A Dance in Moonlight (The Fitzhugh Trilogy) by Sherry Thomas Read Free Book Online

city we never ventured out of our hotel to see.”
    Now he was warm everywhere. “I will not ask you what you were so busy doing in your hotel.”
    “And you will be wise not to.” She tittered. “My goodness, I am drunk. I am not the most close-lipped of women but I assure you I do not go about on a regular basis disclosing how I allocated my time during my honeymoon.”
    “Well, then, since you are already drunk, recite me that unforgettable masterpiece of yours.”
    “Well, bear in mind that I adored making love.”
    He sucked in a breath at a huge influx of lust.
    “Not to mention I found it wonderfully calming afterwards,” she went on. “I always felt invulnerable in the aftermath of the pleasure. My bridegroom was quite happy with how much I welcomed, indeed, demanded his advances.”
    He wished she would demand his advances.
    She cleared her throat. “ There was once a young lady from Bembley, who learned to love married life quickly. Not again, her husband groaned; Yes again, our young lady moaned. So once more unto the breach, well and truly .”
    He burst out laughing. “My God! Did you share this with your husband?”
    “I did—in the dining car, and he spat out his coffee. Years later he would still lean over to me and whisper, Once more unto the breach, especially when we were at some interminable ceremony.” She laid her hand in his; he wrapped his fingers around hers. “It was times like those that I felt happiest, knowing that I was the only person who could understand the joke.”
    And now he, too, understood the secret joke. It had been so long since he felt such closeness, not only to another person, but to everything inside himself that had once made him relish the arrival of each new day.
    “Do you still want to know what Mrs. Fitzwilliam wrote on the map?”
    She sat up and gazed at him. “ Of course .”
    He still needed a few moments to overcome his residual shyness. “About the gingerbread house she said, This is the house I earned by allowing my bridegroom to have his way with me on a desk. ”
    She snorted with laughter. “Is that so? You would only draw part of the map if she agreed to a certain marital deed?”
    “No, I would have drawn the map for nothing. But it was more fun that way.” He smiled back. “Much more fun.”
    “What, may I ask, did she have to do for the dwarfs’ cottage?”
    “Take a turn in our hotel room—after I had disrobed her.”
    “Oh, my. Newlywed love games indeed.” She sighed. “Oh, to be a newlywed again.”
    And then, after a moment of silence. “Or even better, to be an old married woman, thumping her cane on the floor of the parlor, because her husband is making them late for church again.”
    “I am always late for church,” he said impulsively.
    She brushed her hand through his hair again. “And how fortunate the lady who would be thumping her cane at you someday, my dear Mr. Fitzwilliam.”
     

     
     
    “WILL YOU COME BACK and bring your children here?”
    Isabelle opened her eyes, surprised that she’d almost fallen asleep. “I haven’t thought about it yet.”
    When Fitz had decided that his future lay elsewhere, she’d been sure she never wanted to set foot in Doyle’s Grange again. But now the place held good memories. Wonderful memories.
    “What is next for you then?”
    “Back to my sister’s place in Aberdeen. My children are still with her and I miss them.”
    “Bring them here. Winters are harsh in Scotland.”
    “Aberdeen’s is milder than one would expect for a city so far north, or so my sister assures me.”
    “Still, it will be cold and dreary. Bring them here. They will thank you.”
    But if she were to set up household at Doyle’s Grange, soon her entire family would come by to visit. There would be calls on the neighbors, afternoon tea parties, and dinners to make sure that she was surrounded by kind people. And when they saw Mr. Fitzwilliam, after picking their jaws up from the floor, they would