Trying not to burst with ridiculous delight, Mark sat on the ground beside the chair. They stared into the fire together. “Christmas is in a week. We should probably make plans.”
“Plans?” Ellen looked at him with surprise.
Mark was so close to her he saw her pulse beating in her neck. He swallowed hard. “Usually, if I had leave around Christmas for the past few years, I went to Cottesloe to celebrate with my family. I suppose you stayed here, with your parents.”
“Oh.” Her brow furrowed. “We’re celebrating? Together? Why?”
Heart plummeting in disappointment, Mark fumbled for a response. “We’re married,” he attempted. “Married couples usually spend holidays with one another.”
She made a skeptical sound in her throat.
“I have eight holidays to make up for,” he admitted. “It’s nice not to be alone, though, isn’t it? Especially at Christmas.”
“I usually work on Christmas.” Ellen stared at him as though he was a puzzle she couldn’t figure out.
Confusion was much better than disdain, so he considered it progress. “So we stay in London then.”
Ellen shook her head. “I don’t want to keep you from your family. Especially with Matthew still in a fragile state.”
Mark picked his words carefully, holding his breath. “If you will allow it, I’d prefer to spend Christmas with you. And try to make us family.”
Thankfully, the maid came in with two glasses of mulled wine, breaking off whatever Ellen had been about to say. When the wine had been distributed and the maid left, Mark looked back over at his wife. The fire’s glow lit up the edges of her profile, making it look like she was limned in gold. His groin tightened. Abstinence on a ship had been hard, but Mark was finding this even more difficult now he saw his wife every single day.I need her.
“We could exchange gifts,” Mark suggested. “Nothing large. Just something between us.”
Ellen took a deep breath, shifting in her seat to angle toward him. The book of myths in her lap slid toward her knees. “I believe you’ve already given me a gift.”
His stomach flipped as though he’d swallowed a nest of hornets. Mark didn’t dare look at her. He stared down into his cup.
“Mark.” She so rarely said his name he couldn’t help himself, he looked up at her. “It was you, wasn’t it, that purchased the frame for my photograph by my bed?”
He swallowed hard. “Yes.”I did it weeks ago,he wanted to tell her.But you never said anything. I was too cowardly to bring it up myself. Do you like it?
“Thank you.” Her gaze warmed, and Mark found himself leaning his shoulders and face against the arm of the chair to be a little closer to her.
“It was nothing.” His face flushed, and it wasn’t just from the heat of the fire. His chest swelled with pride that he’d gotten something right. Delight that he’d done something that pleased her.
“It means a great deal,” she whispered. One handed drifted free from her mug and rested on her thigh. It was scarcely an inch from Mark’s face. He wished more than ever he could nuzzle her hand. Or lean his forehead into her touch.
“I wish someone had done that for you sooner, but I am grateful I had the chance to give you something you value.” He couldn’t decide which to stare at—her face, all pink and glowing from the fire and the wine, or the hand right before him, with the short, blunt nails and the creases in her knuckles dyed from spooning out medicine all day.
Her fingers curled inward, making a loose fist against the brown fabric of her skirt, and he realized she could feel the warmth of his breath when he spoke. He cast his mind wide for something to speak of—anything—before he did somethingincredibly stupid, like taking her hand in his and kissing every single line of her palm.
“I’ve been wondering something, and that book brought it to mind.”
“Oh?”
Mark hesitated, knowing he was on rocky ground. “Would you tell me why you chose Persephone as her middle name?”
The loose fingers became a tight fist.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t wish to,” he added hastily, leaning away to get a better look at her face.
She pursed her lips and shook her head. “You deserve to know. You’re her parent, too.”
That knot in his stomach, sitting heavy as an anvil, made itself known like every time Constance came up in conversation. Mark didn’t know why. It didn’t feel likehehad lost a loved one. He’d never held her. His loss couldn’t even hold a candle to what Ellen had gone through.
“I chose Constance because she will always be on my mind. I shall always love her.” Ellen gave him an awkward half smile. “You only wrote to tell me your wishes if the baby was to be a boy, not a girl.”