Beauty and the Earl

by Patricia Grasso

  Amber knew one thing for sure. The final barrier between the earl and her was that mask. Removing his mask in her presence was of utmost importance to their future. She needed to see his scars in the light of day. Accepting his scars would prove her love. Once the mask came off, no barriers would lie between them. Only then would they share true intimacy.

  The sound of the door opening drew her attention. She smiled when she saw the object of her thoughts crossing the chamber.

  “For you.” Miles offered her a single red rose. “I didn’t hurt your rosebush. At least, I heard no ouch cries.”

  “Thank you.” Amber leaned against the headboard.

  “Is the rosebush a boy or a girl?” Miles asked, leaning close to press a kiss on her lips.

  “Both.” Amber entwined her arms around his neck.

  That made Miles smile. He gave her a lingering kiss.

  “Tell me the story about the nightingale and the rose,” he said, leaning beside her against the headboard.

  “How do you know about that story?”

  “I overheard your conversation with the rosebush.”

  “Once upon a time, there lived only white roses,” Amber began. “One night a perfect white rose awakened to the song of a nightingale who whispered I love you. When the rose blushed, pink roses bloomed all over the world.”

  Miles nuzzled her neck, his lips and his tongue sending delicious shivers coursing through her body. She sighed at the sensation but heard him whisper, “Finish your story.”

  “The nightingale moved closer, and when the rose opened her petals, he stole her virginity,” Amber said, her breathing ragged as he slipped his hand down the top of her chemise to tease her nipples. “The rose colored red with shame, and red roses bloomed all over the world. Since that long-ago evening, the nightingale serenades the rose and begs for her favors, but the rose keeps her petals closed.”

  “How sad.” Miles captured her lips in a slow, soul-stealing kiss.

  They fell back on the bed. He pulled the top of her chemise down, freeing her breasts, and then caught a nipple between his lips. She clutched his head to her breast.

  Miles slid a hand between her legs. “Open your petals for me,” he whispered, his voice husky.

  Amber spread her legs, and he pushed the bottom of her chemise up to her waist. Then he freed his erect manhood from his breeches. She wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him close.

  Miles groaned, gliding slowly inside her until their groins touched. They began to move together.

  “I knew you would not leave her a virgin,” said a voice beside the bed.

  Miles froze. Amber opened her eyes to see a pistol pointed at the side of the earl’s head.

  “You will need to marry her.”

  “I plan to marry her.”

  Prince Rudolf lowered the pistol. “In that case, you may finish what you were doing.” Laughter lurked in his voice. “We will wait in the drawing room.”

  We? How many people were standing in his bedchamber?

  Miles turned his head to see the prince leaving. He sat up and adjusted his clothing.

  Amber touched his hand. “You do not need to marry me if you feel—”

  He silenced her with a kiss. “I want to marry you.”

  Chapter 9

  “Your cousins won’t do me bodily harm, will they?” Miles joked, pausing outside the drawing room.

  His question made Amber smile. “I doubt Rudolf will make me a widow before the wedding.”

  Unable to resist, Miles planted a kiss on her lips. “Why are you blushing?”

  “Being caught like that embarrasses me,” she admitted, dropping her gaze to his chest.

  Miles tilted her chin up to gaze into her violet eyes. “Never feel embarrassed by our lovemaking.” He took her hand in his and drew her forward into the drawing room.

  “Lo, the groom and his bride cometh,” Prince Rudolf announced when they appeared.

  Five Kazanov gazes turned in their direction. Miles glanced at Amber, noted her blush deepening into scarlet, and knew she hoped her cousin had not told the others how he had found them. Her modesty pleased him, especially since she discarded it at the bedchamber door.

  “Help yourselves to my whisky,” Miles said, noting the glasses in their hands.

  “I assumed we would be waiting hours, but that was rather quick,” Prince Rudolf said, eliciting smothered chuckles from his three brothers. He looked at the princess. “Are you certain you want to marry him?”

  “Interruption promotes shriveling,” Miles said.

