“Ah, there you are,” he said with his ready smile. “I have brought Lampton, as you see. I told him you were holding everything together! Go into the drawing room and help yourselves to sherry. I’ll be down directly, hopefully with Kate.”
“Don’t disturb her if she’s sleeping,” Nicholas said at once.
“She’ll never forgive me if I don’t,” Grant said, climbing the stairs. “And I’m more frightened of her.”
“She can’t possibly be asleep,” Elizabeth said lightly. “Andreas is up there with her.”
Nicholas’s gaze burned into her face. Finally, she allowed herself to meet it. His grey eyes were searching, but they glowed in a way that both elated and frightened her. In sudden panic, she wondered if she had bitten off more than she could chew with this man, and then his lips quirked upward in their characteristic smile and she knew only relief and sweet, growing gladness.
“Good afternoon, Princess,” he said formally.
“Good afternoon, Doctor.”
He offered his arm. “May I give you a glass of Grant’s sherry?”
She inclined her head and laid her fingers on his arm to walk with him. Seeing him again was so overwhelming that she needed these moments of formality to regain her equilibrium.
In the drawing room, the mantelpiece was decorated with holly and ivy, which also trailed from vases strategically placed all around the room. The doctor left her by the sofa near the roaring fire, but she was too restless to sit. Instead, she watched him pour two glasses of sherry with his usual brisk efficiency, and walked forward to receive one. Their fingers touched on the stem, but he did not release it. Their eyes met.
“Merry Christmas,” he said huskily and bent to kiss her.
There was no time to avoid it, even if she had meant to. It seemed too quick, too sudden, yet at the first touch of his lips she melted, for it was not too quick at all. It was just right.
“Do you still want this?” he asked against her lips. “Could you bear to marry me?”
“You know I could. In fact, I might insist upon it.” She took back his lips, to the imminent danger of both sherry glasses. He kissed with such hunger, such intensity, that she forgot where she was. There was only him and his devastating mouth on hers.
Until the door opened and Andreas bounded in ahead of the Grants and a servant carrying a cradle.
Elizabeth and Nicholas sprang apart. “Let me speak to Andreas first,” she breathed, before rushing forward to see the Grants’ baby.
“Meet Miss Nichola Grant,” Kate said smiling.
“Nichola? What an unusual and pretty name,” Elizabeth approved.
“If he was a boy, he would have been Nicholas,” Kate said.
Nicholas looked stunned, staring from the baby to Kate and Mr. Grant, with parted lips. “You named your child after me?” he said at last.
“Who better than the man who brought her into the world?” Mr. Grant said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You are our greatest friend.”
Nicholas was endearingly speechless for several seconds before he launched into a litany of questions about the baby’s sleeping and feeding progress, and Kate’s general wellbeing.
Elizabeth took the opportunity to draw Andreas away and sit him down on the sofa. “Tell me, my dear, do you like Dr. Lampton?”
“Oh yes, he’s a great gun,” Andreas said enthusiastically, having clearly absorbed more English slang than Elizabeth knew. She let it pass for now.
“Then you would not object to seeing more of him?” she pursued.
“I would like that,” Andreas said. “The baby doesn’t do much, does she?”
“Not yet, but she will. Andreas, would you like to stay in Blackhaven? With Dr. Lampton?”
At that he cast her a quick, anxious glance. “And you?”
“Of course!”
Andreas grinned. “Are you going to marry him?” he asked loudly.
The others, supervising little Nicholas’s disposal in the cradle out of the drafts, stopped talking and turned to face her and Andreas with varying degrees of interest.
Elizabeth drew a deep breath. “Yes,” she replied boldly.
*
The following evening was the charity ball at the assembly rooms. Hurrying back from an emergency visit to a patient in one of the outlying farms, Nicholas arrived at the hotel just in time to escort her. There had been no formal announcement of their engagement as yet, but the news was, inevitably, all over Blackhaven.
“Might as well brazen it out at once and arrive together,” Nicholas said. He seemed to be expecting disapproval, and from the way everyone turned and stared at her when they entered the ballroom, Elizabeth saw that he was quite right.
The room was splendidly decorated for Christmas in holly, ivy, mistletoe, and other greenery twining around the walls, hanging from wall sconces, and arching over doorways and alcoves. Red berries gleamed in the bright candle light which shone down on the magnificently sparkling guests in their bright colors and jewels. She might have been back in Vienna.
Dancing had already begun, a lively country dance to the jolly music supplied by the orchestra in the mezzanine gallery. Those who weren’t dancing seemed to be gazing at Elizabeth and Nicholas with silent hostility.
“Is it because I am foreign?” she murmured as he led her forward. “Or because we have stepped outside our perceived stations?”
“Neither,” Lady Tamar said, materializing beside them in time to overhear Elizabeth’s remark. “They think you are taking him away from Blackhaven.”
Startled—for they had not reached such practicalities in the general euphoria of their engagement—Elizabeth gazed up at Nicholas. “Am I? Do you want to leave Blackhaven?”
The possibilities were there. Elizabeth was wealthy. They could make their home—or homes—wherever they wished, in London or the country. Or any country where Alfred could not easily reach them. Nicholas could set up practice wherever he chose. Or not bother, though she could not imagine him abandoning his profession.
