Scandalous Regency Secrets Collection. Кэрол Мортимер

he said, relaxing slightly. “Because I really think we need to go there from time to time. That is, if you can love a duke even half as much as you could love a simple sea captain?”

      Emmaline looked down at the floor. “I’m being silly, aren’t I? I saw us as being so simple, our lives so uncomplicated. Being Charlton’s sister was...very complicated.” She turned her gaze on the man she loved. “How did you know I felt that way?”

      “I don’t know. I felt that if I told you who I am, about the damned title, then you’d not relax your guard around me, tell me the sorts of things you told me yesterday. About your family, about your life.”

      “Well, I wouldn’t have, you’re correct about that. I don’t think I would have worried about how you’d pay for your room at the inn, either.”

      “Darling, do you remember when I said we can’t choose who we love, but we can choose who we like?”

      “Yes,” she said, allowing him to take her hands in his.

      “I knew I loved you the moment I first saw you. That was the easy part. But then I knew I liked you when you showed such concern for my welfare, when you were more worried for me than concerned with the suddenly altered circumstances of your life. Now, am I forgiven?”

      “I don’t know,” she said coyly—imagine, a twenty-eight-year-old almost-virgin, being coy! “I really believe I may have had my heart set on a thatched cottage near the sea.”

      He slipped his arms more fully around her and brought his mouth down to nearly meet hers. “We’ll work on that...”

       EPILOGUE

      THERE WERE TWO musty old aunts in the second pew, a quiet and reserved-looking Charlotte Seavers and her father in the third, and only Emmaline and John sitting in the first pew as the vicar looked uncomfortable in the small chapel hung in black crepe but glaringly absent of coffins.

      Helen Daughtry had not only sent her regrets, but had forbidden her twin daughters from attending the service. “Much too depressing for the young dears,” she’d insisted, which was, Emmaline knew, another way of saying, “If they’re there, then I have to be there, and I don’t want to be there.”

      Last night, while the two of them were in bed together after the rest of the household was asleep, John had proposed a wine toast to Helen’s absence. If it were possible to love him even more, she did, because he was so impervious to Helen’s beauty and wiles.

      The quickness of the memorial ceremony and the absence of the trio who would provide raucous entertainment for them had kept Charlton’s friends firmly in London. As for George and Harold, they were the sort who had acquaintances, men to whom they either owed money or were owed money. Not friends.

      It was a sad statement about three wasted lives, lives that could have been so rich as well as privileged.

      Now Rafael Daughtry was the Duke of Ashurst, even if he was probably still unaware of his new title. His mother would drive Grayson and the other servants to distraction when she was in residence, and Nicole and Lydia would make them happy again, as all the staff adored the twins.

      But Emmaline, who had thought she’d never leave Ashurst Hall, would be departing in the next few weeks to become the Duchess of Warrington. It was obscene, unheard of, for a woman in mourning to wed so hastily, but when she and John had realized that neither cared what Society thought, Emmaline had set her maid to bringing down trunks from the attic so that they could begin packing up her belongings.

      “We mourn our brothers, Charlton, George, Harold,” Vicar Wooten droned on—he’d been droning on for nearly an hour and even he seemed fatigued. “Dust to dust, ashes to ashes...um, well, not perhaps in this particular case, begging your pardon.”

      One of the aunts stifled a giggle and, for some reason she would never understand, that caused Emmaline to shed her very first tears for her brother and nephews.

      Not in this case. No, nothing was quite like this case. The deaths had been senseless, unnecessary and much too soon.

      She dabbed at her moist eyes with the corner of her handkerchief, knowing her tears now were for what might have been, for the past that could never be changed.

      And then John slipped his hand into hers, squeezed it, and she turned to look at this man she loved. Every question she’d ever had, any answer she’d ever sought. They were all there, in his eyes. She smiled through her tears as she saw her future.

      * * * * *

      Prologue

      Battle of Champaubert

      10 February 1814

      GABRIEL SINCLAIR HAD talked his friends into many a wild start or dubious enterprise over the years, but the objectives always had been entertainment, adventure and, often, since they’d grown into manhood, willing women.

      Which didn’t explain why they’d followed him this time, as the only things certain were they’d be cold, bored and forced to miss their noon meal, not that the last could be considered much of a sacrifice.

      There wouldn’t be any more large battles, everyone said so, especially after the Allied Army’s thorough trouncing of Napoleon’s troops at La Rothière. Any day now, Boney would present an offer of abdication, hand back his crown and they could all go home.

      “Tell me again why we’re up here, Gabe, risking frostbite to our most treasured appendages,” his friend Cooper Townsend said, wrapping his greatcoat more tightly around himself. “Our Russian friend camped us in the wrong spot?”

      “I think we’ve already agreed on that. They’re all acting as if the war’s already over,” Gabriel muttered as he studied the crude map he’d drawn a day earlier, while out reconnoitering on his own. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust England’s ally; he merely trusted himself more. He was also partial to giving orders, not taking them, and hadn’t been best pleased to be ordered to join with the Russians. “Look at this, Rigby,” he demanded, shoving the map under Jeremiah Rigby’s nose. “Five thousand men, all but deserted by Blücher and stretched thin like pulled taffy. Our affable host, the dear General Olssufiev, has yet to set out half the needed sentries, and the few he did do nothing but hide in the bushes and snore their heads off.”

      “Not the ones we kicked awake when we first got up here,” Cooper said, grinning. “Only real enjoyment I’ve had in days.”

      Gabriel ignored him and continued making his point. “One sharp bite on the taffy and the French are through our lines, and with nothing at our backs but a half-frozen river.”

      “Yes, yes, very pretty. You’re quite the artist with words, Gabe. Not that I can decipher the thing.” Jeremiah Rigby pushed the offending map away. “Worse, now I’m hungry for taffy.” He winked at Cooper. “Wouldn’t mind a rabbit, either, come to think of it. Since we’ve seen no French, what say you we scrap this ridiculous patrol you bludgeoned us all into, Gabe, and turn it into a hunting party?”

      “Not yet, boys. Our doomsday prophet might yet be right. Shame, if true, but odd things happen all the time.”

      They all turned to Darby Travers, who, for lack of anything else to do, had been lazily scanning the horizon with a spyglass.

      “Give me that—it’s mine. See? It’s got my name inscribed right there, below my grandfather’s. It was a gift to him when he represented England in the court of Russia’s own Empress Elizabeth. We lived there for several years, and that’s how Papa managed to— Well, I didn’t give you permission to touch it.”

      “Christ, Neville, you’re worse than a nursery brat fighting over his toys,” Gabriel said as the last of their small reconnaissance party grabbed the spyglass and stood straight up before being pulled back down by his breeches. “Idiot beanpole—why not wave a flag while