She stilled, the breath leaving her body so that the woman he held in his arms was frozen in a single, crystalline moment of Italian sunshine.
“Our children?” The word was like a whisper of wind through the grass.
“We’ll have children, Cat. Many, I hope.” He pressed his lips against hers, softly. Wanting her to feel the love spilling over inside him. Yet, beneath all that love was truth. “When they return to England to claim their inheritance, the scandal will be theirs, not ours. They will not be accepted. If we weather the storm first, they may be accepted. More—” He breathed deep, knowing he was sending himself into the lion’s den of the ton. “More, you and I can stand together. We can provide our children with an example, so they understand love and sacrifice and strength. We can teach them to stand against those who would put money and property above others. We can show them how to navigate their birthright using the gift of love.”
“Oh, Jones.” Elegant, smooth hands cupped his cheek. Her gaze rested now on his, lips curving up. “That’s—that’s—”
“Ridiculously sentimental.” He felt foolish. Moving away, he began to roll into a crouch. The hand on his arm stayed him, then gently pulled him back toward her.
“Brave.” She sighed the word, her gaze meeting his. “It will not be easy.”
“No.” He ran his hand up her calf, down, willing comfort to flow from his touch and into her. “Though I plan to be too busy making love to my wife to notice.”
She laughed, a soft, amused sound that lifted his heart. “That can be arranged, Jones.”
“I don’t want to live in the shadows, Cat.” He’d done so all of his life. First in the rookeries, then in training, then as spy. He settled down beside her, kneeling almost at her feet. “Not with you.”
The wind kicked up, pushing at the grass so it rippled and rolled across the meadow. The wind pushed at her hair, too, so the strands danced around her face. When she tipped her face up to the sky and let the gold light of Italy gild her skin, his heart simply stumbled to a stop.
She was smart and beautiful—and she was his.
“I love you, Cat.”
Her eyes remained closed, her face still angled toward the sun, but her lips rose in a radiant smile.
“Let’s stay here a few months,” she said. “Let’s enjoy a little time before we face it all.” Now she did look at him, with eyes that echoed her soul. “When we go home, we’ll face all the difficulties of the ton. We’ll let the tide of scandal rage. In a few years, the scandal will not be as great, and a few years after that, it will only be whispered about. When we’re old and gray, no one will care.”
“In the interim, you will have to show me how to go on as a landowner and a man of the ton.” He grinned at her, relief and pleasure swirling in him. “I would not want to wear the wrong cravat.”
She cocked her head. “Considering you’re not wearing anything at all, Jones, I’d say a cravat is the least of your worries.”
Cat reached for him, uncurling her naked body. Running delicate hands up his forearms, she leaned forward, revealing the round loveliness of her breasts. He breathed in her scent, mingling with the sweetness of wildflowers. When she pressed her mouth to his, her fire hummed in his blood again.
She drew back to look at him, the butterfly blue alluring and filled with desire.
“Make love to me again, here in the field. Then we’ll return to the house, and you can make love to me again there.” She smiled at him. “Someday soon we’ll return to England, we shall be married, and you can make love to me there.”
It seemed to him his future wife was very wise.
“As you wish, my lady.”
Epilogue
Cat wandered through the front hall of Ashdown Abbey. Sunlight streamed through high mullioned windows to create a diamond patchwork over the marble floor. A footman passed, and she drew him aside. “Have you seen his lordship?”
“He was down at the stables earlier, checking on the mare.”
“Oh, is she foaling?” Chagrined, Cat thought she might have slept late and missed the event.
“Not yet, milady, but ’tis not long.”
“Thank you.” She smiled at the man sent him on his way. He whistled lightly as he crossed the hall to pass beneath one of the hundred stone archways of Abbey—an act Wycomb would never have allowed but that Cat found heartening.
Not bothering with a pelisse or shawl for such a warm spring day, Cat made her way across the rear of the Abbey to the stables. The building was dim despite the open window, humid, and smelled of horse and sweat and leather. Stepping through shafts of sunlight along the corridor of stalls, Cat found the foaling mare in one of the larger spaces. The horse was round and fat and happy, munching on a feed bag and flicking her tail at buzzing flies.
Two apples were lined up outside the door, and Cat knew Jones had been there, though the stall was empty of people. The mare had been ill in the fall and winter, and he had treated her with red apples to encourage her to eat. Cat rubbed her gleaming, well-curried coat.
“Good morning, my dear,” Cat murmured, running her palm over the mare’s swollen side. The mare barely noticed and with a smile, Cat left her.
Stepping out into the sunshine again, she walked once more to the towering house and stood in its shadow. From there she could see lawns rolling away, the edge of the formal gardens. In the distance, shimmering along the tree line, was a folly some long ago ancestor had built. Beyond that, beyond what she could see clearly, were golden wheat fields and thatched tenant’s cottages.
All of it belonged to her, and now Jones.
She set her hand on her stomach, flat beneath pale blue muslin. Someday, perhaps, all of Ashdown Abbey might belong their children.
Moving back into the house through the terrace doors, she found Mr. Sparks striding through toward his office, worn account ledgers tucked under his arm.
