HI Folks! I am hoping you are enjoying this second chance at love for Eliza and William. Here is the gist so far: Eliza and William have been put together to dance by the Fitzroys. They dance for a little while then the feelings and the need to clear the air not only from their morning accidental meeting but for the last 29 years since William left causes Eliza to use her pick locking skills to sneak to a room in the hotel where the ceremonies have been completed. William and Eliza catch up with each other more fully each showing their deep affection for each other. William asks Eliza and all-important question and shortly after an interruption ensues.

Honorable Mention

Chapter 6

The Question

Eliza and William lay on the bed. In the room there was no sound but their breathing. Faintly downstairs in the ball room you could still hear the strains of music playing.

William still lay holding her. His heart was hammering in his chest, but he had never felt such peace for a very long time. He was not sure how long they had been in this room or how long they had lain with each other. He wanted to remove her formal long brown and yellow gown. Her hair was already tantalizingly unpinned.

"Eliza?" William ventured. His lips were in her hair and he kissed her forehead.

"Yes, William?" She raised her head slowly and unclasped his hand unbuttoning one more button on his already unbuttoned shirt. She could not help but take a deep breath as she ran a finger down the center of his chest. He was still in remarkable shape for a man. Smooth muscled flesh. She attempted to go further but his instead her lips had placed a kiss along the same path her fingers had trailed. She placed her head on William's chest and her arm around his waist. Her head dipped with heaving of his chest and his deep sigh at her from her touch.

"Will you marry me?"

Eliza's head popped up so fast, William thought she would get whiplash.

"Really? You still wish to marry me after all these years?" She smiled excitedly and tried to keep a tear from rolling down her cheek in her happiness and disbelief. Disbelief that he was here lying beside her. His arms had held her warmly. Happiness because William still wanted and loved her and wished her to be with him always as his wife.

William pulled himself to a sitting position. He shirt loosening and opening in the process fully revealing his smooth skin and somewhat hairy chest. Eliza was on tender hooks fighting the urge to touch him again and love him wholly. Unfortunately, she had not felt that for a man since William. Her own husband, whom she had loved as a good and faithful friend, could never excite her sexually as this man whom she had known all of her life.

"Eliza?" William asked taking her hand. He examined her wedding rings on her hand. He then kissed her hand lovingly and held it forcing her to scoot up the bed and sit beside him against the headboard.

"I still have the ring I was going to give you if you had accepted my proposal and come to New York."

"You didn't give it to your wife?"

"No," William answered quietly. "I always remembered the description of the type of engagement ring you would like plus the box it would come in. I had tucked in the back of my mind and never forgot it. " He kissed her hand again and then reached over to kiss her lips. "I put it in the bank in a safe deposit box."

"Did Ellen know about it?"

"No. That was one of the few secrets I kept hidden from her. When I asked her to marry me, I told her to pick out a ring and she picked out a very different ring."

"As you can see, my husband had no idea what type of ring I wanted. Nor did he ask me to choose. This…" Eliza said taking her hand from William's and removing the ring…" is a family heirloom. Apparently he did not take this from his wife. He told me he gave her rings to Sophia as keepsakes. He very lovingly asked me to marry him after he had culled the family jewels to see what he wanted me to wear as his intended."

"I suppose Sophia noticed that you always wore your mother's wedding ring. You're not wearing it now."

"No, it's in my jewelry box. I thought it would look silly once I had my own wedding band. I planned to give my rings to Alex, Jr. if he finds a young woman he wishes to marry."

William smiled and chuckled. "How similar. I gave Ellen's engagement ring to Thomas for safekeeping if he wishes to marry. However, I gave Ellen's wedding band to my daughter as Henry had given you your mother's."

"My, William, I had forgotten how really sentimental a man you were."

"You still haven't answered me, Eliza. Will you marry me?"

Eliza let out a laugh and said, 'I'm so sorry, William. I thought I had given you my answer."

"No."

Eliza rose onto her knees and faced William. She tenderly stroked his face and then kissed him.

"Yes, William. I will marry you," she stated softly and succinctly for only his ears.

He kissed her with a relish and a joy he had not experienced for ages. He was contented and glad when Ellen agreed to marry him, but William had experienced nothing like this joy. The birth of his children were the exception.

This still beautiful woman and old friend whom he had longed for many a long night was finally going to be his wife.

Eliza smiled as William kissed her so hard. She laughed like a young woman! She had loved William since the first time she kissed him. Maybe it was only puppy love then, at 16, but the minute she kissed him there had been no other.

As William had been, Eliza had been content when she had married Alexander Blake and he had been a good husband to her. They had been happy. Alexander had allowed her to work and once in a while when a case did find them crossing paths her husband would authorize working with Scotland Yard. They had been a good team.

She had loved Alexander but she had not been "in love" with him. Still, he had given her a son she whom loved very much and given her a daughter whom Eliza had come to adore.

