Sunshine filtered through heavy-leaved trees, dappling the graves that lay beneath a blanket of green. Beyond, in the distance, the roof of the White House could barely be seen. But here, in this cemetery just outside Georgetown, it was quiet and serene.
Celia knelt beside her mother’s grave, sunlight gleaming on her lovely blond hair. Standing behind her, Colter didn’t speak, but waited patiently. She looked so vulnerable, so sad, her slender shoulders shaking slightly with remembered grief. He wanted to ease her pain but knew there was nothing he could say.
Finally she stood up, turned toward him with a faint smile; her cheeks were still wet. “I wanted her to know how happy I am now, and that she will never be forgotten.”
He held out his arm and she stepped into his embrace. The faint, familiar scent of lemon verbena wafted from her hair, and he held her tightly.
“It will be dark soon,” he said softly, “and there’s still one more grave to visit. Do you feel up to it?”
“Yes, yes, of course I do. I’m with child, I’m not an invalid, my love!”
“Perhaps, but you’re my wife, and I’ve sworn never to let anything happen to you again.”
She paused to look up at him, green eyes still shiny with her tears. “That’s a promise you may not always be able to keep, Colter. You know that. It’s enough that we live and love and have our lives ahead of us. We cannot direct fate, but we can live each day as if it will be our last, and love as much as we can.”
“That,” he said, “will be easy with you.”
He kept his arm around her shoulders as they visited the grave of Old Peter, and Celia knelt to place flowers atop the green mound. It was a catharsis of sorts, this farewell to those who’d meant so much to her, and he understood it.
Hadn’t he laid to rest his own ghosts? Even the specter of his father had at last faded from his life, a memory that he could now put from his mind. All the old ghosts were fading, and before he’d left England, he’d been able to reconcile with his mother as well. He understood the reasons for her deception, even as he loathed the necessity for it. She’d suffered humiliation for years, and the thought of one more prompted her to that infamous pact with Philip. She just hadn’t realized that Easton was cut from the same cloth as her husband, both of them completely ruthless in gaining their own ends.
“Now,” Celia said when she returned to him, “I’m ready to leave. It’s time to let them rest, time for us to live.”
Together, they left the shaded shelter of ancient oaks and walked beneath an approving sun that beamed down on them, granting peace and promising a bright tomorrow.