Startled, she opened her eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“There’s something…” He licked his lips. His red, kiss-swollen lips.
Her own must be equally red and swollen. Good. She raised her eyebrows in silent query.
“You didn’t… Um.” He glanced out the window. His cheeks flushed pink again. “I said… but you didn’t… Never mind.” He reached to kiss her again.
Understanding dawned. She shifted, hiking up her skirts so she could straddle him, her knees bracketing his hips. She cupped his face. “I love you.” She kissed his forehead. “I think I have loved you since I first heard you sing, helping your niece learn an aria.” She dropped a kiss on his right cheek. “I’ve loved you since I heard you entertain children with a scary story.” She kissed his cheek just below his left eye, where his face had recently been black and blue. “I have definitely loved you since you fought two bullies to defend a woman most men wouldn’t give a second thought to, unless they wanted to toss her skirts.”
She leaned back in his embrace and took a fortifying breath. “I haven’t had much experience saying those three words the last few years. No one to say them to.” Her voice broke. “Until now.”
“Honey.” The endearment, rumbled in his deep voice, was as much a caress as his hand cupping her cheek.
She sniffed back tears. “I will happily say those words to you. Every day. For the next sixty or seventy years.” She shifted, letting more of her weight rest on his lap, and smoothed hair back from his face, stroking the long, silky strands.
He groaned and pulled her toward him for another bone-melting, toe-curling kiss. She shivered with delight as his hands skimmed down her shoulders, along her ribs, around to her hips, and cupped her backside.
She wrapped one hand around the back of his neck and rested one palm over his chest, delighting in the feel of his pounding heart. She tilted her hips, needing to be even closer to him, and gasped when she felt the evidence of his desire. She moaned and parted her lips when his tongue sought entry, and rocked her hips in time with their deep kiss.
“Honey,” came his ragged groan minutes or hours later. “We’re not going to make it three weeks for the banns to be read if we keep this up.”
“I don’t care,” she whispered, gleefully tossing years of protecting her reputation out the window. “I want to touch you. All of you. And I want you to touch me.” She could untie his cravat so she could kiss his neck, but that would require letting go of his face, withdrawing her fingers from his hair. Perhaps she could use her teeth…
He moaned, pulling her tight against him.
The horses slowed and came to a gentle halt. Shouts from ostlers made it clear they had reached the inn yard.
She swore in frustration, a very unladylike oath, and dropped her forehead to his shoulder.
He chuckled, and she felt the delicious vibration through her whole body as he wrapped his arms around her and held her in his snug embrace. “Gilroy can ride in the other carriage with Sally tomorrow,” he murmured in her ear.
She sat up a little, her brows raised.
“That means we’ll have this coach to ourselves.” He tugged her sleeve back up on one shoulder and tucked a loose tendril of hair behind her ear, trailing his fingertip down her neck. “All the way back to London.”
Her breath caught at the mischievous glint in his eyes.
Hearing the groom’s footsteps drawing near, she sat on the opposite bench and straightened her skirts just before the door opened. “I like your plan.”
Epilogue
London, four weeks later
The reception line for their wedding breakfast dealt with, David took his bride by the hand and strolled through the swirling crowds of well-wishers that filled the public rooms of the Ravencroft townhouse, aiming for the dining room. Thanks to planning from Aunt Connie and Mrs. Endicott, who had asked him to call her Aunt Eunice, the table and sideboards groaned beneath platters of delicacies and different kinds of punch. One pitcher, Ashley discreetly pointed out to him, did not contain any alcohol.
He’d been too anxious to eat anything this morning. Not that he worried his bride would leave him at the altar. But they’d hardly seen each other since the first reading of the banns, what with her inspecting properties, selecting the one to be her school, and getting ready to take over as headmistress at Mrs. Platt’s school, while he’d needed to visit his estate. Spring had been colder than typical, and summer was still nowhere in sight other than the almanac, and as a result this year’s crops were not growing the way they should. Mr. Ogden had been concerned it was due to his experimental changes. David reassured him it was not; he had talked with enough landowners in Parliament to know the unusually cool weather was adversely affecting everyone.
Notes from a Vivaldi sonata on the pianoforte drifted out from the music room. Sounded like Missy was getting better. David raised Ashley’s hand for another kiss, and was rewarded with her smile that still made his heart beat double-time.
The smile fell from her face and she let go of him to plant her fists on her hips. “No,” she said in what he’d come to think of as her Headmistress voice, standing tall and fierce as she addressed the two army officers who had just stepped foot inside. “You are not taking him again.” She put her body in front of his, her chin raised to a mutinous angle. “Not today.”
The colonel shook his head. “I would not dream of it, Lady Ravencroft.”
Feeling a rush of emotion at the reminder this fabulous, fierce woman was now his countess, David rested a possessive hand on her shoulder and caressed her bare nape with his thumb.
“We ask only for a moment of your time,” said the other officer, a major. “Outside.”
As Ashley drew breath to protest, the colonel added, “Both of you.”
