“Then marry me.”
“Saxon, wait—”
“I’ve waited long enough. I’ve waited too long to say this. I want you to marry me, Ashiana. I love you and I’ve never stopped and I never will.”
She closed her eyes, her expression one of relief and pleasure and wonder. “You can forgive me so easily?”
“Forgive you for what? For sacrificing yourself to save my life? I don’t have to forgive you for that. I love you for that.” He caught her at last, cupping her face in his palms, brushing her hair back from her cheeks, filled with soft emotions that made him ache. “Though it’s something you are never to even think about doing again.” He dusted kisses over her lips, her eyelids, her nose. “How did you escape from your promise to Rao?”
“I…” He finally stopped distracting her with kisses long enough to let her answer. “I did not escape, not really. First he had to make sure the sapphires were safe. He went and put the last sacred stone with the rest, and he moved them to another location beneath the sea. I don’t even know where they are now—”
“Thank God.”
“I kept hoping I could make him understand, make him see that I would not forget you. But he would not listen. He insisted we would marry during the festival of Diwali. But then…then something finally happened to convince him, and he had to agree that I would never forget you.”
“What happened?”
“I discovered that…” Shaking, she pulled out of his embrace, as if needing distance before she told him the rest. He could not understand why she seemed nervous about his reaction. She walked back to the windows.
The words finally flowed out, all on one wavering breath. “I discovered that I’m carrying your child.”
Saxon closed his eyes, then opened them again, but she was still there, and this wasn’t a dream, and he felt as if he would burn to a cinder with the astonishment and joy that flared through him.
His child. His love was carrying his child.
“Ashiana,” he said thickly, the only word he could manage as he realized the real reason for the changes he had noticed in her—the added weight that softened her body, the glow that warmed her skin. “And I thought it was the islands that had been good for you…”
Emotion choked out his voice.
When she turned toward him, she must have seen the love and happiness and pride shining in his eyes, because tears suddenly coursed down her cheeks.
“It was not the islands.” She smiled, opening her peshwaz and resting one hand over the gentle swell of her abdomen. “It was you, here.”
He crossed the cabin in two steps and swept her into his arms, kissing her until they swayed with the power of it. He lifted his head just long enough to allow them both a breath before he kissed her again. It was a long time before she got the chance to finish her explanation.
She said the rest into his shirt. “Even Rao had to agree that while the clan might accept me, they would never accept your son or daughter. He released me from my promise, and even let Padmini come with me. We left the island and came here to Bombay to seek passage back to England, but then I was told that you were still here, and I thought—I hoped—that you might have stayed because you still love me. But I…I was afraid to see you, to tell you. I was worried you would not…would not believe the babe is yours.”
He stroked his fingers through her hair. “Then what made you risk coming here and telling me?”
“My love for you is stronger than any fear or worry.” She raised her head, caressing his beard-stubbled cheek. “I love you, Saxon. Hamesha ke liye. I am yours, forever. I said it in the gardens, before you leaped over the wall, but I wasn’t sure you—”
His mouth covered hers in a kiss that bespoke all his love and passion and found them reflected back tenfold. She was his and he was hers, and nothing would ever separate them again. Holding her safe and protected in his arms, he said everything that needed to be said.
“I love you, meree mahila veer, and I have no doubt the child is ours. As soon as I left you behind on that island, I felt as if I had lost half of my soul. But I thought you would be happier on the Andamans. I thought I couldn’t give you everything you need.”
She reached up to thread her fingers through his hair, her eyes darkening to sea-deep azure. “You are everything I need.”
He blinked hard, emotion making his voice husky. “But won’t you miss your home?”
She shook her head. “It’s not blood or birthplace that make a home. It’s love. My home is with you, my love, now and forever.” Smiling, she snuggled against his chest. “But would it be possible for Padmini to come with us?”
“Padmini?” He started walking her slowly backward…toward the bed.
“My maidservant. She is a good friend, and a talented cook. She knows how to make many spicy dishes and—mmmm.”
There was definitely a “yes” murmured somewhere among the sweet words Saxon whispered in her ear as he lifted her in his arms and laid her on the bed.
She sighed at the whisper of silk parting beneath his fingers. “And Nicobar? We could stop and pick him up from our island on the way home. Tigers do quite well in the cold Himalayas, so I don’t think he’ll mind the English climate—” She gasped as Saxon distracted her with an extremely well-placed kiss.
“Nicobar too,” he agreed. “And you may dispense with wearing the gloves you dislike so much. Perhaps even corsets. I’m willing to negotiate on undergarments.”
“But won’t I be completely scandalous?”
“No, my love.” Saxon stretched out beside her, sharing her smile, loving the sparkle of her sapphire eyes in the candles and starlight as he gently welcomed her home. “You’ll be completely a D’Avenant.”
