Holly and Hopeful Hearts

by Caroline Warfield

  He frowned, his brow creasing. “Don’t what, my heart?”

  If he had not repeated the endearment, perhaps she could have kept her secret, made some non-committal remark that turned the conversation. But she could not help blurting, “Don’t call me that!” She shifted away so his body did not rest against her legs and turned her gaze to the ceiling cornice in the corner, biting the inside of her lip to hold back tears.

  James sighed, a deep exhalation as if she had punched him in his torso, and he shifted too, drawing back. “I was afraid of that. You are sorry you married me. Hythe said it, but I did not want to believe him.”

  “I?”

  Was she sorry? She had been trying to tell herself she was not, that few marriages at their level of society involved love, and at least in the Winderfield household she was needed and respected. And when her husband finally steeled himself to bed her, there would be a chance of children. It would be enough. Surely?

  “No. I am not sorry, James. I am only sorry that you…” Sophia stopped. She had been going to say she was sorry he had lied about loving her, sorry she had fallen so deeply in love with him that even discovering his perfidy had not stopped her from longing for him with every breath she took.

  His brow creased still farther. “Tell me, Sophia. Tell me what I have done and how I can undo it. For I swear, wife of mine, that I will move heaven and earth to make you happy. Do you fear going to Oxfordshire with me? We can stay if you wish.”

  He lingered over the last few words, suffusing them with regret. She shook her head. Another moment and she would be under his spell again.

  “No, you are not afraid? No, you wish to go? To stay?” He shook his head. “Tell me, Sophia. Remember I am a blundering male, and be honest with me.”

  Honest, was it?

  “As you were honest?” she blurted. “When you called me your heart and said you loved me? And then nothing? Not even a kiss! I might just as well have been sharing a bed with Felicity! You didn’t even see my beautiful lacy corset!” To her horror, she burst into tears, and suddenly she was in her husband’s arms, and he was kissing her wet face, murmuring imprecations on his own head.

  “Oh my heart, I am a fool. I am a brute. How could you know… Of course, you could not. I only meant to be considerate, my love. I wanted you so much; I longed for you, but you were so tired, and I feared to tire you further for if I had a taste of you I knew I would not be able to stop. What a stupid man you have wed, Sophia. It never occurred to me that you might think I didn’t want you!”

  He was kissing her then, with a desperation she recognized and met, returning his kisses as if they were her last link to life, and she would die if she could not absorb and be absorbed by him, merging into his very being so they became one.

  “You see?” he said, with half a laugh after a long interlude. “I was afraid to touch you for fear I would ignite, and I was right, it seems. Lying beside you this past week has been torture, and I do not mean to wait another minute, my heart, if you will give me leave.”

  Sophia hesitated, peering into his eyes, and the passion she saw there reassured her. “You are my husband,” she prevaricated. “It is your right.”

  “It is my duty, my privilege, and my delight, my heart, to protect you, to honor you, and to cherish you; to please you out of my bed and, yes, to pleasure you in it.” He swallowed, his throat convulsing. “And if I fail in any of those, it is your right to rap your husband on his thick head and teach him better. Tell me what you want, Sophia, and it is yours.”

  The answer, she found, was simple. “You,” she said. “James, I want you.”

  “You have me,” he told her, and made it so.

  About Jude Knight

  Jude Knight has been telling stories all her life: making up serial tales to amuse her friends and children, imagining sequels to books that have moved her and left her wanting more, occasionally submitting short stories to magazines and the radio, and starting more than a dozen novels set in different times and places.

  She has devoted most of the last forty years to a career in commercial writing and raising a large family. She wrote and published her first historical romance in 2014, and now has the wind in her sails and a head full of strong determined heroines, heroes with the sense to appreciate them, and villains you’ll love to loathe.

