When the next morning dawned, its light bathing everything it touched in an unearthly glow, I was still restless.

I sat in the office, work entirely forgotten as my fingers turned the ring around and around on my finger, my mind mulling over the ultimate change in my circumstances. The only sound which found my ears was Alice’s fingers tapping lightly on her keyboard as she typed.

Her words bothered me still, and despite wanting to marry Edward more than anything, doubt had begun to creep into my mind unbidden.

I glanced up as a shadow appeared in the corner of my eye and found Edward lingering in the doorway. It seemed he couldn’t do without my presence for long at all, and the thought warmed me from the inside out, extinguishing my uneasiness completely.

“Jane,” he said. “Will you take a walk with me?”

Immediately, I rose from my chair and followed him out into the gallery, hardly aware of Alice’s concerned gaze following our departure.

Emerging outside, he took my hand in his, threading his fingers through mine, and we strolled around the side of the hotel. The sky was clear, the storm, which had cast its drizzle all over the countryside the entirety of yesterday, all but gone. The grass glistened and the flowerbeds had darkened as moisture sank into the soil and boosted the life found there. Thornfield’s gardens were spectacular this time of year.

We strolled through the orchard and wove a lazy path through the hedges until we found ourselves at the very bottom of the yard. It was the same place where Edward had asked me to marry him and the same route I’d planned to take when I was going to flee the morning Blanche had attacked me. Now it looked entirely different.

I faced the remains of the grand chestnut tree, my gaze lingering on the precise cuts the groundskeeper had made with his chainsaw. The ground was littered with chips of wood and debris, the trunk marked with the char the bolt of lightning had wrought.

“It’s a sight, isn’t it?” Edward asked, standing beside me.

“Such power a bolt of lightning holds,” I replied. “Do you think it’s an omen?”

“Hardly. It’s just lightning,” he said with a scoff and strode away. Sitting on the bluestone wall, he patted the space beside him. “Come, Jane. I have something to tell you.”

What could he possibly have to add to the revelations he’d already piled upon me in the last two days? Certainly, I was done for the moment and wouldn’t be able to settle until the wedding.

“Tomorrow, we shall be man and wife,” he said abruptly.

“Tomorrow?” I asked, my pulse speeding up. “But…”

His eyes narrowed, displeased at my reaction. “Why delay?”

“It’s a big thing to be married. You only asked me the day before last.”

“I’m simply done waiting for my life to begin.”

I saw the look on his face, and it was troubled. “Has something happened?”

He shook his head and patted the wall beside him again. I sat as he bade, casting my gaze over the moor beyond.

“Edward, may I ask you a question?”

“What do you wish to know, Jane?”

“You know I was witness to the finality of Blanche’s departure,” I began warily.

He peered at me cautiously. “Proceed…”

“She mentioned your brother and implied something terrible had happened to him. It worries me, Edward. I know nothing of him or your parents. What of your family?”

“I am like you, Jane,” he murmured. “I have none left apart from a few distant relatives who have never made themselves known. My mother passed years ago, my father more recently, and my brother… He has been gone a long time. There is no one who will object to our union if that is what you fret about. We are free to do as we wish.”

I could tell his brother’s passing hurt him more keenly than the loss of his parents, but he’d navigated around mentioning the circumstances with expert precision. Truly, it would take time for all our secrets, especially his, to come to light. Perhaps it was too soon to press on it further.

“Are you well, Jane?”

“Everything in life seems so unreal to me,” I whispered, my voice snatched away by the breeze.

“Except me,” Edward replied. “I am real enough.”

Turning as he grasped my hand in his own, I said, “You are the most phantom-like of all.”

He smiled, raising my hand to his lips. Placing a chaste kiss on my knuckles, he asked, “Is that a dream, Jane?”

Shivering, I nestled closer to his side for warmth. “You are too clever for your own good.”

“Not clever enough to best you.”

How untrue that statement was! He’d bested me in all manner of things, the greatest being the ultimate withholding of his darkest secret, the thing that caused him insurmountable pain. Since the night he’d wrapped his hands around my throat, he hadn’t hurt me again, but I feared the day he would try once more while in the throes of passion. If he did not confide in me, then I wouldn’t be able to help him come to terms with it.

“Edward, if tomorrow is the day, then tonight would you give me one thing?” I asked.

His arm found its way around my back, and he held me against his side. “What would you like, Jane?”

“A secret,” I murmured, and when he tensed, I added, “A little one.”

“A little one?” he echoed. “Dear Jane, by now, you should know I don’t do anything little. I prefer things on a grand scale.”

“Would you humor me?”

He turned his gaze to the moor, his brow darkening with a storm of his own. To me, he was my noble stag, burdened by secrets and determined to love despite them. I loved him and would give him the chance to find the strength to share them with me. Marriage seemed a large thing to give, but give it to him I would.

He thought upon my question for a long moment, and when he spoke, his voice was full of emotion.

“Here is my secret, Jane. I had not fully lived until I felt your lips upon mine and tasted your wicked tongue. You are my salvation.”