  “I do not understand,” Amber said, confused by the words and the smiles.

  “May the Lord keep you from learning its meaning,” Princess Samantha said.

  “Welcome to Arden Hall,” Amber greeted her cousin’s wife.

  “Seeing you again is a pleasure, Your Highness,” Miles said, bowing over her hand.

  “Too many years have passed,” Samantha said.

  “Come, Miles.” Amber drew him toward the three young men who resembled Rudolf. “Meet my cousins.”

  Miles shook hands with Princes Viktor, Mikhail, and Stepan. With their black hair and dark eyes, the four Kazanov princes resembled each other but were as different from the princess as night and day. Then he remembered she was no true Kazanov, but the by-product of her mother’s affair with the czar.

  After giving each of her cousins a hug, Amber sat beside Samantha on the settee. “I am pleased that you came along with Rudolf. I have been wishing for a lady who can advise me on certain issues.”

  Miles perched on the side of the settee. “What issues?”

  “Female issues,” Amber answered, making her cousins smile.

  Samantha patted her hand. “I will be happy to answer your questions.”

  “What questions?” Miles asked, looking confused.

  “Female questions,” Amber said. This time the cousins laughed out loud. “My lord, there are some topics that ladies can only discuss with other ladies.”

  “Like what?”

  “Private, female topics.”

  Even Miles laughed this time. He looked at Rudolf, saying, “You will stay at Arden Hall, of course.”

  “Pebbles has already sent maids to freshen chambers,” Rudolf told him.

  “Your Highness, you have acquired a nasty habit of taking control of other people’s lives.”

  “Montgomery, someone needed to take control of your life and set it straight,” the prince said. “By the way, I will send you a case of vodka upon my return to London.”

  “Real men drink vodka,” Prince Viktor said.

  “Save the whisky for the ladies,” Prince Mikhail agreed.

  “I do not care what we drink as long as you protect our precious cousin,” Prince Stepan said.

  Amber hid her face in her hands. “Rudolf, you shared my secret?”

  “I needed to warn them about Fedor,” Rudolf defended himself. “I presume you have told the earl.”

  “I know everything,” Miles said. “I will protect her with my life.”

  “The shame belongs to Fedor,” Prince Viktor told Amber.

  “We should have dispatched him before leaving Moscow,” Stepan said.

  “Murdering one’s father is bad business,” Mikhail reminded his brothers. “Besides, Vladimir is almost as bad as Fedor. Thankfully, our father’s diabolical thinking never infected us.”

  “Who is Vladimir?” Miles asked.

  “Vladimir is Viktor’s older twin brother,” Amber answered.

  “Fedor’s heir,” Rudolf added.

  Miles looked confused. “You are the oldest, aren’t you?”

  “Fedor is only my legal father.” Rudolf smiled at the earl. “My brothers and I share a mother, but my natural sire is an English nobleman.”

  Prince Viktor changed the subject. “We have secured a special marriage license.”

  “The minister will arrive in the morning,” Mikhail added.

  Miles spoke up
. “I would like—”

  “I have already sent a message to the Duke and the Duchess of Avon,” Rudolf interrupted him.

  “We instructed your cook to prepare a wedding breakfast,” Stepan said.

  “Rudolf and I purchased a wedding ring,” Samantha said. “We hope you don’t mind.”

  “You have thought of everything.” Amber laughed with delight and glanced at the earl, who appeared uncomfortable with her family’s presumptions. “What if Miles had refused?”

  Prince Rudolf smiled. “There was no chance of that happening.”

  “What about the Squelch sisters?” Amber asked.

  “Inviting them at the last minute is unseemly,” Miles answered. “We’ll invite them to tea at a later date.”

  “Who are the Squelch sisters?” Samantha asked.

  “His villagers.”

  Miles laughed out loud. “Darling, I told you the villagers belong to themselves.”

  “I do not understand,” Amber said, shaking her head. She turned to her cousins. “I have been reading about you in the Times.” To Viktor, she said, “I had no idea you were married. Where is your princess?”

