“I am sure you do not have to tell Mrs. Brown all our secrets, Thea,” drawled a coldly familiar voice.
Julian.
Julian had arrived at the Wiltons’ ball half expecting to see Thea wearing that scandalous red gown again. If only to annoy and defy him.
He would have relished that defiance. Would have relished her.
Instead, this evening, she once again appeared every inch the prim and proper Lady Dorothea Fitzroy, in a modest gown of a pale coffee color. Her only show of rebellion was in her choice of the gold mask, and no doubt only Julian would recognize it as being such.
When, he wondered, had his every thought and consideration become so attuned to what Thea was doing and why she was doing it?
Perhaps that first time he danced with her, in the ballroom at Latham House? When he had touched her so intimately afterwards and known he had to have her?
He had no answer to those questions, only knew that his blood had run cold when he’d looked across the ballroom and seen her in conversation with another woman.
A woman who looked far too familiar in a gown of sky blue.
Jennifer had always been partial to wearing gowns of that particular color, and the woman’s hair was the same golden blonde as Amelia’s.
While he had been brooding about Thea, wanting to hold her, to touch her again, to make love to her again—to get down on his knees and beg her forgiveness, if necessary, for the way he had behaved and spoken to her—Jennifer had managed to secure and hold Thea’s attention.
It was so much worse than that, he realized once he was within feet of the two women and saw the pistol Jennifer held against Thea’s spine as the two women left the ballroom.
Julian had followed them, his worst nightmare having come true as the two women entered the library together. This was exactly what he had feared after the incident with the carriage; Jennifer had turned all her vitriol, all her twisted thoughts of revenge, onto him through Thea.
Because she believed he cared for Thea.
Despite Thea having just assured the other woman that she does not care for me.
How could he have expected it to be otherwise after the way he had behaved towards her?
He did not look at Thea now but at Jennifer as he closed the library door behind him before stepping in between the two women. Jennifer’s pistol now pointed at him. “This is between you and me and should not involve a third person.”
The woman he had once called his wife now eyed him scornfully. “Lady Dorothea does not believe you care for her, Blackmoor.”
A dagger—no, a sharp stiletto blade pierced the heart everyone, including Thea, believed to be incapable of feeling any emotion. “Perhaps because I do not?” He arched coolly dismissive brows.
Jennifer gave a disgusted shake of her head. “You always were an unfeeling bastard.”
He smiled without humor. “It takes one to know one, my dear.” He glanced at Thea. “Allow Lady Dorothea to leave now, and the two of us shall settle this once and for all.”
“Julian—”
“Please stay out of something that is none of your affair, Lady Dorothea.”
Thea flinched at the icy dismissal of Julian’s tone and expression as he barely glanced at her. As if she was of no significance at all.
Because that was how he truly felt?
Or because he wished Jennifer Brown to believe it was how he felt.
Either way, Thea had no intention of leaving him alone with a madwoman. Moreover, a madwoman who not only felt she had nothing to live for now that her husband was dead, but who also knew she herself was dying.
Thea stepped forward and deliberately put her arm through the crook of Blackmoor’s before linking her hands together to stop him as he would have pulled away from her. “Perhaps it would be more convenient if Mrs. Brown were to make an appointment to visit you at home tomorrow?”
The pistol wavered in the other woman’s hand. She stared at Thea incredulously before her top lip turned back scornfully. “You stupid little fool—”
“Mrs. Brown is ill, Julian,” she continued conversationally. “This evening has already been something of a strain for her. Perhaps it might be best if we both escort her outside to her carriage?”
His mouth thinned at this last suggestion. “I shall accompany Mrs. Brown outside. You will remain here with Amelia and George.”
Jennifer turned to glare up at him. “I have no intention of allowing either of you to take me anywhere—”
Thea had been waiting for the moment the other woman’s attention turned away from her. She had realized from Mrs. Brown’s thinness and the shaking of her hand that the other woman was weak from her illness. She now took advantage of Jennifer’s distraction to release Julian’s arm and quickly grasp the wrist of the hand holding the pistol before twisting it behind the other woman’s back, that pressure forcing her to release the pistol.
“What—”
“Hold her,” Thea ordered a stunned Blackmoor as she quickly bent to pick up the pistol. She placed it upon a side table before turning in time to see Jennifer Brown falling unconscious into Julian’s arms.
He turned to glare at Thea as he placed the other woman on a couch. “How could you have been so utterly reckless—”
“We do not have time for your condemnations now, Julian,” she dismissed briskly. “It has only been a few minutes, so perhaps no one has yet noticed our absence. But we must get Mrs. Brown out of this house as quickly as possible, before she can attempt to do further harm.”
