Chapter 31

"Ah," said Lucien, urging Armageddon forward and pulling him up just before the earl's lifeless body. He gazed contemplatively down at his handiwork. "I must confess that I've been waiting to do that ever since he tried to kill you during the duel. Not very sporting of him, was it? Should have finished the scoundrel off then, but I thought it would look bad with the locals." He swung down from the stallion and stretched out a hand to help his brother to his feet. "You'd better see to that head wound, Andrew, as well as your wife. I daresay she's fainted."

Andrew, barely able to see through a hot film of scarlet, touched his fingers to the side of his head. They came away wet with blood. He took the handkerchief Lucien offered and wiped at his face. "I guess I ought to be thanking you for saving my life yet again," he said gruffly. "This is getting to be a habit."

The duke was eyeing his head wound in concern. "Another inch or two and you would have been forever denied the chance."

Andrew shoved the handkerchief into his pocket and bent down to Celsie, whose face was as white as the sheepskin pad beneath Newton's saddle. He gathered her tenderly in his arms. "Thing is, Luce, I don't even understand why he hated me so . . . He was past the point of desperation, as though he had nothing left to live for. What had I done to bring him to such a state?"

"I am afraid it was mostly my doing," Lucien admitted, turning Somerfield's body over so that Celsie would not see his dead face when she came to her senses. "Do you remember, Andrew, the day you got married? When, just as you were leaving, you demanded that I relinquish the aphrodisiac to you?"

"Yes . . ."

"Well, I did not relinquish the aphrodisiac."

Andrew shut his eyes on a curse.

"I know you thought your laboratory was impervious to my presence, but I can assure you, I had my ways of getting in. It was really a small matter, thanks to various textbooks you had strewn about the place, to duplicate your solution such that it appeared, at least to the naked eye, to be the real thing. Unfortunately, what I created was rather . . . purging, I'm told."

Andrew bent his head into his hand.

"I know you must despise me for interfering yet again, but I simply couldn't allow you or anyone else to have it. The stuff is quite priceless, you know. Best left in my own personal safe. Of course, had I known that it would bring such trouble down upon your" — he smiled — "and Charles's heads, I would never have given you even the forgery."

"I ought to choke you with my bare hands," Andrew said, but his tone of voice implied anything but a resolve to do just that. Why should he be surprised that Lucien had tampered with fate yet again? Why should he be surprised that Lucien had masterminded what had been, in the end, yet another victory? "I ought to throttle you for what you did to force Celsie and me together. I ought to hate you . . . "

"And do you?"

Hazel eyes met black — and for the first time in years, there was no animosity in Andrew's.

He expelled his breath on a great sigh. "No." He wiped fresh blood from his eye and gazed tenderly down at Celsie. "No. I hated you earlier, Luce, for all your interfering, but things are different now . . . now that I love her."

Now that I love her . . . love her . . . love her. . . .

Celsie heard the words through the parting veils of fog as she drifted back toward consciousness. She became aware of Andrew's warm arm just beneath her neck, the protective cradle of his embrace, the steady beat of his heart just beneath her ear.

His heart.

He was alive.

Oh, thank you God.

She swallowed hard. Now that I love her.

She dragged open her eyes. Sure enough, there he was — her lover, her husband, her friend — head tilted up as he spoke with his brother, a trickle of blood, diluted and hastened by rain, running down his face.

"Do you?" she asked.

That got his attention.

"Celsie! Celsie, dearest . . ." he cradled her close and then reared back, his worried gaze searching hers. "My God, my heart stopped in my chest when you threw yourself between me and that gun! Don't you ever — "

"Do you?" she repeated.

"Do I what?"

"Love her," Lucien supplied, helpfully.

Andrew gazed down at Celsie — and then his face seemed to undergo a miraculous transformation. In his changeable, intense eyes, green one moment, brown the next, she saw a distinct softening, a melting, the simmering heat of desire. She didn't need to hear the words, though she wanted to. She didn't need to hear the words, because they were all right there, shining brightly in his sleepy de Montforte eyes.

And then he smiled and lowering his head, kissed her, driving his mouth against hers even as the rain poured down on their heads, dripped from his hair, trickled down their cheeks. Her arm came up to encircle his neck. She sighed, deep in her throat.

At last he finally drew back, and raising her hand, brought her knuckles to his lips.

"Ah, yes. I love you, Celsie. I love you more than half. I love you more than whole." And then he repeated the words he had left for her just hours ago; beautiful, affirming words that were the open door to their own glorious future.

"I love you with everything I am."

Celsie touched his wet, bloodstained face. "I love you too, Andrew. I love you so much that my heart can no longer contain it. And now, my dearest love, take me home. Take me home, and show me just how much you love me."

Andrew needed no urging. Grinning, he scooped her up in his arms, cradled her close so she would not see the corpse of her stepbrother, and gently hoisted her up into Newton's wet saddle. He pulled himself up behind her, his arms forming a protective cage around her body as he turned the horse for home. A moment later, he was cantering away, leaving Lucien, forgotten, behind.

The duke watched them go.

And then he mounted Armageddon, retrieved Gerald's frightened horse, and walking slowly, headed back toward Rosebriar as the rain began to fall off and cracks in the clouds revealed jagged chunks of blue.

Lucien smiled, congratulating himself once again on a job well done.

It was going to be a lovely day.