For a moment, she watched all those possibilities flit through his mind. His eyes held a faraway look of consideration, even speculation, and then they refocused on her, and he smiled.
“No, I don’t,” he said, almost as if surprised. “Do you?”
“No,” she said. “I might like to see the wider world with you sometimes, but I believe I would like to be the doctor’s wife in Blackhaven.”
Lady Tamar laughed. “Then I shall spread the word and put his poor patients out of their misery. Congratulations, Dr. Lampton! Oh, and Tamar wants a word with you. He has had another communication from Anna, his sister in Vienna…”
Intrigued, Nicholas and Elizabeth turned their footsteps toward Lord Tamar who was chatting with a group of people at the edge of the dance floor. Catching sight of their approach, he excused himself and strolled toward them.
After a quick bow, he stuck out his hand to Lampton. “Congratulations! I wish you both very happy. Couldn’t be more delighted for you.” His gaze lingered on Elizabeth, a little ruefully. “I have bad news that my sister was anxious I pass on to you.”
“Bad news?” Elizabeth repeated uncertainly. Her fingers tightened on Nicholas’s arm.
“You’ll receive official word of course,” Tamar said, ushering them hastily into the nearby alcove, “but this letter from Anna came in the diplomatic bag from Vienna, and was brought to Braithwaite only today.”
Nicholas dropped the curtain behind them. “What could be so urgent?”
Tamar met Elizabeth’s anxious gaze. “I’m afraid your brother-in-law, Prince Alfred, is dead. He was killed in a duel with an army officer.”
Elizabeth’s breath caught. Her fingers at her throat to comfort herself, tugged once at the diamond necklace about her throat and fell away. “Dead?” she repeated. “Alfred is dead?”
“I’m sorry.” Tamar grimaced. “I don’t wish to spoil your Christmas with more bad news, especially after what happened to your poor g
overness. But Anna seemed to think it was vital you know as soon as possible.”
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said mechanically, still trying to absorb the news.
“You won’t feel obliged to leave the ball, will you?” Tamar asked.
And suddenly, laughter caught in her throat. The man who had tried to kill her and steal from Andreas, who had been responsible for Miss Hale’s murder, was now dead himself. There was justice in that. And even more, she was safe to look after her son.
“No. No, I won’t leave,” she said shakily. She couldn’t prevent the beaming smile that clearly startled Lord Tamar. “Thank you for bringing this to me. And please…thank Lady Lewis.”
In the ballroom beyond the curtain, the orchestra had struck up a waltz, and Elizabeth couldn’t bear to be still. “I think I need to dance,” she said, tugging Nicholas’s arm.
Nicholas cast Tamar an apologetic glance and led her onto the dance floor.
“I’m safe,” she said as he took her into his arms. “He’s dead and we’re all safe from him. I cannot even pretend to be sorry.”
“Why should you?” He spun her gently, and she remembered her last dance with him, their first meeting only days ago. It seemed like a lifetime.
She frowned. “I wouldn’t be surprised if Anna had something to do with it, you know. He made a lot of enemies.”
“Does it matter?” Nicholas asked.
She refocused on his slightly harsh, yet handsome face, and her heart seemed to dive into her stomach. “No. No, it doesn’t matter at all. I feel as if I have come home, that my life is suddenly quite perfect.”
His arm tightened at her waist, his thumb caressed her fingers. “Then you will stay with me forever?”
She smiled. “Oh, yes. I will.”
And she did.
The End
Mary Lancaster’s Newsletter
If you enjoyed Wicked Christmas, and would like to keep up with Mary’s new releases and other book news, please sign up to Mary’s mailing list to receive her occasional Newsletter.
Other Books by Mary Lancaster
VIENNA WALTZ (The Imperial Season, Book 1)
VIENNA WOODS (The Imperial Season, Book 2)
VIENNA DAWN (The Imperial Season, Book 3)
THE WICKED BARON (Blackhaven Brides, Book 1)
THE WICKED LADY (Blackhaven Brides, Book 2)
THE WICKED REBEL (Blackhaven Brides, Book 3)
THE WICKED HUSBAND (Blackhaven Brides, Book 4)
THE WICKED MARQUIS (Blackhaven Brides, Book 5)
THE WICKED GOVERNESS (Blackhaven Brides, Book 6)
THE WICKED SPY (Blackhaven Brides, Book 7)
THE WICKED GYPSY (Blackhaven Brides, Book 8)
THE WICKED WIFE (Blackhaven Brides, Book 9)
REBEL OF ROSS
A PRINCE TO BE FEARED: the love story of Vlad Dracula
AN ENDLESS EXILE
A WORLD TO WIN
About Mary Lancaster
Mary Lancaster’s first love was historical fiction. Her other passions include coffee, chocolate, red wine and black and white films – simultaneously where possible. She hates housework.
As a direct consequence of the first love, she studied history at St. Andrews University. She now writes full time at her seaside home in Scotland, which she shares with her husband, three children and a small, crazy dog.
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Wicked Christmas (Blackhaven Brides Book 10) Page 10