Julian knew she was right. He was just furious, so utterly incensed, at the risk she had just taken. If Jennifer had failed to drop the pistol, then she might have turned it on Thea and pulled the trigger. “If you ever—ever do anything so reckless again as to challenge an armed woman, I will spank your bottom so hard, you will not sit down for a week! No—a month!”
“Your threats do not frighten me, Blackmoor.”
His eyes narrowed. “It is not a threat but a promise.”
She quirked a brow. “How exciting.”
“Thea—”
“Julian,” she drawled.
He breathed in noisily through his nose. “You should not have taken such a risk.”
She sobered completely as she answered him. “All of life is a risk. It is just a question of whether or not you are brave enough to accept the challenge.”
Julian had the feeling they were no longer talking about the threat of Jennifer’s pistol. “How ill is she?” He glanced down at the unconscious woman.
“She is dying of consumption.”
“Good God…”
“Yes,” Thea agreed flatly. “Does she have any family of her own?”
He shook his head. “Her mother died years ago, and her father is in very poor health. Seeing his daughter resurrected only to watch her die again… No,” he decided firmly.
“Will you tell Amelia?”
“Good God, no!”
“I think that is a wise decision.”
He nodded. “You must return to the ball now. I will see that she is secured and well taken care of until…until the end.”
“I know you will.” Thea reached out to place her hand on his arm. “None of this is your fault.”
Fault or not, Julian had almost seen Thea shot and killed before his eyes this evening.
He doubted that his heart, or he, could have survived the loss.
Chapter 16
“It was a beautiful wedding,” Thea prompted conversationally the next day as she and Blackmoor carried out their duty dance together following the wedding breakfast.
It was the first opportunity she had found to speak to him alone, Blackmoor having taken taciturnity to new heights during the wedding service and then the meal afterwards. At least when it came to her. Uncharacteristically, he seemed to be capable of politeness and smiles when it came to the other wedding guests, those scowls and the silence being reserved for her alone.
Was he still angry with h
er because of what he had deemed to be her reckless behavior the previous evening?
If so, she had no patience with it. “Could you at least give me an answer, Blackmoor?”
He glanced down the length of his nose at her. “You made a statement, not asked a question.”
“I am making it a question!”
“Then yes, it was a beautiful wedding,” he drawled dismissively.
“Is that it?” she spoke with exasperation after several more seconds of silence. “You have nothing else to add?”
He raised arrogant brows. “Not that I can think of, no.”
Thea fumed inwardly. “You have dealt with Mrs. Brown?”
His jaw tightened. “She is in a private sanatorium. The doctor says she has weeks to live at most.”
As Thea had feared the previous evening once she had observed the other woman closely. “I am sorry you have had this added heartache to deal with.”
“You are sorry?” He looked down at her incredulously. “What on earth do you have to be sorry about?”
She shrugged. “You believed her to be your wife at one time, and she is still Amelia’s mother, no matter what she has done.”
“She might have killed you last night!” Julian would never forget the cold dread of fear he had felt at seeing that pistol pointed at Thea’s heart.
She nodded. “It was her intention to shoot me first and you immediately afterwards.”
“If she had killed you, I would have offered to reload her pistol for her.” Julian spoke without thinking and at once regretted it as Thea gazed up at him with narrowed eyes.
“I— What do you mean by that?” She had come to an abrupt halt in the middle of the dance floor. “Explain yourself,” she demanded.
“People are staring,” he admonished softly. The wedding guests began to stop what they were doing to watch the two of them standing unmoving in the middle of the dance floor in the Blackmoor ballroom.
“Let them stare. Let the whole world stare,” she added recklessly. “I am not moving from this spot until you have explained yourself.”
She looked incredibly beautiful at that moment. Indeed, Julian wondered how he could ever have thought her plain. Her eyes were sparkling with rebellion, there was a flush in her cheeks, and her head was thrown back, that glorious red hair seeming to crackle with challenge.
“Thea…”
“Do not take that condescending tone with me,” she warned him softly. “I assure you I am immune to it.”
Of all the things he could have done, Julian found himself chuckling.
He had promised himself he would keep his distance from Thea during the wedding celebrations today, and that afterwards he would continue to keep his distance. He had caused her enough heartache.
She had said she did not care for me.
Whether she did or did not apparently made no difference to how Julian felt about her. How he had felt about her for some weeks now.
He had never known a moment’s boredom in Thea’s company.
Her spirit and determination were more than a match for his own.
He had not so much as glanced at another woman—he saw no other women—since the moment he made love to Thea in the Latham ballroom.
She made him laugh, at himself as much as anything else.
She did not fear him in the slightest, as so many others did.
She looked like an angel and made love like a siren, tempting him, captivating him, until he could think of no one and nothing else but possessing her.
