“It won’t,” he answered with a shrug of his shoulder. But then his teasing faded, replaced by grim sobriety. “My sister went through hell when John Meredith died, and she deserves to have a husband who loves her and would do anything to make her happy. And for some reason I can’t fathom, she’s fallen for you.”
Kit could barely fathom it himself. Yet he’d seen the emotion in her eyes that dawn when she made love to him on the deck of the sailboat, had heard her soft declaration right before the darkness swept over him.
But he also saw the worry and fear that had gripped her when she’d spoken about finding a stable and dependable man to be Meri’s father. He knew she didn’t mean him.
“You will marry her,” Morgan ordered.
He laughed darkly, regretting it when stabs of pain shot down his arm. As if he hadn’t thought of that already! A hundred times since he first kissed her, in fact, and every time, he ended up at the same realization— “Your sister doesn’t want to marry a man like me.”
“Oh yes, she does. She just doesn’t want to marry a soldier.” He gave a curt nod. “Congratulations on your court martial.”
Kit’s heart stuttered. His blood began to warm with a faint tingle that started in his bare toes and worked its way up his half-dressed body, until the hair on his head felt as if it were standing on end. It fell over him slowly, the realization that his world had just been irrevocably changed. That everything his life had been was now gone. An unnamable sensation seeped through him that he was floating weightless, tied to nothing that anchored him in place…nothing that held him down. For the first time since he entered the army over a decade ago, his life was his own, wide open to be anything he wanted it to be.
That was the unrecognizable feeling that crept through him…freedom. A freedom that only a few months ago—only a few days ago, in fact—seemed impossible.
The door opened. The soft metallic click of the latch snapped him back to the moment, so did the slam of pain through his shoulder when he turned too quickly toward it.
“Christopher,” Diana whispered breathlessly, stopping in the doorway and holding onto the door for support. As if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. The relief that flooded her face shot through him with the force of cannon fire. So did the bright tears that glistened in her blue eyes, despite her rapid blinking to clear them away.
Letting his gaze wander deliberately over her, he drank her in. Never—never had he seen a more beautiful vision in his life than Diana at that moment. The sight of her pierced him. To his soul.
“Well,” Morgan drawled, pushing himself away from the window. “I know when I’m not wanted.”
Ignoring Kit, he stopped in front of Diana on his way out the door. He took her arms in his hands to make her face him, even as she attempted to crane her neck to see around him, to keep her eyes on Kit.
“Carlisle’s going to ask you something very important,” Morgan told her. Then he brought her attention back to him with a kiss to her forehead. “However badly he mangles it, say yes.”
Kit rolled his eyes. Good Lord.
Morgan left, closing the door after himself.
Diana remained where she was, on the other side of the room. So close that he could almost feel her softness, yet still a world away. The only movement she made was to bite her bottom lip.
Kit didn’t blame her for being wary. Everything had changed between them. And when he finished telling her what he planned on doing with his newfound freedom and with the offer from the Foreign Office, everything would change even more.
He glanced at his bandaged shoulder and said quietly, “I got shot.”
“I know,” she replied wryly, staying where she was. “I was there.”
Her soft answer pricked him with guilt at the hell she must have gone through that night.
He took a slow step toward her. “I’m going to live.” He paused. “I think.”
Pulling in a shaking breath, she jerked a nod. She couldn’t find her voice to give him the set-down that flippant comment deserved.
“I’m no longer considered a rogue agent.”
She held her breath. “That means…”
“That Whitehall isn’t coming after me to finish what Paxton started.”
A shudder of relief swept through her with such intensity that she swayed on her feet, and a long breath poured from her. All of her fear and worry for him expelled with it.
“I also got dismissed from the army and kicked out of the Home Office.”
Her face paled, but he had no idea if that was a good sign or not. She choked out, as if unwilling to believe that he was telling her the truth, “You did?”
“Yes.”
For a long moment, neither of them moved, neither spoke. But he saw the way that news seeped through her, the understanding of what that meant registering with faint hope on her face.
“You were…” She swallowed nervously. “You were going to ask me…something?”
“Yes, I was.”
He moved to stand in front of her, but didn’t yet reach for her. This was too important, and if he took her into his arms right now, he wouldn’t stop kissing her long enough to finish this conversation.
“The Foreign Office has offered me a position in London. Apparently, instead of wanting to kill me outright, they prefer to slowly torture me to death by making me do administrative for them.”
All traces of hope vanished from her face. Definitely not a good sign. Visibly, she steeled herself. “And your question?”
“Should I take the position?”
He felt her breath hitch, so attuned was he to this woman. Everything about her made his skin prickle and his soul ache.
“I don’t know.” She hesitated, lowering her gaze away for the first time since she came into the room and saw him. “Is it a good position?”
“Of sorts.” He fought to keep his face inscrutable. This decision had to be hers. He needed to know whether she truly wanted a future with him, once he was free to become the man she needed and deserved. “A desk position. No more field work. No more pretending to be a shiftless second son.” He forced a grin. “I can claim that I grew tired of waiting around for a living as a vicar and decided to throw my lot in with the sinners in government.”
