He took Caroline's hands in his, looked deep into her beautiful hazel eyes; those merry loving eyes with the riant laugh-folds beneath which reflected her warmth, her caring, giving cheerfulness. In a face as slim and patrician as anyone at Court. For a year over the dreaded thirty, Caroline was as graceful, as lithe and lovely as a swan, sweet as swans-down to touch. No, this was no frumpy matron he'd married; not one to surrender easily to hearty country cooking and stoutness.

Caroline ran the farm better than most men, presented him with a clean, orderly, well-run household as gracious, as stylish, as any great-house in England. Though there had not been time to see it, she swore that the gardens, the new furnishings, the finally finished salon and bedchambers for guests, were marvels. Everything Caroline turned her hand to was marvelous; everyone said so! Since their first tumbledown gatehouse home on New Providence, she'd been a wonder when it came to housewifery, at hosting-a spectacular blend of practical frugality when called for, a commonsensical North Carolina plantation domesticity, allied with a rich planter's, a rich squire's, easy and noble airs.

A sensible woman, well-read and so easy to talk to, about silly things, about matters of import beyond the stillroom, nursery, and bloody fashion! Tongue-in-cheek waggish, she could be, too; a grown woman's wry and witty waggishness, not the prattlings of some girlish chit fresh in her first Season in Society, still redolent of milk-pap and primer-level humor.

Light brown, sandy-blond hair, still distressed into stylish witches' ringlets, for "а la victime" was still all the "go"; a style that bared a graceful but strong neck and shoulders.

And I've cheated on her? he wondered; to himself, of course! Why, a man'd be a total …!

"It's time, I fear, beloved." He sighed heavily. "Else we'd never, and…"