Regency Christmas (Holiday Collection)

by Jillian Eaton

  He loved it when she blushed – which he had taken particular delight in making her do this morning – and he loved it when she got that little stutter in her voice. He loved how sweet she was, and how kind. He loved how trusting she was, and how honest. Last night they had hidden nothing from each other and Devlin had never felt closer to another human being in his entire life. She was his match, in every sense of the word, and if he had one regret it would only be that he had overlooked her for so long.

  As a plan began to form in Devlin’s mind, he bounded down the stairs to make the necessary preparations, leaving Lily and Sarah to their gossip of which he could only hope showed him in the best possible light for he suspected – and rightly so – that if Lady Kincaid did not approve of him it would be an uphill battle to win Sarah’s heart.

  Inside the master bedroom, Lily reclined belly down on the bed while Sarah combed out her long hair and began to plait it into a braid.

  At first Sarah had been reserved in sharing details of her heavenly night spent in Devlin’s arms, but after enduring a barrage of merciless questions she had finally caved in and, blushing head to toe, gave Lily a full report on what had occurred, leaving no detail left unspoken.

  Her friend listened with rapt attention, interrupting every once in a while with little gems such as, “he did what?” and “oh, I would have positively died” and (Sarah’s personal favorite) “I am going to faint”.

  When she was finally finished recanting her first experience with lovemaking, Sarah sat on the bed beside Lily and wrapped her arms around her knees. “And then we did it all over again this morning,” she confessed.

  Lily clapped a hand to her forehead. “And here I was worried you were being taken advantage of.” Sitting up, she rearranged her skirts and crossed her legs at the ankle. “You little minx, you seduced him! Sarah Emily Dawson, I never thought I would see the day. How do you feel this morning?”

  “Wonderful.” Sarah smiled. “Absolutely wonderful.”

  “And when is the big day?”

  “The big day?”

  Lily rolled her eyes. “The wedding, you ninny. When are you getting married? Why, even now you could be, you know,” she paused to look pointedly at Sarah’s stomach, “in the family way. There really is no time to waste.”

  Sarah’s smile faltered. “I… We… That has not been discussed yet.”

  “That has not been discussed yet? What is there to discuss! He ruined you, thus he has to marry you.”

  “He did not ruin me,” Sarah protested, even as a seedling of doubt in the back of her mind said otherwise. She and Devlin had yet to talk about the future, but she had naturally assumed he would offer for her hand. Now she was suddenly not so certain. Perhaps last night had not meant to him what it meant to her. After all, he’d probably had a thousand of those nights with a hundred different women. How was she any different? Why would she be any different? Because she loved him? Sarah winced at the thought.

  She did not know if love meant anything to Devlin, let alone if he even loved her or would be capable of loving her. In the light of day it was easy to see how much of a fool she had been. A silly, presumptuous fool who never learned from her mistakes and now may have made the most grievous one of all.

  “I have to speak with him,” she decided. Leaving the bed, she picked up her clothing that had dried in front of the fire overnight and began to dress herself while Lily watched, worried concern marring her pretty face. “Help me with the stays,” she implored, and Lily stood at once, crossing the room and tightening the back of Sarah’s dress with four quick pulls.

  “Everything will be fine,” Lily assured her, although she could not quite keep the doubt from creeping into her tone that Sarah could hear clear as a bell.

  “You said it yourself.” She fretted anxiously with the end of her braid. “He ruined me, Lily.”

  “Ah yes, well, perhaps that was a poor choice of words.”

  “What if he never wants to see me again?”

  “Darling, of course he wants to see you. He loves you. I saw it on his face the moment I walked through the door. I was merely being cautious. You know how I can be. Why, I bet at this very moment he is planning out his proposal.”

  “No.” Sarah shook her head and began to pace. “No, he is not. Why, by now he has probably forgotten my name. What am I going to do, Lily? I w-wanted this to happen but I never thought it would really happen.”

  Unbeknownst to either woman, the bedroom door creaked open.