Her mouth pulled down. She didn’t find that amusing, apparently. “It sounds like a fine opportunity.” But the tone of her voice—pained and full of grief—told him a completely different story. So did the way her shoulders sagged when she added, so softly that he had to take another step forward to hear her, “But it’s still in service to the Crown. They could still send you anywhere they liked, couldn’t they?”
“Yes.”
“Could you ever refuse to go?”
“No.” The truth of that was brutal, and he felt that single word rip all the hope from her.
She gave a faint, slow nod of acceptance and blinked rapidly, still refusing to look at him even though he now stood directly in front of her. So close that he could caress her cheek if he lifted his hand.
“Is it what you want?” Emotion scraped her voice raw. “To work for them?”
“I might be persuaded to decline it.” He murmured, “What do you want?”
“I want you…to be happy,” but the words tore from her in a desolate whisper.
He took her chin and turned her head gently until she looked up at him. He repeated quietly, “What do you want, Diana?”
The pleading in her eyes told him that she couldn’t bring herself to put her answer into words. She’d lived for so long at the heartless mercy of fate that she didn’t yet dare consider claiming her own happiness. Didn’t dare raise her hopes, only to have them dashed if he did want a life in service after all. A life that would never have room for the stability and consistency she needed in hers.
She wanted a future together as much as he did, he was certain of it. But she also needed to protect her daughter.
And he loved her even more because of that.
“I haven’t asked it yet.”
Her gaze flew up to his, to search his face for answers.
He gathered all his strength to keep from yanking her into his arms and kissing away her doubts. “So this Meri girl—you like her, do you?”
She blinked, her watery eyes widening at that unexpected question. “Pardon?”
“I mean, you like her enough to keep her around?” He fought to maintain a somber expression on his face as he teased her. “Feed her, clothe her…water her once in a while so she’ll grow?”
“Christopher,” she chastised softly, her shoulders sagging with exasperation. “Be serious, will you?”
“I couldn’t be more serious. I’ve been shot. Something like that shakes a man up and makes him want to seize what’s important.” He rubbed at his aching shoulder. What he wouldn’t have given to be able to crawl into bed and fall back asleep until he healed, with Diana in his arms. “You want Meri to have a loving home, don’t you? Maybe give her a brother or sister to play with?” He murmured, “Or six?”
“A brother or…” Her breath caught, her eyes widening with understanding of what he was truly asking her. “Yes,” she finally managed to choke out. “I think she’d like that. A great deal.” She trembled and whispered, blinking rapidly, “So would I.”
Kit knew what he wanted, then and for the rest of his life.
He opened his arms.
She rushed into his embrace, burying her face in his chest and clasping him around the waist. He pressed her close despite the pain in his shoulder and the fatigue that even now had him light-headed and unsteady on his feet. Although that could have also been due to Diana and the anticipation of a life together.
“I love you, Diana.” More than he’d ever dreamed possible. He drew a deep breath and finally asked the question that was burning inside him. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” she said, pulling back just far enough to cup his face in her hands. “Yes, I will marry you.”
A smile beamed through her tears as she rose onto her tiptoes to kiss him. Then, lowering herself away, she arched a brow that told him she’d brook no argument.
“But I am not having six children.”
He laughed as happiness swelled inside him, and he pulled her back into his arms, to never let her go.
Epilogue
Kingscote Park, Hampshire
Two Months Later
Diana reclined in the bottom of the little rowboat and turned her face up toward the warm afternoon sun, relishing in a few moments of peace from the noisy party they’d left behind at the manor house. “Where are we going?”
“I told you. It’s a secret,” Kit answered, not pausing in his rowing as he moved them across the lake on his brother’s country estate. “You used to like secrets.”
A laugh fell from her lips, and she corrected, “What I liked were secret agents.” She smiled flirtatiously at him. “One secret agent, actually.”
“You’d better like me.” He softened the warning with a smile, his hands not leaving the oars as they skimmed the water’s mirror-like surface and took them further away from their own wedding celebration. “It’s too late now to change your mind.”
She watched the sunlight sparkle against her wedding ring as she lazily dipped her hand into the water. “I won’t be changing my mind.” With a happy laugh, she flung a handful of water up at him. “So tell me where you’re taking me.”
“Even pharaohesses don’t need to know everything.”
“Then how about your wife?”
He flashed her a grin, and her belly fluttered. Please, God, never let me grow used to this feeling of Christopher smiling at me.
“My wife is allowed to know everything,” he promised.
His wife. That sent her belly into somersaults.
The new appellation would take some time to get used to, especially since it was less than four hours old. Even now, the grounds of Kingscote Park were filled with hundreds of guests of all stations, ranks, and association to them, from the Duke of Wellington all the way down to Angus Higgins, the steward at Idlewild who had once come after Kit with a gun…although at the time, Diana had had no idea how common an event that actually was. And something she prayed would never happen again.
