The Reluctant Heir

by Jennifer Conner

  She smelled like so many memories. Happy memories. Spring days they played in the fields. “I don’t know.” She contemplated his question. “I want to touch you.”

  “I am yours.” He lifted his arms out from his sides.

  When her soft, small hand wrapped around him, Clarke thought he would spill right there. She tentatively slid her hand from the base to the crown. It only lasted a few strokes before he stilled her hand. “I’m not sure how much you know about a man.”

  “Nothing.”

  “Then I will tell you, your touch is too sweet. I am not stopping you because you are doing anything wrong; I am stopping you because you have stripped my willpower and I want to show you there is more.”

  He swung her into his arms, strode a few feet and laid her on top of the small bed in the corner of the room. He pressed over her.

  She cupped his cheek with her hand and looked into his eyes. “Do you really love me?”

  “I have known you half of my life, and loved you the other half.”

  He was large, and she was so damn tight, he would have to let her adjust. But, she was already wet with desire and this allowed him to slide a few more inches inside. He ground his back teeth fighting for control.

  “Clarke?” Her eyes were wide and the darkest shade of blue he had ever seen.

  He kissed her gently as he pressed against her barrier, and then further. “From this night forward, I am your husband and I will always love you.”

  He wanted to spend the next few hours kissing her and making love. He would, but for this first time, he knew he would not last. He brought her knees higher and plunged deep. This time when she cried his name, he knew it was from pleasure and not pain.

  She rippled around him as her climax shattered her. His entire body tensed. He let her milk him as he thrust one last time. Clarke threw back his head, let out a guttural cry, and emptied himself deep within her. It poured from his soul, filled with his dreams, his needs, his fears.

  They were now bound. He was hers.

  Chapter 5

  Clarke swirled the brandy until it coated the sides of the snifter in tiny tendrils. He leaned a hip against the stone hearth, and looked at Spencer. “So what is this ‘secret meeting’ about? You made it sound like a life or death issue.”

  “I feel it is.” Spencer strode over to stand beside him, and poured himself another drink from the cut crystal decanter. He pulled the drape aside and stared at a distant spot on the grounds. “I think there are things needing to be dealt with. Now that you have asked Adeline for her hand in marriage, I realized that both our lives are more than just our own.”

  “If this has to do with the handling of her father’s land and Ellis being in charge of Garrison, I-”

  Spencer cut him off. “It has nothing to do with land or property… or… Jesus.” He tipped the glass, downed the content, and then placed the glass with a thump on the sidebar. He ran a hand through his already disheveled hair. “I think we need to… I need to talk to someone about what happened to us in the war.”

  “Yes?” He was pretty bloody sure what Spencer might say, but Clarke let the word hang in the air as a question.

  “What went on.” He swore again. “The things we saw…. no man should see.”

  The mere mention of the battle had Clarke’s mouth bone dry. He tried to add an air of practiced casualness to his tone. “Come man, what is there to say? As far as I am concerned we are home, it is over.”

  “If you say it’s ‘over’, than I fear you lie. The battle is over. The memories will live forever, at least with me… with all of us.”

  Clarke started to add a rude comment. All of this was too fresh. Too raw. Like an open wound. When he noticed the stark honesty on his friend’s face and heard the crack in Spencer’s voice his own chest tightened.

  “There are nights when I am not home, I am back in the fields with blood on my hands and the stench of gunpowder in my nostrils. Surrounded by death. I hear the cries of dying friends I can’t help. I thought I could handle things on my own, go on as it always has been when I returned, but it’s not just you or me this is affecting.”

  “Amelia?”

  “And Adeline. Amelia’s my wife and soon you will wed Adeline. I love Amelia with every fiber of my being, and why I am baring my soul and asking for your help. You have always been the brother I wished I had by birth. But, most of all, we stood side by side on that battlefield, that hell. I cannot go through this on my own. It has taxed me to the extreme. I want to wake up with the feel of Amelia’s bare flesh next to me, and the smell of her hair…” he closed his eyes, lost in thought, and pulled in a long breath before he continued, “her hair smells of the honeysuckle water she bathes with. It’s the most amazing smell. Most nights… I can’t smell it. It’s replaced with blood from those days. I get up and pace the floors. It’s as if I attempt to out walk my demons.”

  Clarke moved away to the wall and drew a saber off the rack. He pulled it from its scabbard and ran a gentle thumb over the blade just enough to not break the skin. He wondered what went though Ellis’s mind when he was cut down with such a sword.

  Spencer’s voice drew him back, “I sound like a ranting lunatic. I understand… you can only say no.”

  “You have not proposed anything. Once again you are putting words in my mouth. I have always hated when you did that. You’re telling me you suffer nightmares that still haunt you?” Clarke noticed the red rim of Spencer’s eyes as he nodded. Was it from broken sleep? Spencer’s eyes were the same he’d seen in the mirror that morning.

  He sat in a chair and hooked a long leg over the arm. The silence in the room stretched before Clarke finally admitted, “Yes. It’s devastating when it happens.” His laugh was dry. “Funny enough, it was such a nightmare that brought Adeline, alone, to my room. She heard my cries.” He sat up and dropped hands between his knees. “I felt like a fool. A child. That was the night I knew I truly loved her, but how can she love a man who is so weak?”

  “I’ve asked myself that question a hundred times about Amelia. But do you want to know the God’s truth… they do.” Spencer shook his head. “I still can’t believe how large and understanding their hearts are. Much more than I fear mine would ever be.”

  Table of Contents

  Start