To say Julius was confused was something of an understatement. He hadn't proposed to Eloise for more than a decade, hadn't had a brush with death any time in recent months.

"Two days ago," he offered, concern in his tone, "I went to work at the Ministry. I was in office all day, took my supper at Black's, and returned home shortly before midnight. No danger, and I did not visit you."

Julius did not owe her any details of his day, but Eloise seemed so certain, and he had loved her for far too long to simply dismiss her, however agitated she was. Were it not for her mourning, his sister's need to find a husband, it was altogether possible that Julius would have insisted she elope with him—likely when he had first seen her at the beach of the Sanditon. Everything that had kept them apart for the past fourteen years was either dead or irrelevant, but new hinderances had bloomed in their wake.

And Julius was very certain he would remember both a near-death experience and a proposal.