  “Adele had other plans,” Viktor answered, his lips curling in distaste.

  “You are not in accord?”

  “We are never in accord.”

  “I told you not to marry her,” Rudolf reminded him.

  “I wish I had listened.”

  Amber looked at Stepan. “What will you do with this opera singer?” she asked, eliciting ribald laughter from the men.

  Prince Stepan cast his brothers a quelling look. “Miss Fancy Flambeau is perfection. I intend to marry her, no matter the scandal our union will create.”

  “Rumor says that Miss Flambeau wants nothing to do with you or any other nobleman,” Prince Mikhail said.

  “I will change her mind.”

  Amber looked at Mikhail. “I was sorry to learn that you had been widowed, but I would love to meet your daughter.”

  “I can arrange that.”

  “Will the opera singer’s sister accompany her?” Amber asked, making her cousins laugh.

  In an obvious attempt to turn the conversation away from that topic, Prince Mikhail gestured to the portrait above the hearth. “Is that your late wife?”

  Amber felt her heart lurch when the earl answered, his love apparent in his voice. “Yes, that is my Brenna.”

  “What a lovely woman,” Viktor was saying.

  “Brenna Montgomery was a sweet woman, too,” Samantha added.

  “How did the fire start?” Stepan asked.

  Miles shrugged. “I never investigated.”

  Amber watched her cousins turn surprised gazes on the earl. “Miles was badly injured and gravely ill for a long time,” she said in his defense.

  “If you do not understand what caused the fire,” Rudolf said, “you cannot protect yourself from another.”

  “I have nothing to wear to my own wedding,” Amber said, diverting attention from the fire. She refused to sit there and allow her cousins to criticize her intended husband. After the wedding, she would investigate the cause of the fire and hoped its origin had not vanished over the years.

  “I brought you my own wedding gown,” Samantha told her.

  Amber smiled. “You have thought of everything.”

  “Dinner is served,” Pebbles announced, stepping into the drawing room. “Come and get it.”

  “Thank you, Just-Pebbles.”

  The four Russian princes looked at each other and burst into laughter. “I told you his majordomo was an Original,” Rudolf said.

  “I can hardly wait to see the wedding gown,” Amber said, looping her hand through Samantha’s arm. She walked out of the drawing room with her. “I thank Rudolf and you for all you have done for me.”

  Samantha patted her hand. “We couldn’t be happier for you. With Miles for a husband, you need fear nothing.”

  Pebbles was in his glory, supervising the serving of so many dinner guests. They dined on oyster soup, celery crab salad, potatoes in a mustard vinaigrette, and roasted quails.

  “Good evening,” Isabelle Saint-Germain called, walking into the dining room with her husband. “We came as soon as we received the good news.”

  The Kazanov princes and the earl stood at her entrance, but the duchess gestured for them to sit. Pebbles rushed forward to set places for the Duke and Duchess of Avon.

  Before taking her seat at the table, Isabelle hurried across the room. She kissed her brother’s uninjured cheek first and then Amber’s. “I am so happy for you,” she said. “We will need a special license, a wedding ring, and a gown for the princess.”

  “My cousins have taken care of the details,” Amber told her future sister-in-law.

  Dinner progressed pleasantly. Amber had never felt so much a part of a family as she did now. This was all she had ever wanted from life. Except love and children.

  “Caroline will live with us,” Amber told the duchess.

  “I will give you a week alone and then send Caroline home.”

  “Cousin Terrence will be terribly disappointed,” John Saint-Germain remarked. “Terrence was depending on you leaving no male heirs.”

  “Who is this Terrence?” Amber asked.

  “Terrence Pines, my closest cousin, inherits the title and the land if I die without heirs,” Miles answered. “I assure you that my cousin will be happy for us, especially when we are blessed with sons.”

  Amber flicked a glance at the duke. She noted his doubtful expression. Could the earl be blinded by family loyalty? That worried her.

