Guardian to the Heiress

by Margaret Way

  His tone was harsh, even to his own ears. “Carol, you know very well it won’t end there.”

  Every word of rejection hurt her. “What’s the point of this stand-off, Damon?” she burst out in utter frustration. “You act as though I’m under-age. You act as though making love to me will break all the rules of good conduct. You act like you wrote the damned things.”

  “Some things are set in stone.” He thrust a hand through his thick coal-black hair. “You’re very vulnerable at this point, Carol. You’ve had a bad shock. You’re off-balance.”

  “So you’re telling me I shouldn’t be here in your arms?” She sank into sarcasm.

  “Carol, baby, please.”

  She half sat up. “I refuse to be shut out,” she told him fiercely. “I love you. Love you. Love you. Love you. You’ve got a big problem with that?” Her voice rose and echoed.

  He caught her wrists, his emotions dangerously unchained by her passionate admission. That gave him far too much power. “Don’t you know—?” he cried.

  The rest of the sentence remained unspoken. “Don’t underestimate me, Damon. I know it all.”

  She was looking back at him as though they were at war. “Carol, you’re my responsibility. It’s my duty—”

  “Oh, shut up about your sacred duty.” The speed with which they had come to clashing was dazzling. She struck him again, feeling his chest muscles tighten against the attack.

  He tried to joke. “Those sessions at the gym have to stop.”

  “Don’t!” Suddenly she snapped. She made a violent move to get away from him, in the process winding her long dress mummylike around her body. Instead of managing a leap to her feet, she almost took a tumble.

  He caught her back to him, incredible tension in his hard, throbbing body. The emotional temperature was going through the roof. Even the air around them crackled with charge. His feelings for her forced him to take a fantastic turn around. Hunger for her grew stronger than his resolve. His body knew him better than he knew himself. He started to kiss her, his hand snaking into her silky curls so she couldn’t turn her head. He was kissing her not like she was a precious piece of porcelain but a living, breathing woman, a woman he desired above all others. He had urged her earlier to breathe in and out to calm herself, only he was kissing her so passionately she might scarcely be able to breathe at all.

  He lifted his mouth fractionally from hers, only she whispered fiercely, “Don’t you dare stop.”

  “As unlikely as that appears to be. But understand, I will reach a point when I won’t be able to stop.” He gave fair warning.

  “You think I don’t know that?” She stared up at him incredulously. “Keep going, Damon. I mean it. I’m tired of obeying the rules. Make love to me. If you don’t, I promise you, I’ll simply crack up.”

  “Don’t I know the way that works?” he said with black humour, his resonant voice slipping deep in his throat. Control had moved off a great distance. It was a frenzy of longing she aroused in him, the craving to have her. Heiress or not, he wouldn’t give her up. Not after she had told him she loved him. Over and over. For that he was willing to pay any price.

  Wall sconces glimmered along the hallway. He lifted her in his arms with great ease, carrying her down the corridor and setting her on her bed. The skirt of her lovely dress belled out around her. To him she was the most desirable woman in the world.

  “Well, here we are, Carol!” He bent over her, his breathing coming hard. “This is decision time. You have to be absolutely sure.”

  For an answer she knelt up on the bed, bouncing a little on the springy mattress but still managing to get a grip on him. “Come here to me, you gorgeous man.” She allowed herself to fall back, pulling his upper body down over her, revelling in the weight of it against her breasts. “It’s okay, Damon,” she whispered, her eyes on the moulded arabesques on the plastered ceiling. “You won’t make me pregnant. Not tonight, anyway. I’m on the pill. All for you,” she added. “Let me make that plain.”

  He was astonished and aroused. “You meant for me to make love to you, you wicked girl?”

  She offered a laugh that entranced him. “God, Damon, I’ve lived for this moment. You’ve changed my world. Don’t you know that? Everything has become more meaningful. I know you want me. I suppose it’s possible I might want you more, but—”

  She got no further. “I’ll show you want.” He placed one hand over her breast, feeling the tightly budded nipple. “You’re more precious to me than an Aladdin’s cave full of treasure—chests brimming over with diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires like your eyes.” He lifted his head a moment, as though struck by a thought. “Actually, I love rubies. What about you?”

  “My favourite gemstone!” Carol cried, her whole being exuding joy. “Come back here to me.”

  “I can, now that’s out of the way.” He lowered his head to kiss her, feeling her gently slide the tip of her tongue into his mouth.

  “What’s out of the way?” she asked after some time.

  “Never you mind.” His voice was faintly slurred. He had a ruby engagement ring in mind. Slowly he began to undo the halter that held her dress. “How should I describe you, my little seductress?”

  She gave him a slow, sweet, incandescent smile. “My philosophy is, if offered a heaven-sent opportunity, one should never turn it down. However, apart from telling me I’m more valuable to you than a treasure trove of precious jewels, you haven’t yet told me you love me.”

  “How could I not?” The expression on his handsome face turned very serious. “To love you is my fate. I loved you from the moment I laid eyes on you—the adorable little redhead, so full of fight. I intend to tell you just how much I love you right through the night.”

