‘Goodbye, sweet Ellena,’ he said softly, smiling sadly at her.
She inhaled sharply. ‘Braedan, you know I’m against marrying again?’
‘Yes.’ He nodded, pain flickering across his features. ‘I know and I understand. There’s no need for you to explain any more.’ He sighed. ‘I don’t wish to be rude, but I would prefer it if you left now.’
‘But I have one more thing to say,’ she protested, taking a step towards him so that only a whisper of air separated them.
‘I’m not sure I’m strong enough to hear it,’ he admitted.
This close she could see that his eyes were filled with sadness, and her heart ached for him.
‘I want to tell you that I’m only against being forced into marriage for alliance purposes. I’d quite happily marry for love.’
Braedan froze. Only the steady rise and fall of his chest showed he hadn’t turned to stone.
She waited.
‘Say something...’ she whispered eventually.
‘Ellena...’ he murmured, pulling her towards him and brushing her jaw with his lips.
He shivered as she ran her fingertips over his chest.
‘Something else...’ she breathed as his fingers stole into her hair and down over her back.
She felt his laugh whisper across her cheek.
‘I love you,’ he said, as his fingers found the ties to her tunic and began to pull them free.
‘Really?’
She gasped as he pulled the tunic from her body and dumped it on the ground.
‘I am amazed you even have to ask,’ he said, and laughed as he nudged her towards his bed.
Her fingers traced the contours of his chest, doubt rushing through her despite the physical evidence that he desired her.
‘I’m Ogmore’s ugly daughter...tall and reedy like a sapling. I’m only useful for making good alliances and that’s if you can ignore the fact that I’m headstrong and opinionated.’
‘Don’t forget bossy,’ said Braedan as he pulled her dress over her head, throwing it in the direction of her abandoned tunic. ‘And stubborn. And lacking even a grain of sense.’
Laughter gurgled out of her. ‘I am amazed that you could love such a harpy.’
Braedan stood back to look at her and she fought the urge to cover her naked body with her hands. He’d said he loved her and she believed him. It shone fiercely from his eyes, making her knees tremble at the enormity of what was happening to them both.
‘You are so beautiful,’ he said. ‘You’re tall, yes. But I could hardly love a short woman. I wouldn’t know what to do with her. As for reedy...’ His hands traced the outline of her body, leaving her skin burning with desire. ‘Once you may have been, but now you have a figure to make men weep.’
He pulled her towards him and brought his mouth down to hers, kissing her deeply and thoroughly, leaving her in no doubt that he believed what he was saying even if no one else could see the beauty he described.
‘As for your personality,’ he said as his lips left hers and travelled down her neck, ‘you are kind, passionate and thoughtful.’
His stubble brushed the sensitive skin of her breast and she moaned softly.
‘You’re forgiving and ferociously intelligent,’ he said as he continued his journey down her body.
Her knees turned liquid as he knelt before her, and it was only the strength of his arms wrapped around her waist that stopped her from sinking to the floor.
‘And if you sometimes rush headlong into danger without a second thought, it’s only because you care so passionately.’
His words whispered against her thigh.
Her body quivered with anticipation.
She hadn’t come to his room for this. She’d come to find out whether he really did love her. But now that she was here, in his arms, she knew she couldn’t leave until he’d made her body sing with desire once again.
He placed the softest of kisses against her centre and she moaned.
He smiled against her. And then she could only feel as his lips and tongue moved against her sensitive skin. The pressure building within her took her by surprise with its intensity. She called out his name as pleasure shot through her, starting at her centre and travelling through her whole body, leaving her breathless.
He stood and lifted her into his arms. She fell against his chest, limp and boneless.
He laid her reverently on the bed and stood gazing down at her, a soft smile playing over his lips. She held out a hand to him and he took it, before joining her on the bed, lying next to her and gently trailing his fingers down her neck and over the swell of her breasts.
‘I’m not afraid,’ she whispered.
Whatever expression he saw on her face must have reassured him, because he brought his mouth down to hers and began to kiss her once more. She ran her hands over his chest, desperate to touch every inch of him.
Her fingers tugged at the material at his waist. ‘The rest of your clothes...’ she murmured as his lips travelled along her jaw.
He huffed out a laugh and quickly shrugged off his braies, throwing them to the floor and pulling her tightly towards him so that every inch of her body was against his.
He pressed another kiss to her mouth as he moved over her, his solid weight pushing her into the mattress.
‘I need you,’ she said, squirming beneath him as his tongue teased her nipples.
‘I love you,’ he said, and groaned as he entered her, slowly filling her up. ‘I love you,’ he said again as he began to move, slowly at first but with increasing urgency as she responded.
She pushed her fingers into his hair and pulled his mouth down to hers. His tongue swept into her mouth, plunging in and moving in a steady rhythm that matched his hips.
She held on to him tightly. Her movements became frantic and jerky. Desperate moans fell from her lips. He pulled her arms above her head, lifting his own head so that he could look into her eyes.
