Page 87 of Give Him a Chance
Firstly, Bernard could not help but think even as he wished she would keep her voice down,because I have not actually asked you to marry me.
Obviously, he would. He just hadn’t, not yet. It was galling to have the moment stolen from under one.
“It’s not about approval, or permission, it’s—it’s deciding to do things together, rather than one of us just going off and deciding for both of us!” Bernard tried to explain without allowing his temper to rise. “It’s about telling people at the right time!”
He had expected that statement to calm her, but somehow, it only seemed to make her more upset.
“Oh, so I suppose you never actually intended to tell anyone?!”
“Lucy,” Bernard said tightly, “you’re being ridiculous.”
Which was also the wrong thing to say.
“I am not being ridiculous,” snapped the woman he loved, glaring as though he had done someone, probably her, a real wrong. “What sort of person doesn’t want to share the fact that they love someone?!”
“I’m not saying it was going to be a secret forever. I’m saying that now probably wasn’t the best time!”
Honestly, could she not see? How was it possible that a woman as bright and as brilliant as Lucy could not understand?
“It’s like you’re ashamed of me—”
“Now, hang on, that’s utter tripe and you know it,” Bernard said firmly as he stepped forward, his need to be close to her overwhelming his need to be calm.
Lucy pushed aside his outreached hands. “Then why?”
He bit his lip as Bernard looked down into the eyes of a woman who had clearly been hurt and yet could not—seemingly would not—comprehend that rushing in and just doing what she liked wasn’t always the best way.
Hell, sometimes it was the only way. He’d had to learn that, that time in Kent when he—
Needless to say, sometimes rushing in was the only way to save your skin.
But not like this. Not for something as important as this.
“Lucy,” Bernard said quietly, hating the unshed tears sparkling in her eyes. “Lucy, it’s… Timing is important. There’s the matter of the danger—I must make sure you won’t face any because of the work I’ve done in the past. And I did not tell you I wasn’t a criminal until I realized you loved me, did I? Your love came first, and the truth followed. I… Well, honestly I had expected to do the same here. Our love can grow and then, when the time is right…we tell people.”
It had not been the most impressive speech of his life, and even Bernard could admit—though only in the privacy of his own mind—that there were certain holes in his argument.
But it was not a rational debate that Lucy launched into, dissecting his line of reasoning and pointing out all its inadequacies. All his inadequacies.
No, something quite different occurred. Lucy stepped back from him, a stagger, not a step, and was looking at him like—like she did not even know him.
“Lucy?” Bernard said, utterly confused at why she was staring like his hair had suddenly changed color. “What’s wrong?”
Her lips parted, but no sound came out.
Bernard whirled around, almost expecting to see a dozen Frenchmen, each equipped with a dozen iron bars, but there was nothing. The hallway was empty; no servant had appeared, and none of the three Chances in the drawing room had evidently considered the coast clear enough to venture out.
He turned back to Lucy, his brow furrowed. “What is it?”
Lucy was still staring, eyes wide, as though…as though she had never met him before, and a stranger had been caught intruding in the house. “You… I don’t know you.”
Bernard’s stomach dropped.
Surely, this was not possible; he had never heard of a medical situation in which amnesia could occur without any head injury or illness. How could she not know who he was? How was this even feasible?
“Lucy—Lucy, it’s Bernard,” he said quickly, stepping toward her.
But Lucy half-walked, half-ran away from him, stepping around him toward the front door as though she were fleeing an intruder. “But are you? Whoareyou, Bernard?”
