“No one will forget.”
“They probably will. What if the songs I taught you were remembered? It could ruin some very good Broadway shows in the twentieth century.” She tried to smile but didn’t quite make it. “I want you to swear some things to me.”
“I will not marry Lettice. I doubt now I will be asked again,” he said sarcastically.
“Good. Oh, very, very good. Now I won’t have to read about your execution.” She ran her fingertips over his neck. “Promise me you’ll take care of James. No more swaddling, and play with him sometimes.”
He kissed her fingertips and nodded.
“Take care of Honoria; she’s been so good to me.”
“I will find her the best of husbands.”
“Not the richest, the best. Promise?” When he nodded, she went on. “And anyone who’s delivering a baby has to wash his or her hands first. And you have to build Thornwyck Castle and leave records behind that show that you designed it. I want history to know.”
He was smiling at her. “Naught else? You will have to remain by my side to remind me of all this.”
“I would,” she whispered. “I would, but I cannot. May I have the miniature of you?”
“You may have my heart, my soul, my life.”
She clasped his head in her arms. “Nicholas, I can’t bear it.”
“There is naught bad to bear,” he said, kissing her arm, her shoulder, his lips traveling downward. “Perhaps Kit will give me a small estate, and we—”
She pulled away to look at him. “Wrap the miniature of you in oiled cloth, something that will protect it over the next four hundred years, and put it behind the . . . What’s the stone thing that holds up the beams?”
“A corbel.”
“At Thornwyck Castle you’ll make a corbel that’s a portrait of Kit. Wrap the miniature and put it behind the corbel. When I . . . when I return, I’ll go get it.”
He was kissing her breast.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard all. James. Honoria. Midwives. Thornwyck. Kit’s face.” With each word, he punctuated it with a little sucking-kiss on her breast. “Now, my love,” he whispered, “come to me.”
He lifted her body and set her down on top of him, and Dougless forgot everything on earth except the touch of this man she loved so much. He stroked her hips, her breasts as they moved together. Up and down. Slowly at first, then building faster.
Nicholas rolled with her until she was on her back, and his passion rose as he entered her deeply, her body rising to meet his. They arched together, both with their heads back, then they collapsed, Nicholas on top of her, holding her very tightly.
“I love you,” he whispered. “I will love you for all time.”
Dougless clung to him, holding him as tightly as she could. “You will remember me? You won’t forget me?”
“Never,” he said. “Never will I forget you. Were I to die tomorrow, my soul would remember you.”
“Don’t speak of death. Speak only of life. With you I am alive. With you I am whole.”
“And I with you.” He rolled to one side and pulled her close to him. “Look, you. The sun comes up.”
“Nicholas, I’m afraid.”
He stroked her damp hair. “Afraid of being seen unclad? It is not something we have not seen before.”
“You!” she said, lau
ghing. “I’ll never forgive you for not telling me.”