Christmas in The Duke's Arms

by Grace Burrowes

  Regretfully, she agreed. Sitting up, she arranged the nightgown over her breasts and sat up with her legs folded beside her. “Your coat melted on me.” No longer heated by his proximity, she tugged at patches of wet linen, cold against her skin. “I may have to take this off.”

  “Not while I’m in the room, please.”

  “I wish you didn’t have to go.” Having become betrothed—for the right reasons—she should have the chance to savor the experience. “When you proposed to me in London you set aside the whole morning. We’ve only been engaged for fifteen minutes and you’re leaving already.”

  “We can talk tomorrow. The walk back to Dinfield will cool me off, and I need it.” They smiled at each other for a minute, reluctant to part. “You make me happy, Robina.”

  “I love you.” She hadn’t said it before.

  “I love you too.” He dropped a quick kiss on her lips and gathered up his purse and other odds and ends he’d tossed onto the floor earlier. Besotted, she thought how lovely it would be to have a tidy husband. An unromantic quality, but she didn’t want Wyatt to change. The burden of responsibility she’d carried so long became feather-light now that she shared it with a man who would never let her down.

  She pointed at a thick folded parchment that had fallen under the washstand. “Don’t forget that. I wouldn’t want you to lose any important documents.” He scooped it up. “What is it?” she asked, only to prolong his departure by a minute or two.

  “I completely forgot that I left it in this coat.” His astonishment that he could have forgotten anything made her laugh. “It’s a special license from the Archbishop of Canterbury for the marriage of Lord Carbury and Miss Robina Weston.”

  “That’s pretty presumptuous of you, Carbury. How long have you had it?”

  “Since the day before I offered for you. In London.”

  “Very presumptuous.” She blew him a kiss to soften the blow.

  “I’m ashamed to say I was entirely confident that you’d accept me. I had a plan. Don’t laugh at me, you wretched girl. There’s nothing wrong with being organized. I was going to take you to Yorkshire, where we would be wed during Christmastide in front of our families and friends.”

  “Was it on your list?”

  “Actually, no. I obtained it on an impulse.”

  “Wyatt, how splendid! Your first?”

  “Perhaps, but not my last.”

  “I thought you wrote everything down.”

  His look made her toes curl. He picked up the paper that still lay on the bed, unscathed by their recent romp. “I had a few more items on this list I didn’t write down.”

  “Tell me.”

  “After we are married.”

  She looked at the list and then at the parchment, and back again. “We have a special license. We’re virtually married. We could be married tomorrow.”

  “Tonight even, in the unlikely event I could persuade a parson to come out in this storm.”

  “Let’s pretend we did.” In case he didn’t understand her, she pulled her nightgown over her head and tossed it aside. Instead of embarrassment at kneeling naked before a man, she felt a surge of delight at the way his dark eyes bored into her. In her bones she knew she never needed to be shy in front of Wyatt.

  He looked serious and determined, and she expected him to resist her. “You have two minutes to change your mind,” he said, and his top coat dropped to the floor.

  “Never.”

  He pulled off his boots.

  “Keep doing what you’re doing,” she said.

  He unbuttoned his waistcoat. “Last warning.”

  “I’m enjoying the spectacle.”

  “You’ve completely undermined my morals.”

  “You’re not the only one capable of executing a plan.”

  He undid the last button on his breeches. “Very last warning.” The garment hit the ground, and she gasped. The naked male in reality was larger than she’d expected.

  “Wyatt,” she said faintly.

  “Yes, my darling? Are you sending me away after all?” He sounded agonized.

  “Lord, no. Come up here immediately.”

  “You’re warm,” he said, pulling her against him so they were touching everywhere they could.

  His skin was cool—he’d been out in the snow not so long ago—and she rubbed against him. Lying in his arms was indescribably lovely, both cozy and thrilling. The prospect of a lifetime of sharing a bed with Wyatt choked her with joy. She pressed her lips to his chest and squeezed back happy tears.

