Wed at Leisure(The Taming Series)

CHAPTER FIFTEEN



* * *





He didn’t speak of it. Not through the awkward dinner at which everyone spoke of everything but the scandal. It was like a great, noisy elephant had taken up residence in the room and no one would acknowledge it. They accepted Luc’s presence as if he had always been an intended guest. The charming Viscount home from his continental journey. Yet, even as they all sat here with this pretense, the greater world was likely gossiping about the shocking happenings at Hopford Manor.

He didn’t speak of it the next day through the hunt and dinner. But after dinner, when there was a proposal for dancing and he took Kate upon the newly bared wooden floor, he couldn’t help but question her with his touch, his eyes. He felt himself doing it. A lovesick fool.

“Stop,” she hissed when the figure brought them close together.

“Stop what?”

“Looking at me. It’s unnerving.”

“You are my dance partner. It is required,” he said reasonably.

“People will talk.”

“People are already talking.”

“About us.”

“You no longer wish for the attention?” he teased.

She narrowed her eyes and looked away. But if she did much more of that, people would talk, and wonder what they discussed.

Maybe she’d reject him yet. But he hoped not. With each passing moment, his surety grew. This was the woman for him.



Perhaps she and Bianca had found their own truce, but the irreverence with which her sister and the Viscount treated the whole affair grated. In response, Kate needed to be more demure, more proper, and less the Kate of London. Through it all Peter was there, offering silent support with those gray eyes when their gazes met. There was something about the way he watched her that made her feel . . . uncomfortable . . . a way she had never felt before. As if someone cared deeply for her. Perhaps his proposal was not merely an act of charity. Perhaps he felt something besides his dishonorable desire. The way she felt, despite her fear of feeling it.

Through the next two days, the outing to the village market, the evening of dancing and games, the amateur theatrical production that was put on in the ballroom on a whim, she thought about his proposal. Thought about his gray eyes and his smile. About every moment she had ever spent with him.

But she could not tell him that with her guests here. Accepting a proposal at this point might seem like using him. The way she felt when she looked at him, thought of him—when he spoke to her and touched her—it was new and exhilarating and a secret she wanted to hold for herself. She wanted to keep it pure and untainted by scandal, by society’s suspicions.

When at last, she and her family saw the final guest off, she was tired. Tired of being proper, of worrying what the world would think.

She sent him a note.

The sun was high in the sky when she crossed the fields and headed for Fairview.

By way of that place at the stream. That special hidden little bend where so many moments had occurred. Where she desperately wanted to have one more.

He was there waiting for her, at that place on the border of their estates, melding each other’s lives and yet a separate world entirely.

He looked handsome and beautiful and every superlative she could think of. Her heart was full as she stared at him.

“I suppose you will return to Brighton,” he said.

It was so far from what she was thinking that she started a bit. Didn’t he know? Couldn’t he read her emotions in every gesture that she made? In every breath that she took?

“I was thinking that I would stay here awhile,” she returned with a little smile.

“The scandal will not be terrible. These last few days have done much to alleviate it.”

“Oh, I am certain that Lady Vane has already gossiped about us to the world”—he laughed and the sound encouraged her—“but that is not why.”

He raised an eyebrow. “No?”

This was it. She could say her piece or she could . . . she could go on as if it didn’t matter. But it did matter. Her heart said it did. So much had happened this last week. And he was a part of it all. She took a deep breath. No cowardice. Not now.

“By the river, you said you wished to marry me. Do you still?”

His eyes widened. He looked incredulous and she swallowed hard.

“Catherine—”

“I know your offer was impetuous,” she interrupted, terrified to hear him make some excuse. “Gallant, even, and with the brunt of the storm weathered, the time for gallantry is past.”

“It wasn’t gallantry. Kate . . .” He took her hand in his and her heart felt as if it leapt. Foolishly, perhaps, but hopeful still. He lifted that hand to his lips, never once looking away from her eyes. Her hand shook. “Bonny Kate,” he said with a slow smile, “and sometimes Kate the curst; but Kate, the prettiest Kate in Christendom, Kate of Kate Hall, my super-dainty Kate—”

“Oh stop!” she cried, the tremulous emotion at the edge of tears turning to laughter. “Be serious, Peter.”