The rooms of the grand manor house were filled to bursting with people who had come to help them celebrate their wedding, a small ceremony held that morning in the village church with only family and close friends in attendance. Even then, though, the pews had been filled with all the Carlisles and their growing families, the Winslows, the Mattesons, the Westovers—the Duke and Duchess of Strathmore’s beautiful little girls took up a row of pews all by themselves—a scattering of Whitbys, and even Nathaniel Grey, along with his wife Lady Emily and their son. With Kit’s brother, Ross, standing beside him as his best man, Miranda Carlisle as her matron of honor, Meri as the flower girl, and the general walking her down the aisle, it was a true family affair.
Diana wouldn’t have had it any other way.
As she watched Kit row in his shirtsleeves, his jacket removed and the muscles of his shoulders and back rippling, happiness bubbled inside her. The most wonderful man in the world loved her, a man who also loved Meri and insisted that her daughter be publicly raised as their child…who had already hired a solicitor to start the adoption process, in fact, so that he could also make her his daughter. In every way possible.
Diana didn’t want to create any more upheaval in Meri’s young life, preferring to ease her into all the changes to come. Kit agreed. So when they returned to Idlewild after the events at Bradwell, the family and household servants quietly enacted their subtle plan. Now, Diana was referred to as Meri’s mama, with Diana’s mother as her grandmama and Garret as her uncle. Meri transitioned well, experiencing only a bit of confusion when everyone began to refer to the general as her grandpapa. They gently yet persistently corrected her whenever she referred to them by their old roles, and always without directly confronting her about it. By the time of the wedding, Meri had come to accept the new roles without a second thought…including referring to Kit as Papa.
There was no explanation for Meri, except that Kit was going to marry them. The truth would come later, when she was older and could understand. Then, she would be told the story of John Meredith, of what a good and brave man he’d been, how he would be proud to know that she was his daughter.
But for now, they would form their own new family and simply enjoy being together.
The rowboat rocked suddenly beneath her, and she grabbed at the sides of the boat.
“If I’m going to have to swim for shore,” she teased, taking a different tack to discover why he’d brought her out onto the lake, “I’d like to know in which direction to head.”
He nodded toward the little island in the center of the lake. “There.”
Her heart fell with disappointment. “There?”
“Wooded and private, with a hermitage. One that is conveniently lacking a hermit at the moment.”
“Convenient,” she drawled a bit suspiciously.
“Very. Even more so since I asked the servants to get it ready for us.”
She sat up. “Ready?”
Knowing that he’d pricked her curiosity and now had her full attention, he lazily described, “Flowers, wood for warm fires, soft bedding…lots of soft bedding.” A wolfish gleam lit his eyes, and that predacious stare pulsed all the way down between her legs, where a soft ache began to throb in time with his rowing. “And a picnic basket filled with enough food and wine to keep us fed for days.”
“Days?” The word emerged as a throaty purr, only for the tingles of excitement to be dashed by reality. “But someone will notice we’ve left the party and come looking for us. They’ll find us by nightfall.”
“They can’t.”
The smug way he said that made he
r ask, “Why not?”
“Because this is the only boat on the lake that’s still seaworthy.” He winked at her. “I scuttled all the others last night.”
“You didn’t!”
“Days, Mrs. Carlisle.” He rested his elbows on his knees as he paused in rowing to lean toward her to punctuate his point. “Days and days of nothing to do but ravish you, thoroughly and repeatedly.” He glanced regretfully over his shoulder toward the little boathouse on the far shore. “But I suppose we could go back and—”
“Keep rowing.” She gestured her hand imperially toward the island and once more reclined on the seat. “Your pharaohess demands it.”
Amusement danced across his face as he took up the oars again. “Yes, my queen.”
She couldn’t help but smile at him. He made her so happy that it seemed she’d never stop beaming. Which was perfectly fine with her.
The only dark spot so far in their lives had involved his work.
Just as she’d hoped, he’d declined Canning’s offer with the Foreign Office, yet fate had brought him back to the Home Office. This time, thankfully, not as an operative but as an administrator, overseeing the Home Secretary’s latest initiative—a metropolitan police force. One that would be organized, well-funded, and—unlike Bow Street—uncorrupt. One that needed a man exactly like Kit to develop and implement it. A man who knew England’s criminal underworld but who also had connections with enough influential members of Parliament to ensure passage of the act necessary to establish it. So Sir Robert Peel had come hat in hand to ask Christopher to lead it.
He and Diana had a long conversation about what he wanted from his work, about what she needed from him. He was a man who wanted action in his life. And she needed him to be happy. The new police force would give both of them that. Moreover, the initiative would take years to implement, with the position based exclusively in London.
He’d finally become the respectable, settled, and dependable man whom Diana wanted for a husband and who Meri needed for a father.
After the Spy Seduces Page 27