Sebastian.
He’d come for her! Somewhere deep inside, she’d always known he would. Or at least she’d hoped. Although she did wish he would stop yelling quite so loudly.
“Here-” When her voice emerged as little more than a raspy whisper, she spit out a mouthful of mud, cleared her throat, and tried again. “Here I am! Down here. At the bottom of the hill.”
It didn’t take him long to find her and when his dark silhouette appeared in front of the tower Georgiana could have wept with joy. Leaning back on his haunches, he half ran/half slid down the steep embankment.
“Georgie. You’re alive.” The relief in his tone was palpable as he crouched down beside her.
“Of course I’m alive,” she sniffed, a bit perturbed that he’d thought otherwise. “It’s going to take more than a spot of rain to do me in. I’m not a wilting flower.”
“No.” His hands began a thorough examination of her body, fingers running lightly up and down her limbs as he searched for any broken bones. She held perfectly still, letting him do what he wished. She couldn’t help but flinch, however, when he touched the pulsing wound at her temple. With a violet curse he plucked her up into her arms as though she weighed no more than a bag of feathers. “What you are is a bloody idiot,” he growled, dark eyes flashing. “What were you thinking, coming here alone? You could have been set upon my highwayman-”
“Highwaymen?” Brows rising, she turned her head to look at the vacant countryside. Aside from a few cows in a nearby field who didn’t seem bothered by the weather in the slightest, they were completely alone. “There’s no one around for miles!”
“Which is precisely the point. You could have gotten lost-”
“There’s only one road,” she pointed out reasonably.
“-or slipped and broken your foolish neck!” He tightened his grip, large hands clamping around her back and beneath her knees like iron manacles. “It was stupid of you to come here.”
“Well then it was equally stupid for you to come after me!” Georgiana retorted. She didn’t know what she had been expecting. A touch of sympathy, at the very least. A little kindness wouldn’t have hurt. Maybe a kiss - or two. Just to warm her up, of course. But she hadn’t the faintest idea what to do with his anger.
It wasn’t until he looked down at her, obsidian eyes ablaze and jaw clenched tight, that she saw the fear beneath the fury. “What if something had happened to you? I don’t know what I would do if I lost you,” he whispered hoarsely before he buried his face in the side of her neck.
“I’m alright.” Stunned by his raw display of emotion, Georgiana twisted in his arms and pressed the flat of her palm against his heart. It was galloping at an uncanny rhythm, and her own jumped in response. “I’m alright, Sebastian. A bit banged up and bruised, but no worse for wear.”
“If I hadn’t been able to find you…”
“But you did find me.” She’d never seen him so vulnerable. It touched something deep inside of her, and just like that the wall she had painstakingly built around her heart suffered its first serious crack. “You did find me,” she repeated softly.
He lifted his head, expression bleak. “I never should have left you.” A light rain began to fall, but neither one of them noticed. Standing at the bottom of the ruins, with Georgiana wrapped firmly in Sebastian’s strong grip, they were in their own little world and nothing, not rain, nor sleet, nor God himself, could penetrate it. “Not marrying you is one of the greatest regrets of my life, Georgie. When I think of the pain I caused you...”
“Why?” It may have taken seven years and a near death experience, but she was finally ready to hear his explanation. “Why did you do it, Sebastian? I thought - I thought you loved me.”
“I did love you. I do love you.” The lightning that streaked across the sky was nothing compared to the blazing heat in his gaze. “But what I said this morning was true. I was selfish, Georgie. Young and selfish and afraid of losing someone else who meant the world to me.”
“Your parents,” she said softly as understanding dawned. She’d known they had drowned at sea in a tragic accident, but Sebastian had never spoken of them and she’d never dared ask.
“And my sister,” he confirmed as pain sliced across his countenance. “I should have been with them on that bloody ship. I was supposed to be. And the guilt I felt when I wasn’t and they died...it tore me apart.