“I am, deeply. It was here, ten years ago, that you first offered me a glimpse of your strength.”

“My strength,” she scoffed. “I was licking my wounds while my mother was dying.”

“Her death did not diminish the wounds she caused.”

She ducked her head and blinked rapidly. He was right. They had merely been compounded with guilt, with loss, with a confusion she couldn’t quite dispel. And she had had no one. But now. Now, perhaps, she did.

“Shakespeare did say it best,” Peter said, his voice sliding over her, warm and secure, the way home should feel, the way she had always idealized Hopford from afar. “‘Thy virtues spoke of, and thy beauty sounded, yet not so deeply as to thee belongs.’ Kate, marry me.”

“Not ‘kiss me’?” she teased, wiping away the tears. Now she was only filled with joy. For him, for the future, for a love like she had never known and thus never imagined possible.

“That, too,” he whispered, drawing her into his embrace. “Yes. Kiss me.”

But before she pressed her lips to his, there was just one more thing she had to say.

“I love you.”

“Oh my bonny Kate, I love you, too.”





Want to see how it all began?

Keep reading for a peek at


WOO’D IN HASTE.


Bianca’s story!





An Excerpt from


WOO’D IN HASTE





A man’s life can change in an instant. Lucian Dorlingsley, Viscount Asquith, heir to the Earl of Finleigh, had heard this aphorism many times, but until that particular August morning, he had never experienced such a profound moment. Not throughout his sheltered childhood at his familial estate. Or during the more arduous years at Harrow and Cambridge. Not even during the long continental tour from which he had just returned.

Yet here, in the sleepy town of Watersham, where he was stopping briefly with the Colburns on his way home, his life had been rocked down to his very essence.

“I’m in love, Reggie!” He paced the length of the veranda where they were enjoying an al fresco luncheon. The sky beyond was a cerulean blue and the weather, for once, that rare balance of very English sunshine (and he had now seen enough of the world to know that sunshine had a different quality in different places) tempered by a delicate breeze. In other words, the perfect day to fall in love.


His friend, the younger brother of the Duke of Orland, looked at him doubtfully, a cautious smirk on his lips.

“Who is she, then? A Parisian dancer from the opera? An Italian nymph? What paragon did you meet on your travels that has you so bound up in a paroxysm of amorous emotion?”

Reggie saw the world as one large jest, and on most occasions that was one of his charms. In fact, his boisterous manner was what made him so easy to be around. Often Luc could simply follow him about and be amused without having to put himself forward in any way. It was also, at this moment, the one thing Luc did not need. Not about a matter so serious.

“No, nothing so cliché as all that. I saw her here, in the village this morning. I stopped by the apothecary and there she was.”

“And did you pledge your undying love to her?”

Luc shook his head, ignoring Reggie’s exaggerations and persistent humor for a confessional honesty. An honesty that he had with few others, including his sisters. But Reggie had been the foremost companion of his youth, his roommate at Harrow and later at Cambridge. At least for the one year that Reggie attended before he decided the pretense at study was a waste of his time. He’d been gallivanting about London ever since. Still, Luc said the words with shame. “I could hardly approach her.”

“I shall never understand how such a giant as yourself is one of the most painfully shy men that I know. One would think a Grand Tour would cure you of that.”

Europe had cured him in many ways. Out of the shadow of his gregarious father, away from the judgments of his usual society, he had been able to be more himself. But now he was back in England, and . . . this was not just any woman.

“Miss Mansfield, they called her,” he said instead. “Do you know her? Can she be mine?” Not that he had ever thought twice about marriage before this point. He was still young and most of his friends unattached. Yet the idea of such beauty being his . . . His own Botticelli. He looked expectantly at Reggie, but his friend’s usually round, smiling face looked aghast.

“What? Is she promised to someone already? Are you in love with her, Reggie? Or is Peter?” He tried to calm his sudden fears with levity. “Have I lost my heart to some untouchable?”

