“I’d like that.” For the first time in months, possibly since she’d left Russia, her heart danced in delight. Memories of happiness in simple pleasures had been suffocated beneath the terror of survival for so long, she had doubted they would ever surface again. Much less the possibility of feeling so happy. Yet, once more, Wynn offered her hope.
Before she could dwell further on the meanings behind that thought and the warmth it stirred within her, she crossed the room to the door.
“I better allow you to finish dressing before you catch pneumonia.”
“You can’t catch pneumonia from being cold. It’s an infection that fills the lungs with fluid.”
“Chills, then.”
“At the moment I don’t feel any chills.”
She wasn’t either with the way he was looking at her. Silhouetted against the orange glow of the fireplace behind him, he seemed larger than she remembered, shoulders wider and chest broader with arm muscles filling out the sleeves of his shirt. She remembered feeling those arms around her, holding her close, protecting her against the onslaught of fears. With the way he looked at her now, she knew he wouldn’t deny her stepping into his embrace once more. A darkening of the eyes, a parting of the lips, a concentration of the brow. It was a look to be recognized by a woman in a man and within her power to do what she willed with it.
What did she want to do with it? She’d become his wife under duress, but now that the danger had passed, they found themselves treading unfamiliar waters. Should she ignore the pulling look in his eyes and swim back to the shallows, or give in to the swell of emotion and strike out to deeper waters with him? She was no longer sure where the boundary of safety tethered. With a desperate need for stability, that uncertainty was enough to frighten her.
Her hand fumbled for the doorknob.
“You can use the other door.” He pointed to the door that connected his chambers to hers through the private sitting room. The desire stirring in his eyes blinked away.
She tried not to give in to the disappointment at his polite change in expression. She had made the decision to step back, and like the gentleman he was, Wynn was respecting it. Would she mind so terribly if he threw politeness to the wind and closed the distance between them?
“I didn’t want to make a habit of entering your room that way. That is, I mean to say, I don’t wish to intrude on your privacy.” She twisted the knob. She needed to get out before her rambling carried her away.
“You’ll never intrude, Svetlana. Not at my door. It is always open for you. All you have to do is step through.”
She did step through. Out and into the hall before he carried her right into those deep waters where she no longer knew if she was drowning or floating.
Chapter 20
Glasgow teemed with life and new purpose as the city unrolled itself from the fog of war. Battle scars remained in the wearied faces of its townsfolk, but businesses and shops were beginning to reopen as life resumed, though at an altered pace.
“Any more shops you wish to look in?” Tucking a newly purchased maidenhair fern against his chest, Wynn held tight to Svetlana’s arm as they crossed George Square in the biting January air.
Like the other bit of Scotland she’d witnessed, a wet cold clung to the air as mist rose from the nearby River Clyde and reminded her of Petrograd winters. People bundled into their coats as they scurried under the midmorning shadow of the towering Scott monument while Svetlana lifted her face to inhale the icy air. Winter had always dressed Petrograd in frosted finery, and she, like a true daughter of Russia, reveled in the snow crystals of brilliance.
She shook her head, careful not to unpin the new felt and quail feather hat Wynn had insisted on buying her yesterday, their
first day in the city. She’d been looking for a traditional fur
“You’ve bought out most of them already.”
“My beautiful wife deserves to be spoiled. No more rags or ill-fitting castoffs for you.”
Ignoring the temptation to run a gloved hand over her fine wool skirt, Svetlana squeezed his arm instead. Buttery soft kid gloves, warm woven wool, delicate lace at her throat, and real silk undergarments. It was like returning to a long-lost fairy tale after living in a nightmare for so long. Yet while she had been restored to a castle, many still found themselves in the trenches. Or in an overcrowded, infested basement lost in Paris. In this new chapter of tales, she would not forget what it was like to go without.
Wynn hefted the young fern, its delicate stalk wrapped in protective burlap. “Should we find another florist and see what they have in the way of trees? Or those decorative herbal plants you were telling me about?”