“Aye.” Tears filled her eyes, magnifying their grassy green color. “Mon Dieu, I never thought to see you again, my love.”
My love. Simon stared at her, his heart thudding so loudly he barely heard his own voice. “You are Lady Rosalynd?”
She nodded, a single tear trickling down her cheek. The faint lines around her eyes and mouth, the few gray hairs among the golden ones, were the only signs she was old enough to be his mother. “How…how did you know to come here?”
Simon stiffened. “I regret intruding upon you.”
“Simon,” Linnet murmured, laying a hand on his arm. “Your name was in Bishop Thurstan’s journal. He…he is dead.”
“Aye.” Rosalynd sighed heavily. “The news reached me two weeks ago, but I was not surprised. On that very night he died, I awoke with a feeling of such loss that I feared something had happened to him. ‘Twas a foul crime indeed.”
“We have caught the murderers.” His voice gruff with emotion, Simon related the twisted tale. “Jevan hanged himself before he could be brought to trial. His death shattered the last of Odeline’s sanity. Reverend Mother Catherine has taken her to the abbey, but Odeline believes she is living at court awaiting Jevan’s return.”
“A sad business,” Rosalynd murmured. “I will mourn Thurstan all my life, but that sorrow is tempered by your return. I am glad he did know you lived ere he was taken from us.” She smiled faintly. “It is a joy to look upon your dear face and see you smile back at me. I feared you would hate me for giving you up.”
“I did…once.” Simon linked his fingers with Linnet’s. “But Catherine told me that Baron Robert’s hunger for power was responsible for parting you and my father. And Linnet, my wife, has taught me that love sometimes means letting go.”
Rosalynd started. “You are Linnet Especer?”
“Until a few weeks ago, I was.” Linnet snuggled closer to Simon. “Now I am Linnet of Blackstone.”
“Sweet Mary,” the lady whispered, her eyes swimming with tears though she smiled broadly. “God does work in mysterious—”
“Nanna! Nanna, I’m clean.” A small child trotted down the garden path, pink cheeks glistening, damp blond curls gleaming in the sunlight. Her eyes, a paler green than Rosalynd’s, danced in time with her busy feet.
The lady’s granddaughter, Linnet thought, speared by a sharp, painful reminder of her own daughter.
Rosalynd scooped the child up and kissed her. Then looked over at Linnet. “I wonder if Thurstan knew, when he first hatched this scheme, how it would all turn out.”
“What do you mean?” Linnet asked.
Instead of replying, Rosalynd turned to the child cuddling contentedly in her arms. “Rosie, you remember I told you someday you might meet your mama? Well, this is that day.”
Linnet heard her own gasp of surprise echoed by Simon’s. “She…she is our daughter?” Linnet asked, scarcely daring to hope.
“Aye.” Rosalynd’s smile grew to encompass them all. “Thurstan thought it fitting that I should raise her, for he knew I would love her nearly as much as you do.”
Linnet stared at her baby girl, her heart so filled with love it was a wonder it didn’t burst.
“I don’t remember you,” Rosie said around her thumb.
Linnet knelt, her shaky insides steadied by the feel of Simon’s arm coming around her as he sank down beside her. “I remember you,” she whispered, her eyes drinking in every inch of the sturdy little girl with her hair and Simon’s eyes. “Though you were much smaller than you are now.”
“I’m a big girl,” Rosie replied.
“Why do you not show your mama your room and your toys?”
Rosie cast a canny, rebellious eye at her grandmother. “She wants to see the kittens.”
“They are too young for you to play with,” Rosalynd said.
“We will just look.” Rosie slid off her grandmother’s lap, and held out a pudgy hand to Linnet. “They are in the stables.”
The feel of that small hand slipping so trustingly into hers warmed Linnet clear through, healing her battered soul. Heart so full she could scarcely breathe, she stood and looked at Simon. His eyes glittered with joyful tears. “Can he come, too?”
Rosie tilted her head at him and frowned doubtfully. “He’s too big. He might squash the kittens.”
“Nay, he is gentle,” Linnet said. “He is your papa.”
“My papa is an angel. Nanna said so.”
“I would not go quite that far,” Linnet said, tongue in cheek. “But he is the most wonderful of men.”
“Very well, but you must promise to be quiet,” Rosie said sternly. She held out her other hand.
Simon took it, and felt a sense of wonder fill him. The three of them were together…a family. His family. It was what he had wished for all his life, and now he had it. Thanks to his father. And mother. He turned back to the lady who sat on the bench, her expression mingling happiness and sorrow; happiness for gaining a son and sadness for…? Surely she didn’t think they would leave her out? “Come, Mama, I would not be parted from you, or part you from Rosie.”
Lady Rosalynd stood, smiling, and took the hand he held out. “Nor do I want to be apart from you…ever again.”
“Are we all going together?” Rosie asked, bright eyes scanning the beaming adults.
“Forever and always,” Simon said.
Later that night, Simon stood over the sleeping child, both of his arms wrapped securely around Linnet. This had surely been the best day of his life. “Happy, love?” he whispered.
“Aye.” Linnet leaned into his embrace. “If only Thurstan could be here with us, my joy would be complete.”
“He is with us, in our hearts. Always.”
Linnet nodded. “I think he would approve of your plans to make Blackstone Heath a home for orphaned babes.”
“So do I, but perhaps we’d best wait a bit. If today is anything to judge by, we will have our hands full with Rosie.”
Linnet glanced at him over her shoulder and grinned. “Is that your way of saying our daughter is willful?”
“And stubborn. We have much to learn about raising her.”
“Then it is well that your mother is coming back to Durleigh with us.”
Your mother. Simon liked the sound of that. Better still, he liked her. She was warm, caring and witty. And he did relish the notion of spending more time with her, but…“It will be confusing for Rosie to have three parents to order her about.”
“Rosie is not much one to be ordered, I think And it will ease her to have Rosalynd nearby in her new home.”
“You do not mind, then?”
“Nay. Never. I am hoping to coax Rosalynd into helping get Blackstone ready to receive its first children. And too…” Linnet stroked Simon’s chin. “We are all four a family at last, but the adults, at least, have wounds that are not yet fully healed. They will mend quicker if we are together.”
He kissed the tip of Linnet’s nose. “Is it any reason why I love you? Even though I do foresee being hard-pressed to keep you and our equally impetuous daughter out of trouble.”
Linnet wound her arms around his neck and drew his mouth down for a blistering kiss. “I can think of no man better suited to the task, my love. My champion.”
* * * * *
Simon smiled, a deep and abiding love reflected in his soft gray-green eyes. “It will be my pleasure to champion you all the days of our lives,” he whispered.
Women found Nicholas of Hendry irresistible.
All except one. And she was the one this reformed rogue was determined to have….
Be sure to look for
THE ROGUE
by
Ana Seymour
the next book in the exciting
KNIGHTS OF THE BLACK ROSE miniseries!
Available in February 2000
from Harlequin Historicals
eISBN 978-14592-5105-2
THE CHAMPION
Copyright © 1999 by Carol Suza
nne Backus
All rights reserved Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A
® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
Visit us at www.romance.net
Printed in U.S.A.
The Champion (Knights of the Black Rose Series : Harlequin Historicals, No 491) Page 28
