My heart was jerking madly, my pulse thundering in anticipation, and every cell in my body strained to lean into him. So I let them. ‘I’m happy too,’ I said. ‘Right this moment.’ I had forgotten my earlier doubts. George wasn’t Charles. He was a decent man who had done the right thing. He had admitted his mistakes and had the courage to change. Why had I resisted him for so long? ‘George,’ I said, ‘do you remember that night in your cottage when we kissed?’ He cast his eyes up and pretended to think. ‘Now let me see, would that be the kiss I’ve only thought about every minute of every day since then?’ ‘I thought you’d forgotten,’ I said involuntarily and he laughed and tightened his arm around me. ‘How could I forget a kiss like that?’ ‘But you were so...normal!’ ‘I knew that if I wasn’t, you’d freeze me out,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want that.’ ‘I lost my nerve,’ I confessed.