“Untouchable, perhaps,” Reggie choked out, taking a moment to twirl the long hair that fell over his forehead in sandy curls. “I didn’t realize Kate was back from Brighton. But listen, Luc, this one—Forget about her. She might be a success in London these last two Seasons, but everyone in these parts knows her for the brat that she is.”

Brat? Luc couldn’t reconcile that word with the image that still lingered in his mind. Honey-blond hair framing a rosy-cheeked countenance. Eyes as blue as today’s perfect sky. A paragon of quiet English beauty, in fact.

“She seemed quite well liked. She had a charming smile and manner. Brat seems like an unfair epithet.”

“Not for Kate, but oh! Perhaps it was Bianca. Your Venus, was she fair or dark?”

“Fair.”

“Aha, the mystery is cleared,” Reggie said with a smile, slapping his knee. And then the smile faded. “I would be more than happy to introduce you to Bianca Mansfield, younger sister to the cursed Kate, but it wouldn’t matter in any event. In fact, her father would likely not let you near if he thought you a suitor.”

“She is taken.” Of course, she would be.

“Quite the opposite. It’s very clear, Luc, that you know nothing about the family. If you’d been in London these last two years instead of traveling across the Continent, you would know all about Catherine.”

“It isn’t Catherine I want.”

“But Catherine is unmarried and refuses to allow her sister to have a Season this year and upstage her in London.”

That sounded ridiculous, impossible, and positively Shakespearean.

“And their father allows this?”

“Mr. Mansfield has allowed Catherine her own way ever since their mother died. And his current wife seems to support the situation, as well. Not that Bianca has ever been seen to complain. In fact, as best I know, she couldn’t care less and is completely immersed in her books.”

Books. That little insight added slight shading, a rounded curve to his previous image of her. What kind of books did she prefer to read? Poetry? Minerva’s Press? Greek philosophy? His own preference was modern philosophy. Voltaire, Rousseau, Locke, Herr Kant. Not that he read every word of any given tract. He’d done quite enough of that during his rigorously classical education. No, now he preferred a looser approach, to simply catch the gist of an author’s argument. And really, when it was all about ideas, who needed to have all those extra words?

“How do you know this?”

“The servants, of course. I don’t know how your father thinks you’ll ever make a proper earl. You, my friend, are the embodiment of naiveté.”

A social reticence, Lucian would admit to, but na?veté was a different matter and the words rankled. Especially as Lucian had spent two years abroad gaining a continental education while Reggie had never once left England’s shores.

Yet, ultimately, the slur to his worldliness aside, Reggie had given much food for thought. Lucian sat down in his chair somewhat dejectedly. Naturally, when Cupid’s arrow finally struck, the object of his desire would be unattainable.

“I can still introduce you to her,” Reggie offered. “You never do know. Perhaps her father will be so impressed by your ancestry that he will risk strife in his own home.”



“Thomas Mansfield, that is not how gentlemen sit when they take tea!” Charlotte Smith scolded. Bianca sat up straighter herself at the governess’s strident tones. Not that there was anything wrong with her posture, at least at the moment. Lottie (Bianca had only been allowed to use that familiar name two years earlier) had ensured that over the last ten years.

“It’s how Father sits,” Thomas rebuffed. He was eight and, ever since recovering from the illness that kept him from attending Eton with his closest friend, he had been increasingly obstreperous. But he was still too weak to be sent off this quarter.

“If you wish to not be a laughingstock, you will learn basic manners.”

Wisely, Lottie had not addressed the issue of Bianca’s father, who was a country gentleman through and through, and very happy with his hunting and sport.

“Go on and read it. It is simply ink on paper and can hardly bite you.” This chastisement was in fact addressed to Bianca, and she looked down at the letter in her hands. While Bianca and Kate were not close, had not been since the day Bianca watched their mother die and been unable to do a thing to stop it from happening, Kate always sent regular letters when she was away from home. They were usually long, and fraught with details about clothing and society events, about people of whom Bianca knew nothing. As if she was taunting her with the life she refused to share.

Not that Bianca cared.

In fact, there were only three things in the world that she did care about: books, music, and Thomas. She had decided several years earlier, while still a child, that the rest of her family wasn’t worth worrying about, from her sister’s constant demands and histrionics to her father’s inability to refuse Kate anything.

