Victoria nodded.
“Big enough for a man?”
Her lips twitched. “I'd say so.”
“How utterly convenient.” Robert picked up Eversleigh by his collar and the seat of his pants, and shoved him halfway out the window. “Last time you attacked my wife, I believe I told you I'd tear you from limb to limb if you repeated your insults.”
“She wasn't your wife then,” Eversleigh spat out.
Robert slugged him in the stomach, then turned to Victoria and said, “It's amazing how good that feels. Would you like give it a try?”
“No, thank you. I would have to touch him, you see.”
“Very wise,” Robert murmured. Turning his attention back to Eversleigh, he said, “My marriage has left me in remarkable good humor, and it is for that reason alone that I do not kill you right now. But if you should approach my wife ever again, I will not hesitate to put a bullet between your eyes. Do I make myself clear?”
Eversleigh may have tried to nod, but it was hard to tell as he was hanging upside down outside the window.
“Do I make myself clear?” Robert roared. Victoria actually took a step back. She'd had no idea he was still so furious; he'd been keeping such a firm control on his emotions.
“Yes, damn you!” Eversleigh yelled.
Robert dropped him.
Victoria rushed to the window. “Was it very far to the ground?” she asked.
Robert looked out. “Not so far. But do you happen to know if the Lindworthys have dogs?”
“Dogs? No, why?”
He smiled. “It looks a little messy out there. I was just curious.”
Victoria clapped her hand over her mouth. “Did you…? Did we…?”
“We certainly did. Eversleigh's valet is going to have a devil of a time washing his hair.”
There was no holding in her laughter at that one. Victoria doubled over with giggles, managing to catch her breath only long enough to gasp, “Move, so I can see!” She peered out the window just in time to catch Eversleigh shaking his head like a dog as he quit the scene, vicious invective streaming from his mouth all the while. She pulled her head back in the window. “It certainly smelled noxious,” she said.
But Robert's face had grown serious. “Victoria,” he began awkwardly, “What you said… Did you…”
“Yes, I meant it,” she said, taking his hands in hers. “I love you. I just wasn't able to say it before now.”
He blinked. “You needed to knee a man in the groin before you could tell me you loved me?”
“No!” Then she thought about his words. “Well, yes, in a way. I've always been so fearful that you would run my life. But I've learned that having you with me doesn't mean that I can't take care of myself just as well.”
“You certainly made short work of Eversleigh.”
Her chin lifted a notch and she allowed herself a satisfied smile. “Yes, I did, didn't I? And do you know, but I think I couldn't have done it without you.”
“Victoria, you did this all on your own. I wasn't even present.”
“Yes, you were.” She picked up his hand and placed it over her heart. “You were here. And you made me strong.”
“Torie, you're the strongest woman I know. You always have been.”
She didn't even try to put a halt to the tears rolling down her cheeks. “I'm so much better with you than I am without you. Robert, I love you so much.”
Robert leaned down to kiss her, then realized that the door to the retiring room was still hanging on its hinge. He shut the connecting door and locked it. “There,” he murmured in what he hoped was his best rakish voice. “Now I have you all to myself.”
“You certainly do, my lord. You certainly do.”
Many minutes later, Victoria pulled her mouth a fraction of an inch away from his. “Robert,” she said, “do you realize—”
“Hush, woman, I'm trying to kiss you, and there's damned little room to maneuver in here.”
“Yes, but do you realize—”
He cut her off with his mouth. Victoria surrendered to his kiss for another minute, but then she pulled away again. “What I wanted to tell you—”
He let out a dramatic sigh. “What?”
“Someday our children are going to ask us what the most meaningful moment of our lives was. And they're going to want to know where it happened.”
Robert lifted his head and regarded the cramped washroom, then chuckled. “Darling, we're just going to have to lie and say we traveled to China, because no one would believe this.”
Then he kissed her again.
Epilogue
Several months later Victoria was watching snowflakes through the window of the Macclesfield carriage as she and Robert returned home from supper at Castleford. Robert hadn't wanted to visit his father, but she had insisted that they needed to make peace with their families before they could think about beginning a family of their own.
Victoria's reunion with her own father had occurred two weeks earlier. It had been difficult at first, and Victoria still wouldn't say that their relationship was completely repaired, but at least the healing process had begun. After this visit to Castleford, she felt that Robert and his father had reached a similar point in their own relationship.
She let out a soft sigh and turned back to the carriage's interior. Robert had dozed off, his dark lashes sinfully long against his cheeks. She reached out to brush away a lock of his hair, and his eyelids fluttered open.
He yawned. “Did I fall asleep?”
“Just for a moment,” Victoria said. Then she yawned, too. “Goodness, it must be catching.”