“Nicholas will have to leave here,” Lily said. “Or hire himself out. Or starve.”

To her back Simon said, “Aye. Are you sorry?”

The word took her by surprise, and she laughed. A harsh laugh, a small explosion of displeasure and unhappiness wound into a knot.

“I suppose I'm sorry for what he's lost. He had such dreams for the orchard, and it's been stolen away from him.”

To that Simon wisely said nothing at all. After a moment Lily said, “And I'm angry. At Jemima, and at him.”

“He'll get his divorce now, if he goes back to the courts.”

Lily turned and saw that Simon had not moved at all. He stood just where he had been on the other side of the table, his hands at his sides, his expression carefully, purposefully blank.

“You hadn't thought of that?”

“No,” Lily said, flushing. She hadn't thought of it, but Simon doubted that: she saw it in the way his eyes met hers and then lowered. She said. “It doesn't matter, anyway.”

“You could have him then, if you still want him. No doubt your cousin would give you this house to live in. He could start over.”

Surprise left Lily wordless, just for a moment. There were many things she might have said, all rushing through her head at once, but only one thing that she must say, just now. That Simon was waiting for her to say: that she had no more interest in Nicholas Wilde, and were he free to marry. It was what she should say, what she wanted to say, but somehow it wouldn't ring completely true. Nicholas had been too long a part of her life to dispose of him so easily.

“Ah,” Simon said. A small sound, no more than a sigh. He turned then, and started toward the door.

“No,” Lily said. “Don't go.”

He was angry, she saw it in the set of his shoulders.

“And why should I stay? I don't care to hear your apologies, Lily, or your explanations. You want your apple man, then have him.”

He was through the swinging door before she could stop him, but Lily flew after Simon and caught up to him in the hall.

“Simon,” she said. “Don't be foolish.”

That stopped him in mid-stride, though he didn't turn to her.

She said, “I can't love somebody I don't respect.” Her voice came out much softer than she intended, with a crackling quality. Suddenly Lily felt a little dizzy, and she reached out for the wall, pressed her fingers to it to find her balance.

“What is it you're saying?”

Irritation flooded through her. “You know what I'm saying. After the ice storm, you know exactly what I'm saying.”

He turned abruptly and advanced on her with such contained fury that she backed up in alarm until she bumped into the wall.

“Don't play with me, lass. Tell me now, do you still love Wilde?”

He was glowering down at her, his dark eyes narrowed in anger or pain or some strange combination of both. Something small and warm blossomed in Lily to see those things: clear evidence of how important she was to him, that he wanted her. And she was ashamed to have pushed him so far.

She said, “I will always be fond of him. But no, I can't say that I love him. Not anymore.”

Simon bowed his head over her and put a hand on the wall near her head. He leaned into her then, the great width and fact of him blocking out what little light there was in the cool dark of the hall.

“And?” he said, his gaze hard and unflinching.

What she wanted to do was grab him by the ears and kiss him, but he was so close that she would have to struggle to raise her arms.

“And what? You want me to say that I love you. I could say it, Simon, but I don't know what it means. I like you, I respect you. I think about you all the time—”

“That's lust,” he said sharply.

“Yes,” she said, her voice creaking a little with the effort to maintain her composure. “Lust enough to burn down the world. Will you kiss me now, or must I beg?”

A sound escaped him as he bent to her, a gasp that a man might make as he died, full of desperation and hope. The last thing she saw before his mouth touched hers was a flash of his dimples, and then there was nothing in the world but the taste of him, his textures and smells and the fierce wanting that rose up between them.

“You do love me,” he said, pressing himself to her. “Even if you're afraid to own it.”

“Have it your way,” Lily said.

“I'll have you any way I can get you.” He laughed against her mouth and held her pinned to the wall, kissed her into senselessness and she kissed him back, deep kisses and passionate, the kind of kisses that she dreamed about and that woke her, trembling and covered with sweat. His kisses, and no one else's.

When he pulled away she let out a sorrowful sound.

“Shall I carry you up the stairs?” he said. “Or will you walk?”

“Up the stairs?” Lily echoed stupidly, her gaze fixed on his mouth.

“Aye, up the stairs. There must be a bed in the house someplace.”

“No,” Lily said, her hands wiggling their way beneath his mantle, pulling at his clothes impatiently. “All the chambers are empty.”

He must have lost track of the conversation then, for he lifted her up to kiss her again and they went on like that for a long time, and then Lily was being danced down the hall between kisses, trailing bits of clothing. The kitchen door swung to let them through and swung shut again and then Simon lifted her and she found herself on the table with him standing between her knees, her skirts already half raised.