  Website and Blog: http://www.judeknightauthor.com/

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/judeknightbooks

  Twitter: https://twitter.com/JudeKnightBooks

  Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/jknight1033/

  Other books by Jude Knight

  Candle’s Christmas Chair

  They are separated by social standing and malicious lies. How can he convince her to give their love another chance?

  * * *

  Farewell to Kindness

  Love is not always convenient. Anne needs to hide and Rede to hunt, but when their enemies join forces, so must they.

  * * *

  A Baron for Becky

  She was a fallen woman. How could the men who loved her help her land on her feet?

  * * *

  Gingerbread Bride

  She ran to save herself from an unwanted marriage, and to find family who would care. He escorted her to her aunt, and couldn’t forget her.

  * * *

  Hand-Turned Tales

  Three short stories and a novella to thrill, intrigue, and delight. The Prisoners of Wyvern Castle is a prequel to Revealed in Mist.

  * * *

  Revealed in Mist

  Their job is uncover secrets. But spy Mist and thief taker Shadow have secrets of their own. They can handle blackmail amongst the cream of Society, murders and possible treachery. Their hearts are another matter.

  A Suitable Husband

  Chapter 4

  Christmas Day, 1812

  If one more person arrived, they would need to sleep in the stables. Every room in the house was full, and the under servants were sleeping several to a bed.

  Cedrica could not help a guilty thank you to whatever impulse set Mr. Arbuthwick climbing a tree to retrieve Miss Ellison’s parasol, blown there by a stray gust of wind. He insisted that ice on the branches led to his fall, but Cedrica suspected a contribution from the warming punch he and his friends had been passing around.

  Perhaps his relaxed state was for the best, as he suffered nothing worse than a sprained ankle. He was conveyed to the nearby town where his parents lived, to convalesce in the care of his fond mama, Miss Ellison’s offer of nursing services having been vetoed by her own mother.

  But Mr. Arbuthwick’s room had not been empty above seventeen hours before Viscount Elfingham turned up at the door begging shelter. Yesterday, it was. Christmas Eve. He claimed his horse was lame, but Sophia confided that he was pursuing Felicity and that Hythe said it would not do.

  Before the day was over, the sons of the duchess had also arrived. Lord Aldridge had been expected, but Lord Jonathan Grenford was thought to be somewhere in Russia. His mama was delighted, of course, but if Lord Jonathan had not cheerfully pronounced himself willing to sleep on a trundle in the room set aside for his brother, Cedrica did not know where she would have put him.

  And now, on Christmas Day, another late arrival. Thank goodness Lord Elfingham did not object to sharing his room with Mr. Halevy! Mr. Halevy seemed a very nice gentleman, polite, not fussy, and with a charming French accent that reminded her of Monsieur Fournier. Although hearing him speak disproved one of the theories she had developed to explain her inconvenient fascination with the chef. The accent was clearly not the cause. She felt no such attraction to Mr. Halevy.

  She left the new guest to the care of his room host and the servant allocated to valet far too many gentlemen for efficient service. What had seemed a large staff of servants was stretched almost to breaking point now the house was at capacity. To make things worse, Her Grace had declared that the servants were to work shortened hours today and a half day tomorrow, but her gues
ts still wanted their breakfasts served, their clothing brushed, their chins shaved, their bath water carried, their corsets tightened, their forgotten gloves fetched, and on and on and on. So all day yesterday and today, Cedrica and Mrs. Stanley the housekeeper had been trying to juggle hours and people to perform the impossible.

  The kitchens, her greatest trial in the early days of the house party, had become a haven, and she headed there now. She would just check that all was running smoothly for the second most important dinner of the whole event. And she would do so by way of the servants’ stairs, thus avoiding the kissing boughs that Sophia and her decorating crew had hung everywhere. Cedrica had already been saluted by Hythe, Weasel Winderfield, and Lord Jonathan, and could not quite see the attraction of the pastime.