For the moment that her wonderful fiancé had stopped kissing her, the realization hit Eliza like a lightning strike. She exclaimed, "William we have a lot of planning to do!"

"Yes, we do, my love. I shall send a cable to Thomas and Camille and let them know I have been delayed here in England," William said as he kissed her again.

"We do have a lot of things to work out. I will have to tell Alex, so he can take over the agency and Sophia will need to be told."

For just a moment in all the excitement of the proposal and the answer, they had forgotten how long they had been locked in that room.

Suddenly, the door burst opened! Alex, Jr. stood there with his own lock-picking tools.

"Oh, mother! I thought you may have come up here. Francesca tried to stop me and then so did Oliver but neither could. I thought something was wrong. This room is usually used only if someone is ill."

The air in the room suddenly changed from one of love to intense wariness. William looked at Eliza and noticed how she had tensed. William was surprised as well but their was another mild look of embarrassment on Eliza's face. William's shirt was still gaping open and Eliza's hair was still mussed. Other than that there was really no other signs of anything untoward.

Eliza embarrassed began to climb off the bed and explain to Alex when William interjected, hopped off the bed while re buttoning his shirt, and said, "I apologize Mr. Blake. Your mother and I still had some catching up to do after our dance, so she suggested we come up here."

Eliza smiled at William's explanation. For one moment, Eliza thought all would be very well until she noticed the mild antagonistic look on her son's face. The only time that Eliza ever noticed that Alex, Jr. looked like Alex, Sr. was when he was upset about a situation he felt was indecent or not proper. He was a bit of a prude, her son, which was unlike his father who would see the logic in things and then make his judgment. The weighing of a situation seemed to have bypassed their son. So Eliza immediately expected Alex, Jr. to jump all over William.

"Mother, you have conversed enough. It is past 11 pm and our carriage will be here to take us home."

William questioned the tone of this young man who looked so much like Eliza but sounded very much like a domineering male. Times had changed somewhat William thought. He also thought this odd behavior coming from Eliza's son. Then again, he had never met the young man's father.

"William, where are you staying? We could drop you there on our way?" Eliza asked while she gave her son the evil eye. She did not take this kind of behavior from his father, and she would definitely not take it from their son.

William had a better idea.

"Mr. Blake, would you mind if I bring your mother home? You must understand we have over twenty years to catch up and we've barely scratched the surface."

Suspiciously, Alex, Jr. looked at William and then at his mother.

"Under normal circumstances, I would protest but I know she has known you all her life. That would be fine. I do want to take Julietta home."

Eliza's eyebrow rose. "Julietta? Did her parents forget her?"

Alex's face finally relaxed and he said, "No, her mother was feeling a little tired and wanted to go home a bit earlier, so I said we would take her home in our coach. "

"Oh, how very kind of you, Alex. Then in that case you would not want your mother to share the coach," Eliza suggested.

Alex still had a mild disgruntled look as if he were leaving his mother with a brute instead of an old friend which from what Alex could tell by their embarrassment Chief William Wellington meant a lot more than just an old friend to his mother. However, he would let it pass this time. She was his mother and if his mother trusted William Wellington Alex would also….this time.

"See you at home, mother. Chief Wellington. Goodnight." Alex then bowed stiffly. He closed the door behind him.

William gave a little chuckle.

"That was unexpected."

"And unusual. Alex has developed a tendency to want to protect me since his father died."

"I can understand that. If anyone ever needed protection from yourself, it was you," William laughed and smiled. He took two steps and put his arms around Eliza's waist and pulled her to him. Her arms went around his neck and she stood on her tiptoes as William's head dipped and he kissed her tenderly this time. He lifted her off the floor just a tiny bit.

"Do I need protection from you, Chief Wellington," Eliza whispered.

He breathed in deeply and sighed.

"Yes, you might."

"At last," Eliza whispered back and kissed him deeply. The butterflies were fluttering again as William held her so close to him. I never got butterflies when Alex kissed me. Not fair to your dead husband Eliza. OMG! I can't help it though!

"I want you, Eliza."

Eliza laid her head on his chest and closed her eyes at the soothing sound of his heartbeat.

"I want you too, William."

"I was thinking when I told your son about catching up that we could walk to my hotel which is not far from here."

Eliza looked up at William and said, "Do I run the risk of scathing gossip and my son's wrath if I show up disheveled at the breakfast table?" She flirted smiling widely.

There's that twinkle in her eye that was missing earlier today. If she did not listen to her father, I'm sure she's not going to obey her son. Besides I have to be sure to put him at ease. I just wonder what my children will think when I bring Eliza home.

Looking deep into her eyes as they swayed together in the dimly lit room.

"Yes, you do," William whispered.

"Then…yes…" Eliza said and kissed William deeply on the mouth.