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He glanced over at her, surprise on his features. “Everyone’s climbed trees, haven’t they?”

She laughed at his incredulity. “There weren’t a heap of ancient oaks in my neck of the woods.”

“Come on, there must have been trees.”

She pressed her teeth into her lip, lifted one shoulder. “I guess I didn’t look up.”

He stopped walking and surprised her by pressing a finger into her chin, touching her so lightly she thought she’d imagined it, before dropping his hand away again. “I think you looked way up,” he said. “Past the trees, past the sky, all the way to the stars. That’s how you got here.”

Her heart soared into those same stars at his lavish praise, her insides tightening now with a sense of being not just seen but appreciated.

She had to look away, to break the eye contact that was starting to make her chest compress in a way that was somewhat painful. She glanced toward the house, breathed out slowly, as her eyes traced the ivy that scrambled over so much of these walls. There were little leaded glass dormer windows lined up along the top, five of them in total.

“Our playroom,” he said, following her gaze. “The nanny’s room.”

“You had a nanny?”

“We had two.”

Tia wrinkled her nose. “You really are preposterously fancy, do you know that?”

He grinned; her heart thudded. “Don’t you know I’m a real-life Lord?”

“I have it on good authority you’ll one day be an Earl.”

“And you’ll be a Lady. In fact, you already are.”

Her smile slipped. “Tell me you’ve told your parents about me?”

He was very still.

“Hamish,” she groaned.

“I told the Earl I wasn’t coming alone,” he defended. “I thought this was news better delivered in person.”

She rolled her eyes.

“It’s not something one can easily broach on the phone,” he said, starting to walk once more. She fell into step beside him, silently conceding that he had somewhat of a point.

“So, you’re just going to announce me as your wife?”

“As Lady Ashcombe, yes,” he bumped his hip lightly against hers to show he was joking. Her pulse fired.

“You know, just a little text to at least foreshadow my existence might have greased the wheels…” her voice trailed off to nothing as she realised she’d lost him completely. He’d stopped walking, abruptly, so she turned around, frowning. “What is it? Bee sting? Snake? Spider?”

He didn’t answer, but his Adam’s apple shifted, his eyes focused on a spot somewhere over her shoulder. She spun around again, just in time to see a quick movement in the rose gardens.

A hand, an arm, the rest of the person was concealed by a bush. But Hamish swore, under his breath.

She narrowed her gaze. “What is it?”

He didn’t have to answer. The person moved, stepping out of the bush and holding a bunch of perfect roses in front of her to admire, then she lifted them to her nose and inhaled.

And even though they’d never met, Tia would have recognised those long, blonde curls and the perfect honey tan anywhere.

She looked like one of the photos Tia had seen online come to life, as though someone had waved a magic wand over the computer screen and voila, here she was. Wearing a floating white dress and Hunter boots, and all those bangles, it was as though the rose garden had somehow birthed her into being.

Tia had lived in the world long enough to know that men found her attractive. But hers was an aesthetic of untouchable neatness, of couture and buttoned-up professionalism, of being immaculate and perfectly presented at all times and suddenly she felt like a faded piece of paper, as though she’d never be even half as real or as vibrant as the woman in front of her.