‘You’re so beautiful,’ he ground out.
She shattered again, crying out as her world fell apart in an instant.
He followed her on a growl, collapsing against her as shudders ran through him.
They lay like that for an unending moment, their heavy breathing filling the air. Then his head settled against her breast as he pinned her to the bed with his weight.
‘I should move,’ he said eventually.
‘Don’t. I like feeling you there.’
She stroked her fingers through his hair and felt a shudder run through him.
‘I love you too,’ she said.
He planted a soft kiss between her breasts, his beard tickling her soft skin.
‘Despite your stubbornness and your arrogant belief that you’re always right,’ she went on.
His laughter rocked the mattress and made her smile.
‘I love your bravery, your loyalty and your innate nobility.’ Her fingers traced the path of his scars. ‘And I love your face,’ she said softly.
He kissed her fingers as they skimmed his lips. Then he heaved himself off her and curled his large body around her.
‘It’s just as well. This whole encounter would be awkward if you’d come to tell me you’d decided to marry the Earl of Borwyn.’
She threw back her head and laughed, pleased to see the answering grin on his face.
As her laughter died away his expression sobered. ‘But we still have to tell your father that we are going to marry. It won’t be easy, my love. I’m not the man he would hope for you. But I will have you—with or without his consent. Now that I know you love me I feel able to conquer the world.’
Ellena smiled and touched his face. ‘We don’t have to worry about that. We already have his approval.’
‘What?’ he demanded, sitting bolt upright.
She laug
hed at his comically wide eyes. Joy bubbled up within her. ‘My father has already given his permission for us to marry. Apparently all those times he demanded I come home it was with the express intention of introducing us. He thought we would suit, and for once I have to admit that he was right.’
‘What?’ said Braedan again.
‘It turns out he’s a romantic at heart, although his practical nature is never far from the forefront. He wants his best warrior looking after his furthest outpost—and, although he didn’t say it, I’m sure he wants me to carry on looking after the accounts.’
Braedan raised an eyebrow and Ellena laughed. She was sure there would be plenty of arguments in the future about who was really in charge. She’d only have to make sure he thought it was him while doing everything her way. She was fairly sure she knew the way to wrap him around her finger.
‘What about the handsome Earl of Borwyn?’ asked Braedan, a frown crossing his face.
‘If I didn’t fall in love with you, then Borwyn was his alternative plan.’
‘The manipulative, underhand...’
‘Quite,’ she said, reaching up to tug him back down to her.
‘I suppose,’ he said, as he dropped another kiss on her mouth, ‘we could let him win just this once...’
Epilogue
‘That’s a big horse,’ said the small boy standing next to Braedan.
‘Aye.’
‘Is it yours?’
‘Aye,’ said Braedan, eyeing the young stallion which had yet to be broken in but was already showing a great deal of promise.
‘Can I ride him?’
‘Not until you’re bigger,’ said Braedan, the thought of the small body on such a gigantic beast making his knees weak.
‘How long will that take?’
‘Another six summers, I should think.’
‘But that’s ages,’ said Garrick, his slender shoulders slumping forward in disappointment.
‘It will go in a flash,’ said Braedan. But hopefully not too quickly, he thought. ‘In the meantime, you’ve got Beadle to ride.’
‘But he’s a baby’s horse. Hunter could ride him.’
Braedan laughed. ‘I don’t think so; he’s only six days old. Speaking of which—it’s high time we went to see him and your mother.’
‘But we’ve only just seen them. And the girls will be there.’ Garrick’s shoulders slumped even further.
‘I don’t see what’s wrong with that,’ said Braedan, reaching down and lifting his son onto his shoulders. ‘You love your sisters and they love you.’
He felt Garrick shrug. ‘They love Hunter more.’
Ah, so that was the problem. His eldest son was experiencing his first taste of jealousy.
‘They do not,’ said Braedan. ‘Give it a few days and they’ll be back to causing mischief with you again. They’re just excited to meet Hunter after such a long wait.’
‘The babe was inside mother forever,’ said Garrick, resting his chin on the top of Braedan’s head. ‘I thought she was going to go bang.’
Braedan chuckled. ‘Aye, I think she would have done if he’d been in there any longer.’
He ducked through a doorway, making sure Garrick didn’t bang his head on the stone entranceway, and climbed the steps that led to his bedchamber.
Inside, his wife lay at the centre of the large bed, his two daughters sprawled across it, all of them gazing at the newest member of their family, who was curled up in his mother’s arms and twitching in his sleep.
‘There you both are,’ whispered Ellena, smiling up at them. ‘Would you like to hold Hunter, Garrick?’
‘Can I?’ said Garrick, his voice full of awe.
Braedan smiled and tugged his son down from his shoulders.
‘Climb up next to your mother,’ he said. ‘Then she can pass him to you.’
Garrick scooted across the bed and curled up against his mother’s side. When he was sitting securely, Ellena handed over the baby.
