The chess table jostled when his leg bumped it, but he steadied the rattling surface with one hand even as he held her with the other. His mouth never left her own, and Aven laced her fingers into his to ease any worry about keeping everything righted.
The table suddenly forgotten, he drew himself closer in a way that was both tender and sure. Her back bumped against the wall, and he braced himself with a hand to the boards. She slid her touch from his waist to his shoulder and the strength there. His breath against her own hastened, no worry to appear composed as a hearing man might. An uninhibited sound that sent a puddle of warmth straight through her.
Aven slipped an arm around his neck. Rising up onto the toes of her shoes, she leaned into him. The motion sent them off-balance and the table skidded again, this time sending the game stand and all its pieces toppling to the floor.
Though he couldn’t have just heard Ida’s bedroom door open, Thor pulled away. The sudden loss of him would have been her undoing if it weren’t for the need to think quickly. Aven pointed toward the sound of footsteps. Thor fetched up the table, then signed to her in earnest—a handful of words, only two of which she grasped. The very same phrase he’d used near the tree house.
“Please . . . I don’t understand.” A tightness of tears came, for she wanted to know his thoughts as much as she wanted to know him.
But Thor sank down to gather up the spilled game just as Ida poked her head into the great room.
“Everything alright?” Ida raised a lantern.
“Oh, aye,” Aven squeaked, certain Ida was peering in on something more telling than a chess match gone awry. She knelt to help. “Just a wee . . . stumble.”
Thor set the board where it belonged, then added two handfuls of pieces, letting them clank haphazardly in the center. Stepping sideways, he fetched three more, then placed them with the others. His hair tumbled against his face, and he shoved it back. Nodding a rushed farewell, he turned for the stairs, nearly tripping them both as he did. He steadied Aven beside the bricks of the hearth before heading off, his gait so determined there would be no coaxing him back.
Aven’s skin felt as hot as the glow from Ida’s lantern. “I’m so sorry it woke you.” Such a crash it had been. She was surprised Cora hadn’t come running.
Ida watched Thor go. “Just feared that somethin’ had gone amiss. That’s the second time this week the pair of ya upended furniture.” Her growing amusement was scarcely concealed.
Aven tamped down all embarrassment and forced herself to weave around the sofa to where the housekeeper stood. “Might you tell me what this is to mean?” With hands that were still atremble, she recreated the motion that Thor had made, shaping the first symbol and then the second by closing her hands into fists and pressing her knuckles together.
“That first one is with.” Ida set the lantern at her bare feet to repeat the second gesture. “Together, it means stay with.”
That’s what he had been asking? Aven stay with Thor?
“Thank you so much, Miss Ida!” Aven whirled away, hurried up the stairs, and slipped into her room long enough to fetch the letter that had come from Lexington, then rushed up toward the attic. With no light, she nearly stumbled in the dark.
Would knocking be pointless? She couldn’t bear to let morning come without him knowing she understood. Aven rapped knuckles against the wood. Might he see the shudder? When that failed, she rattled the knob, praying that would be more noticeable. After a few more jostles, she heard heavy footfalls and the door opened.
TWENTY-SIX
It took all his composure to peer down at Aven—to see her eyes wide and her stuttering words that didn’t make a shred of sense—and not pull her near again. A single candle flickered behind him, and he’d already tugged his suspenders from his shoulders. Thor clamped a hand on the knob to keep himself in place.
Looking as startled as he felt, she was panting from her climb up the stairs. At last Aven managed to string words together that were decipherable. “Did that make any sense?”
He shook his head.
Some kind of envelope was in her grasp. Closing her eyes, she exhaled with, “Yes.” She tucked the envelope to her side and clumsily shaped his request as he had, first her name, then stay and with. Last, she formed a T and slid it beneath her chin, the very spot he’d held her so tenderly just moments ago. Had Ida helped her understand? Thor strode down a step, then a few more until he was low enough to look directly at Aven. She appeared taken aback, as if expecting him to do something rash. He wasn’t going to do anything—but he sure was thinking about it.
Right now he needed to ensure that she hadn’t believed his request for her to stay with him was of a dishonorable nature. Though he doubted that was why she was here, he had to make it clear that he wasn’t trying to lure her farther up these stairs.
His notebook was on the chess table, so Thor took her hand, hoping his own was steady. Dipping his head, he pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist, then placed her palm flush to his heart. He held it there, firm beneath both of his hands, and hoped that said what he couldn’t. That he wasn’t asking her to stay with him now, this hour or even this night, but that he was asking her to stay with him in this life.
Aven rose onto her tiptoes to press the softest kiss to the side of his face, and he knew she understood. She pulled a letter from the envelope and offered it over. It was the job offer from Lexington. The one that meant to bear her far away from here. Before he could finish reading, she pinched the paper in her fingers and tore it in two.
Thor smiled.
Doing the same, she backed away. At her room Aven spoke a good night and he nodded, wishing her the same. She slipped from sight, and he returned to the attic. Though he’d never felt so peaceful, sleep was hard to come by that night.
When Thor woke, it was to daylight and a kind of contentment that had lingered even through his sleep. He rose from bed, grabbed a work shirt and his boots, and leaving Haakon to sleep longer, headed down. He stepped softly past Jorgan’s room. Best not to wake either of his brothers. While he didn’t mind learning how their night had gone, it would be harder to explain Aven’s and his chess game.
Outside, autumn’s chill hung in the air and the orchards beckoned, the acreage needing to be gleaned like a mother in need of her nursing babe. Which made it a relief to see the lads already at work in the distance. Except for the first time, Al wasn’t with them. Thor pulled on his boots and laced them up. He finished with his shirt and, still cold, fetched a flannel from the peg behind the kitchen door. He slid it on as he started down the road. When he reached the workers, he wrote Al? in the dust with a stick.
Jacob spoke up. “I guess somethin’ spooked Tess in the night when she was out fetching water. Al said he’d be along soon but that he wanted to stay around to make sure that everything was fine. Promised he’d be here before it got too late. We told him we’d make up for it.”
Thor shook his head so they wouldn’t worry and gave Jacob’s shoulder a squeeze of thanks. Before the sun got much higher, he meant to help the pickers, but for now there was a different kind of task to be done. With dawn just brightening the horizon, Thor headed east, striding up the hillside that marked the entrance to the Sorrel farm.
The climb wasn’t steep, just lengthy. He was breathing hard before he’d even made it halfway. It had him tugging the flannel off to tie around his waist. He rolled back the sleeves of his shirt as well. Thoughts still on Aven, and with him utterly alone, Thor tried to say her name again. He couldn’t get past, “Av—” Somewhere in his memory lived the other sounds, but they were too far buried. How long had it been since he’d really tried to speak?