  “Sarah?” Devlin asked uncertainly, stepping into the room and taking in the harried scene. “What is it? What is wrong?”

  Lifting tear drenched eyes to his, Sarah choked back a sob, shot past him, and fled.

  In the deafening silence that followed her abrupt retreat, Devlin rounded on Lily with a snarl. He had never shaken a woman, but he was sorely tempted to now, especially after witnessing the naked pain he had seen flash across Sarah’s face. The urge to help her, to protect her, was like a live thing inside of him, clawing to get free. “What the hell did you say to her?” he demanded.

  Helpless to explain, Lily could only shake her head.

  On a vicious oath, Devlin spun on his heel and bolted out of the room.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Sarah made it through the front door before she came up short and nearly flew off the front steps in amazement at the sight that greeted her. There, in the middle of the empty snow covered street, stood Devlin’s gray horse and sleigh.

  Both had been resplendently decked out in lavish red bows, ornate gold bells, and – even though she had to squint to make them out – sprigs of mistletoe tied together with silver ribbon.

  “Do you like it?” Devlin murmured from behind her. “I was coming upstairs to get you. I wanted it to be a surprise.”

  Sarah startled slightly as Devlin draped her cloak – forgotten in her rush to flee – over her shoulders. “Thank you,” she said absently, still distracted by the sleigh and the possible implications of what such a grand gesture could mean.

  Coming to stand beside her, Devlin gently took her hand, his long fingers wrapping easily around her smaller ones. “Come on a ride with me?”

  She hesitated. “Devlin, there is something I need to ask—”

  “Come on a ride with me,” he repeated.

  This time it was not a question.

  Arm in arm they walked down the steps. The gray horse waited patiently while Devlin first helped Sarah into the sleigh before he went around to the other side and climbed in himself. A flick of the reins, a cluck of his tongue, and they were off, moving with a swift speed Sarah was more accustomed to the second time around.

  The wind whistled past her cheeks and caught the hood of her cloak, nearly causing it to fall from her head before she pulled it more firmly down around her ears. Wordlessly Devlin reached down underneath the seat and pulled out the fur blanket he had given her before. This time he used it to cover them both and their thighs brushed intimately as the sleigh moved briskly down the street and turned left, towards the park.

  Sarah’s heart pounded, so loud she feared Devlin would surely hear, but when she sneaked a sideways glance at his profile she saw his attention was firmly fixed on the winding path in front of them.

  Taking a deep breath she settled into the seat and forced herself to relax and enjoy the scenery. Now that they were beyond the houses and shops of the city it passed by in flashes of green and white, so pristine and clear it made Sarah smile despite the aching in her heart. Winter may have been many things, but ugly it was not, at least not in the typical sense of the word.

  Despite the frigid temperatures and the ice and bone chilling wind there was a loveliness to all of it that many people failed to realize. There was a sense of magic as well, a soft tingling in the air that made one appreciate their surroundings far more than usual. It filled Sarah with awareness, not just for the beauty of a solitary pine standing guard over a field painted in white, but for herself as a woman
.

  For the first time she recalled the wish she had made in the darkened study with only Lily to bear witness. A wish that had, for all intents and purposes, come true threefold since its making.

  I wish Devlin would simply notice me.

  Sarah glanced at him again and this time he was looking back at her, his blue eyes calm and soft with an emotion she dared not name. He eased the horse down to a shuffling walk, shifted the reins to his left hand, and raised the right to gently cup her cheek. She leaned into the pressure, closed her eyes, and sighed.

  “You are not a great beauty,” he said huskily.

  Sarah’s eyes shot open. “What d-did you say?” she said, her forehead creasing. She would have drawn back, but he had begun tracing the curve of her jaw with his thumb, and she was too weak a creature to deny herself such a simple pleasure.

  “The other women I have been with were all great beauties. Their hair was more golden than yours, their lips more red, their bodies more voluptuous.” Here Devlin paused and Sarah, who had grown more and more incredulous with every word he spoke, finally jerked free of his grasp and wedged herself into the farthest corner of the seat she could reach.