  “I can’t ask for more than that.”

  “I’ll never run out of love for you.” He looked deeply into her eyes.

  “Nor I for you.” Carol lifted her mouth to give him a kiss that was hot, sweet and fierce.

  The intimacy between them seemed to Damon like the greatest gift life could afford. Very slowly, he began to peel her dress down to her hips. Her skin was flawless in the lamplight, her naked breasts small, high, perfect, inviting his mouth and his hands. He bent his head and pressed his open mouth against one tight pink bud, catching one nipple then the other very gently with his teeth. “Are you a virgin?” he asked very quietly.

  She lay back, her body consumed by sensation. “I know you aren’t, but I am. I’m one of the very few around. So, now you know you’re going to transform me. Maiden into woman. I never got past petting, Damon. You will be my first lover.” She felt exultant now. “Does that worry you?” She reached out to him as he pondered her question.

  Damon had to consider how the strength of his feelings, the power of his body, his driving male need for her, might impact on her. He wanted to give her only pleasure.

  “Not at all,” he said after a moment, the strength of his love for her showing in his eyes. “I’ll take it very, very slowly. I want this to be one of the all-time memorable experiences of our lives.”

  She was so moved she could scarcely speak. “So it’s til death do us part?” Tears glittered in her eyes.

  “Yes, Carol, my love, it is.” He said it like a sacred vow, which indeed was what he felt.

  “And it’s a yes for me, too.” Carol’s voice matched his intensity. “You’re my fixed star, Damon. I need you. I’ll always need you.”

  “And I’ll always be there for you.” He raised her slender arm, kissing the length of it, from her wrist to her elbow to the curve of her shoulder. “Marry me,” he begged, his dark eyes brilliant with love and pride in her. “It will be a communion of our bodies and our souls.”

  “The way it should be if one is blessed.” There was no question of pausing for Carol, not even for a second. Her face took on a very special radiance. “I’ll be everything you want.”

  “But you are already.” Damon dipped his head to kiss the soft hollow
of her throat.

  High emotion assailed them. Carol pressed her palms hard against the coverlet, half-faint with wanting. “So, a night to remember?” She gazed up at him with blue smouldering eyes.

  “Let me show you what love is,” he resolved, smiling into her eyes.

  “Then I want you to start. Right now.”

  It was miraculous and it was simple: total commitment made manifest.

  * * *

  In such a world as Damon and Carol were destined to live in, neither as it turned out could have hoped for a more perfect partner or a more perfect ally. The one was always there for the other. That alone conferred tremendous strength on a union that was further blessed with children, boy and girl, who would be given all the love, the support, the trust, and the training to carve their own successful paths in life.

  EPILOGUE

  CAROL AND DAMON had recently returned from their honeymoon when Maurice Chancellor rang to ask if he could call in. He was told, of course. Maurice was still living at Beaumont, writing his magnum opus, a crime novel of memories and murder. It was by all accounts going well. He had a publisher and an excellent editor who gave him many a helpful suggestion and lots of encouragement.

  Divorce proceedings were well under way. In less than a year and a day, Maurice Chancellor and his wife Dallas would enter a new phase in life. Dallas in fact had already entered one. She had chosen to live in London. Though strictly speaking she hadn’t been left with a choice, just a clear directive. She had been told never to return.

  Were it not for his overly careful movements, Carol wouldn’t have thought anything was amiss. But something definitely was. She braced herself. She and Damon were sublimely happy, working as a finely meshed team. She had graduated in law with first-class honours. Christmas was coming up, a wonderful time of the year that they would share together. They were so enjoying their lives and one another, full of their hopes and plans.

  Maurice waited until they were all seated in the living room of their new penthouse apartment, a fresh start. The Chancellor mansion on the harbour had sold within a week of its going on the market. Carol and Damon had the proceeds of the sale earmarked for medical research into childhood autism and programmes to significantly brighten future prospects for children with the disorder and the lives of the caring parents.

  “So what is it, Uncle Maurice?” Carol asked. She and her uncle had grown much closer. He had, in fact, given her away at the wedding—the wedding of the year, and no mistake! It had been an unforgettable day for everyone. Roxanne, looking marvellous, had even shed a few motherly tears. There had been no jocular mention of when she might expect her first grandchild. Roxanne probably couldn’t survive being a grandmother.

  “There’s some news...” Maurice said and let the sentence trail.

  “Please tell us,” Carol prompted.

  He spread his hands. “I must be a terribly cold-hearted man, but I can’t feel any sort of grief. I want to, but I can’t. I’m just numb.” In truth, he had been numb since his wife’s confession to tampering with Carol’s car before she had left for London. Shockingly, she had shown little in the way of remorse.

  Damon reached for his wife’s hand, as ever highly protective of her well-being. On her left hand Carol wore her engagement ring above her diamond-banded wedding ring. He had asked the city’s top jeweller to hand-make the ring using the finest Burmese ruby the jeweller could source. He had designed the ring himself, an oval 3.59 ruby, the gemstone associated with love and passion banded by baguette diamonds to match Carol’s wedding ring.

