Finally, he cleared his throat, sat up, and faced her. "I owe you an apology."
Rose almost jerked, she was so surprised at his words. This was the last thing she'd expected from him.
"I'm very protective of my family, and from the beginning I saw you as a threat to my mother. And when her ring turned up missing, I was told you had taken it. I treated you horribly, and for that I'm sorry."
He took a deep breath. "I had you thrown in jail, I kidnapped you, I forced you onto the back of a horse, I treated you like a prisoner at the house, I've accused you over and over of stealing the ring, of being a thief and a whore. Yet you were innocent all along."
Travis gazed straight into her eyes. "You didn't deserve to be treated the way I behaved toward you. I'm sorry, and I hope you will forgive me."
She gazed at him in bewilderment and awe. "I must say that I'm surprised you followed me here just to apologize." She paused. "We had some trying times, but I never felt abused. Just tied down. I accept your apology."
She'd never seen him this way. He seemed to be struggling, wanting to express himself, but having a hard time of it. Her heart went out to him.
Yet something held her back. Some instinct for survival kept her from throwing her arms around him.
"Before you accept my apology, you should know there's more. Seems my matchmaking mother knew that you were the perfect woman for me, and she knew I would protect her at all costs. The ring was never missing, Rose. She schemed to bring us together by falsely accusing you of taking her ring."
"What?" Rose said, outraged. "The ring was never missing? I've been forced to stay at your ranch all this time, and all along your mother still had the ring? How could Eugenia do this? She knew how upset I was at your accusations."
"Looking back, I should have realized something was wrong. The way she kept defending you, protecting you, should have made me realize something about her story wasn't true. I know it doesn't make you feel any better, but I thoroughly chastised her for the wrong she did to you."
"I knew she was trying to bring us together, but I never realized just how far she would go to keep me there," Rose admitted. "But I'm still angry with her."
"And you should be," he agreed.
He jumped up and started to pace nervously. "There's something else I need to tell you. Ever since you left last Saturday, there's a part of me that's been incomplete, that seems missing. I'm not a man who can easily express his emotions, but you were right to leave me that day. Until you left me, I didn't know how much you had changed and improved my life. I didn't realize that you had become my reason for living."
He stopped and got down on one knee. Rose almost cried at the sight of this strong, prideful man on bended knee.
"I didn't know that you had captured my heart. I've fallen deeply in love with you, but didn't know it until you were gone."
Rose gasped, not believing the words Travis was speaking.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold wedding band and held it up. "This is the ring that brought us together." He paused. "Will you please marry me, be my wife?"
Rose stared down at the big, handsome cowboy who was on bended knee asking her to marry him. Who had managed to say the words she so longed to hear. She knew what this had cost him in pride, yet he had done it for her.
A sob escaped her throat and she threw her arms around him, knocking him back onto the ground. They both lay in the grass, her on top of him, kissing.
Finally he pulled back, breaking the seal of their lips. "Does this mean you'll say yes?"
"Yes. I'll marry you, Travis Burnett, bear your children, and even learn to ride horses with you. But I will not learn how to be a proper lady."
He laughed. "I love you, Rose. Please don't ever change or stop loving me."
Covering her lips with his own, he sealed their promise to one another.
Finally, Rose broke off the kiss. "I'm still angry at your mother, but without her scheming, we would never have found one another." She held up her hand in the light. "This little band of gold brought us together and will have kept us together until death do us part."
He kissed her lightly on the nose and laughed. "Even death won't keep us apart. Madam Desirée will find a way to unite us.
____________
Author Bio
Sylvia McDaniel
Sylvia McDaniel and her very supportive husband, Don live in Texas with their teenage son, Shane; Putz, the klutzy dachshund; and Ashley our shy dachshund. During the day Sylvia works for a small insurance agency helping clients with their commercial insurance coverage.
Hooked on romances at a very young age, she is now hopelessly addicted to writing and gets up at 4:30 A.M. four mornings a week to write for two hours before going to her day job. Plus she spends at least three evenings a week in front of the computer working on her dream of publishing a best-selling romance.
The weekends are spent working out in the garden until the temperature climbs above ninety degrees. Recently, with the help of her husband, she learned to make homemade blueberry and blackberry jam. Cooking is not her favorite past-time and she prefers Don’s cooking any day of the week.
Currently, she’s written fourteen novels and sold nine. A 1996 Romance Writers of America Golden Heart finalist, 1995 President of North Texas Romance Writers of America, and the 2012 President-Elect of Dallas Area Romance Authors. You can write to Sylvia at P.O. Box 2542, Coppell, TX 75019 or visit her Web site: https://www.SylviaMcDaniel.com
Preview The Burnett Brides Series:
The Outlaw Takes A Bride
EXCERPT:
“"I've Waited Years for a Husband."
Beth stopped in front of Tanner, her hazel eyes flashing indignantly. "To have someone who would wake up in my arms each morning, a baby to rock to sleep. Isn't that what all women dream of? So why am I so bad for wanting the same things?"
"You're not as long as you know I'm not good husband material." Tanner took a deep breath and tried not to reflect on what he could see beneath her sheer nightgown. "But you think you can soothe my hurts and make me care about you enough that I'll change my ways."
"I don' t give a fig about your hurts."
Tanner didn't want to stop. "You think that beneath this rough exterior there's a man worth saving, worth turning into a husband. You're wrong."
God, how he wanted her even when she was pushing him, making him feel things he'd long forgotten. He still wanted to feel her arms around him, even while he was trying his best to push her away.
"I have a man waiting for me. Why would I want a coldhearted bastard like you?"
"Because the man waiting for you, doesn't make you feel like this," he said as he pulled her into his arms.