  “If you are trying to pay me compliments you are not doing a very good job!”

  “Oh,” Devlin, his blue eyes gleaming and his dimples flashing, “I am paying you the greatest compliment of all. These women,” he continued, apparently oblivious to the fact that Sarah did not want to hear of anyone else he had been with, “were so beautiful it often pained me to look upon them, for I knew beneath their glittering smiles and batting eyelashes they were as cold and empty as porcelain dolls. They could not love another, you see, for they were already in love with themselves. I knew this, and in knowing it pursued them all the more, for I did not seek love, I sought beauty and all the coldness it brought with it.”

  “But… But why?” Sarah asked.

  “Because when you are cold you cannot feel alive, and when you are not alive you cannot feel love.” With a soft murmur Devlin eased down to a full halt. Securing the reins he turned to Sarah and gently drew her hands into his, his fingers tracing across the delicate bumps of her knuckles as he gazed earnestly into her eyes. “But I do not feel cold around you, Sarah. I feel alive, as I have not in years. I loved another once, and when she broke my heart I swore never to open myself to such pain again.”

  It was beginning to dawn on Sarah that Devlin was trying to tell her how much he cared for her, albeit in a rather roundabout way. She drew in a deep, trembling breath and tried to still the hope that quivered wildly within her breast.

  Hope had not served her well in the past, and she dared not set it free now, not when there was still a chance her heart could shatter as surely as Devlin’s had all those years ago. “What are you trying to say?” she pressed, searching his eyes for the answer to the most important question of all.

  “What am I trying to say?” Devlin repeated wryly. Before she could brace herself he had his arms around her waist and she was whisked into his lap. Stifling her gasp of surprise with a quick brush of his mouth against hers, he cradled her against his chest as if she were made of the finest glass and whispered in her ear, so soft as to barely be heard, “I love you.”

  “You… You love me?”

  “And I want to marry you.”

  Her jaw dropped. “You want to marry me?”

  “Yes, you silly girl.” Stroking his fingers through her hair, he loosened the knot that held her braid in place and began to unwind the sections tendril by golden tendril. “I loved you from the first moment I saw you, even though I was too proud to admit it. I loved you on that first sleigh ride when you were so delightfully nervous you could barely speak a word, and I shall love you to the last one when we know each other so well no words will need to be spoken. You are my light, Sarah Mine. My heart. My love.” He punctuated each declaration with a kiss to her cheek, his lips chasing away the tears that fell like sparkling diamonds from her lashes. “Do not cry,” he murmured, pulling her even closer. “You should be happy, not sad.”

  Tipping her head back Sarah gazed up at him through her tears and managed a choked laugh. “I am happy,” she assured him. “Happier than I ever dared to be.”

  He nodded. “Good. Now tell me you love me as well.”

  “I love you as well,” she said obediently.

  Devlin’s brow furrowed. “That did not sound very convincing.”

  Clasping her arms around his neck, Sarah squeezed him to her as tight as she could. “I love you.” She kissed his chin. “I love you.” She kissed the tip of his nose. “I love you.”

  Devlin frowned. “You missed a spot,” he said, pointing to his mouth.

  “Did I?” Sarah blinked innocently. “Well, I shall have to fix that.”

  “At once,” he said.

  “At once,” she agreed.

  Laughing, the two lovers clung to each other in an embrace so passionate that for a moment, a moment so quick if you blinked it would be missed, the sun shone a bit more brightly and the snow, for the first time all winter, began to thaw.

  The Risqué

  Resolution

  CHAPTER ONE

  Kincaid Country Residence

  Devonshire, England

  37 days until Christmas

  “Let me make sure I understand you clearly.” Sucking in a deep breath, Lily Kincaid pinched the bridge of her nose and fought the urge to scream. “Due to a clause in Father’s will, I must marry before the year is out or everything we own will be given to Cousin Eustace?”