  Maurice’s voice brought him out of his moment of reverie. “It’s Dallas,” he said heavily. “Her luck has finally run out. She was involved in a pile up on the M1. Weather conditions were very bad. She was travelling too fast, couldn’t stop.”

  Something shifted inside Carol. “You’re saying she didn’t survive the crash?” She was unable to prevent a moment’s relief before dismay prevailed. Death was death, but she still had the occasional nightmare about Dallas and her plans.

  “She didn’t.” Maurice replied, a mix of emotions engraved on his handsome face. “Troy is knocked sideways. He’s going over there. Put simply, Troy is the only one who loved her. I suppose you’d have to qualify that and say, in his own way. Poor Dallas, she was her own worst enemy,” he said like a bone-weary man.

  She certainly was, Damon thought, convinced the superrich thought they were different from everyone else. He drew his beautiful wife, the love of his life, ever closer. “No one wants to hear of a death, Maurice, and the pain it inflicts on those remaining, but whatever happened with Dallas in the past is over. Carol and I—we hope you, too—are looking to the future. Your book is going well, from all accounts. Your editor tells you you’ve got the talent. You have to take it as far as you can.

  “We have some news, too. I was offered a full partnership at Bradfield Douglass. I expected it, but Carol and I have talked it over and we’ve decided to go out on our own. I always intended to at some stage. Now is the time and I’ll have my wife beside me. We’ll build our own firm, Hunter Chancellor.”

  Maurice searched their expressive faces. “Well, that is wonderful to hear. Splendid to bring Carol in.”

  “She’ll be an asset,” Damon maintained.

  “So I will.” Carol turned her head to kiss her husband’s cheek.

  For the first time Maurice gave a smile. “Perhaps I should start thinking about shifting my allegiance from Marcus Bradfield.” Marcus had become too set in his ways, not much thinking outside the box.

  “Up to you, Uncle Maurice,” Carol said, thinking there was wisdom in such a decision. “My husband is positively brilliant, as Grandfather came to realise. As a family, we’ve outrun the past, Uncle Maurice. Our future is made every day.”

  Maurice Chancellor studied his beautiful niece. Would that he had such a daughter! “A long, very happy life to both of you,” he said with the utmost sincerity, his battered heart filling with comfort. Perhaps when he got home he would call his son, saying he would join him in London. He had to take better care of his son than his father had ever taken of him. He saw now he had been offered a second chance. How did that make him?

  Happy, he realised.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Single Dad’s Holiday Wedding by Patricia Thayer

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  CHAPTER ONE

  SHE still wasn’t sure if coming here was a good idea.

  Lorelei Hutchinson drove along First Street to the downtown area of the small community of Destiny, Colorado. She reached the historic square and parked her rental car in an angled spot by a huge three-tiered fountain. The centerpiece of the brick-lined plaza was trimmed with a hedge and benches for visitors. A pathway led to a park where children were playing.

  She got out, wrapped her coat sweater tighter against the cold autumn temperature and walked closer to watch the water cascade over the marble structure. After nearly twenty years many of her memories had faded, but some were just as vivid as if they’d happened yesterday.

  One Christmas she remembered the fountain water was red, the giant tree decorated with multicolored lights and ornaments and everyone singing carols. She had a family then.

  A rush of emotions hit her when she recalled being in this exact spot, holding her father’s hand as he took he
r to the park swings. One of the rare occasions she’d spent time with the man. He’d always been too busy building his empire. Too busy for his wife and daughter. So many times she had wanted just a little of his attention, his love. She never got it.

  Now it was too late. Lyle Hutchinson was gone.

  With a cleansing breath, she turned toward the rows of storefront buildings. She smiled. Not many towns had this step-back-into-the-nineteen-thirties look, but it seemed that Destiny was thriving.

  The wind blew dried leaves as she crossed the two-lane street and strolled past Clark’s Hardware Store and Save More Pharmacy, where her mother took her for candy and ice cream cones as a child. A good memory. She sure could use some of those right now.

  There was a new addition to the block, a bridal shop called Rocky Mountain Bridal Shop. She kept walking, past an antiques store toward a law office with the name Paige Keenan Larkin, Attorney at Law, stenciled on the glass.

  She paused at the door to the office. This was her father’s town, not hers. Lyle Hutchinson had made sure of that. That was why she needed someone on her side. She pushed the door open and a bell tinkled as she walked into the reception area.

  The light coming through the windows of the storefront office illuminated the high ceilings and hardwood floors that smelled of polish and age, but also gave off a homey feeling.

  She heard the sound of high heels against the bare floors as a petite woman came down the long hall. She had dark brown hair worn in a blunt cut that brushed her shoulders. A white tailored blouse tucked into a black shirt gave her a professional look.

  A bright smile appeared. “Lorelei Hutchinson? I’m Paige Larkin. Welcome home.”

  * * *

  After exchanging pleasantries, Lori was ushered into a small conference room to find a middle-aged man seated at the head of the table, going through a folder. No doubt, her father’s attorney.