“SOON,” RAND whispered, “it will be our turn.”
Lily watched the starry-eyed bride and groom exit Hawkridge’s grand red-and-gold private chapel as though they were walking on air. Tears had welled in her eyes more than once during the romantic ceremony. “I cannot wait,” she whispered back, reaching up to touch the pendant Rand had given her.
The past few days without him had felt so empty.
Holding his hand, she walked sedately from the chapel, following the other guests to the great hall. Once there, she rushed to hug her soon-to-be sister-in-law. “The wedding was beautiful! You both look so happy.”
“We are,” Margery and Bennett said together, sharing a joyful smile.
Rand hugged Margery, too, while Lily watched, not at all jealous this time.
“Your gown is gorgeous,” she told her.
“Thank you.” Margery’s fingers skimmed the pearls and embroidery that covered her pale green satin overskirt. “It’s my best.”
Standing nearby, the marquess narrowed his eyes. “What happened to the gown you ordered in Windsor?”
“Oh.” Color flooded her cheeks. “Well. I—I…it wasn’t quite ready, after all. You didn’t give the seamstress much time, Uncle William.”
“Hmmph,” he said and walked away.
Rand waited until the man was out of earshot and then grinned at his foster sister. “You never ordered a wedding gown, did you? I suspected you were with Bennett that night.”
“It’s the vows that count,” she said evasively. “Not the clothes.”
Her groom laughed and gave her a kiss. As other guests pressed close to offer felicitations, Rand turned to Lily, a silvery glint in his eyes. “Come. I have something to show you.”
He led her from the great hall, grabbing a pewter goblet off a sideboard and handing it to her as they went.
She sipped, then smiled when she tasted what was in it. “Your father poured the champagne my parents brought.”
“He likes your parents.” His shrug encompassed all the bafflement she knew he felt at his father’s recent behavior. Beatrix appeared and padded at their heels as Rand entered the corridor that led to his room. But instead of turning left, he walked straight ahead into Alban’s bedchamber.
Only it wasn’t Alban’s bedchamber anymore. It wasn’t a bedchamber at all.
She stared. “What happened?”
“You’ll be living here the week after next. I told my father we needed more room. He didn’t argue, so I sent a message to Kit. The day after that, a crew of men showed up to begin the remodel. They’ll resume tomorrow, once all the wedding guests go home.”
The dark paneling had been stripped and was half refinished in a warm, honey tone that lightened the whole chamber. The door to the secret space stood open, and she could see it had been emptied. The rest of the room was empty, too.
“Even the bed is gone,” she said.
“This will be our sitting room.” The drapes had been removed, and soft summer rain blew against the naked windows. Taking her hand, Rand drew her into Alban’s old sitting room, now dominated by a huge four-poster bed draped in yellow silk. “I had it brought from another chamber. Just until you choose a new one. Something without a history. I thought we could go to London, and—”
“Thank you,” she whispered past a sudden lump in her throat. She knew Rand didn’t care whether he slept in the same room that Alban had, or even in the same bed. He’d done this for her. “Where are Alban’s things?”
“I had them sent to a foundling home. Every last item. I asked Father, and he didn’t say yes, but he didn’t say no, either. I think he wants to forget that Alban ever existed. He even had his portrait removed from the long gallery.”
In an effort to steady herself, she took a sip of champagne. “Did he send that to the foundling home, too?”
“No.” Again, that baffled shrug. “He burned it.”
“Maybe he’ll have one painted of you to replace it.”
“I wouldn’t go so far as to assume that.” He gave a strangled laugh. “But I’m not dreading living here half the year quite as much as I thought I would.”
Beatrix followed them back through the sitting room and into Alban’s old dressing room, and it was empty, too. The clothes presses were gone, the walls stripped and waiting to be finished. “Kit is arranging for someone to build cabinets.” Rand took the goblet from Lily’s hand. “Newfangled ones with drawers.”
She turned to him. “It all sounds wonderful. I love you.”
