Page 166 of The Wallflower Takes All
Lady Viva saw Gabriel and stopped fanning herself. Her expression sharpened. “Mr. Ashby.”
“Lady Montague.”
She studied him for one long moment. “You look purposeful.”
“I am.”
“If you have come to ask Poppy to be sensible, I must warn you I have developed an aversion to the word.”
“I have not.”
“Good.”
“I have come to tell her I’m madly in love with her and beg her to marry me,” Gabriel announced.
Lady Viva’s face softened. “Ah. In that case, she is in the study.”
Gabriel glanced toward the half-open door.
Freddie emerged from beneath the table with a strip of green fabric dangling from his mouth.
Lady Viva looked at the dog approvingly. “At last, someone has dealt with that cloth properly.”
Gabriel smiled. Then he went to the study.
The room had been stripped of much of its life. Empty shelves gaped where books had stood that morning. Crates occupied the floor, and pale rectangles marked the walls where pictures had hung.
Poppy stood beside the writing desk in the plain gray gown he had seen earlier, her hair coming loose at the temples, dust on one cheek, a stack of papers in her arms. She looked tired. She looked brave.
She looked exactly like the woman he loved.
She raised her chin when she saw him. “Gabriel, if you’ve come to discourage me from taking the cottage?—”
“I have not.”
“Or encourage me to accept Lord Caldermere?”
“I have not come to speak of cottages or Caldermere.”
She set the papers aside. “Then what have you come to say?”
He crossed the room until only a few paces separated them. “I came to tell you I was wrong.”
Her breath caught.
“I asked you to marry me because I believed it was the honorable thing to do. I spoke of duty and protection because I was afraid to trust the only thing that truly mattered.”
He took another step. “I was afraid to trust you.”
Poppy looked at him without speaking.
“I thought I knew what your future ought to be. I thought I understood what you would one day regret.” He shook his head. “I do not. Only you know your own heart, and I should have believed you when you told me where it lay.”
Emotion tightened her features.
“I love you, Poppy.”
The words were quiet, but they filled the room.