“I wasn’t in a good place when I met you, Georgie. I was dealing with demons that I couldn’t control.” He looked away. “That I didn’t want to control. Then there you were. A bright beacon of light in an otherwise dark and gray existence. And I wanted you.” His brows drew together as he gazed down at her. “I wanted you more than I wanted to breathe. But I knew...I knew if I lost you as I’d lost them...it would be my undoing.”
“So you chose someone who was safe,” Georgiana said, echoing Ginny’s words. “Because being safe was easier than being hurt. But what about me, Sebastian? What about the hurt you caused me?”
Water dripped from the ends of his hair as he gave a dismal shake of his head. “I wouldn’t have been a good husband to you, Georgie. As excuses go, it’s more pitiful than most, but that’s the truth. You were better than I deserved. You still are. And I would have ruined you. Not at first. Not all at once. But little by little, bit by bit, the sweet, charming, witty girl I was in love with would have been destroyed by the same demons that nearly destroyed me.”
“And what makes this time any different than before?” She wanted to trust him. She wanted it so desperately that she ached. But she was still afraid, and as long as she was afraid the wall around her heart would continue to stand. “What makes us any different?”
“Time,” he said simply as he tucked a wet curl behind her ear. “We’re not the same people we were, Georgie. For better or worse, we’ve both changed. I’ve made peace with my demons, and I’m not the man I was.”
“And I’m not the girl I was. That sweet, charming, naive girl you fell in love with…” Her hand fell away from his chest. “She’s gone, Sebastian. What if you’re only in love with a memory? What if you” - her throat burned to even speak the words “-break my heart again?”
“I’m not in love with a memory, Georgie. I’m in love with you.” Lifting his head, he gently traced the curve of her jaw, thumb sliding across her cheek to catch a tear before it could slide down her face. “I loved the sweet girl you were, and I love the opinionated, stubborn, independent woman you’ve become.”
“At least one of those was a compliment,” she said with a wry sniffle.
The ghost of a smile touched his lips. “I can’t promise I will never break your heart again. I know we’ll fight. We’re both too pigheaded not to. But I can promise that I will never leave you. I can promise that I will never give up on us. I can promise that every night I will fall asleep beside you, no matter how angry we are with one another, and every morning I will wake with you in my arms. You’re mine, Georgiana. Just as I’m yours.” His chest rose and fell as he drew a deep breath. “If you’ll have me.”
More tears raced down her cheeks, faster than Sebastian could catch them. “You’ve made me cry,” she complained, batting his hand away when he tried to comfort. “I hate to cry.”
“I’m sorry,” he said solemnly.
“Good. You should be.” There was a part of her that still wondered. A part of her that still feared. But maybe that was the point, she thought silently. To not know, and to accept love anyways. Because love - true, once in a lifetime love - was not safe. It was not boring or staid or predictable. It didn’t come with a guarantee.
And that’s what made it beautiful.
“Kiss me,” she said, looping her arms around his neck.
Sebastian frowned. “You’re soaked through to the skin. There’s a cottage not far from-”
“Kiss me,” she repeated. “I won’t ask again.”
One dark brow rose. “I wasn’t aware you asked to begin with.”
/> “I’m a stubborn, opinionated woman.” Her fingers curled into his wet mane. “You said as much yourself. I think you’ll find I am also quite demanding.”
“God, I hope so.” On a groan he sought her mouth in a deep, drugging kiss that left them both breathless and craving more.
“Where did you say this cottage was again?” she murmured against his lips.
Sebastian needed no other encouragement. After one more long, lingering kiss, he carried Georgiana away from the ruins of the past...and into a future bright with promise.
Epilogue
Georgiana and Sebastian were married two months later on a hot summer’s day in the middle of August. As it was the second marriage for both of them the wedding was a small, private affair with only close friends and family in attendance.
Plus Eleanor’s hedgehog, of course.
