His stomach dropped. If Emma had seen him with the lady, with her hand against his chest, she might have thought…
“Damn it,” he muttered. “Out the front, you said?”
“Yes,” Grimble said. “I watched her go toward the stables, but the bend in the path prevented my being able to track her much further than that.”
James rushed past him, out the door and down the same path Emma had apparently taken a few moments before. His head spun as he rushed to find her. After everything she’d been through, everything she’d watched her mother endure with her wayward father, if she’d seen him with Lady Montague, no one could blame her for expecting the worst.
Especially since she believed James was marrying her only out of some sense of honor or duty. But the fact was, it was much more than that.
Much, much more. Only he’d never told her that. He’d hardly allowed himself to acknowledge it in his own heart, let alone confess it to her or anyone else. Bearing his heart had never ended well for him, and so here he was, chasing after a woman whom he had likely hurt without meaning to.
And that meant a great deal to him. More than it should have.
“No!”
James froze as he approached the stable, for he had heard the sharp cry of a woman’s voice within. Emma’s voice.
He broke into a run, racing toward the stable at double time as he heard a truncated second scream. He rounded the corner into the still stable, his gaze darting from one side of the large space to the next. And there, in the far corner, in the shadowy darkness, he saw Emma. She was leaning back, tugging hard against a man’s hand, a man’s hand that gripped her wrist. The blackguard was obviously working to pull her into an empty stall.
James rushed forward. “Stop!” he called out.
Whoever was holding Emma released her and she staggered backward, nearly depositing herself on the dusty stable floor. James pulled her behind him and looked down into the stall to see who her attacker was.
His eyes went wide as he saw Sir Archibald in the narrow space. The older man’s face was pale as paper and his lips trembled as he stared up at James. “Abernathe,” he breathed.
James let him say nothing else before he threw a punch that connected squarely with Sir Archibald’s jaw. Sir Archibald fell backward, colliding with the wall of the stable and letting out a pained grunt.
“What the hell are you doing here?” James asked, though he could see exactly what the man’s intentions were. His clothing was in disarray, his shirt loose and untucked from his trousers.
That he had intended to harm Emma made James want to kill him.
He might have, but Emma wrapped a hand around his forearm, forcing him to look back at her. “James,” she said softly.
He looked down into her tear-streaked face and caught his breath. Disheveled as she now was, she was also beautiful in her wedding gown.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked, reaching out to trace her jaw with his finger. “Did he touch you?”
“No,” she reassured him. “Not yet. You stopped him.”
He caught his breath. There were bruises on her wrist, faint but there. He lifted her hand up. “Emma…”
“I’m not hurt,” she whispered, though her trembling voice said that was a lie. “I’m not hurt.”
He spun back to face Sir Archibald, anger coloring his vision, but found that the man had snuck past him as he tended to Emma. Now he was running out the stable as fast as his legs could carry him. James rushed after him in time to see the bastard swing up on his horse and fly off toward the estate gates.
“I will see you dead if you come near her again!” James shouted, certain the wind carried his angry words to the hunched back of his enemy.
He turned back and reentered the stable. Back at the stall where Emma had been attacked, she leaned against the wall, her face pale and drawn. His heart clenched at her expression. At her pain.
“I will ride after him,” he murmured, smoothing an errant lock of hair from her cheek. “I will kill him for what he tried to do.”
“No,” Emma said, stepping forward to clutch his arm. “James, you know what would happen if you did something like that. You could be transported or hanged. Even if you weren’t, the scandal would destroy you. Destroy Meg. I am not worth that.”
He stared at her. She believed what she said. Of course she would, after the life she’d led. And suddenly he wanted to give her so much more than she had already experienced. He wanted to give her everything. Everything he had and was. More importantly, he wanted to give her everything he could be but hadn’t yet become.
He wanted to be better for her.
“You are worth far more,” he said softly.
“I don’t want to lose you,” she said, forming each word succinctly. “Please don’t follow him.”
His ground his teeth. The idea of Archibald getting away after what he’d tried to do was disgusting. He would only hurt someone else. Or perhaps even come after Emma again in his vengeful state.
“I’ll have Graham take care of it,” he said at last. “When we return to London, he can monitor Sir Archibald. I’m sure he’ll find help in that task from plenty of our friends.”
She nodded. “Yes. Then you’ll know if he has designs for some other kind of evil.”
James stepped forward and gathered her into his arms to hold her close. Her body trembled in his arms and he held her tighter, wishing he could take away whatever fear she had experienced.
“Emma,” he whispered against her hair. “I’m so sorry.”
She shook her head as she drew away from him. Out of his arms, taking her warmth with her, leaving him cold as she stepped back, back and away from him.
“I’m—I’m fine,” she said, metering her tone so that she no longer showed him all her emotions. “He was drunk and angry and…driven to punish us both for breaking whatever promise my father made to him.” Her hands shook and she balled them up at her sides. “Thank you for saving me.”
