Diamond in the Rough

  Clara giggled and tucked her head beneath his arm.

  “You are well? I’m afraid I wasn’t as gentle as I’d planned to be.”

  “I am perfectly well. A small twinge.” She kissed his shoulder. “Do you know what I would like to do now?” Positioning herself half on his chest, she tucked her arms beneath her chin and gazed at him.

  “I have an idea.” He laughed. “The garden.”

  “Oh, could we? It’s only that it’s still quite early and the sun won’t set for hours yet. I have such plans, Nathaniel.”

  After they’d freshened up and Clara assured Nathaniel at least a half dozen times that she was perfectly capable of walking—even after their vigorous “exercise” (he’d chuckled at that)—they went through the house and out the back entrance to what could only be described as the saddest bit of garden Clara had ever seen.

  “It needs me,” she said as they walked toward the overgrown, weed-filled shrubbery. Then she stopped still, her eyes going up to a wrought-iron arch positioned over a break in the rock wall that separated the lawn from what would one day be her garden. There, with vines already twining around it, in lovely scrolling letters, were the words, “Clara’s Garden.” It was not a new addition; the vines were proof of that.

  When she turned to him, he gave her a sheepish grin. “I was perhaps overly confident of my abilities to make you forgive me.”

  In that moment, any lingering anger was swept away. That time in the garden, it had been real, it hadn’t just been all a ruse. This small gesture showed he understood how important that garden was, how important her gardener was to her.

  “Do barons work in their gardens?”

  He smiled. “They do. Alongside their beautiful wives.”

  “Mr. Smee will help us,” Clara said, feeling a bit choked up thinking about their mentor whom they would never meet.

  “He already has,” Nathaniel said, and he pushed ahead, stepping over twigs and overgrown grass that pushed through the long-neglected brick path. “Look here.”

  There, tucked behind the stone wall, was a long line of plants, a huge variety, all still in their burlap, waiting to be planted in the garden.

  Clara gasped and ran to the plants, thrilled by what she was seeing. “All from Mr. Smee’s garden?”

  “A wedding present from his son.”

  It was silly, really, how seeing these plants made her heart sing, made her eyes tear. Or perhaps not so silly. Her husband, a baron, an aristocrat, understood how very important it was that she marry her simple gardener, her Mr. Emory. It seemed she had, after all.

  About the Author

  Jane Goodger lives in Rhode Island with her husband and three children. Jane, a former journalist, has written and published numerous historical romances. When she isn’t writing, she’s reading, walking, playing with her kids, or anything else completely unrelated to cleaning a house. You can visit her website at www.janegoodger.com.