  For a while they kissed and stroked each other with no great urgency, but she felt his male part pressing against her stomach. “Wyatt,” she whispered. “What’s next on the list? I don’t know what I’m doing, and you do. Tell me what to do. I know you love to give orders, and I promise to obey without question.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Would you?” she asked.

  “I hope not, but I’m not precisely an expert myself.”

  “You mean you’ve never…?”

  “I’ve been with women over the years, and I won’t go into details, but I’ve been too busy to…study the subject.”

  It was such an odd way of putting it, she wanted to laugh, but she sensed a tension in the muscles of his back. She wouldn’t hurt him for the world, and she guessed this wasn’t a place where he would enjoy her teasing. “I trust you completely.”

  “Let’s go about this methodically,” he said, making her want to laugh more, because it was so adorably like Wyatt to apply logical thought to lovemaking. She settled for a tender kiss, which he seemed to appreciate. “I will try things,” he said after an interval, “and you can tell me if you like them. Anything disagreeable, say so at once, and I shall stop. Promise?”

  “I promise.”

  He stretched her out on the bed where he could see her. She missed his embrace, but his intense gaze traveling the length of her body was exciting in a different way. He started to stroke her breasts, fingering the nipples. “Do you like that?”

  “Yes.”

  He pinched them lightly, one by one. “That?”

  Strangely, she did. The tiny pain sent a line of sensation streaking through her, right to her hidden place. “Don’t stop.”

  He touched her in different places, using both hands and mouth: her neck, her stomach, the backs of her knees, even her feet. She learned that her rib cage, just beneath her bosom, was especially sensitive. With each new move, he asked her if she liked it, and she kept assuring him that she did, with her voice and the blissful writhing of her body. “I like everything,” she said finally. “I like everything about you and everything you do. Why don’t we assume it unless I say otherwise?”

  “I like to hear your voice.”

  She loved to hear his voice, yet having his mouth busy in other ways was utterly delightful. While he sucked on one nipple, which was pure bliss, she ventured to stroke the hard plane of his stomach, whence a narrow line of hair led down to his sex. When she brushed against his male organ, he groaned. “Did I hurt you?”

  “God, no. It’s perfect. You’re perfect. Do you mind if I touch you down there?”

  The nerves in the area in question told her yes. “I’m wet,” she said, feeling timid for the first time. It was one thing when she’d occasionally, shamefully, experimented with herself and quite another thing for a man to do so.

  “That’s as it should be. It makes it easier and more pleasurable for both of us when I enter you. Do you know what that means?”

  “Yes, and I want it.” She wanted it badly and immediately, but first he stroked her down there, all the time kissing her, in the ear, which drove her almost mad with delight, and all over her face, and whispering that she was beautiful and he loved her.

  His caresses created a delicious tension until she almost wept with need. “Please,” she cried. “Like that. More. Now. Please.” She squeezed her eyes tight, the world reduced to his hand and one little spot in h
er body.

  “Easy, my darling.” And with a fiendishly clever flick of a finger, he sent her shooting off into rapture and she saw stars. Waves of bliss consumed her, and she hardly noticed him mount her until she felt his hard member demand entrance to the shaking passage. “Easy,” he said. “Tell me if it hurts.”

  It was tight and a little awkward at first, but she was slick inside. He slid in, and she felt nothing but a pressure that relaxed once he was fully lodged and turned to pleasure. She opened her eyes and found him resting on his elbows, gazing anxiously into her face. “That was the best thing ever,” she assured him, bobbing her head up to peck at his lips. “Now carry on, Lord Carbury.”

  And he did, working long and hard, while she met his thrusts until they were wet with perspiration, hot bodies sliding together. After she had another burst of rapture, less intense than the first but all the sweeter for coming when they were joined, his head reared back, his muscles snapped taut, and with a muted shout of triumph, he spent. As she felt the gush of his seed within her, he rolled onto his side, taking her with him in protective arms, and fell into a doze.

