They were both stunned by this admission, so they said nothing and ate more, tearing apart oranges from Spain that were fragrant and sweet. Then they discussed their situation and the terms of their living arrangement, including the fact that he must not love her, it was too dangerous to do so. She thought back to the gallows, how she had looked at John Hathorne and set a curse upon anyone who might fall in love with a member of the Owens family. She’d sought to protect herself and her daughter and any of their descendants from the grief she’d known.

“You can’t be in love with me,” Maria told Samuel.

“If you insist, I will say that I’m not.”

The butter in a dish on the table had already begun to melt, a sign that someone in the house was in love.

“Why is that happening?” Maria asked when she saw how it melted.

“When it’s hot, things melt.”

“I see.” Maria was burning as well.

“What’s love?” Samuel shrugged. “You can’t hold it in your hand. You can’t see it. It’s something you feel. Perhaps it’s not even real.” He thought his argument was excellent, until Maria laughed at him.

“How many women have you told this story to?” she wanted to know.

Then Samuel was serious. “Only you.”

With that, he won the argument and they went up to bed. Maria insisted they make no vows to each other, no contracts of love, no promises, nothing that could call down the curse. Of course he agreed; he would have agreed to anything in order to have her. When Maria woke the next morning, she gazed at Samuel’s broad back as he slept, and she felt something that she couldn’t name in the pit of her stomach. Perhaps it was desire, or affection, or perhaps it was more, the thing you couldn’t hold in your hand or see with your own eyes, but was there all the same.