“And I love you.” A smile lit his eyes as he sipped, regarding her over the rim. Without swallowing, he bent and put his mouth to hers, giving her a sweet, cold, sparkly kiss as he shared the bubbly beverage.
She swallowed and laughed. “Eleven more days and we’ll be together for good.”
“Too long.” He took another sip and gave her another effervescent kiss, the champagne still fizzing in her mouth when he pulled back to skim his knuckles along her cheek. “You’re not going to make me wait that long, are you?”
She remembered, vaguely, that she’d decided they really should wait. But the kiss had made her light-headed, and her skin tingled wherever he touched, so she couldn’t remember why.
When Beatrix began hiccuping, Lily leaned to pick her up, cradling the cat in her arms. Protection from Rand and her own weakening resolve. She mustered a teasing smile. “Did you bring me in here to show me the renovations or to get me into that big yellow bed?”
“Both,” he answered with a grin. He took another sip and leaned over Beatrix, meeting Lily’s lips once again. The bubbles tickled her throat as Rand tickled her senses.
The idea of making love right now was absurd, but she sighed longingly as she licked the remnants of champagne off her lips. Delicious. Rand’s kisses were delicious.
“Not here, during the wedding.”
“Here. Now.” He didn’t look at all concerned with propriety. “The wedding is over.”
“But not the wedding supper. There are guests in the house,” she reminded him, the protest faint to her own ears.
“We’re in here. The guests are out there.” His voice was husky and low, filled with the pent-up frustration of desire unfulfilled. “Eleven more days, Lily…and all the days before now…”
His words made heat shimmer through her. What he was proposing was surely wicked, here at a wedding.
Wickedly tempting.
And a weakness in Lily’s knees told her she was all too close to surrendering.
It had been so long. So many days of yearning need…so many nights living with that low-burning heat…lying chastely with him here at Hawkridge and then alone in her bed at Trentingham…
When she swayed toward him involuntarily, he laughed and swung her up into his arms.
“Rand!” she squealed, barely holding on to the cat. “We cannot!”
“Oh, I think we can,” he said, striding into the sitting room.
Beatrix leapt to the floor as Rand kicked the door shut and set Lily on her feet. “See?” He threw the bolt. “There are no guests in here.”
He was impossible. And irresistible. His mouth covered hers, and despite her misgivings, her arms wound around his neck. Now-familiar feelings began coursing through her, building a heat centered low in her middle. She pressed herself close, wishing desperately that she and Rand weren’t wearing so many clothes.
A small sound of satisfaction rose from his throat. “I knew I could wear you down.”
“A kiss,” she said with mock indignation. “I’ve only assented to a kiss.”
Beatrix hiccuped louder, rubbing against Lily’s skirts.
“A kiss, hmm?” Rand started easing her into the bedchamber, working the tabs on her stomacher as he went, and she couldn’t find it in herself to protest. Her legs felt shaky, and when the backs of them hit the high, silk-draped mattress, she reclined onto it with a sigh, using her arms locked behind Rand to bring him down with her.
Beatrix suddenly began meowing emphatically.
“Ignore her,” they whispered together.
Meow…
Lily melted into Rand’s embrace. His kisses tasted of champagne and desire, and excitement built inside her, coupled with wonder that he would be hers. Not only today, but forever. Seeing Margery wed Bennett had really driven that home.
Her own wedding was next.
Meow, meow…
The mere thought made her giddy, made her senses spin with delight. She pressed her lips tighter to Rand’s, tilting her head until their mouths fit perfectly.
Meow, meow, meeeooow…
A knock came at the door. “Lily? Rand? Are you in there?”
“Goodness! It’s Mum!” Lily bolted upright on the bed, her heart pounding not with arousal now, but with something more akin to panic. She rushed to refasten her stomacher.
Still fully clothed, Rand calmly rose to his feet.
“She was trying to warn us!” Lily whispered.
“Your mother?”