  She watched him for a while. He looked years younger and less burdened by care than he had ever been, even in his youth. When she kissed his forehead, he opened his eyes. “You are mine,” he said with a delicious self-satisfied smile. “You can’t change your mind now.” And fell asleep again before she could assure him that as far as she was concerned, they were already married, and he could expect to take orders from her for the rest of his life.

  *

  Wyatt woke up wondering why he felt so happy, considering that he was in a small lumpy bed of the kind found in inns that didn’t cater to the quality. He could see his breath, and his foot was hanging over the side in the chill air. He pulled it back under the covers and remembered the reason. His future wife was curled up at his side, sleeping. He succumbed to temptation.

  “Oh!’ she said, opening her eyes and jerking her leg out of his way. “Your foot is cold.”

  “It’s one of the duties of a wife to warm her husband’s cold feet.”

  “You just made that up,” she said, but she moved her leg back so that he could rub his foot against it.

  “Good morning, Lady Carbury,” he said and gave her a kiss. Their first good-morning kiss.

  “Not yet.”

  “As soon as we can get out of here and travel to Yorkshire. I’m not staying with Sybilla a day longer than I can help it.” He gathered her into his arms and thanked God, and every angel and saint, that he had Robina in bed and hadn’t, in some horrible nightmare, ended up with his cousin’s widow.

  “What will we say about being out all night?” She smiled saucily. “I never thought to sleep in The Duke’s Arms. May I say that I found it thoroughly agreeable?”

  “Has anyone ever told you that you are a hussy?”

  “Why, yes. Someone did recently, but I have forgotten who. Shall I tell your cousin Sybilla that I was with Oxthorpe?”

  “All she needs to know is that we were caught in the snow and stayed at the inn. We will not mention that we shared a room.”

  “The Wattleses must know. Word will get out.”

  He felt amazingly unconcerned about the prospect of a scandal. “By the time it spreads, we’ll be far away and married. It was on my list.”

  “No, it wasn’t. Getting the license was an impulse, remember?”

  Silly arguments with Robina were so enjoyable he had to kiss her again. He didn’t want to do anything or go anywhere else.

  “You are right,” he said after a while. “It wasn’t on the list, but it was a plan. After our wedding, we were to have a short honeymoon.”

  “Short? Now I am insulted. That part of the plan is in sore need of adjustment.”

  “I am confident our honeymoon will last forever, but I need to be back in London for Parliament. I confess, I’ve never in my life felt less like doing my duty.”

  “The fact that you say that makes me determined to make sure you do. We can’t have any shirking. How otherwise are you to become Prime Minister and solve the problems of the nation?”

  “As a married man, it is my duty to spend a great deal of time with my wife. And if it means I don’t end up Prime Minister, so be it. The minute I can get free, we’re going somewhere alone. How do you feel about Italy?”

  “Very warmly.” She shivered and snuggled into his side. “I wish we were there now. Goodness, I forgot it was Christmas Day. Where are you going?”

  He dashed naked across the room and fumbled in the pocket of his coat—not the topcoat, but the green riding jacket he’d changed into before setting forth in the snow, the same one he’d worn that afternoon.

  Returning to bed in triumph, he held up a sprig of mistletoe. “Happy Christmas, Lady Carbury. Here’s to many more.”

  About Miranda Neville

  Miranda Neville grew up in England, loving the books of Georgette Heyer and other Regency romances. Her historical romances include the Burgundy Club series, about Regency book collectors, and The Wild Quartet. She lives in Vermont with her daughter, her cat, and a ridiculously large collection of Christmas tree ornaments. She is thrilled to finally write a Christmas story in collaboration with three amazingly talented ladies.