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I hope you enjoyed spending time with Saxon and Ashiana in the pages of One Night with a Scoundrel. I’d love to keep writing books that touch your heart for many years to come. Readers like you make it possible, and I’m so thankful for your support.
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Writers the world over are blessed with exceptional librarians who make our lives easier. I’d like to say thank you to all who spend their days behind a reference desk, never blinking when a stray writer asks for advice on eighteenth-century explosives or the raising of baby tigers. A special word of praise to Marilyn Gurney of the Maritime Command Museum, Halifax, Nova Scotia, for her research-and-rescue mission.
Thanks also to Kelly Norman, MIRLYN wizard and U-M library guide extraordinaire; Alka Goyal, Kusum Mongia, Nidhi Nigam and Aruna Ravishankar for their assistance with the Hindu language; and the Government of India Tourist Office, Port Blair, Andaman Islands.
My deepest, most heartfelt thanks, always, to Mark, whose love makes everything possible.
ALSO BY
The Escape with a Scoundrel Series
These sexy bad boys are on the wrong side of the law—and willing to break all the ru
les to protect the women they love.
ESCAPE WITH A SCOUNDREL
HER SCOUNDREL EARL
ONE NIGHT WITH A SCOUNDREL
A SCOUNDREL’S KISS
The Stolen Brides Series
These regal brides are about to discover that falling in love with a warrior is the most dangerous adventure of all.
HIS STOLEN BRIDE
FOREVER HIS
HIS FORBIDDEN TOUCH
HIS CAPTIVE BRIDE
Stand-Alone Novels
AFTER SUNDOWN
Boxed Sets
Buy a bundle and save a bundle! Special-edition boxed sets are available for a limited time. Click the Boxed Sets link above to view Shelly’s latest collections.
Bonus Excerpt: His Captive Bride
(Stolen Brides Series, Book 3)
Abducted from a trade fair by a mysterious warrior, Lady Avril de Varennes awakens on Asgard Island, an enchanted paradise kept secret from the world for centuries…
The glitter of steel on the wall caught her attention. Along with hunting trophies and strange sculptures and artifacts, the owner of this place had a number of weapons on display.
How foolish of him, Avril thought with a grim smile of satisfaction, to leave them within easy reach. She walked over and selected a double-edged blade that was long enough to use as a sword yet light enough to throw, if the need arose.
When her abductor returned, he would find himself with more trouble than he had bargained for.
Gripping the weapon in one hand, she was about to renew her search for an exit when a sound from the dark, distant corner of the chamber startled her—the sound of a key turning in a lock.
Her pulse racing, she retreated a few steps, away from the hearth and the open window, trying to conceal herself in the shadows. She raised the sword in front of her and peered into the blackness.
A door creaked open. A massive, heavy portal from the sound of it. It closed an instant later with the clatter of an iron latch. Avril heard a footfall. Another. Then nothing more.
Nothing but the pounding of her heart.
“Milady?” a deep male voice called after a moment, speaking quietly in French. “There is no need to hide from me. I mean you no harm.”
She did not reply, edging silently along the wall. Now that she knew the general location of the door, if she could tiptoe her way around him…
“You cannot hide forever.” He walked farther into the room, his tone becoming impatient. “And there is nowhere to run.”
Ha, she thought, moving faster. That was his opinion. Once she reached the door, he would discover why she had always won footraces when she was a girl—
Her next step carried her straight into a small table and sent both her and whatever had been on it crashing to the floor.
She landed hard and yelped in pain as she bruised her hip on the hard stone and cut her hand on a shard of glass. Cups and platters and a shattered goblet littered the floor around her.
Uttering what sounded like an oath, her abductor closed in on her, a massive shadow looming out of the darkness.
“Stay back!” she shouted, grabbing the sword she had dropped. “I have a weapon. And I am skilled enough to use it!”
The threat stopped him, at least for the moment. “A blade will avail you naught more than shouting yourself hoarse at the window did.” He sounded annoyed rather than concerned about his safety. “You cannot harm me, milady.”
What arrogance! Shaking her head, Avril got to her feet, careful of the broken glass. “Come any closer and you will discover precisely how wrong you are.” She tried to judge the distance to the door, took a cautious step.
And felt surprised when he moved away from her, toward the window.
“I do not doubt your skill,” he said dryly. “I saw you demonstrate it in the marketplace.”
He stepped into the pool of moonlight that poured through the open shutters.
Avril gasped, staring at him in open-mouthed astonishment. “You!” she choked out. “You are the trader who ran into me at the street corner.”
Her pounding heart seemed to fill her throat as she gaped at him. It was unmistakably the same tall, heavily muscled rogue who had collided with her. The same fierce, rugged face. The same bronzed skin and sun-colored hair, utterly at odds with the moonlight all around him.
“As I recall,” he said sardonically, one corner of his mouth curving, “it was you who ran into me.”
