He mightn’t have any choice, damn it. “How beautiful.”
He’d been so lost in his troubled thoughts, he hadn’t heard her rise from the bed. His heart slammed to a stop as she slid her arms around his waist and pressed her warmth to his back. He curled his hands over the windowsill to stop himself from sweeping her up and carrying her back to bed.
The bright light of Christmas Day told him that the magical night was over. Too soon, too soon, his aching heart protested. Now he’d tasted her ardor, he couldn’t live without her. And she’d tempted him with more than passion. The sweet intimacy of last
night’s conversation. The tenderness of her embrace now. Alicia was everything he wanted. Enduring their separation had been difficult enough before he’d glimpsed this joy. Now if she meant to leave him again, she’d destroy him.
“I thought you were asleep,” he said softly. “I missed you.”
His gut lurched with anguish as she brushed a kiss across his bare shoulder. “I’ve missed you every day,” he said before he could stop himself.
“I thought you were glad to be rid of me.” Her voice was muffled
against his skin. “I can’t blame you. I was such a silly chit.” “You were enchanting. You still are.”
“You didn’t think so at the time.” The sheer neutrality of her tone betrayed her suffering as nothing else could.
He swallowed the choking lump in his throat and admitted the humiliating truth. “Yes, I did. But I believed the world would bend to my will merely for the asking. You were too fine for my possessing and I was too arrogant to see just what a treasure I had. I was impatient and self-centered and you were right to hate me.”
“You weren’t impatient last night.”
He laughed without amusement. “Misery is an excellent schoolmaster. I’ve learned the error of my ways. Although I can’t expect you to believe that after the hash I’ve made of everything.”
“I should have trusted you.” Her voice was muffled.
“I wasn’t worthy of your trust then.”
The question hovered—was he worthy of her trust now? He prayed desperately that it was so. He prayed that he hadn’t placed himself beyond redemption and that she’d give him another chance. He wanted to swear his allegiance, promise he’d never hurt her again, vow to make her happy. But emotion too strong for words jammed the declarations
in his throat.
Silence fell, a silence heavy with remembered pain and everything still unspoken between them. Because he couldn’t resist touching her, he rested his hands lightly on hers. The urge stirred to seize, to grab,
to compel, but he crushed it. Last night, she’d given herself freely. He refused to compromise that memory. After today, it might be all he had left.
She sighed softly, her breath a sensual tickle against his skin. “The snow is so clean.” Her voice was soft, musing. As if she spoke to herself rather than for his ears. “Even after the storm, it’s perfect. It’s waiting for us to make the first footprints.”
He tightened his grip on her hands. So much hinged on the next moments. He struggled to find the right words, wondering if the right words even existed.
“Our future could be like that, Alicia. A new path. A new life. A Christmas miracle.” He paused, swallowed, and his voice was husky when he spoke what lay in his heart. “Come back to me.”
He felt her stiffen. His heart breaking, he waited for her to move away, to reject him, to speak in that cold, cutting tone that she’d reserved for their few meetings in London.
“For how long?” Her voice was quiet. She hadn’t moved away. Yet.
He stared at the glittering scene outside without seeing it. Instead he remained utterly focused on his wife. Again, he risked honesty, even if honesty cost him any hope of achieving his dream.
“For the rest of our lives.”
This time she did draw away, and he felt the inches between them as grim absence. “Why?”
He turned to study her. The light from the window illuminated her as if she stood on a stage. Swathed in the white bed sheet, she looked unhappy and uncertain and remarkably young. Almost as young as the
pretty girl he’d married. “Because I love you.” “No…” She shook her head in disbelief.
Kinvarra smiled at her, even while she split his heart into a hundred bleeding pieces. Again. “Yes.”
Alicia raised her chin and regarded him as if what he said made no sense. “I was so foul to you. How can you ever forgive me?”
“How can you forgive me? Let’s rise above the past, my darling. I want you with me. I’ve never wanted anything else. Don’t let old mistakes destroy our hope of happiness.” He paused and swallowed. “If you love me, come back to me.”