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  Books By Miranda

  The Burgundy Club Series

  The Wild Marquis, Book 1

  The Dangerous Viscount, Book 2

  The Amorous Education of Celia Seaton, Book 3

  Confessions From an Arranged Marriage, Book 4

  The Wild Quartet Series

  The Second Seduction of a Lady (prequel novella)

  The Importance of Being Wicked, Book 1

  The Ruin of a Rogue, Book 2

  Lady Windermere’s Lover, Book 3

  The Duke of Dark Desires, Book 4

  Other Historical Romance

  Never Resist Temptation

  P.S. I Love You, novella in anthology At the Duke’s Wedding

  Licensed to Wed, novella in anthology Christmas In the Duke’s Arms

  Coming Soon in Contemporary Romance

  Novella in anthology At the Billionaire’s Wedding

  The Spy Beneath the Mistletoe

  By

  Shana Galen

  Contents – The Spy Beneath the Mistletoe

  About The Spy Beneath the Mistletoe

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  About Shana Galen

  Books by Shana

  About The Spy Beneath the Mistletoe

  Fledgling spy Pierce Moneypence seeks a highwayman and the key to Eliza’s heart.

  When weapons designer Eliza Qwillen (Q) and clerk to the mysterious M, Pierce Moneypence, arrive in the English countryside, they’re unprepared for the dangers that await. The operatives are intent upon capturing the highwayman styling himself as the New Sherriff of Nottingham. Secret rendezvous, mistaken identities, and cat-and-mouse games challenge these fledgling agents, but rediscovering their passion for each other is the most rewarding mission of all.

  Chapter One

  ‡

  The inn would be a difficult building to explode.

  The thatched roof would burn easily enough, but the whitewashed fieldstone exterior looked to Eliza to have weathered a good many years and a good many winters. Colder winters than this one.

  Although snow poured from the leaden sky and the windows of The Duke’s Arms glowed with the promise of a roaring fire in the hearth, she tarried in the yard. Her legs were cramped from days on the road, and she was happy to stretch them.

  Her fellow passengers hobbled and stumbled past her into th
e cozy inn. Their cold, damp boots would soon be dry and warm. Beyond the inn, the coach road curved like a white ribbon, past hedges dotted with white and oak and maple trees, whose naked branches reached for the sky like sharp icy fingers. In the spring, the prospect would be far more pleasing. Flowers would dot the rolling green hills with spots of color, the oaks and maples would offer leafy shade, and verdant ivy would lend a swath of color to the pale walls of the inn.

  The prospect today was not quite so charming. The gray sky matched her mood. Christmas was only a few days past, and a provincial inn on the Great North Road was the last place she wanted to be. Scratch that. The Barbican group’s Piccadilly office was the last place she wanted to be. Still, this inn, with its ragged holiday wreath on the door and a few browning sprigs of mistletoe hung near the window, depressed her. Not that she didn’t enjoy the Yuletide holiday. She’d spent it with her sister in London. The two of them, spinsters both, always managed to have a lovely, if quiet, Christmas and New Year.

  Eliza hefted her valise and started for the inn. She could have refused the assignment. Baron’s brows had risen when she’d accepted. She’d surprised him, but was she to remain a weaponry engineer forever? She rather liked her work, and at one time she might have been content to pursue it forever. Now she wanted time away from her little workshop.

  And a world away from Pierce Moneypence.

  The Duke’s Arms hardly qualified as traveling the world, but it was a start. She would complete this mission quickly, return victorious to the Barbican, and Baron would recognize her talent and assign her more missions. Exciting missions in Paris or Milan or Budapest—wherever that was. Eliza stamped her numb, booted feet free of snow and pushed the door of the inn open.

  The warmth from so many bodies and the blazing hearth rushed at her with a vengeance. She staggered back, momentarily overwhelmed by the scents of wet wool, tallow, and the cloved oranges left over from the holiday. Her gaze swept the room efficiently, looking for exits, threats, and allies. She was a spy and a woman traveling alone—though a plain, uninteresting woman—so she kept her head down.