Avril felt a rush of dizziness, just as she had in Antwerp—mayhap because he seemed familiar, in a way she could not explain. There was something about his deep, quiet voice. Something in his gaze.
He had eyes of the palest blue, like a clear, cool lake reflecting a summer sky.
And as he regarded her silently, the unnerving sensation she had felt upon first meeting him shimmered through her once more—a dazzling heat, as if the sun had tumbled from the heavens to fill every fiber of her being. The impact swept over her so suddenly, so powerfully, it robbed her of breath, voice, of her very senses.
Even as she struggled to give the feeling a name, she sensed, somehow, that he felt it, too. Which only mystified and unsettled her all the more.
Shaken, she managed to tear her gaze from his, and realized that he no longer wore the homespun tunic and cloak of a trader. He was garbed in naught but a pair of close-fitting brown leggings, leather boots, and a gold armband encircling one thick bicep. A sheathed sword and knife hung from his belt.
Every hard plane and angle of his shoulders and chest and powerful arms was exposed to view. From his unyielding stance to the blunt tips of his fingers, he looked as strong and solid as the rocks that sliced up the sea below his keep.
He moved away from the window, and a moment later the center of the room flared with the glow of fire, as he used flint and steel to light the candles in an iron candle-stand. The golden warmth flickered over his back and arms, casting every muscle and sinew in sharp relief.
“Put the weapon down,” he said without looking at her.
Avril shivered. It was not a suggestion but a command. He spoke in the same way he moved—with an air of authority. As if he owned not only this place, but everything in it.
She felt renewed fear curl in her belly. But she did not comply. She tightened her hand around the blade’s hilt, ignoring the sting in her injured palm.
Carrying one of the candles, he moved even closer to light a second candelabra. Avril held her ground—and, in the growing brightness, felt surprised to see that she was not in a bedchamber after all.
There were cook pots, copper utensils, and a cauldron beside the hearth. A table for eating in one corner. Shelves that held linens and soaps for washing, next to a rain barrel. This odd dwelling seemed to be some sort of long, one-room home.
Finished with his task, her abductor glanced toward her, mouth open as if he meant to issue another command. But then his gaze fastened on the revealing silk kirtle and skimmed down her body, taking in every inch of skin illuminated by the light.
Those pale azure eyes suddenly darkened in a blaze of heat. Avril inhaled sharply, filled with feminine alarm at the obvious direction of his thoughts. Every instinct urged her to flee, yet she could not move. And could not understand the tingle that coursed through her limbs, holding her fast.
“I left a tunic for you.” His voice sounded even deeper than before. A muscle flexed in his lean jaw. “Did you not see it?” He nodded toward the foot of the bed, where a garment of black velvet lay draped over a trunk.
“I-I was more interested in finding a way out!” She tried to keep her voice from wavering, looked at the distant door. Wondered if she dared try to run past him. “Where am I?” she demanded, deciding boldness was her only choice at the moment. “Who the devil are you and what do you—”
“Put down the blade,” he repeated with measured patience, “and we will discuss this”—he seemed to search for the appropriate word— “situation calmly.”
“Calmly?” sh
e sputtered. “I have been attacked by brigands, kidnapped, carried off to sweet Mary knows where, locked in a room, and now—”
“Milady,” he said in soft warning. Without another word, he advanced toward her, his patience apparently at an end. She retreated only a step.
Then she retreated three more.
As he kept coming, she decided that discretion might be better than valor at the moment. She dashed toward the bed, snatching up the black velvet tunic on the way and clutching it in front of her. She tossed the weapon into the center of the rumpled sheets.
“There. There, are you satisfied?” She kept moving, maneuvering around until the huge bed was between them. The sword was still within reach if she chose to lunge for it.
But he seemed placated for now. He kept his distance, reaching out to close his fingers around one of the dragon-headed posts.
“If I had meant you any harm,” he grated out, pronouncing each word distinctly, as if she were a slow-witted child, “if I had intended to kill you, or do aught else”—his gaze flicked over her body again—”I already had ample opportunity. You will have to trust me.”
Trust him? Trust him! Avril choked back a biting retort and quickly pulled the tunic over her head. It was obviously one of his, the sleeves much too long, the hem falling to her ankles. But at least she no longer felt as exposed as she did wearing only the ridiculous scrap of silk.
“Where am I?” she repeated more calmly once she was dressed, trying not to provoke him again. “How far are we from Antwerp? How long was I asleep?”
“You were asleep…” He paused, clearly choosing his words carefully. “A short time. I brought you here early this morn. That gown was the only female garment I had at the time. I have brought you some others, along with some additional female trappings you might require.” He nodded toward a pair of sacks he had left on the far side of the room. “As for where you are, this is Asgard Island. I bid you…” He paused again, sighing tiredly. “Welcome.”
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