After the ceremony was concluded the newlyweds departed directly for Warwick Lock. Nestled contentedly in her husband’s arms - how strange it felt to think of him as her husband! - Georgiana closed her eyes and murmured, “That was very nice.”
“It was,” Sebastian agreed. “I particularly liked the part where it ended so quickly.”
Slanting one eye open, she scowled up at him. “It took us seven years to get to that church, and your favorite part was how quickly it ended?”
“Aye.” He grinned wolfishly. “Because now I have you all to myself.”
Georgiana squealed when his hand slid beneath her skirts, but all it took was one stroke of his clever fingers to have her purring with pleasure.
“You’re positively wicked,” she gasped as he traced a fiery path down her neck with his tongue.
“And you, Your Grace,” he growled when her hand slid down between his thighs to encircle the hard, pulsing length of him through his trousers, “are no saint yourself.”
When their passions were sated and their clothes properly disheveled, Georgiana laid her head on Sebastian’s lap and muffled a yawn. “How much further?”
“To Warwick Lock, or to our happily-ever-after?”
Her mouth curved in a sleepy smile. “Both, I suppose.”
“Another five or six hours to the estate, I’m afraid. But as for our happily-ever-after…” Leaning down, he pressed his lips to her brow. “We’re already there, Georgie. We’re already there.”
Prologue
Evan did not remember much about the fall.
But he couldn’t forget the whispers.
How could he, when from age eight to one and twenty they followed him wherever he went? The whispers were there to greet him in every room he entered. They trailed after him through the hallways. The blasted things even followed him into ballrooms and carriages and the middle of Hyde Park.
Suffice it to say he heard the whispers everywhere. But even worse than the hushed voices, even worse than the gossip and the terse smiles and the horrified gasps, were the pitying stares.
Evan could take the whispers and the staring. He didn’t even mind the disgust, for he knew it was well deserved. He had a mirror, hadn’t he? He knew what he looked like. Which was why, when children cowered and ladies swooned at the mere sight of him – and not in the good way – he took it all in stride.
But the pity...the pity he could not abide.
Five years had gone by and the back of his neck still burned with embarrassment and anger whenever he thought of one incident in particular. It had been the night of the Glastonbury ball. A ball he never would have attended if his sweet, ailing mother hadn’t begged him to go.
‘You’re becoming a recluse Evan,’ she’d cried, her large blue eyes awash with tears. ‘Staying in all day and all night. It ‘tisn’t natural. Especially for a man of your caliber and station.’
Evan had been tempted to point out that the only thing unnatural was his face, but he’d held his tongue. And when his mother began to cry in earnest he’d acquiesced to her request, for despite the hardness in his gaze he’d still had a soft spot in his heart that could not abide a woman’s tears. Which was how he found himself standing awkwardly in the shadowy corner of a ballroom while the ton’s elite swirled by in a pastel blend of ivory gowns and sleek black tailcoats.
Dressed in his own black tailcoat with a crisp white cravat strangling his throat and fawn colored breeches clinging to muscular thighs, he could have almost passed for one of them.
Almost.
Keeping one hand pressed defensively against the puckered flesh on the right side of his face and the other wrapped tightly around a glass of champagne that had already been refilled four times, he failed to notice the petite blonde approaching until she was nearly on top of him.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, round cheeks flushing prettily as she batted her lashes and giggled into the palm of one satin glove. “I am terribly sorry. I fear I did not see you standing there...Your Grace.”
Evan stiffened, broad shoulders drawing taut beneath his coat. “You know who I am?”
“Of course,” she said, sounding surprised. “Doesn’t everyone?”
When his jaw reflexively tightened, pulling at the gnarled scar tissue he was still covering with his hand, she gasped and took an inadvertent step back.
“I - I am terribly sorry. I didn’t mean to imply...I just meant that, well, you are a duke.”
No, he corrected her silently. His father had been a duke. And while Evan had technically inherited the title upon his death, he was no more a duke than he was a fish. Or a horse. Or a bloody cloud floating by in the sky.
