Candice Hern (61 page)

She opened her eyes, looked into his, and smiled. "Yes," she said in a firm, proud voice. "I will marry you, Jack. And this time," she said chuckling, "I promise not to run away."

"Mary, Mary." He pulled her tighter against him. "I love you so much. But even those words don't seem adequate to express how I feel. I wish I could say more. It is not enough, somehow."

"Stupid man," she said, pulling his mouth down to hers. "It is more than enough. It is everything."

* * *

It was sometime later when Mary nestled her head against Jack's shoulder as they sat leaning against a large boulder on the cliff's edge. Clothes disheveled and gaping, lips swollen, and hair in wild disarray, they sat quietly watching the waves crash beneath them. Between moments of sweet passion, they talked and talked and talked, at last opening completely to one another about their mutual dreams and desires. Mary spoke, at last, of her father, and Jack told her about Suzanne. There were no more secrets between them as they laughed and cried over what no longer seemed important.

As the sun made its way west, they reluctantly decided it was time to return to Glennoch. Mary tugged up her bodice and pulled down her skirts. She retrieved her pelisse while Jack tried to make something presentable out of his discarded cravat. Jack rose first and offered his hand to Mary. He pulled her to her feet, grabbed her by the waist, and swung her around and around.

"Put me down!" Mary squealed, laughing and out of breath. "You're making me dizzy."

"Sorry, love," Jack said as he returned her to earth. "I was momentarily overwhelmed with joy at my good fortune."

"Good fortune!" Mary asked in a teasing tone. "Are we back to that again?"

Jack shuddered. "I will have to think of another word, for I will not be reminded of my initial mercenary motives."

"You know," Mary said, "I would be happy to hand over my fortune to you. You are welcome to it. I can think of no better use for it than to bring Pemworth to rights again. And your other estates as well. The money has never been that important to me. If you had told me from the start, I would have gladly handed it over."

"And we could have avoided all this heartache?" Jack said. "I know. But I was too stupid and too proud to admit to you my problems. I suppose each of us has a thing or two to learn about too much pride." He put his arm around her waist and pulled her close. "I will take your money, Mary, for I need it badly. But you must promise me one thing."

"Anything."

"You must never, ever forget that it is you I love and not your money."

She grinned up at him. "I may need reminding, now and then."

Jack pulled her into a passionate kiss. "Consider yourself reminded," he said breathlessly.

Taking Mary by the hand, intertwining his fingers with hers, he led her along the steep path toward Glennoch. "We must hurry," he said with a smile. "My mother is hoping to see us married before Christmas."

"Well then," Mary said with a playful gleam in her eye, "let us oblige her. We are, after all, in Scotland."

Jack stopped on the path and looked down at her, grinning rakishly. "So we are," he said. "Then let us find the nearest blacksmith."

"You're on," Mary said, and dashed ahead on the path, Jack close at her heels.

###

AN AFFAIR OF HONOR

by Candice Hern

A Regency Romance

Book 3 in the Regency Rakes Trilogy

Chapter 1

Suffolk, March 1814

Viscount Sedgewick was dead. He was sure of it.

He had a vague recollection of the sensation of flying as he had been thrown from his curricle. Now, he seemed to be floating in darkness. He could see nothing, hear nothing, feel … nothing.

Good Lord, he must have killed himself! How the devil had he managed something so stupid?

He had been on his way to ... where? He could not focus his thoughts clearly enough to remember. Was this what happened when you died? Funny. Though he had never actually given it much thought, he had assumed it would be different, somehow—that everything that had in life been a puzzle would suddenly become clear, that a lifetime of forgotten memories would be presented to his mind's eye with the clarity and detail of printed pages in a book. He would never have predicted that thoughts and ideas would become fuzzy and disjointed, as elusive as dandelion seeds scattered in the wind, until they were completely out of reach and could no longer be grasped at all.

Perhaps he had been wrong about death. Perhaps his mind—all he seemed to have left now, no longer having any sensation of a body—would simply fade away until there were no more thoughts at all, nothing whatsoever remaining of Colin Herriot, Viscount Sedgewick, body or mind.