“I am in love with you.” Julian realized incredulously. Words he had never thought he would say to any woman. Words he realized Thea could not, did not, want to hear. “I apologize—”
“Do not even think of taking back those words,” Thea warned him fiercely as she took him by the hand and led him off the dance floor. “Carry on playing,” she instructed, as even the musicians began to falter, so captivated were they by the scene taking place in front of them. “Amelia, ensure your guests are entertained.” She smiled brightly at the wide-eyed younger woman. “I am taking your father somewhere private where he can make love to me.”
“Thea!”
“Help Amelia and George to entertain their guests, Daniel.” She ignored her brother’s scandalized expression as she pulled Blackmoor across the ballroom and out into the hallway.
“Thea—”
“I am in love with you too, Julian.”
Julian was so shocked by the quietly spoken declaration, he could only stare at her.
“Incredible, is it not?” Thea teased. “You are unbelievably arrogant. Dictatorial. High-handed—”
“You forgot presumptuous and deluded,” he felt in a daze as he reminded her of their conversation in the Latham ballroom a month ago. “I believe you also described me as being arrogance personified.”
“Do not effect that drawl with me, Julian Remington, because I now see it for the shield it is to your real emotions.”
He gave a shake of his head. “I was cruel to you.”
“To protect me. To push me away so that woman would think you were done with me, and she could no longer use me to hurt you. That is the truth of it, is it not, Julian?”
“Yes…”
“I should be angry with you for being so high-handed.”
“You should?”
“Of course.” She sighed her impatience. “You have spent far too many years making decisions you consider to be right for both yourself and other people. Well, I will have no more of it, Julian. Do you hear? In future, you will share these worries with me, so that we might make decisions together.”
“You told Jennifer you did not care for me…”
“For the same reason you said those cruel things to me. I was endeavoring to protect you.”
“You said I did not care for you.”
“Because that is what I believed. What you wanted me to believe.” Her expression softened. “We are in love with each other, Julian. Is that not a wonderful thing?” Her eyes glowed with the emotion.
It was wonderful. Unbelievable still to a man who had never known the love of any woman outside those of his family. Who had never allowed himself to feel love for any woman outside of his family.
He loved now.
He loved Thea so much and so deeply, it terrified him.
She made a tutting sound. “I can see that I will have to show you how much I love you. The location of your bedchamber, if you please?”
He began to chuckle. “We cannot disappear to my bedchamber in the middle of Amelia and George’s wedding!”
“Why not?” She returned his grin unabashedly. “I am so looking forward to having my bottom spanked again. To having you show me so many other pleasures I know nothing about— Julian?” she squeaked as he swept her up into his arms to carry her up the stairs and along a hallway until they reached his bedchamber.
He kicked the door closed behind them before allowing Thea to slide down the length of his body until her feet once more touched the floor. “How I love you, Thea,” he groaned as he kissed her on the lips and held her so tightly against him, he could feel the rapid beat of her heart. “So very much,” he vowed huskily when he at last raised his head to look at her. “And I am deeply sorry for not sharing my worries with you. For pushing you away so cruelly. Please believe I only did it to protect you.”
“Of course I believe you.” One of her hands moved to caress the side of his face. “I love you, my darling Julian.”
“Enough to marry me?”
Now it was Thea’s turn to feel shock. “I… You are the Duke of Blackmoor. You cannot possibly marry someone like me.”
“I can marry whom I damn well please,” he assured her with all his haughty arrogance. “And what do you mean, someone like you? Someone who is funny and kind? Strong-willed and determined. Passionate and wild?” he added teasingly.
“I am also plain, a widow, and—”
“You are beautiful, and the woman I have grown to admire
and love more than life itself,” he assured her forcefully.
Thea gazed into his eyes, seeing that love shining brightly in the steadiness of his gaze and the tender curve of his lips. “I thought an affair—”
“It is not good enough for how I feel about you,” he cut in firmly. “It is not good enough for you. I want us to belong to each other completely, Thea. To have children together. To grow old together.”
A month ago, Thea had imagined becoming a mistress.
She had become a duke’s mistress, however briefly.
Julian was now offering her so much more than that. He wanted her as his duchess. Was giving her not only his love but himself. All that he was. All that they could be.
He was giving her joy beyond measure.
“Oh yes, Julian! Yes, I will marry you, have your babies, and grow old with you!” she cried joyfully as she was gathered into his arms to be kissed and caressed.
Nothing else existed but each other, the joy of their lovemaking, and the anticipation of the long and happy life they would live.
Together.
As the Duke and Duchess of Blackmoor.
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About The Author
Carole Mortimer is a USA Today Bestselling Author and recipient of the RWA Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award 2015, a Pioneer for Romance Romantic Times Award in 2014. She was recognized by Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 for her ‘outstanding service to literature’. Carole has written over 200 contemporary and Regency novels.
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