For an unendurable moment, her expression didn’t change. Kinvarra’s every heartbeat tolled the knell of doom. Then the tension drained from her face and her eyes turned as blue as a clear sky. Suddenly, in the depths of winter, he basked in the reviving warmth of summer sunlight.
She stepped toward him, although she didn’t touch him. “Sebastian,
I love you, too. We’ve wasted so much time. Let’s not waste any more.” Shaking, he reached out to curl his hands around her upper arms and drag her unresisting body against him. He could hardly believe that this
was happening. Yesterday he’d been lost in an eternal mire of despair. Today the world offered love and hope and a future with the woman he adored. The swiftness of the change was dizzying, left him reeling.
“My wife,” he murmured and kissed her with all the reverence he felt in saying those two words. “My countess. My beloved.”
The vivid, passionate woman in his arms kissed him back with a fervor that set his blood rushing in a wild torrent. Bright, unfamiliar joy flooded him as he realized that Alicia at last was his.
Then because it was cold and he wanted her and he loved her—and he’d been apart from her for longer than mortal man could bear— Kinvarra swung his smiling wife up in his arms and strode across to the rumpled bed.
Also by Anna Campbell:
A Rake’s Midnight Kiss (2013) Seven Nights in a Rogue’s Bed Midnight’s Wild Passion
My Reckless Surrender
Captive of Sin Tempt the Devil Untouched
Claiming the Courtesan
And now an exclusive excerpt of SEVEN NIGHTS IN A ROGUE’S BED, book 1 in Anna Campbell’s “Sons of Sin” series
(out 25th September 2012)
CHAPTER ONE
South Devon Coast, November 1826
STORMS SPLIT THE heavens on the night Sidonie Forsythe went to her ruin.
The horses neighed wildly as the shabby hired carriage lurched to
a shuddering stop. The wind was so powerful, the vehicle rocked even when stationary. Sidonie had seconds to catch her breath before the driver, a shadow in streaming oilskins, loomed out of the darkness to wrench the door open.
“Here be Castle Craven, miss,” he shouted through the sheeting rain. For a second, terror at what awaited inside the castle held her
paralyzed. Castle Craven indeed.
“I can’t leave the nags standing. Be ‘ee staying, miss?”
The cowardly urge rose to beg the driver to carry her back to Sidmouth and safety. She could leave now with no damage done. Nobody would even know she’d been here.
Then what would happen to Roberta and her sons?
The remorseless reminder of her sister’s danger prodded Sidonie into frantic motion. Grabbing her valise, she stumbled from the carriage. When the wind caught her, she staggered. She fought to keep her footing on the slippery cobbles as she looked up, up, up at the towering black edifice before her.
She thought she’d been cold in the carriage. In the open, the chill was arctic. She cringed as the wind sliced through her woolen cloak like a knife through butter. As if to confirm she’d entered a realm of gothic horrors, lightning flashed. The ensuing crack of thunder made the horses shift nervously in their harness.
&nb
sp; For all his understandable wish to return to civilization, the driver didn’t immediately leave. “Sartain ‘ee be expected, miss?”
Even through the howling wind, she heard his misgivings. Misgivings echoing her own. Sidonie straightened as well as she could against the gale. “Yes. Thank you, Mr. Wallis.”
“I wish ‘ee well then.” He heaved himself onto the driver’s box and whipped the horses into an unsteady gallop.
Sidonie hoisted her bag and dashed up the shallow flight of steps
to the heavy doors. The pointed arch above the entrance offered paltry protection. Another flash of lightning helped her locate the iron knocker shaped like a lion’s head. She seized it in one gloved hand and let it crash. The bang hardly registered against the roaring wind.
Her imperious summons gained no quick response. The temperature seemed to drop another ten degrees while she huddled against the lashing rain.