No! I am not ready to go! He struggled to hang on to this one conviction, perhaps his last remaining conscious thought.
I am not ready
.

And all of a sudden, in an almost blinding flash, everything changed. Where moments ago—was it only moments?—there had been nothing, now there was pain. Excruciating pain. Where before Sedgewick had been conscious of no physical sensation whatsoever, he now became aware of his body for the first time, and as far as he could tell, every single part of it hurt.

Now this was more like what he had expected from death, or at least from dying. There had to be suffering, or so he had always assumed. Well, by Jove, he was suffering. The only question now was, how long would it continue? Once dead, one would think it would end. Unless ... unless ...

But no, he couldn't be
there
, could he? He had not done anything that terrible in his lifetime. Or had he? Oh, good Lord. His head, or at least the place where he knew his head to have once been, felt as though it were on fire, so the possibility that he was in fact
there
had to be faced. His poor dead soul was being tortured for his sins. But why?

To be sure, he had led a somewhat capricious life during his thirty-six years. He had enjoyed himself, but what was the harm in that? There had been all those women, of course, but they had all been willing, and often eager. partners. Sedge couldn't help it if they found him irresistible. Besides, he had never knowingly hurt any of them, and they had in most cases remained friends long after the end of an affair. Of course, their husbands might have a complaint or two against him; but even that seemed a bit far-fetched, for, after all, how many of those gentlemen could lay claim to any sort of faithfulness?

So, then, how the hell had he ended up in ... well... hell?

A sharp stab of pain pounded through Sedgewick's head, as if in reply. Dammit, what had gone wrong? How was it he was being judged so harshly?

He had gambled, too, of course, but not to excess, and had never been, as far as he knew, the cause of anyone's ruin. He was prone to be lazy at times, it was true, but for the most part had been conscientious in his duties and obligations. He kept an eye on his investments and tended his estates. Well, to be perfectly honest, he hired excellent solicitors and stewards who ensured that his estates and tenants were well tended, but it amounted to the same thing. He remained close and attentive to his widowed mother and sister, was a loyal friend to many, and generous with his time and money.

Damnation! He did not deserve this. By all accounts he should have ended up someplace altogether different. Some place pleasant and painless and beautiful, with angels strumming harps and singing in perfect harmony. By God, it wasn't fair. It simply was not fair.

Before he could formulate another thought, things got worse. It felt as though his brain had slammed up against the side of his skull. His head seemed to have moved to an awkward angle. Or been moved.
Ohhhhh.
The sound of his own groan echoed in Sedge's head like a clap of thunder. Could a dead person groan? For that matter, could a dead person feel pain like the pounding of Thor's hammer in his head? Thank God he had never committed any truly heinous acts in his lifetime, if this was the punishment handed down for such trivial and common sins as his own.

His present agony was soon increased by the weird, muffled sound of voices rumbling in his head. Incomprehensible and yet somehow frightening, the odd sounds only intensified the thundering pain so that Sedge thought he might go mad. By God, he was determined to see what it was he faced, despite his helplessness. Frustrated by the stygian blackness, he attempted to open his eyes.

Ohhhhh.
It was going to be more difficult than he had thought. He could almost wish he were dead, but, of course, he already was dead, so what was he to do?

He tried again.

His head throbbing mercilessly, Sedge fluttered his eyes slowly open into the merest slits. Blast it all, the light was blinding! Oh, good Lord. Was it fire? The flames of hell?

He groaned and snapped his eyes shut once again. His chest tightened as he breathed heavily, exhausted by the simple effort of opening his eyes. The thought briefly crossed his mind that dead men don't breathe, but he dismissed it as simply a malicious illusion.

Why me? What have I done to deserve this?

He tried again.

This time, after very slowly cracking open one eye and then the other, he steeled himself to withstand the brightness, determined to see how bad the situation really was. Trembling with effort, he strained to keep his eyes open, blinking against the light. Everything was a bit fuzzy, but as he squinted he could make out a dark, looming shape surrounded by a fiery nimbus.

Oh God. This was too much. He quickly closed his eyes again, not yet ready after all to face his own final judgment.