“Beatrix!”
More knocking. “Lily? Are you in there?”
Amusement lit Rand’s eyes. “I’ll get the door.”
“Not yet!” Her fingers fumbled on the stomacher’s tabs.
“Are you in there, dear?”
Rand walked into the sitting room to answer the door, and Lily scrambled to join him, doing her best to look composed. He pulled back the bolt, at the same time reaching to tweak her stomacher straight. As the door swung open, revealing her parents, she plastered on a smile.
Chrystabel’s gaze flicked to Lily’s bodice before settling on her face. “There you are!” she said brightly.
Too brightly.
“I was just showing Lily the rooms we’ll be using when we live here,” Rand said unconvincingly.
“We’d love to see them, too,” her mother said and walked straight into the bedchamber.
As her parents passed, Lily looked down, mortified to find one of her stomacher tabs unattached. She whirled away, fastening it surreptitiously before joining them in the other room. Her heart seized when she noticed the rumpled counterpane on the bed.
“This entire home is magnificent.” Chrystabel crossed to a wall and ran a hand down the newly stripped paneling. “The grain is lovely.”
“I thought to paint it white for Lily,” Rand said while Lily inched over to the bed to smooth the yellow silk. “But Kit suggested a pale stain might look nicer on this wood.”
Chrystabel nodded her approval. “What kind is it?”
Her husband pulled out his pocket watch and flipped open the lid. “Half past three.”
“Cedar,” Rand said, clearly suppressing a laugh. Lily wondered which he found amusing, her father’s misunderstanding or her own red-faced embarrassment.
Probably both.
Joseph snapped the pocket watch shut, nodding vaguely at Rand. “I expect you’ll be staying here the next week or so to supervise finishing this?”
Rand raised his voice. “The house in Oxford needs my attention, too, Lord Trentingham. Perhaps I can bring Lily along—”
“I think not,” Chrystabel interrupted. “Lily will be at home, busy with the wedding plans.”
Lily stopped smoothing. “Mum, I think—”
“You’ll be busy,” she repeated. “If you weren’t insisting on marrying so quickly, it might be a different matter. But I’ll need your help. Now, I imagine Margery and Bennett are missing us, so our little tour of the house is over.”
As they all returned to the great hall together, Lily exchanged a frustrated glance with Rand.
“Elizabeth!” Chrystabel cried, waving to a neighbor and dragging Joseph in her direction. “I’ve found the perfect man for your daughter.”
No sooner had her parents walked off than Rand swung Lily to face him. “Margery wasn’t missing us.” He aimed a pointed look to where his baby sister was half entwined with Bennett, blissfully unaware of any of the guests.
Lily nodded. “Mum is trying to keep us apart.”
“And your father is cooperating.”
“I cannot figure why. They’ve left us alone before—”
“Does it matter why? They intend to make certain we don’t see each other again until the day of our wedding.”
A maid came by with fresh goblets of champagne. Rand took one and a bottle, too, meeting Lily’s eyes in a way that made her certain he had an idea that involved the sparkling wine.
An idea her parents wouldn’t approve.
Lily’s lips—and other places—tingled at the thought. She took the goblet from him and downed a bracing swallow.
“They won’t succeed in this,” Rand warned, sounding as though he’d just assigned himself a mission. He cast a glance to Lily’s parents and, seeing their backs momentarily turned, grabbed her hand. “Come along.”
He hurried her into the adjoining dining room, where footmen were setting the long gatelegged table with Delftware dishes for the wedding supper. Lily glanced back into the great hall. “They’ll just find us again.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that,” he advised her, taking the goblet from her hand and setting it on the leather-topped sideboard. Still carrying the bottle, he led her into the next room.
His father’s chamber. She stopped short and gaped at the tall, heavy oak bed.
“Not in here!”
Laughing, Rand leaned a hand on the wall.
Lily was astonished to see a panel swing open. They slipped beyond it, and Rand closed it quietly.