Bianca was a fortress, not only physically, thanks to her sister’s decree that she could not enter society until Kate found a mate (the rhyme brought a small smile to Bianca’s lips), but also emotionally. No one and nothing could hurt her if she didn’t care.


Although she did feel deeply. When she read Mrs. Burney’s Evelina again for the fourteenth time, she still sighed over Lord Orville, preferred him in fact to all the heroes of Miss Austen’s works. Although Mr. Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth never failed to thrill and Captain Wentworth’s final speech to Anne was the epitome of romance.

Romance that Bianca would never experience. Unless perhaps this letter contained news of Kate having formed a tendre for some gentleman.

But no, Kate was far too happy flirting and flitting about to settle down just yet. And thus, at nineteen, Bianca was still stuck here at home.

Not that she would wish to leave Thomas’s side until he was completely mended and off to school. She did love him desperately. In some ways she was more a mother to him than a sister, as his own mother, her stepmother, was always off accompanying Kate, from London to Brighton to Bath and back to London. Henrietta had knowingly married a country gentleman but she refused to remain in the country herself.

With a sigh, Bianca unfolded the missive. The mere sight of the familiar script sent dread seeping down her body.

She skimmed the letter, only registering a few lines here and there.

The Season is over and next week we shall move to Brighton, where we are staying with our cousins, the Plimptons.

Their mother’s family. Bianca had only met them once as their mother had not been close with her siblings. However, she had never felt one of them. Kate, who had inherited her dark hair and eyes from that side of the family, had always seemed to fit in.

I hope Brighton is its usual effervescent self. It will be such a relief to enjoy the sea air after all those months in London. London is wonderful and diverting but a change of scene is very welcome.

Not that Bianca had ever experienced a change of scene, which Kate knew very well.

And without the eternal presence of our neighbor, as His Grace usually chooses to return home this time of year.

Peter Colburn, the Duke of Orland. Whom Kate disliked for some unknown reason. She never failed to post some snippety snippet about him in her letters.

I look forward to Christmastide and seeing you again. It has, as usual, been too long.

Bianca had a very faint memory from early childhood of toddling behind her sister, looking up at her in the hazy sunshine. Loving her.

Sometimes she longed for that falsely idyllic image. Longed for an older sister the same way she missed her mother.

Sometimes she longed for a mother.

Which Henrietta, her stepmother, would never be. No, Kate, in her usual way, had demanded all of the attention. Even before her sister had actively been antagonistic toward Bianca. And thus there was only Thomas. And Lottie.

Thank goodness for Lottie.

There were other homes, she knew, where there was a more conscious separation between master and servant. Indeed, between the regular staff, the parlor maids and footmen and so forth, yes, there was. But as her governess, Lottie was simply part of the family. And in many ways, the entirety of Bianca’s family.

P.S. If Mr. Buncombe comes calling, you should decline his suit by reminding him you may not marry before me!

Bianca read that last with a mixture of disgust and anger. Disgust because she would never consider marrying the much older, newly widowed Mr. Buncombe. Yes, his was one of the first families of the area, but his daughters were older than she and all already married. She didn’t need that ridiculous proclamation to keep her safe. All the reference did was make her burn with resentment. Just as she had burned for two years, despite her efforts to not worry about the things she could not control.

It had been the end of Kate’s first London Season. Those four months had been the most pleasant of Bianca’s life in years. But then, in usual Kate fashion, her sister had come home for one week and turned Bianca’s world upside down. Kate had been in a rage from the first moment she walked into the house and no one had been safe. Bianca’s clothes were ugly, her posture slouched, she smelled of fish (yes, she had just returned with her angling rod). And when Bianca, excited for her own incipient Season, dared to ask how Kate’s Season had been, for details that were not in her sister’s letters, the infamous proclamation was made.

“You’ll have to wait for your Season, Bianca. You shan’t marry before me!”

Terrified that her sister actually meant the flippant words, Bianca had said nothing more on the matter. After all, Kate was stubborn and would likely dig her heels in out of spite if pushed. But at the dressmaker several days later, the proclamation was reiterated. Then, after much ado, supported by their step-mother, upheld by their father, Bianca’s fate sealed. Choices about her life made by everyone but she.

