“You slyboots! All this while!”
“All this while,” Katherine agreed. “So tell me now, please, just between us, because I love you and you love me, and you’re the one person on earth I’ve entrusted with my confession of those delicious Easter kisses. Is it the truth for you two, Maddy? The truth, or the looking glass?”
“Oh, the truth,” Madeleine said softly. “After how far we’ve come, how could it be anything but the truth? My soul does sting.”
They looked at each other, frosted with light, alike and not, a matched pair and not, two halves of a whole as only sisters could be. Two halves about to follow two acutely divergent paths. And even though that hurt a bit, even though it smarted, it was still all right.
“But that’s a shame about Alasdair.” Madeleine sighed, facing away again. “I seem to recall he was quite rich.”
“Stinking rich,” Katherine said, laughing. “But I never would have been able to stand the Scottish winters, even if his touch did make me melt.”
“It’s a lot of snow.”
“A lot of snow, and a lot of days and nights trapped by the snow. No parties or balls. No dancing with anyone but him.”
“Did I say sagacious before? I definitely meant wily.”
“I will accept your compliment, missus.”
Madeleine linked their arms again, leaning against her sister’s side as the wind brushed by, and the fish smell came and went, and the Noma sliced towards the future.
After a while, she whispered, “I wish I were as brave as you.”
Katherine was leaning back; they’d found their careful balance. “Isn’t that queer? I’ve always wished to be as strong as you.”
The ocean slid past. The moon beamed down, scattered white fireflies across the water.
“Perhaps I’ll become a mermaid instead of all that other nonsense,” Madeleine said to the view. “Being a missus, I mean. Having to cluck.”
Katherine glanced at her.
“Mermaids still get to wear pearls, so that part’s fine. And they live forever, or very nearly forever, don’t they? Enchanted lives that go on and on. No curly piles of hair, however. I’ll wear it down, with a crown of sea flowers.”
“Do mermaids have husbands?” asked a new voice, just behind them.
They both turned, Katherine giving a swift, startled laugh.
“Colonel Astor! You’re not supposed to see the bride before the wedding! It’s terrible luck, you know!”
“I just saw her at dinner.” He joined them at the railing. “And you’ve put me in the awkward position of having to point out that the yacht’s not that big.”
Madeleine smiled up at him, his craggy lavender-and-silver face, and he smiled back. Heat filled her up again, that fine, champagne heat, and her soul did sting.
Butterflies, butterflies, butterflies.
No one is going to have to drag me to the altar.
Her sister hugged her arms over her chest. “Yes, well . . . but there has to be some sort of a bridal time limit. No seeing her after coffee and dessert, I’d say.”
“After our goodnights,” he countered.
“Yes,” agreed Madeleine. “Not till then, at least.”
Katherine paused to take them both in, wise once more. “Hmm. I find I suddenly miss my coat. But I will return soon.”
Her footsteps faded off.
Madeleine lifted a hand to the lapel of Jack’s jacket, running her fingers down the sharp woolen crease. He brought up his to capture her palm against his chest and they stood there like that, connected, gazing into each other’s eyes. His were pale as the moon now, just the same soft silver. His heart beat so strong against her.
“How happy you make me,” he said, unexpected.
She curled her fingers tighter around his. “Good. Because I’ve decided that mermaids definitely have husbands. At least, this one will. So become accustomed to happiness, Colonel Astor.”
“I will,” he said, sounding almost bemused. “I plan to. I will.”
*
They held hands during the ceremony.
She wore a suit of kingfisher blue with a pencil skirt and a cream hat. Her bouquet was a sweet-smelling mass of deeply scarlet roses.
Katherine stood to her left as maid of honor; Vincent served as best man. Her father had walked her down their makeshift aisle, a long, snowy runner laid across the shining floor, vases and vases of American Beauties stationed between the poles lining either side.
A part of her knew that it was cold in the ballroom. That her nose was cold, her cheeks were cold. That the storm brewing beyond the windows, gray and thick and spliced with lightning, might prove to be more than just a little rain. That outside of this chamber, outside of this mansion, waited a phalanx of reporters and photographers, eager for their scraps of fresh news.