"Wrong fer being in love?" her brows rose. "If ye must know, I never loved the clock-maker, and he left me anyway. As far as Mister Vaughn goes, he's been an absolute gentleman and has courted me only after I'd been a widow fer a year, so there is no reason to lecture me fer doin' it proper like." She paused when the babies both started babbling at each other from the blanket near the cool hearth. "And ye would know all of this if ye hadn't run off yet again without a word."