That made him laugh. He cupped her face in both hands and kissed her. A simple, chaste kiss.
“Father McKinnawae is about the furthest thing from my mind. This isn’t about Sophie and Cap or the inquest or anything but me, wanting to marry you. Today. I’m tired of waiting. I want to go to sleep with you and wake up with you. Starting today.”
“It’s a little more complicated than that, Jack. Where would we live? I can’t move out of the house just when Sophie’s going; it would be terribly disruptive to the girls and Aunt Quinlan, all of them.”
“I see that. But I could move in, just until Weeds is ready.”
Anna knew that her mouth was hanging open, and more than that, she could see that Jack was pleased with her. Because she hadn’t refused, out of hand? Because she was thinking about it?
Because she was thinking about it. Then something occurred to her.
“Your sisters? Your mother? They won’t be offended at being left out?”
“My mother, no. She’s practical. As far as my sisters are concerned, they are so wound up in transforming Weeds that they won’t much care. Really, think about it, Anna. It’s the best part. With my sisters so busy with the house, they’ll point-blank refuse to go home to Greenwood, and Mama will see the logic in letting them finish. Maybe by the time Weeds is ready, everybody will be comfortable with the idea of them staying in the city.”
Anna put a hand over her mouth to keep herself from laughing out loud.
“Can you come up with any real objections?”
Slowly, she shook her head.
Jack peeled her hand away from her face, kissed the palm, and held on to it.
“Savard, if you’re not ready, all you have to do is say those three words. ‘I’m not ready.’”
Anna’s voice cracked. “What about—Monday? The inquest? Will it complicate things?”
“Just the opposite,” Jack said. “Nobody will be able to challenge my place next to you.”
“In theory I could end up in prison,” Anna said. “If Comstock has his way, that’s exactly what will happen.”
Jack studied their linked hands for a moment, and then he gave her an even, calculating look.
“There are people working on your behalf this weekend.”
“That’s an oddly momentous statement. I do trust Conrad, but—”
“Oscar is hard at work, too.”
That gave her pause. “Oscar?”
“If they want to send somebody to prison, it’s going to be the person who did Janine Campbell harm.”
“Jack,” Anna said. “I appreciate Oscar’s help, but it’s entirely possible that she acted alone, without any assistance.”
“Maybe so,” Jack said. “But Oscar is tracking her movements for the days before she died, I can pretty much guarantee that. If she saw no one out of the ordinary and no one out of the ordinary came to see her—if Oscar can account for all of your time in the last week—that will be the end of the matter. As far as your connection, of course.”
Anna drew in a very deep breath and held it. She could see a half-dozen ways this plan might fail, but then again, it might succeed.
“So can you put that worry out of your mind for the rest of the weekend?”
“I suppose I must,” Anna said. She stood, but he stayed where he was, looking up at her.
“Are you coming?” she said. “They may have already closed the town hall for the day, and then what?”
? ? ?
IN FACT, THE justice of the peace was almost out the door when they found him. He had already put an old-fashioned stovepipe hat on his perfectly bald head and was standing in the doorway. He looked at them over the top of his spectacles with what could only be called suspicion.
Before Jack had said five words, the man turned his back on them and went back into his office, leaving the door open.
Jack ushered her inside, following closely.
The man who had taken a seat behind the desk was Theodore Baugh, Esq., according to the placard on his desk. He gestured to two chairs, and they sat. Anna wondered if the man would ever speak, and whether she should be nervous about the way he was studying her. Before she could think of something to say that wouldn’t sound silly or inappropriate, the man put both hands on his desk and leaned forward a little.
“Witnesses?”
Jack said, “I’ll go ask the clerk down the hall.”
“The clerk down the hall. In a hurry, I see.”
He didn’t ask why they were in a hurry, and Jack didn’t volunteer any information. Anna was starting to enjoy herself, though she wasn’t sure why.