What on earth would she do if the house was uninhabited? By the time the door creaked open to reveal an aged woman,
Sidonie’s teeth were chattering and she shook as though she had the ague. A gust caught the servant’s single candle, making the frail light flicker.
“I’m—” she shouted over the storm but the woman merely turned away. At a loss, Sidonie trailed after her.
Sidonie entered a cavernous hall crowded with shadows. Muddy brown tapestries drooped from the lofty stone walls. Ahead, the fire in the massive hearth was unlit, adding to the lack of welcome. Sidonie shivered as cold seeped up from the flagstones beneath her half boots. Behind her, the heavy door slammed shut with a thud like the strike
of doom. Startled Sidonie turned to discover another equally geriatric retainer, male this time, turning a heavy key in the lock.
What in heaven’s name have I done, coming to this godforsaken place?
With the door shut, the silence within was more ominous than
the shrieking tempest. The only sound was the sullen drip, drip, drip of water from her sodden cloak. Fear, her faithful companion since Roberta had confided her plight, settled like lead in Sidonie’s belly. When she’d agreed to help her sister, she’d assumed the torment, however horrid, would be over quickly. Inside this dismal fortress, the horrible premonition gripped her that she’d never again see the outside world.
You’re letting your imagination run away with you. Stop it.
The bracing words did nothing to calm spiraling panic. Bile rose in her throat as she followed the still-silent housekeeper across acres of floor. She felt like a thousand malevolent ghosts leered from the corners. Sidonie tightened numb fingers around the bag’s handle and
reminded herself what agony Roberta would endure if she failed.
I can do this.
The stark fact remained that she’d come so far and still might fail. The plan had always been risky. Arriving here alone and vulnerable, Sidonie couldn’t help considering the scheme devised at Barstowe Hall feeble to the point of idiocy. If only her clamoring doubts conjured some alternative way to save her sister.
The woman still shuffled ahead. Sidonie was so rigid with cold, it was an effort forcing her legs to move. The man had offered to take neither her cloak nor bag. When she glanced back, he’d disappeared as efficiently as if he numbered among the castle’s ghosts.
Sidonie and her taciturn escort approached a door in the opposite wall, as imposing as the door outside. When the woman pushed it
open, it shifted smoothly on well-oiled hinges. Steeling herself, Sidonie stepped into a blaze of light and warmth.
Trembling, she stopped at one end of a refectory table extending down the room. Heavy oak chairs, dark with age, lined the table on either side. It was a room designed for an uproarious crowd, but as her gaze slowly traveled up the length of board, she realized, apart from her decrepit guide, only one other person was present.
Jonas Merrick.
Bastard offspring of scandal. Rich as Croesus. Powerbroker to the mighty. And the reprobate who tonight would use her body.
“Maister, the lady be here.”
Without straightening from his careless slouch in the throne-like chair at the room’s far end, the man raised his head.
At this, her first sight of him, the breath jammed painfully in Sidonie’s throat. From nerveless fingers, her bag slid to the floor. Swiftly she looked down, hiding her shock under her hood.
Roberta had warned her. William, her brother-in-law, had been merciless in his excoriations on Merrick’s character and appearance. And of course, like everyone else, Sidonie had heard the gossip.
But nothing had prepared her for that ruined face.
She bit her lip until she tasted blood and fought the urge to turn and flee into the night. She couldn’t run. Too much depended upon staying. In childhood Roberta had been Sidonie’s only protector. Now Sidonie
had to save her sister, no matter the cost.
Hesitantly she lifted her gaze to her notorious host. Merrick wore boots, breeches and a white shirt, open at the neck. Sidonie tore her gaze from the shadowy hint of a muscled chest and made herself look at his face. Perhaps she’d detect a chink in his determination, some trace of pity to deter him from this appalling act.
Closer inspection confirmed that hope was futile. A man ruthless enough to instigate this devil’s bargain wouldn’t relent now that his prize was within his grasp.