Braedan watched as his two sons met properly for the first time. His older son grinned as his younger brother wrapped his tiny fingers around Garrick’s slightly bigger ones.
‘Come and join us,’ Ellena said softly, holding out her hand towards Braedan.
Careful not to disrupt the bed too much, Braedan stretched out next to Ellena. His two daughters clambered on him, using him as a mattress.
‘How are you feeling, my love?’ he asked Ellena as she settled her head against his shoulder.
‘I’m fine,’ she said, grinning.
He kissed her forehead. ‘You’ll never let me forget that, will you?’
‘No, my love, but I am lying to you. I’m not fine.’
Braedan’s body tightened. This last pregnancy had been hard for Ellena, and the birth had been long. Every time she fell pregnant he worried that he would lose her, and every time she amazed him with her strength. Four children would have to be enough. He couldn’t go through the worry again.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, sitting up slightly and examining her.
There were dark smudges underneath her eyes, and more wrinkles gathering at their corners than there had been eight years ago, but she was still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
‘Nothing’s wrong, my love,’ she said, reaching up to touch his face. ‘I’m not fine. I’m perfect. I have everything that I’ve ever wanted right here in this room.’
He hid his face against her hair, inhaling her soft lavender scent as tears pricked his eyes.
He felt laughter gurgle through her. ‘Ah, you soft-hearted man.’
He laughed too. ‘Don’t tell anyone,’ he murmured.
‘No one would believe me if I told them that The Beast gets emotional around his family,’ said Ellena, giving him a playful nudge.
He put his arms around her and held her tightly. Ellena was right. Everything was perfect.
* * *
Keep reading for an excerpt from Redeeming the Reclusive Earl by Virginia Heath.
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Redeeming the Reclusive Earl
by Virginia Heath
Chapter One
Three hundred acres...
‘What the hell do you think you are doing?’
The grubby boy scrambled back to a sitting position and blinked up at him through the thick lenses of his spectacles. When Max had first spotted the lad kneeling on the ground, he had assumed he was a poacher and was about to ride by, not caring if a few of his pheasants were liberated for a poor family’s cooking pot. Just because he no longer had any appetite didn’t mean the rest of the population couldn’t eat and he’d never had a taste for pheasant even when he had enjoyed his food, so it made no difference to him. But as he had crested the small rise near the eastern boundary of his new estate in his quest to fill some time, he spotted all the holes in the ground, the shovels, tools and wheelbarrow, and realised the intruder was digging.
‘I asked you a question!’ He practically spat in annoyance, aggrieved that he had to make the effort to actually converse or to concern himself with another human being and their peculiar business when he was in no mood for either. The boy’s spectacles magnified his dark eyes. They were the oddest spectacles Max Aldersley had ever seen. Instead of arms, the unsightly frame was tied around the back of his head with a bright red ribbon secured in a bow. Perhaps his first guess about the direness of the lad’s financial circumstances had been correct if he had to go out looking like that. His gaze drifted to the paintbrush and trowel in the boy’s hand, then fixed on the hole he was crouched before. Half-exposed in the mud was a dark object. Spherical, like
a pot, which was either being buried or exhumed. All very odd and all entirely unwelcome. All much too much effort. ‘Why are you trespassing on my land?’
‘My land?’ The boy didn’t sound like a boy and instantly Max felt his hackles rise in panic at his own curious stupidity. The trespasser stood and his stomach plummeted to his toes.
Now he could see significant evidence that the boy was a woman which really made his blood boil. When he had first spotted her scratching around in the mud he had assumed her to be a young man—an easy mistake to make, considering she was dressed in breeches and work boots. Odd work boots. One black. One very definitely brown.
‘Oh, hello! You must be the new Lord Rivenhall.’
It was so much easier to be an abomination in front of a man.
Had he known that she was female, he wouldn’t have brought his horse so close no matter what she had been doing on his property. But now Max could see the trousers hugged her female form like a second skin and there was no getting away from the fact that the hips which flared from her waist were as unmanly as it was possible for hips to be—more was the pity. Worse, the capacious linen shirt tucked haphazardly into the top of the waistband also did little to disguise the fine bosom beneath. The wench had a body that was made for sin. Unfortunately, there was very little evidence that the rest of her lived up to that promise. Which, all things considered, was probably just as well. His sinning days were well and truly over.
The floppy brown felt hat she wore hid her hair and it was anybody’s guess what the strange spectacle affair was all about, but it did a very good job of hiding her features. What the large round lenses did not cover was hidden behind a thick smear of wet dirt. She smiled cheerfully as she idly patted his horse’s muzzle with one hand and shielded her magnified eyes from the sun rising behind him with the other.
‘We are neighbours, my lord. I called upon you yesterday and twice more last week to introduce myself, but you were indisposed. I am so glad we have finally met. I am Miss Euphemia Nithercott, daughter of Doctor Henry Nithercott of Hill House.’
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