Even amid the concrete and urban noises.
It hadn’t ever mattered if Jonathan wrote back. Not in all of those times Benny stole into their old project. Because he needed to write anyway—just in case Jonathan saw it. He never gave up. Just in case Jonathan… Just in case.
He slapped the book shut. A part of him was gone forever. But another part—the most important part—was lingering.
“For once you have fallen low,” he quoted, conjuring Merinda’s detective hero. “Let us see, in the future, how high you can rise.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Should you follow this guidebook closely, you will invariably reach a moment where one or more suitor will make a declaration of intent for courtship or marriage. In these instances, it is best to act demure and coy. Act surprised, even if the proposal is anticipated. Make the gentleman feel valued and worthy of his advances.
Dorothea Fairfax, Handbook to Bachelor Girlhood
Merinda had that deflated postcase feeling. Lethargic, she paced back and forth in the sitting room before falling into her chair and bellowing for Turkish coffee.
Her brain wheels still chugged but for no apparent purpose, and she was saddled with frenetic energy she wasn’t sure where to channel. It buzzed through her fingertips and snaked through the sinews of her arms.
She picked up Emma Goldman’s book and leafed through the pages, wondering how something so terse and disjointed to her now had once latched on to her. She needed something to believe in. The way Jem believed in God, the way Benny believed in Jonathan and the code of his Mounted Police. Merinda heard a knock at the door and then Mrs. Malone’s welcoming voice from the hallway.
Into the parlor walked a tall figure in six feet of red with a Stetson tucked under his right arm.
Merinda gasped as he entered over the Persian carpet, the gold of his buttons licked by the last flames of sun through the window.
“Benny! This is some getup! Cracker jacks!”
He chuckled. “You like it? I confess to dragging it out to try and get some of the wrinkles and creases ironed out.”
“I want one! Full regalia.” She scooped the hat from under his arm and plopped it on her head, waving him into a chair.
“You’re an amazing woman, Merinda Herringford.”
He leaned forward in his chair, his long fingers cupping his kneecaps. Merinda studied his face—his playful blue eyes and slightly crooked nose. “You sound so final,” she said.
“Mounties don’t have jurisdiction in Toronto.”
“That’s the same as saying women don’t have jurisdiction as detectives.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were sad.”
“Sad? Why would I be sad?”
“Because you”—he grabbed her hand and held tightly, so tightly she stopped trying to jerk it away—“are going to miss me as I will miss you.”
“Miss you? What… you… of all the silly… ”
“Merinda.”
“Oh, fine. Fine. I’ll miss you.” She hopped to her feet, and Benny followed suit. “Oh, look at you there. So you’re going to kiss me now?”
“Do you want me to?”
He leaned in. His lips were close. The wool of his scarlet serge scratched at the light fabric of her cotton blouse.
“Kiss me?” she mouthed, dazed. The ruddy fire was overheating her—and then she remembered it was August and there was no fire and the light through the open front curtains and the room was too hot and his jacket too warm and why was he standing there so close? His breath brushed her cheeks, along with his spicy scent. Wretched man! He had put on cologne! A Mountie wearing cologne. She had never felt undone before. Her knees hadn’t threatened to buckle, perspiration had never pricked up over the back of her neck and her arms, and… She surrendered, throwing herself at him and locking her lips on his.
They remained thus for moments, at once infinite and finite, and when they backed up, breathing heavily, staring at each other stupidly, Merinda’s heart beating so loud and so fast she thought it would pop out of her chest, they were drained of words the moment had soaked up.
For all of his cocksure countenance, even Benny Citrone couldn’t keep steady. He swaggered slightly in those knee-high boots of his.
“Bet Emma Goldman’s never felt like that,” Merinda murmured.
“Hmmm?”
“Oh. Never mind.”
“You know what they say”—he gave her a wink as he wound one of her curls around his finger—“a Mountie always gets his man.”
Merinda rolled her eyes and shoved him back. “Yes, but does he always get his woman?” She spun on her heel and settled back nonchalantly into her armchair, drawing her knees to her chest. “Mrs. Malone!” she hollered, refusing to meet Benny’s starlight eyes until her housekeeper rounded the door frame. “Show the constable out, would you?”
Unfazed, Benny strode toward her. “I’ll be seeing you again, Merinda.”