“Good afternoon, my lady.” Bright green eyes twinkled at her from beneath his spectacles as he adjusted the ledgers to sketch a slight bow.
“Hello, Mr. Sparks.” Cat grinned as she noticed the spring in his step—it had been there since they had returned to Italy the year before. “Have you seen Jones?”
“He just returned from inspecting the planting in the north fields. I believe he is in the estate room.”
“The big one, or the other?”
“The other,” he said, pushing up his glasses with a forefinger.
“I should have guessed. Thank you.” Her heart soared and she found herself smiling. Jones always seemed to be in that little room occupied by generations of her ancestors. “Will you be joining us for dinner this evening?”
“I don’t believe so.” He patted the ledgers in his hand, the tanned skin nearly the same shade as the aged leather. “Your husband indicated you both would like to discuss assisting the blacksmith in the village to expand his forge. I must study the accounts.”
“Yes, the blacksmith has been assisting the neighboring village since their smithy burned. We’ve been thinking to combine the shops and avoid future fires.” She smiled at the man who had seen her through her father’s death. “Your expertise would be most appreciated, however.”
“Ah.” Green eyes lit beneath the spectacles. “I shall most certainly attend.”
“We shall see you then.” She found that another smile flitted over her lips as she watched Mr. Sparks walk to his own office as if a bubble of satisfaction propelled his steps.
So much had changed.
Cat finally found Jones in the tiny room the Ashdowns had toiled in for generations. He was in his shirtsleeves, fine linen shifting as he reached for a sheaf of papers, and appeared to accept the towering bookshelves around him as ordinary rather than a mountain of history on his back. Piled beside the scarred desk was the waistcoat, cravat, and coat he’d donned that morning—she imagined he’d removed it as soon as he was out of eyesight of the Abbey, then carried it back lest he be caught.
“He
llo,” she murmured, heart soaring as he looked up and smiled at her. He smiled so often now, she barely recognized him as her serious Jones. “I invited Mr. Sparks to dine with us.”
“Excellent.” Jones ran his hands through the hair he’d continued to keep long, as she’d discovered she preferred it that way. There was so much more there to take hold of. “I’m looking over the yields from last fall to be certain the new granaries will be able to hold enough to last the winter.”
“Jones?”
“Mm.” He’d looked back to the documents, running blunt fingers down a column of numbers. He fit easily into her father’s chair, she noticed, though she had found the seat comfortable of late.
“The physician said we are to have a babe later this year.” Cat found that the joy in her could not be hidden in her words. “In the fall.”
Jones stilled, then looked up at her with deep brown eyes blurred by shock. “A babe? We’re having a babe? You and me?”
“Yes.” She laughed aloud as he pushed back the chair and leapt across the tiny room toward her. Strong arms enveloped her, wide shoulders just there for her to lean on.
“You are well?” Jones cupped her cheeks, pressed his lips to hers with such reverence she wanted to weep. “The babe is well?” he whispered.
“Both of us are well, as far as we know.” Cat slipped into that space between his torso and arm. Satisfied, she smiled to herself. His body and hers had somehow shaped themselves so that she fit perfectly there.
“I love you.” His arm around her tightened—not roughly, but with the subtle protection she had discovered meant he was moved.
Cat smiled to herself. He was easy to understand, her Jones, once you knew him. He was all that was responsible, strong, silent, unyielding—except for the heart of him.
The heart of Jones was filled with nothing but love.
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Acknowledgments
Many thanks to my editor, Alethea Spiridon, the Goddess Among Agents, Nalini Akolekar, and everyone in the art and marketing and editing departments at Entangled Publishing. It really does take a village!
I’d also like to give a huge shout out to Kimberly Kincaid for reading and loving Jones’s book. Thanks for that eagle eye going through the first draft. And to Jennifer McQuiston—without your suggestion, Cat and Jones would never have had their HEA!
Last, but not at all least, many thanks to Kerry Keberly. My very own Eliza Jane. Thank you for plotting, brainstorming, and sending me good vibes and pretties in the mail. Without your long distance handholding, this book would still be unfinished. Most especially, thank you for taking my frantic phone call at 10 pm the day before deadline—which, after two pots of coffee followed by two glasses of wine, went something like this: “Hello-Cat-is-stuck-across-the-road-and-I-can’t-get-her-out-and-who-should-kill-the-villain-because-I-don’t-think-she-can-and-I-don’t-want-Jones-to-backslide-and-one-of-the-other-spies-can’t-do-it-and-I-can’t-send-Cat-into-the-opium-den-either-and-now-what-do-I-do?” To which, my dearest moon sister, you calmly replied: “OK. Let’s talk this through.”
About the Author
Despite being a native Michigander, Alyssa Alexander is pretty certain she belongs somewhere sunny. And tropical. Where drinks are served with little paper umbrellas. But until she moves to those white sandy beaches, she survives the cold Michigan winters by penning romance novels that always include a bit of adventure. She lives with her own set of heroes, aka an ever-patient husband who doesn’t mind using a laundry basket for a closet and a small boy who wears a knight in a shining armor costume for such tasks as scrubbing potatoes.
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