unhooked her arms from his back. Her face scrunched, pleading that this gesture did not bode ill news. She could not bear it. But there was a promise tucked in his grin, and the sudden cramp in her brow eased when he spoke.

“Do you think we can begin again?”

She turned her head in question. “What do you mean?”

In a swift motion he curled a finger in his waistcoat pocket, an ache in his angled expression. Slowly, he raised his hand, revealing the ring he had made for her so long ago.

Her eyes burned, and she flung a hand to her mouth.

“Come away with me tonight.” He moved closer, circling his other hand around her ear to cup her face. “We can at last be married and begin the life we wished for ourselves.”

Hannah blinked the moisture away, straining to speak against the heated stone in her throat. She was consumed. So consumed with love, surely she could live forever on the life it gave. While deeper, a blackening sorrow brewed. How could Philo have done this? He might have despised their impetuous youth, their sin, but how could a man take it upon himself to destroy the lives of anyone, let alone his own child?

Joseph brushed her cheek with his thumb. “We are done now—no more spying. No more secrets. Our future awaits us.” Gently, he took her hand and slid the warmed ring over her finger as if ’twas a reverent act. “Your father will never come between us again.”

He swooped his head down and captured her mouth with his, and she responded, pressing against him, when the note in her stays burned her skin like a singe from heaven, and she pulled away.

“What is it?” Worry bit into his face. “You have not changed your mind?”

“Nay, I…” She turned from him to pull the paper free from her bosom, then whirled back. “I meant to give this message to you earlier, but I was so distraught, I…”

He took the missive and read it, the tick in his jaw indicating he understood the gravity of the intelligence even deeper than she. He refolded it. “The Patriots need this.”

“I know. Forgive me.” Had her mistake cost the lives of her friends? Or would God grant them another chance? “What can we do?”

Ducking his head, Joseph kissed her again, his mouth warm with vows of more yet to come. “This last missive we will take on our journey away. Then our lives will be our own. Come.”

He stepped back and took her hand in his, when a voice outside the hall sent a shiver down Hannah’s spine.

Nay. Their lives would never be their own.

Chapter Thirty-Two

“A fine evening for such an occasion.”

Philo sipped the drink he’d acquired and attempted menial conversation while Stockton stared in bitter silence at the way Joseph and Hannah moved in effortless grace around the dance floor.

Stockton answered in a toneless hum before taking a drink. Jealousy was never difficult to detect, but this man’s was blatant. Perfect for manipulation.