“A secret passage?” she said in wonder.
“Not secret.” Calmer now but no less determined, he guided her through a windowless corridor lit by plain lanterns mounted on walls painted a simple pale gray. “The house has these passages all through it,” he explained, guiding her around a corner. Here, a longer hallway bustled with servants carrying dishes and linen. “Father didn’t want the staff walking through one chamber to get to another, so corridors run behind. That way, they can duck in and out of rooms unobtrusively.”
The floors were not painstakingly polished here, but covered with long rush mats instead. With no fire to warm it, the passage was chilly. “Do all the rooms have secret doors?”
“Most of them, but the doors aren’t secret, either. They’re designed not to be obvious, but you just have to look for them.”
Lily shivered. “If there’s a door into our suite, I want it sealed.”
She thought Rand smiled beside her, but the corridor was too dim to tell for sure. Rows of leather fire buckets hung overhead, making her think they must be near the kitchen. “Where are we going?”
“Out. Through the servants’ entrance.”
“Out? You mean outside? Into the rain?”
His hand squeezed hers. “No one will be coming out in the rain to look for us, will they?”
The way he said that made a shiver of another sort run through her.
Summer rain blew in when he pushed open the door. They made a run for it, Rand holding Lily with one hand and the champagne bottle with the other. After crossing the courtyard to the outbuildings, they finally ducked into the dairy.
Though Rand shut the door against the rain, it still pattered on the roof and slashed against the dairy’s diamond-paned windows. Lily remembered peeking in here once and seeing a dairymaid with a pockmarked face and a pretty, shy smile.
She glanced around the small room. “Where is everyone?”
“Inside, helping with the wedding. No one will interrupt us.” He grinned. “Even Beatrix failed to make it out here.”
The walls were plain and whitewashed. Lily turned in a slow circle, her shoes leaving wet prints on the red tile floor. Pails, pans, and strainers sat on a wide marble counter supported on legs that ended in cows’ hooves. She hugged herself, smiling at the whimsy.
“Cold?” Rand asked.
“A little. There’s no fire.”
“I’ll warm you up,” he said, the tone of his voice leaving no doubt how he planned to accomplish that end. He set the champagne bottle on the marble surface with a definitive clunk.
A nervous laugh bubbled out of her. “I hope you’re not planning to warm me up too effectively. There’s no bed, either.”
“I plan to warm you effectively indeed.” Both hands on her waist, he lifted her to sit on the counter. “And we’ve no need of a bed.”
The marble felt cold beneath her skirts, but Rand’s fingers felt warm on her shoulders as he maneuvered himself closer, working his way between her knees. When he looked pointedly down, her gaze followed, her heart hitching as she saw how it could work.
“I guess we don’t need a bed,” she whispered as his mouth descended on hers.
His lips were gentle and cherishing, and when he coaxed her mouth open, his tongue was gentle, too, exploring as though he had all the time in the world, as though he wanted nothing more than to taste her thoroughly, to commit her texture to memory.
She felt drugged. The pitter-pat of rain blended with her breathy sighs, blocking out the rest of the world. Here and now, it seemed there was only she and Rand and their love.
Easing away, he took her hands and raised them to his lips. Slowly he kissed the palms and the backs and the fine white scars.
“Don’t flinch,” he murmured when she did. Looking down, he traced the webbed patterns with a fingertip. “They’re beautiful, because they’re part of you.”
Her throat closed with emotion, but she managed a shaky smile. “They remind me that I’m imperfect, which I suppose is not such a bad thing.”
“It’s a good thing you have one flaw.” He kissed her nose and then her mouth, tiny damp kisses. “I’d feel damned inferior living with perfection.”
Something twisted in her heart. “There were times when I feared you’d never be living with me at all.”
“Never say never,” he murmured, reaching for the champagne bottle. He tipped his head back and took a sip, then bent to nuzzle her throat. The wine fizzed in the hollow beneath her chin. She arched her neck, the combination of cold, bubbly liquid and warm, soft mouth sending shivers rippling through her.