  Since the kitchens had stopped sending for her several times a day, she had evolved the habit of visiting in the morning after the breakfast service and her meeting with Grace and Sophia. She took a cup of tea in one kitchen or the other, consulted with Mrs. Stanley, and admired whatever plans Mrs. Pearce and Monsieur Fournier had for the house party’s meals. Frequently, she was called upon to sample some delicacy while its originator watched anxiously. She had no idea what had happened to the war, but the two kitchen heads were now firm friends, each bending over backward to help the other succeed.

  Mrs. Pearce was alone when Cedrica arrived. Cedrica was not disappointed. Not at all. She was here to work, not to ogle Monsieur Fournier, however ogle-worthy he might be.

  “No monsieur today?” she found herself asking.

  “A busy day for Mark today, miss.”

  The words Monsieur, Fournier, and Marcel all being too difficult for Mrs. Pearce’s tongue, she had taken to calling her colleague Mark.

  “He gave permission for those who wished to go to the Christmas service, but of course that has put him behind and not many hours now until Christmas dinner.”

  Cedrica felt guilty. “Did Monsieur Fournier not wish to go to the Christmas service himself, Mrs. Pearce?”

  “No church for his kind here, miss. He’s a papist, see? French, of course. Lots of them are papists, so I hear. He’s a nice boy for all that, and a good chef. He’ll get his ordinary, right enough.”

  “‘His ordinary?’” Was that a kind of award for chefs? Or something to do with being French? Or Catholic? It was not clear from Mrs. Pearce’s speech which of the two made his niceness a surprise.

  “You know, miss. A French ordinary in London. A place for the gentlemen to have their dinners. It’s what Mark wants, why he is taking jobs like this instead of a proper position in a house, like me. Good experience, good contacts, and good money, Mark says.”

  Cedrica’s spurt of resentment was most unreasonable. Monsieur Fournier was free to confide in his fellow cook if he wished. And Cedrica’s life was calmer now the two were friends.

  “Go and say hello, miss,” the cook urged. “He’d appreciate the interest, I’m sure.”

  “I would not want to disturb him when he’s busy.”

  “We’re all busy today, miss, you as much as the rest of us, I’ll be bound.” Mrs. Pearce and her staff would be serving Christmas dinner in the servants’ hall. Three times: once for her own kitchen staff and the outdoor servants, once for the upstairs servants when their masters and mistresses went down to dinner, and once and finally for Monsieur Fournier’s kitchen.

  And Cedrica, as soon as she put her nose above stairs, would be pounced on by a guest with a problem only she could solve. Indeed, even here, the housekeeper or the under butler might track her down. They would not trespass in Monsieur Fournier’s kitchen, especially when the temperamental chef was under such pressure. He would not have time to make her a cup of the coffee she had come to enjoy since being taken up by the duchess, but perhaps she could just sit for a minute or two and watch other people work.

  The kitchen was as chaotic as she had expected. She took a chair at the end of the kitchen table farthest from all of the activity, and a few minutes of careful observation disclosed the order and patterns of frantic movement centered on Monsieur who stood, the calm center of a purposeful storm: barking orders, giving advice, tasting from spoons and plates that anxious disciples brought to him.

  A hand appeared over her shoulder, a cup of coffee, followed by another with a plate of the small cakes Monsieur decorated with such artistry. She smiled at the maidservant who was placing it for her, but the girl nodded toward Monsieur, who caught Cedrica’s gaze for a moment, smiled, then turned back to the next in his line of supplicants.

  She took a sip. Hot, creamy, and sweet. Just as she liked it.

  Moments later, Monsieur Fournier joined her, hooking a chair with one foot and sitting on it back to front so he could rest one arm along the top rail while he sipped his own black, bitter brew. “Is there something I can do for you, Mademoiselle Grenford?”

  “No, no. I had no wish to disturb you, Monsieur Fournier. I just wished to sit for a minute and not be interrupted. I can go.”