In a world where she could not control much of anything. Where she couldn’t stop her mother from dying . . .

She shook the thoughts away, invoked the peace of the stream, of focusing on the perfection of the cast. Found a sense of calm determination and looked up at Lottie.

“It is much the same. A pretense at sisterly affection while teasing me with the life she will not share. I do not see why you insist I read these.” And as she said those words, she realized that was one thing she didn’t have to do. She crumpled the letter up decisively. “In fact, I won’t anymore. That is the very last one.”

There was something freeing about that decision. A bittersweet freedom.

But she was nineteen, and she refused to live her life any longer according to her sister’s whims.





An Excerpt from





FALLING FOR OWEN


Book Two: The McBrides

by Jennifer Ryan

From New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Ryan comes the second book in an unforgettable series about the sexy McBride men of Fallbrook, Colorado. Reformed bad boy Owen McBride will do anything to protect his beautiful neighbor when she gets caught in the crossfire between his client and her abusive ex.




Claire woke out of a sound sleep with a gasp and held her breath, trying to figure out what had startled her. She listened to the quiet night. Nothing but crickets and the breeze rustling the trees outside. A twig snapped on the ground below her window. Her heart hammered faster, and she sucked in a breath, trying not to panic. Living in the country lent itself to overactive imaginings about things that go bump in the dark night. The noise could be anything from a stray dog or cat to a raccoon on a midnight raid of her garbage cans, even an opossum looking for a little action.

Settled back into her pillow and the thick blankets, she closed her eyes, but opened them wide when something big brushed against the side of the house. Freaked out, she got up from the bed and went to the window. She pulled the curtain back with one finger and peeked through the crack, scanning the moonlit yard below for wayward critters. Not so easy to see with the quarter moon, but she watched the shadows for anything suspicious. Nothing moved.

Not satisfied, and certainly not able to sleep without a more thorough investigation, she padded down the scarred wooden stairs to the living room. She skirted packing boxes and the sofa and went to the window overlooking the front yard. Nothing moved. Still not satisfied, she walked to the dining room, opened the blinds, and stared out into the cold night. Something banged one flower pot into another on the back patio, drawing her away from the dining room, through the kitchen, and to the counter. She grabbed the phone off the charger, went around the island, and tiptoed along the breakfast bar to the sliding glass door. She peeked out, hiding most of her body behind the wall and ducking her head out to see if someone was trying to break into her house. Like she thought, the small pot filled with marigolds had been knocked over and broken against the pot of geraniums beside it. Upset that her pretty pot and flowers were ruined, she moved away from the wall and stood in the center of the glass door to get a better look.


With her gaze cast down on the pots, she didn’t see the man step out from the other side of the patio until his shadow fell over her. Their gazes collided, his eyes going as wide as hers.

“You’re not him,” he said, stumbling back, knocking over a potted pink miniature rose bush, and falling on his ass, breaking the pot and the rose with his legs. She hoped he got stuck a dozen times, but the tiny thorns probably wouldn’t go through his dirt-smudged jeans.

In a rage, she opened the door, but held tight to the handle so she could close it again if he came too close. She yelled, “What the hell are you doing?”

“I’ll get him for this and for sleeping with my wife,” the guy slurred. Drunk and ranting, he gained his feet but stumbled again. “Where is he?” The man turned every which way, looking past her and into her dark house.

“Who?”

“Your lying, cheating, no-good husband.”

“How the hell should I know? I haven’t seen or heard from him in six months.”

“Liar. I saw him drive this way tonight after he f*cked my wife at his office and filled her head with more bullshit lies.”

“Listen, I’m sorry if my ex is messing with your wife. I left him almost two years ago for cheating on me. Believe me, I know how you feel, but he doesn’t live here.”

“You’re lying. He drove his truck this way and stopped just outside.”

“He doesn’t drive a truck.”

“Stop lying, bitch.”

“I’m not. You have the wrong person.”

“You tell that no-good McBride he better stop seeing my wife. If he thinks a bunch of papers will ever set her free from me, he doesn’t know what I’m capable of, what we have. He’ll be one sorry son of a bitch. She’s mine. I keep what’s mine.”