As he nibbled his way up to her ear and drew the tender lobe between his teeth, she threaded her fingers into his hair. A soft groan rose from his chest, and suddenly he was kissing her again, more demanding now, nipping on her bottom lip before his mouth crushed hot against hers.
Instantly a matching heat flared up inside her. It had been there, building all day, and now it flamed to life. Her heart thundering, she gave as much as she took, a reckless meshing of lips and tongues and teeth that made her blood race with excitement. When he finally broke away, she was breathless.
She worked her hands beneath his surcoat as he flicked open the tabs that attached her stomacher. He dropped frantic kisses on her cheeks, her chin, her neck, and the expanse of trembling skin afforded him by the wide, low neckline of her saffron gown. With her stomacher removed, he loosened her laces and spread her bodice. Hooking the lacy edge of her chemise with a finger, he dragged it down, exposing her breasts to his hungry gaze.
Once more he reached for the champagne, tilting his head back to take a mouthful. Then he leaned forward and fastened his mouth on a sensitive peak.
The wine was cold and tingly, his mouth hot and emphatic. The combination robbed her of thought. Her senses reeled wildly as drops of champagne trickled free and he followed them with his tongue, leaving warm trails of sensation. She trembled with need, an urgent ache growing within her.
“Now,” she breathed, and he shot her a wicked smile, reaching down to ruck up her skirts. His fingers danced up her legs, grazing the delicate skin on her inner thighs. The ache grew unbearable, and she gripped his shoulders. “Rand, we’ve waited long enough, days and days—”
“Hush,” he whispered, reaching higher, brushing against where she ached. Then stroking, over and over, slipping a finger inside and back out to stroke more. His mouth slanted against hers again and again as his hands worked magic. Her eyes drifted shut, and she locked her arms behind his neck, tremors shimmering through her. The sweet torture continued until she was certain one more velvet stroke would be her undoing.
“Rand!” she cried out.
Suddenly their four hands were tearing at the laces that secured his breeches. And at long last he pulled her close and buried himself inside her.
Her arms and legs went around him, welcoming, squeezing tight. It had felt like forever, all those days they couldn’t be together. Tears welled in her eyes at the sheer joy of him finally filling her, making her complete.
Their mouths met, hot and wet as he rocked up against her, as they rocked together, an exquisite rhythm that built and built until she came undone with a little cry that was swallowed by his own deep moan of pleasure.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered after she caught her breath. “That was one perfect moment.”
One perfect moment of euphoria.
“We’ll have more,” he murmured, pulling back to wipe traces of tears from her cheeks. With one gentle finger, he touched the dent in her chin. “A lifetime together.”
Nothing would ever come between them again.
FOR A LONG time Lily stayed wrapped around Rand, and he held her close, cradling her head against his chest, his gaze drifting out the window. Rain pattered softly against the leaded panes. Beyond the glass, tall old trees danced in the blustery breeze, bright green against the dark gray sky, and farther beyond that, the red brick of Hawkridge Hall loomed majestically.
This, Rand thought—all of it—would someday be his. And he belonged here, as much as he belonged in a lecture hall or huddled over a cryptic passage of ancient text.
As a lad, he’d sought acceptance from a father who couldn’t stand the sight of him and a brother who’d hated him since birth. Alban was dead now, his evil laid to rest. And as for the marquess…maybe now he would finally offer that approval that had been so elusive.
But to Rand it didn’t really matter anymore. Because now he had Lily.
A contented sigh drifted from her, and he raised her face for his kiss. He would never get enough of her, he thought as he grazed her eyes and her cheeks and her lips, settling there to savor her sweet mouth. A kiss as gentle as the summer rain, a kiss for them both to melt into, a kiss to meld bodies and souls. And then another kiss. And another.
And another, until they heard a scratch and a peck and a tap against one of the dairy’s windows.