  * * *

  “How do I recognize true love?” Amber asked her cousin’s wife. “With her marriage only moments away, she worried about the earl’s feelings for her. Was she about to trap herself in a loveless marriage? She desperately wanted to believe the earl would grow to love her.

  “Your heart will recognize if a love is true,” Samantha answered. “Are you worried that you cannot love the earl?”

  “I worry about the earl not loving me,” Amber answered, making the other woman smile. “How do I compete with his wife’s memory?”

  “Brenna Montgomery is gone,” Samantha told her. “Miles will always have a special place for her in his heart, but he will love you, too. Come, look at yourself in the mirror.”

  Amber crossed the bedchamber to the cheval mirror and studied her appearance.

  The wedding gown had been created in white satin overlaid with lace and adorned with tiny seed pearls. Its bodice had a squared neckline, dropped waist, and long, flowing sleeves shaped like bells. A jeweled tiara served as her headdress.

  A knock on the door drew their attention. It swung open, admitting the earl’s sister.

  “Welcome to the family,” Isabelle said, kissing her cheek. “You are exquisitely lovely and, I hope, will become the sister I never had.”

  “Do you think Miles will ever care for me?”

  “Do you love him?”

  “With all of my heart.”

  “Be patient with my brother,” Isabelle said. “He needs you.”

  Another knock sounded on the door. Wearing a broad smile, Prince Rudolf walked into the bedchamber. Samantha and Isabelle slipped out of the room, leaving her alone with her cousin.

  “Thank you for finding me a husband.”

  “You are certain about marrying the earl?” Rudolf asked, guiding her toward the door.

  “Miles is a special man, more special than I deserve,” Amber answered. “I wish he could love me.”

  “How could he not love you?” Rudolf said, looping her hand through the crook of his arm. “You are the most lovable woman I know.”

  “Is there any news of Uncle Fedor?”

  “He is not in England,” Rudolf assured her. “Do not let thoughts of him ruin your wedding day.”

  “I cannot help feeling that Fedor and Gromeko will search for me,” Amber said. “Fedor knows I will run to you for protection.”

/>   “If Fedor threatens you,” Rudolf said, sounding like the earl, “I will kill him. Come, your groom awaits his bride.”

  Prince Rudolf escorted Amber down one flight of stairs to the library. Everyone turned when they crossed the chamber to the hearth where Miles and the minister waited.

  Amber noted the portrait of Brenna Montgomery hanging over the hearth. Again, she wondered if she would always walk in the shadow cast by the earl’s first wife.

  Rudolf placed her hand in the earl’s and stepped back. Miles surprised her by raising her hand to his lips. Together, they turned to face the minister.

  The ceremony was surprisingly short. Her only blunder came when the earl placed the wedding ring on her finger.

  “With this ring, I thee wed,” Miles vowed, slipping the ring on her finger. “With my body, I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods, I thee endow . . .”

  Amber dropped her gaze to the ring he was sliding onto the third finger of her left hand, a simple band of gold topped by an enormous diamond, but it was the earl’s ring that captured her attention. He was wearing her gift, the ring that had once belonged to the czar.

  Her heart filled with joy. Amber threw herself into his arms, pulling his head toward her. She kissed him with passion, eliciting chuckles from her cousins.

  “Child, you need to wait until the end of the ceremony for that,” the minister said.

  Amber blushed and released the earl. “Please continue.”

  “Those whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder,” the clergyman said, and ended with the words, “I pronounce that they be man and wife together . . .”

  Miles drew her into his arms. His lips covered hers in a lingering kiss.

  Their wedding breakfast was a simple affair. There were grilled salmon steaks, baked eggs au gratin, stuffed mushrooms, hot buttered biscuits, assorted cheeses and fruits, and wedding cake.

  Miles and Amber sat together along one of the long sides of the rectangular dining table. The others sat on either side of them and along the opposite length of the table.

  The Duke of Avon stood and raised his flute of champagne. “To the bride.”

  Amber blushed as everyone lifted champagne flutes in a toast to her. She looked at her husband, who surprised her when he stood to speak.