“It is my job to save you,” he said. “My greatest duty as your husband will be to protect you from all harm. I should have guessed Sir Archibald might be so foolish as to threaten you. I will never allow that to happen again, Emma. Once we are married I will ensure you are protected at all times.”
He expected her to smile at that claim. Perhaps even return to his arms for a kiss. But her face remained taut with dark emotion and pale as paper. She dropped her chin, refusing to hold his gaze.
“James,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “I-I appreciate your desire to protect me. I do. But something has become very clear to me today.”
He wrinkled his brow. “Clear? And what is that?”
“I can’t marry you, James. I-I don’t want to.”
The words Emma had just forced from her trembling lips were the most difficult she had ever said, made even more difficult by James’s overwhelming presence in the tight space of the stable stall. He had swept in to rescue her, and it would be so easy to allow him to cradle and protect her forever.
But she wanted more than that. More from him. Not getting it would only result in ruin and despair in the future.
“Have you struck your head, Emma?” he asked at last, his tone filled with incredulity.
“Of course not.”
“Then what in the world can you mean that you don’t want to marry me?” he asked, his tone tense as a wire stretched to the breaking point.
The part of her that had always stood along the wall, the part of her that had lived in fear from the time she was old enough to know her father could ruin her, wanted to apologize to James. To bend to his will and say she was mistaken and step into the future of his design.
But there was another part of her now. A part that recognized her own worth. Ironically, it was a part that James, himself, had helped her find. And this was the part that told her to walk away from him.
“I saw you,” she said softly.
&nbs
p; He swallowed hard. “Saw me?” he repeated.
She forced her gaze to lock with his and held there. “I saw you on the terrace. With Lady Montague.”
She expected him to react with shock and then to deny her claim. That was what her father would have done. Hell, had done a dozen times or more, when her mother confronted him about his affairs over the years. Emma had witnessed those horrible rows. Her mother crying, her father offended at the accusations. Eventually her mother would capitulate. Eventually he would leave again.
It was a never-ending cycle.
Only James didn’t look shocked by her accusation, only grim. And to her surprise, he nodded. “I thought you might have seen us. Grimble said you went out to the terrace to find me and left the house shortly thereafter.”
She clenched her jaw. “I saw you talking. Flirting.”
He shook his head slowly, the denial she had been waiting for at last finding his lips. “I assure you, I was not flirting with Lady Montague.”
Anger swelled in her, hurt and betrayal that she knew she didn’t deserve to feel. James didn’t love her. He had never vowed that he did, nor that he would be faithful. Most men of his ilk were not.
But she still wanted that from him, foolish as she was. At the least, she wanted honesty from him.
“I saw it,” she repeated, her voice rising. “And I recognize it for what it is, James—don’t pretend I’m a fool. I watched my father play those same games all my life.”
“I am not your father,” he said softly, but there was no gentleness in his tone.
“Well, I have no wish to be my mother,” she snapped back. “Loving you and forgiving every lie you tell, like a fool.”
“I’m not your father,” he repeated, his tone harsher than even before. But then his face changed and he stared at her. “Did you just say you loved me?”
Emma’s lips parted. In her upset, she had said those words. She had revealed herself. She was surprised to find she didn’t regret that action. Now that it was out, she could explain better to him why she had to walk away.
“There are two parts to me, James,” she began, shocked her voice was calm and steady. “There is the girl who always hid away, sat along a wall, tried not be noticed, especially by a man like you. And she is strong inside of me. She tells me to deny my heart, to protect myself by lying to you. Lying to me.”
He moved toward her a fraction, and her hands began to shake. “And what is the other part?”
“The other part is stronger now,” she whispered. “The other part doesn’t want to live in shadows and with lies ever again. The other part tells me to confess the truth to you.”
“And what is the truth?” he pushed.
She let out a sob and bent slightly as she struggled to catch her breath. Finally, she straightened back up.
“That I love you, you great oaf,” she burst out, blushing at her directness. “Like a fool, I love you.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
James could hardly breathe. The power of Emma’s even stare, the power of her words, washed over him. Emma Liston loved him. She loved him.
A terrifying and wonderful concept that all at once made his head spin and his legs tremble.
And yet she didn’t look pleased about that confession, nor did it change the fact that she had told him she didn’t want to marry him.
“Why are you a fool to love me?” he asked softly. “Because I am not worthy of your love?”
Her lips parted and she reached for him, touching him for the first time since they’d begun this conversation. She caught one of his hands in both of hers and lifted it to her chest.
“Great God, no, James. That is your father talking, not me.”
His heart lurched. “What do you know of my father?” he asked. She tilted her head and he shook his own. “Meg. She told you about him. About us?”
She nodded. “A little. But don’t be angry with her. I asked, I pried.”
“I’m…not,” he said slowly, and realized it was true. Very few people knew about his relationship with his father. All of them were people he trusted to his core. Emma certainly fit that description. “If we are to marry, which is a topic we still have to discuss, then you have a right to know. My father was…cruel.”