Abundant coal-black hair, longer than fashion decreed, tumbled across his high forehead. Prominent cheekbones. A square jaw
indicating haughty self-confidence. Deep-set eyes focused on her with a
bored expression that frightened her more than eagerness would have.
He’d never have been handsome, even before some assailant in his mysterious past had sliced his commanding blade of a nose and his lean cheek. A scar as wide as her thumb ran from his ear to the corner of his mouth. Another thinner scar bisected one arrogant black eyebrow.
A gesture of the graceful white hand curled around a heavy crystal goblet. In the candlelight, the ruby signet ring glittered malevolently. The claret and the ruby were the color of blood, Sidonie noticed, then wished to heaven she hadn’t.
“You’re late.” His voice was deep and as replete with ennui as his manner.
Sidonie had expected to be frightened. She hadn’t expected to be angry as well. This man’s palpable lack of interest in his victim stirred outrage, powerful as a cleansing tide. “The journey took longer than expected.” She was so furious, her hands were steady when they slid her hood back. “The weather disapproves of your nefarious schemes, Mr. Merrick.”
As she uncovered her features, she had the grim satisfaction of watching the boredom leach from his expression, replaced by astonished curiosity. He straightened and glared down the table at her.
“Just who in hell are you?”
***
The girl, whoever the devil she was, didn’t flinch at Jonas’s irascible question. Under disheveled coffee-colored hair, her face was pale and beautiful in the heavy-lidded, voluptuous manner.
He had to give her credit. She must be scared out of her wits, not to mention as cold as a cat locked out in a snowstorm, yet she stood calm as a marble monument.
Not quite. If he looked closely, faint color marked her cheeks. She was far from the indomitable creature she struggled to appear.
And she was young. Too young to tangle with a cynical, self-serving
scoundrel like Jonas Merrick.
At the bella incognita’s side, Mrs. Bevan wrung her wrinkled hands. “Maister, ‘ee said to expect a lady. When she knocked—”
“It’s all right, Mrs. Bevan.” Without shifting his gaze from his visitor, he waved dismissal. He should be piqued that his original prey evaded his snare, but curiosity swamped anger. Just who was this incomparable? “Leave us.”
“But do ‘ee expect another lady tonight?”
A wry smile twisted his lips. “I think not.” He cast an assessing glance over the silent girl. “I’ll ring when I requi
re you, Mrs. Bevan.”
Muttering displeasure under her breath, the housekeeper stumped away, leaving him alone with his guest. “I take it the delightful Roberta is otherwise occupied,” he said in a silky tone.
The girl’s full lips flattened. She must be repulsed by his scars— everyone was—but apart from a slight stiffening of her posture when she’d entered, her composure was remarkable. The delightful Roberta had known him for years and still reacted with trembling horror at every encounter.
Thwarted malice darkened his mood. He’d rather looked forward to teaching his cousin’s wife to endure his presence without suffering the megrims. This impetuous beauty’s arrival dashed those hopes.
He wondered idly whether she’d offer adequate compensation for his disappointment. Hard to tell. So little of her was visible under the worn cape dripping puddles onto his floor.
“My name is Sidonie Forsythe.” The girl spat out the introduction and her chin tilted insolently. He was too far away to see the color of her eyes but he knew they sparked resentment. Under delicate brows,
they were large and slanted, lending her an exotic appearance. “I’m
Lady Hillbrook’s younger sister.”
“My condolences,” he said drily. Ah, he knew who she was now. He’d heard an unmarried Forsythe sister lived at Barstowe Hall, his cousin’s family seat, although he’d never encountered her in person.
He sought and failed to find any resemblance to her sister. Roberta, Viscountess Hillbrook, was a celebrated beauty, but in the conventional English style. This girl with her dusky hair and air of untapped sensuality was in a different class altogether. His interest sharpened, although he made sure he sounded as if her arrival were the dullest event imaginable. “Where is Roberta on this fine night? If I haven’t mistaken the date, we’d arranged to enjoy a week of each other’s company.”
The Winter Wife Page 6