  Mr. Guthridge, the Kincaid’s lawyer for the better part of two decades, bobbed his head and rattled the paper he held in his hand.

  A short, stout man with an impressive salt and pepper moustache and a propensity for stuttering, he looked as though he would rather be anywhere else in England than where he currently was: standing in the middle of the late Lord Kincaid’s study delivering the worst news imaginable to his eldest daughter. “Y-yes, I am afraid s-so. Your f-father made it quite clear before his p-passing that in order to receive your inheritance in full you will need to marry.”

  “Before this year’s Christmas,” Lily clarified, her violet eyes narrowing.

  “Yes,” Guthridge confirmed miserably. “That does seem to be the case.”

  Unable to remain still, Lily began to pace the length of the narrow study. Her skirts moved in an agitated swirl of green between her ankles before she abruptly stopped in front of the window, braced her arms against the sill, and peered out across the back lawn.

  Courtesy of a storm that had swept through two days before, the shrubbery surrounding the Kincaid’s tidily kept country estate was blanketed in a layer of fresh, powdery snow. Morning light reflected off the skeletal branches of a towering oak, its limbs heavy in winter slumber. Icicles, glistening bright as diamonds, clung to the wooden fence line that wrapped around the edge of the lawn. The very same fence line, Lily thought absently, that her father had been planning to repair before he passed away peacefully in his sleep at the not so advanced age of four and fifty.

  For three months Albus Kincaid had been promising his wife he would fix the fence, but something or other had always come up. A new invention to create. A new discovery to unearth. A new recipe to learn. Albus had been a loving father and husband, but he’d never been a practical man, not in life nor, it seemed, in death.

  “Mother is not going to like this,” she murmured under her breath.

  “What was that?” Guthridge asked.

  Lily turned and leaned against the window, letting the chill from the glass cool a rising temper that had nothing to do with the man standing in front of her and everything to do with the one who had placed her in this rather unfortunate predicament. “Was my father of sound mind when he dictated the will? Because if he was not of sound mind then—”

  But Guthridge was already shaking his head before she had even completed her sentence. “I am afraid, Lady Kincaid, that your father was
of very sound mind. He even wrote a letter” – the lawyer paused while he rummaged through his leather satchel before removing a square piece of parchment – “saying exactly that. Would you like to read it?”

  Read one of the last things her father wrote before he died? Lily, who had not shed a single tear during the funeral or the three days since while her mother and younger sister wept buckets by the hour, felt her throat inexplicably tighten. “I… No,” she managed before she spun around and once again faced the window. “No, Mr. Guthridge, I… I believe you.”

  “Very well, Lady Kincaid,” the lawyer said quietly. “If there is nothing else, I will leave all of the documents on your father’s desk for you to examine at your leisure. Although, I pray you do not take much time, for my next visit shall be to your cousin’s house.”

  “My cousin?” Lily said blankly.

  Guthridge cleared his throat. “I am afraid so. As he will be the main benefactor if you do not marry within the time allotted, he must be made privy to the will’s contents.”

  Lily let her forehead fall against the glass with a dull thud. “What is the date, Mr. Guthridge?”

  “The eighteenth of November,” the lawyer answered promptly.

  “Thirty seven days,” she whispered.

  “What was that?”

  “Thirty seven days,” she repeated as she turned around. “I have thirty seven days to find a suitable match, convince him to marry me, and save my family from financial ruin.” She smiled weakly. “You are not in the business of giving out Christmas miracles, are you Mr. Guthridge?”

  Looking more uncomfortable now than ever before, the lawyer shook his head. “I am afraid not. But perhaps with the help of your mother—”

  “Oh no.” The very idea was enough to cause Lily to cringe. “Mr. Guthridge, I realize this is a bit unorthodox, but you must promise not to tell my mother about the will’s conditions. It will send her into a panic,” she continued hastily when the lawyer opened his mouth, “and right now she is so distraught I fear more bad news would be very ill advised. She loved my father very much, you see, and his death… Well, his death has been hard on all of… on all of us.”