Emma sucked in a breath. “Meg said something similar.”
“He’d lost his first son, his first wife. They were the family he really wanted.” James fought the pain that accompanied those words. “We were a replacement. I never lived up to the original. I never earned the love he felt for his son. His true son.”
She gripped his hand tighter. “You were a boy, you should not have had to earn anything. Love is not a bartering tool, James. That he used it as a reward rather than a gift says everything about him and nothing about you. You deserved more.”
He looked down into her eyes and saw reflected there the life he would lead with her. A life of love and happiness, of protection, not just of him to her, but of her to him. He saw children and a chance to be the father he’d never had.
He saw his future, and in that moment he swelled with a desperation not to lose it. Not to lose her and the love she offered. The love he felt in return but had been hiding.
“Emma,” he whispered. “Lady Montague approached me on the terrace and she wanted to be my mistress.”
She made a soft sound of pain in the back of her throat that stabbed him in the heart, and moved to pull away from him. He clung to her hand, holding her in place.
“Listen,” he said softly. “Please look and me and truly hear what I’m about to say.”
Her breath came short, but she stopped struggling and looked at him with teary eyes. “Very well. What do you have to say?”
He swallowed hard. “I didn’t want her,” he said.
Her brow wrinkled. “But she is beautiful and popular, better matched to you than I would ever be. And everyone knows the rumors of her…her…experience. Many men take a lover and—”
“I don’t care,” he interrupted before she could waste any more breath on convincing him. “I don’t want her. I didn’t want her when she made the offer. And I told her so. I only want you.”
She blinked, rapid little flutterings, like a bird struggling to take flight. “But you’re…you. And I’m…me.”
“You keep saying that,” he said, frustrated by her continued self-deprecation. “But I’ve never thought that you didn’t match me. In fact, this new side of you that you described earlier, the one that is willing to confront me, to walk away from me if you think I’ve betrayed you…that Emma may be far above me. I like her. I like the original Emma too. The bluestocking wallflower with all that passion hiding beneath her surface is exactly who I became enthralled with. I want you, Emma. All the parts and sides of you.”
“You truly refused her?” she whispered.
He nodded slowly. “I did. And I will refuse any other offer I may get in the future. I’m not your father, Emma. I will never betray you as long as I have breath in my body.”
She let out a shuddering sigh. “And I am not your father, James. I will never use love as a bargaining chip.” She shook her head. “Aren’t we a pair, though?”
“Yes,” he said with a small laugh. “It seems we’ve both been so tangled up in the past, we were ready to let it ruin our future.”
She caught her breath, her hands trembling even though she continued to hold his firmly. “Do we have to let it?”
“No,” he whispered. “We could start over.”
She cocked her head. “Start over?”
He slid his hand away from hers and held it out again, as if to meet her for the first time. “Hello, I’m James Rylon, Fifteenth Duke of Abernathe. And I love you, Emma Liston. If this moment is to be a fresh start, that is all you need to know.”
Her face crumpled slightly and she stared at him in heartbreaking disbelief. “You—you love me?” she repeated.
“I do. And if you
will lower yourself to marry me as we planned, I will endeavor for the rest of my life never to make you doubt that fact again. I will endeavor to show you that it is true every moment of every day for the rest of my life.”
She let out a sob, but she was smiling. Then she took his hand and shook it gently. “Hello, I’m Emma Liston. And I love you James. And you are more than worthy of my love, no matter what some crusty old bastard of a duke told you.”
He leaned in and cupped her cheeks, kissing her with all the passion and love and surrender he had found with her. And for the first time in a long time, years, decades, he felt at home. Because his home was with her. And that made it safe.
He drew back with a laugh. “I think we just made our wedding vows. Assuming you will still marry me.”
“If you wish to,” she said, tears streaming down her smiling face.
“I used to think not marrying, not carrying on his name, would be my best revenge against my father,” he said softly as he gently wiped those tears away from her cheeks. “But living happily, removing myself from his shadow…I think that is a far better revenge.”
“Then let us go be happy together,” she whispered, taking his arm.
He guided her toward the stable doors with a laugh. “Happily ever after.”
Epilogue
Three Months Later
There were those who had whispered that a wallflower like Emma Liston could never be a good Duchess of Abernathe. But even those cruel gossips were begging to be invited to the end of summer party at Falcon’s Landing just three months after her marriage to the duke.
Emma had only invited those she actually liked. Now she stood on the landing that looked over the lawn and smiled down over the crowd that was gathered for tea. These were her friends, her family. The only one missing was her mother.
She sighed a little at the thought. They hadn’t spoken since their row before the wedding, though she’d heard through friends of friends that her father had recently abandoned Mrs. Liston again. She shook her head at the thought. In a few days, she intended to reach out to her mother. Perhaps this time she could help her see that whatever was between her parents, it wasn’t love.
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