She said, “You’re the one who isn’t sure.”
“Oh, I’m sure.” He used both hands to cup her face and tilt it up so that he could kiss her. His hands and his mouth and nothing else, at this moment, and that was enough. For a long minute they were satisfied with the soft warm suckling and then Jack dropped one hand to press it to the small of her back.
Against the corner of her mouth he said, “Would you like to see the workrooms too? Or I can show you the house right now. If you like.”
They left the greenhouses by a back exit that opened onto a narrow path paved with flagstones. An overarching arbor was dense with deep green foliage and flowers as white and round and flat as a plate. Another time she might have asked for a name to pass on to Mr. Lee, but the capacity for speech had left her.
Jack started to say something and then stopped, his head canting sharply toward the far end of the passageway and the green door in the perimeter wall, small with a rounded top. As it swung open a conversation came to them. Two women, speaking Italian. Jack closed his eyes and shook his head in obvious disbelief and frustration.
The women stopped where they were, as surprised to see Jack as he was to see them.
“Anna,” he said. “Let me introduce you to my sisters. Just returned from New Jersey. Without notice.”
16
ANNA HAD HEARD enough about Jack’s sisters to be able to tell Bambina from Celestina. Bambina was the youngest, but her gaze was sharp and unflinching, while Celestina was confused and struggled to make sense of the unexpected sight of her brother with a woman.
The introductions were short and to the point, and then Jack disappeared to carry luggage into the house while his sisters made soft exclamations of pleasure: Such an honor, please join us, coffee, cake?
Celestina showed her into the parlor, excused herself, and disappeared down the hall to what Anna assumed was the kitchen, leaving her alone for the moment. By rights she should have found someplace to sit and stayed there with her hands folded in her lap, but curiosity was a powerful thing. She was calmer now than she had been a half hour ago when she thought the evening would end very differently. More than that, she was enjoying herself, as long as she didn’t think too hard about what Jack Mezzanotte might be telling his sisters. That’s Anna, she imagined him saying. A heathen. Unsuited to housework, clever with only one kind of needle. Overeducated, stubborn, an advocate for rational dress, women’s education, birth control, orphans, and the poor.
She got up to explore after all.
? ? ?
WHILE HIS SISTERS made coffee and cut up the cake they had brought with them from home and lamented the lack of anything more substantial to offer their guest, Jack did his best to hide his irritation and answer their questions—very reasonable questions—with calm certainty. It was Bambina—it was always Bambina—who spoke the question he had been waiting for.
“Who is this Miss Savard to you?”
Jack considered. He would let Anna tell them that she was not a Miss, but the crux of the question was his to answer. On the promenade of the new bridge he had been glib, a mistake he would not make here. Nor would he be coy or dismissive or anything but honest. Anything else would be disrespectful to Anna and to his sisters and by extension, his parents as well.
They had paused their work to wait for his answer. Bambina studied him as she would a dropped stitch, weighing alternative approaches to get the solution she desired. Round faced, full in the chest and hips, she struck most people as the matronly type, which was a serious miscalculation. Many shopkeepers who had thought she was too dull to notice a miscalculation in cost had learned differently. And now she wanted to know about Anna.
They had gotten the tea cart ready, and he opened the door so it could be pushed into the hall.
“I’m going to marry her.” It was the easiest, truest thing he could think to say.
? ? ?