––– end of excerpt –––
The Marshal Takes A Bride
EXCERPT:
A RELUCTANT BRIDE
At the sound of the rapid knock, Tucker glanced up from the paperwork on his desk. Why did the sight of Sarah always cause his heart to give a small leap? She stood in the doorway, her face red, her body taut, something was dreadfully wrong.
“Can I come in?” Her voice was polite and brisk.
Tucker jumped up from behind the desk and hurried around to greet her. “What’s wrong? You wouldn’t have come if there wasn’t a problem”
He could see the tension in her body in the way she walked toward him carrying a small tin.
“What’s in there?” he asked, afraid of the answer.
“This is what’s the matter,” she said, laying the tin on the desk and pulling off the lid. Then she reached inside a layer of white tissue paper and pulled out his mother’s bridal veil.
Tucker cringed. “I tried to warn you.”
Sarah watched him, a frustrated expression on her beautiful face. “I was bluntly honest with her, and she didn’t hear me. She had the gall to ask me to wear the thing when I marry you!”
Tucker stared at her, thoughts racing through his mind. H
ow could he honor his plan to help Sarah find another man when his own mother was so determined to see him wed to Sarah? And when all he could think of was the chance to kiss her again.…
––– end of excerpt –––
If you liked the Burnett Bride series you might also like…
A Scarlet Bride
Alexandra Thurston wants revenge. Revenge on the husband who wrongly accused her of infidelity and divorced her, tainting her as a scarlet woman. She vows she will reclaim her good name and never marry again. However, her father wants grandchildren to be heirs to his banking fortune and he' s determined to find her a husband. He has no luck , though, until she finds herself caught in a compromising position with the handsome plantation owner, Connor Manning.
My Sister's Boyfriend, A Contemporary Romance Novel
Book 1 - The Trouble with Twins Series
EXCERPT:
"Never again," Jennifer Riley vowed as she stepped into the black-paneled wooden coffin outside the entrance to the Hilton Hotel in downtown Tyler, Texas. Traffic whizzed by on Main street, while she laid inside the macabre structure. She tugged at her filmy black chiffon dress, trying to cover as much of her exposed cleavage as possible. "No matter how busy Julia gets or how much she pleads, I refuse to do this again. I didn't come back to Tyler to dress up as an over-the-hill sex queen."
Paul, her sister's employee, stood quietly by, holding the lid open. "Ready?"
Jennifer took a deep breath, dreading the darkness that would engulf her. "Yes, make it quick. I hate lying inside this creepy box."
Jennifer watched the coffin lid come down, shutting out the noise and headlights from the traffic.
"You all right?" Paul asked.
"Hurry!” Her breath sounded harsh in the darkness. She felt the pallbearers lift the coffin onto the cart and roll it along the sidewalk into the hotel.
After tonight, Julia, her twin sister, would have to find someone else to jump out of coffins and sing seductively when she needed help with her business. No ifs, ands, or buts!
As the new Development Director at County General Hospital, Jennifer would be way too busy to fill in at her sister's fledgling singing telegram business. Not to mention that popping out of coffins could be damaging to her new career.
The cart jostled along the hallway of the hotel until she heard wolf whistles and loud, boisterous, voices cheering, and she knew they'd arrived at the party.
Paul rapped on the coffin lid. "Are you ready?"
Jennifer cleared her throat and searched for the button that would pop open the door. Whatever happened to women jumping out of cakes? What nut case thought coffins were funny?
The coffin lifted. She gripped the sides, trying to find her balance as the pallbearers slid the casket off the cart until the box stood upright. She landed with a jarring thunk on the floor. You just couldn't get good pallbearers anymore.
Paul tapped on the side of the coffin to signal her it was show time.
"In honor of your birthday, your friends and family have given you a gift from the other side. The other side of the hill, that is," Paul announced as the noise from the crowd swelled.
Music started to play, and Jennifer hit the button on the inside of the wooden box. The lid sprang open and she slinked out, her chiffon dress clinging like a second skin that left little to the imagination.
"Happy Birthday," she sang in her alto voice, her eyes blinded by the lights. She blinked rapidly, hoping her eyesight would adjust to the brightness of the room. When her vision finally cleared, she found herself staring into the face of the one man she'd hoped never to see again.
There before her, wearing a stunned expression on his face and a Marvin the Martian child's birthday hat on his head, sat Brent Moulton.
"Well, I'll be damned," said the captain of her old high school football team, the person voted most handsome and most likely to succeed.
Jennifer's voice cracked as she gazed into the emerald eyes of the boy who'd once been the object of her teenage dreams. A lock of dark hair lay across his high forehead. His full lips smiled as she stumbled over the words to the song she'd sung countless times.
I should never have agreed to do this tonight!
Dancing for a man who, almost fifteen years ago, hadn't known the difference between her and Julia was anything but special, but the show had to go on.
She slinked around him, her heart beating in her throat as she ran her hands along the hard, contoured muscles of his shoulders during her act. Brent must have existed on nothing but Wheaties since graduation, because his physique resembled a professional football player's, rather than that of a high school kid.
Of course, he would never remember her. She had portrayed Julia that night so long ago when they'd pulled a switch on him. Nevertheless, deep down inside, the foolish young girl Jennifer had convinced herself that he'd known which twin he was with. To her, their identity seemed apparent. Yes, they looked alike, but when someone really knew the two of them, their differences were obvious.
With a coo that she hoped resembled Christina Aguilera's crooning, she ran her fingers down his cheek as she began the last chorus of the song, the place in the act where she was supposed to lean forward and place a chaste kiss on his cheek. She gazed at his lips, full and inviting, and remembered the feel of them against her own that moonlit night when he believed he was kissing Julia's lips.
She chickened out.
––– end of excerpt –––
Available in August
The Rancher Takes a Bride Page 26
