It was too much. Maggie hung up the receiver and turned away, chin high, meaning to escape. She had to succeed as an actress now, for there was no hope of ever earning a certificate.

“Maggie?” Reeve’s voice stopped her, unexpectedly gentle. “What is it?”

Maggie looked back at him, her eyes brimming, and said, “You’ll be pleased to learn that I have just been shunned by the one woman who could have given me another means of earning my living.”

Reeve was standing directly in front of her now, and he inclined his head to one side. “You don’t want to be an actress?” he asked, and he sounded genuinely concerned.

Maggie wanted only to be Reeve’s wife, at that moment at least, but of course she couldn’t say that outright. She dashed at the embarrassing tears with the back of one hand and said plaintively, “I was only trying to find my friend Tansy.”

“The one you were with in Parramatta?” Reeve asked, and now his hands were resting on her shoulders. Maggie was beginning to hope that he’d forgiven her after all.

She nodded and sniffled once, quite inelegantly.

“That’s easy, Maggie. She works for my friend Adam Beckwith. I can drop you off there on my way to the wharf.”

Maggie remembered that Reeve was going to sea, and a new fear overtook her. “Will your journey be a long one—or—or dangerous?”

Reeve smiled, and his hands rested on the sides of her face. One thumb smoothed her tremulous lower lip and Maggie felt a shiver go through her. “Whalers are not crafts built for sight-seeing,” he said quietly. “I’ll be gone a week or two, I suppose.”

“Reeve—” Maggie paused, swallowed. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t tell you about Jamie—”

He tipped his head to kiss her lips, sending another spasm of desire flowing through her body, in the wake of the first. “You did what you had to do, love,” he said. “I know that now.”

“Then you’re not angry with me anymore?”

Reeve’s wonderful eyes were fixed on the ceiling as though he were pondering the question. But there was a twitch of amusement at one corner of his mouth. “I didn’t say that, Yank. After all, you just kicked me soundly in the shin.”

He drew Maggie close and held her, his strong hands splayed on her back. Maggie’s breasts were touching his chest, and even that much contact made her nipples harden beneath her clothes. “Aren’t you going to say that you’re sorry for kicking me too?” he prompted.

Biting back a grin, Maggie shook her head from side to side. “You deserved it. After all, you’ve given me a room the size of a mousehole.”

“I think there might have been some mistake,” Reeve said, pretending to be very serious. “Would you mind showing me this room?”