The muffled sound of voices continued to assault his ears. Clamping his eyes tightly shut, he concentrated on the voices. No, not voices. Voice. One voice. Female, slightly musical, somehow soothing. Very, very slowly, he opened his eyes again. Blinking furiously, Sedge tried to bring the dark shape into focus. By God, he would face this thing.

Allowing his eyes a moment to become accustomed to the almost painful brightness, the dark shape finally coalesced into a face—a hazy countenance only inches away from his own. Sedge forced his eyes to remain open, blinking frequently to ease the pain, and the intense brightness gradually faded into a more normal sort of light that eventually allowed him to see the face more clearly.

It was the face ... of an angel.

Sedge gazed up at a vision of such dreamlike beauty as he had never seen. Before he could notice much more, his eyes fell shut again, this time of their own volition. He could not seem to keep them open. But one thing he knew for sure: that was no demon looking down on him. It was a lovely female face of creamy white skin surrounded by brilliant coppery curls and gazing down at him with huge sherry-colored eyes. She was an angel.

Ha! He had been wrong all along. He was not in hell. He had ended up in heaven after all!

He forced his stinging, uncooperative eyes open, for he must see her again, his angel. Head pounding furiously, he batted his lids against grainy, painful eyes and focused once again on the vision hovering above him, surrounded by light.

* * *

Meg Ashburton gazed down into the bleary eyes of the injured gentleman whose head was cradled gently in her arms. Using an embroidered linen handkerchief quickly retrieved from her reticule, she carefully dabbed at the bleeding gash over his left eye. All at once, his eyes fluttered and a muffled sound escaped his lips. Meg leaned closer.

"Can you hear me, my lord?" she asked, bending low over him. "Can you hear me? Try not to move. We are going to help you."

Lord Sedgewick made another inarticulate sound and squinted his eyes tightly shut.

'"My lord'? You know him, Meggie?"

Meg looked up as her brother Terrence knelt beside her. When they had come upon the curricle wreckage while traveling home on the Ixworth Road, Terrence had immediately tossed the reins of their gig to Meg. He had jumped down to see to the frightened team of chestnut geldings who were pulling nervously at the steel bar across their backs and dancing skittishly among the tangle of broken traces.

"Yes," Meg replied. She glanced briefly across the road to see that Terrence had freed the horses from the traces and pole, and secured them separately to tree branches with the carriage reins. "It is Lord Sedgewick. I met him once or twice during my Season."

Meg almost laughed at how inadequate the statement sounded, though it was perfectly true. She doubted he would even remember her.

"Ah," Terrence said.

Looking back down in Lord Sedgewick's face, Meg noted a muscle twitching near his right eye and knew he had not completely lost consciousness. He seemed to be working the muscle deliberately. Finally the eyes fluttered open again. Meg watched as he squinted up at her and blinked several times. All at once, his eyes stopped blinking and seemed to fix on hers with a dazed, disoriented look.

"Lord Sedgewick?" She was concerned by his glassy stare. His lips moved slightly as though he wanted to say something. Meg bent her face closer to his. "Lord Sedgewick?"

"An ... gel," he murmured.

Meg looked at her brother in confusion and shrugged her shoulders. Bending her face close to Lord Sedgewick's once again, she studied his dilated eyes, still fixed on hers. "I do not understand, my lord," she said softly. "What is it you are trying to say?"

"An ... gel," he repeated in a slurred, thick voice. "Angel. My ... my angel... speaks." A corner of his mouth twisted briefly into what might have been a grin but immediately became a grimace. His eyes rolled upward and then closed, and his head fell to one side.

Disconcerted by the words for a brief instant, Meg saw Terrence arch a questioning brow. Ignoring her brother, Meg directed all her concentration toward assessing Lord Sedgewick's injuries. She released his head from her hold and carefully laid it down while her eyes scanned his body. He lay on his back with one leg at an unnatural angle, obviously broken. Meg leaned over him, taking care not to jar the injured leg, and quickly attempted to survey the damage. Gently running her hands under his bloodstained greatcoat and jacket, she had not been able to find the source of the blood.