“Is there something I can help you with, Lady…”
“Portia.” Having recovered from her faux pas, she offered him a brilliant smile. “Lady Portia James. If I am not mistaken, I believe our mothers attended the same finishing school.”
“Indeed,” he muttered before he glanced purposefully over her shoulder in a not-very-subtle indication that he wished for their conversation to be over. Unfortunately, Lady Portia either did not receive the hint or she simply chose to ignore it.
“I can assure you this is quite out of character for me and, well, a bit presumptuous if I am being honest, but…” She hesitated, and Evan felt an unmistakable prickling of desire when she sank her teeth into her plump bottom lip. “Would you care to dance?”
“Dance?” he repeated, so startled by the request that he nearly spilled his champagne. Women – especially women who looked like Lady Portia James – rarely spoke to him, let alone asked him to dance. And yet here she was, standing right in front of him, doing precisely that.
In hindsight, Evan realized he should have known then and there that something was amiss. That Lady Portia, for all of her guilelessness, was not nearly as sweet or innocent as she appeared. But as he’d gazed down into her cornflower blue eyes he had felt something he hadn’t felt in a very, very long time. So long, in fact, that it took him a moment to recognize what it was.
Hope.
“All right,” he said gruffly, setting aside his flute of champagne on a nearby planter in order to take her arm.
If she noticed his stiff gait as they approached the outskirts of the dance floor she made no mention of it, but he still released a quiet sigh of relief when the quartet of musicians sitting high on a dais began to play a slow, subdued waltz.
Before the fall Evan had been lively and quick; a veritable dervish of athleticism and energy. After it there had been several doctors who had ominously predicted he would never walk again. The late Duke of Wycliffe, determined that his one and only heir would not grow up to be a cripple, had scoured the country until he’d found a physician who told him what he wanted to hear: that his son would in fact regain full control of his legs and, with time and exercise, might even make a full recovery.
After years of agonizingly painful therapies that required the use of wooden braces and a barbaric pulley system, Evan had managed to walk again. But it was clear, even then, that he’d never be what he once was, much to the duke’s everlasting disappointment.
“I apo
logize.” Evan’s scars stood out in vivid white contrast against his tanned skin as his face flushed a deep, mottled red when he stepped on Lady Portia’s tiny foot for what felt like the hundredth time since they’d begun their waltz. “I – I haven’t danced in quite some time.”
“It’s fine,” she assured him, but she couldn’t quite disguise the wince of pain that flashed across her features when he tried to turn her in a circle and his leg locked in place, causing their shins to collide.
“This is a mistake.” But when he went to disengage himself she clung fast to his wrist, nails sinking into his sleeve cuff with surprising tenacity.
“I think you’re doing splendidly, Your Grace. Truly,” Lady Portia insisted when Evan made a scoffing sound under his breath. “I can only imagine how difficult it must be for a man of your stature to complete such intricate steps and turns.” Her mouth curved. “Particularly when your partner is significantly lacking in height. I fully accept all of the blame.”
A man of his stature? The way she spoke almost made it seem as if she didn’t notice his physical impairments. But that couldn’t be true...could it?
Again hope stirred inside of Evan’s chest, warming the protective layer of ice he’d used to shield his heart against all of the stares and the whispers and the unwanted pity. Maybe, just maybe, Lady Portia was the sort of woman he’d started to fear did not exist. The kind who could see past his ruined exterior to the man beneath. The kind who saw him for what he was, not for what he was not.
When the dance ended he met her flawless curtsy with an awkward bow, lips twisted in a grimace of discomfort as liquid fire shot up through his ruined leg. The waltz had been more demanding than he’d anticipated, and already he was dreading the inevitable ice bath and stretching that was to come. But such therapies, albeit horrifically painful, were necessary if he wanted to retain the limited range of motion that he still had left. Which he did, particularly now that he had a new incentive to do so.
A Duchess for all Seasons: The Collection Page 26