  He put a hand on her arm to stop her rising and snatched it back as if he, too, felt the shock of that connection.” My kitchen is your refuge. I am honored, and only sorry it is so…” He shrugged helplessly, an expressive lift of his shoulders and a wave of his free hand.

  “It is nice,” Cedrica confided, “to see everyone working and not to be responsible for any of it.”

  He smiled. She had noticed before how the smile transformed his lean dark face, making it seem much younger. “I am responsible for them, and to you, Mademoiselle.”

  “To the duchess, surely.”

  “Oh no.” He stared at the coffee cup as if it held the secrets of the universe. “To you, Mademoiselle, make no mistake.” His dark lashes swept up, and his eyes, dark as his coffee, looked deep into hers. “My kitchen, my craft, my service. All are devoted to you, Mademoiselle Grenford.” He pushed himself to his feet, flushing slightly. “I should not have spoken. I am tired, I think. Forgive me, Mademoiselle. You need not fear that I will embarrass or importune you. I know my place.”

  A loud crash startled Cedrica and drew Monsieur Fournier from her side to berate the boy who had darted through the door without looking just as a maid crossed the room with a stacked pile of serving bowls.

  Cedrica sat and sipped until her cup was empty, hoping he would come back, but he did not look at her again, returning instead to conducting the work of the kitchen, and in the end she went back upstairs, where she did not belong any more than she belonged down here.

  What good did it do knowing he was attracted to her as she was to him? He was right, of course. The duchess would never countenance such a connection. It was impossible.

  Wasn’t it?

  Christmas Kisses

  by Nicole Zoltack

  Louisa Wycliff, Dowager Countess of Exeter, wants only for her darling daughter, Anna, to find a man she can love and marry. Appallingly, Anna has her sights on a scoundrel of a duke who chases after every skirt he sees. Anna truly thinks the dashing duke cares for her, but her mother has her doubts. When Lady Exeter insists on Anna befriending a marquess’s son, a man Anna thinks is far too crude, Anna learns all about the trials her mother went through to find love herself. Only time will tell if Anna can find true love this Christmas season.

  Chapter 1

  1st October, 1812

  Lady Anna Wycliff accepted the letter from the butler and unsealed the wax. With reluctance, she smoothed open the paper and sighed.

  A chair scraped against the floor as her dear friend Emily Pembroke stood and walked around the table. “Is that the invitation?”

  Anna read the letter quickly and tapped her fingers against the table. “To Hollystone Hall for the Duchess of Haverford’s house party and charity ball on New Year’s Eve? Yes. I suppose you are going since you helped plan it?”

  “Of course! I do believe it will be a wonderful time, and for such a good cause too.” Emily smiled. “I was sorry you were not able to help with the planning. We hav
e both been so busy. It feels like we’ve hardly seen each other for weeks, and even now, this must be a short visit as my mother is feeling poorly. I just came to see if you had your invitation. Do say you will come.”

  Anna grimaced and dropped the letter onto the table. “I regret I will not be able to make it.”

  “Why not?” Emily rested her hand on the back of Anna’s chair. “You enjoy charity work.”

  “Precisely why. I have already promised the Home for the Motherless Children that I would read stories to the orphans on New Year’s Eve. I promised them a new story for that specific date, and I cannot on good faith abandon them. And I had hoped you might accompany me that day. No matter. The children and I will have a grand time.”

  “Could you not change the date?” Emily asked.

  “I do not know how quickly I would be able to finish the story, Emily. No, I must stick to that date.”

  “Well, that is a shame. But, Anna, even if you are otherwise occupied for that day, the house party is for two weeks! Surely you can pull yourself away for a few days.”

  Anna fiddled with a strand of hair that had come free from a pin. “I just do not think I will make an appearance, unfortunately,” she said softly.

  “I do wish you would change your mind.” Emily sighed. “I must go home. I promised mother I would not be long.”

  “Give her my best.” Anna walked Emily to the front door, and after seeing her friend off, Anna started toward the staircase when her mother called her from down the hall.