“You don’t understand.”

“No. You don’t understand,” he said, almost like a whining child. “You tell him, or I’ll make him pay with what’s his.” He pointed an ominous finger at her. “You tell him if he doesn’t leave my wife alone and let her come back to me like she wants, I’m going to hurt you before I come after him.”





An Excerpt from





GOOD GIRLS DON’T DATE ROCK STARS


by Codi Gary

Gemma Carlson didn’t plan on waking up married to her old flame—and her son’s father-turned-country rock star—Travis Bowers, following a night of drunken dares. So she does the only sane thing: she runs!

Travis finally has a second chance, and he doesn’t plan on losing Gemma again—or the son he didn’t know he had. He’s in this for the long haul. Even if it means chasing his long-lost love all over again . . .




“What are you doing here, Travis?”

The rage and frustration that had been simmering below the surface of his skin started to burn. “Why wouldn’t I come here?” He turned around and faced her, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re my wife. We spent a magical night together, and I just happen to have a break in my tour that allows me to spend several weeks with you.”

“I thought you would—”

“What, Gemma?” His voice was low and dark as he approached her. Grabbing her shoulders, he gave her a gentle shake. “What? You thought I’d just read your letter and be grateful? That I’d think, ‘you know what, she’s right’ and leave you alone, just disappear from your life again?”

She stopped struggling, and he could tell by her expression that was exactly what she’d been thinking.

“This is my home, Travis. You can’t just show up here and disrupt my life,” she hissed.

“I’m not trying to disrupt your life. I just want to know why you left without talking to me. At least trying to work out what happened,” he said.

“What happened is we got drunk and did something stupid. End of story,” she said.

“No, that’s not the end of it, sweetheart,” he snapped before he could rein in his temper. “Like it or not, we’re married. It wasn’t something I planned, but that’s the way things are, and you could have at least given me the courtesy of waking me up and talking about it.”

“What’s there to talk about, Travis? We haven’t seen each other for ten years, and yes, I had fun with you, but we want totally different things,” she said, sounding almost disappointed. “You and I . . . we don’t work anymore. We’re too different. Our worlds are too different.”

He took a calming breath and thought about her words. It was true that their lives were different, but that wasn’t a kill switch for a future. People called alcohol “truth serum,” and if he’d stood up and pledged himself to Gemma legally, deep down he must have wanted it. Which led to a whole new line of crazy he could sift through later, but right now, he needed to make her understand that he took what they’d done seriously. He wasn’t going to let her just sweep it under the rug as a drunken mistake.

Especially since it took two to say “I do.”

He had been developing his strategy the whole drive, and he’d come up with an idea he was going to propose—before he’d lost his cool. He needed to prove that there was more to what happened than a wild weekend gone wrong. Gemma had said he didn’t know her; well, what better way to get to know someone than to date them?

She’d never agree to it, though, until she got over whatever had her in a panic. He needed to show her that it wasn’t over, not just like that. There was too much left between them for “closure” or whatever her letter had said.

And he would prove it to her.

“I thought we were working really well together,” he said softly, his tone seductive. He took her hand, holding it gently when she tried to pull away and caressing the back of it with his thumb. He saw her shiver and smiled as he brought her fingers up to his mouth, his lips hovering above the knuckles as he spoke. “When we were in your hotel room, and I had my hands on your body, running them over your skin . . . you felt so good.” She licked her lips and closed her eyes. He pulled her closer, trailing his lips from her wrist to her elbow. “And the taste of your skin . . . all the little sounds you made when I played with your breasts . . . or when I was deep inside you.”

He wrapped his arms around her, his large hands splaying across the curve of her ass, using it to pull her against him. Her breath whooshed out as he pushed himself against her, knowing she could feel every inch of his erection between them. He felt her relax into him, and her hand held onto his bicep, her eyes opening slowly, meeting his. He saw the matching desire in those mossy depths and dropped his lips to her temple, traveling over her skin until his mouth reached her ear. He nipped the small shell teasingly, and her body tightened against his, making him smile as he added, “I can show you again, if you don’t remember.”