Page 68

Leonora laughed. ‘No, but I think she’s very diplomatic.’ He put out his hands and helped Leonora to her feet. She looked down at the beautiful ermine-lined cloak fixed across her body with kitchen twine. ‘As you can see, your kindly cook has trussed me like a haunch of venison. I think she knows her master’s susceptibilities well.’

He chuckled. ‘She should by now. But I have never before had to rescue a headstrong beauty from my lake!’ He took her into his arms, bundled up in velvet and ermine, and said in a more serious voice, ‘A beauty who then threatened to break my heart by leaving me alone in this world.’

‘If my déshabillé so disconcerts you, my lord, I can go upstairs and get dressed in the clothes Nanny P has brought from the Manor.’ She looked up into his face with a teasing light in her eyes.

‘No, it’s much more fun to see if I can unwrap this charming parcel.’ He pulled at the bow in the twine his cook had tied at the front, and the makeshift string belt fell to the floor.

Leonora giggled and clutched the edges of the cloak together. ‘Have a care, Lord Rokeby! As you once pointed out to me, we are not even married!’

‘Well, Miss Appleby, as you once told me, nothing would induce you to marry me. I wondered if there were anything I could do or say that might persuade you otherwise?’

Leonora gazed up at his rough, scarred face, shadowed with the night’s stubble. She glanced across at where Mrs Priddy slept and feeling unaccustomedly provocative, slipped her arms round his neck. ‘Do you think you might kiss me, Lord Rokeby?’

He looked down into her expectant face, a peculiar, guarded expression on his. With a voice no longer teasing he said, ‘Before you agree to marry me, even to kiss me, I want you to know the full extent of the damaged man you profess to love.’ He released her and took a step backwards, and in one deft movement he stripped off his shirt.

Leonora gasped at the sight of his lean, muscled torso bisected by a long shocking wound. From his left shoulder to his right hip bone was a jagged raised scar. Watching her face, he turned his back and there was a comet-shaped gouge across his shoulder blade, and scattered pitted holes from grapeshot.

His voice was matter-of-fact but Leonora sensed the air between them electric with emotion. He continued, ‘That was the shot that deflected off my shoulder and took my finger instead of my life. The sabre cut that opened my chest was wielded by one of Napoleon’s elite Old Guard, still wearing his bearskin. Such men don’t usually leave their adversaries alive.’ He turned back to face her, his expression soft and uncertain. ‘As you see, it is not a pretty sight.’

Leonora put out her hand and traced the scar with her finger. ‘I see it as part of your beauty and the courage in which you live your life. How could I think otherwise?’

Alistair Rokeby put his damaged right hand over her small pale one and pressed it against his chest. ‘There is one other disfigurement I have to show you.’ With his gaze steady on her, he slipped off his eye patch. Leonora had become so used to the scar that ran across his face she had grown to barely notice it. It was part of the gallant landscape that distinguished him. She now saw the full extent of that French sabre’s damage and her spirit recoiled. The raised gash that ran from his temple continued across his eyelid to his jaw. His lordship’s eye had been saved but was milky and sightless. It was a shock to see his face so ravaged and she felt her knees give way. He had been watching her closely and murmured, ‘Do not be ashamed of recoiling. I would find my look repellent if I hadn’t become so used to it by now.’

‘No, no! Never repellent. Never anything but beloved.’

He still held her from him. ‘Can you really love such a grotesque carved-up man as this?’

Tenderness welled in Leonora’s breast and she flew into his arms. ‘How could I not love every inch of you? Your character and heroism are inscribed on your body and I embrace them with pride and love.’ She stretched up on tiptoe to gently kiss the puckered corner of his mouth, then with a small moan he moved his head and their mouths met, at first with the faintest brush of their lips and then with the urgency of long pent-up desire. The opera cloak had fallen open and Leonora’s bare breasts were pressed against his naked chest. The intimacy was astounding to her. She had never felt so close to anyone in her life, not certain where her flesh ended and his began, aware only of the warmth, the hard insistent strength of his body and the soft pulsating joy of hers.

There was a stir in the window and they looked across at Mrs Priddy who had just woken. They sprung apart. Nanny P said, ‘My dear, you look quite restored to health. In fact, more bonny than I’ve seen you for ages.’ She stood, holding up the large lacy shawl she had been knitting for months. ‘It’s finished at last!’

Leonora had hurriedly closed the cloak over her body and walked towards her old nanny. Lord Rokeby slipped his shirt back on, tucking it roughly into his breeches. He replaced his eye patch and with Achille by his side, walked to stand with Leonora and Mrs Priddy. They both put out their hands to touch the shawl. He said, ‘This is beautiful, Nanny P. Now you have to tell us who it’s for.’

Her blue eyes twinkled. ‘It’s for either your or Charlotte’s baby, whoever first arrives.’

‘But neither of us are yet married.’

‘Well, I suggest you hurry up, then,’ was her unruffled reply.

Leonora took her hand. ‘My dearest Nanny P, I have relied on you as a mother for so many years, so you must be the first to know.’ She looked up at Alistair Rokeby, her face aglow. ‘I think Lord Rokeby has just asked me to marry him and if that is so, then I have agreed.’

Lord Rokeby stepped forward to embrace them both. ‘Of course I’ve asked Miss Appleby—Leonora, to marry me. And of course she has agreed, as you, Nanny P, always knew she would. And I hope you will move with her into the Abbey as soon as we are man and wife.’ With a smile that was full of mischief he continued, ‘As Leonora and I are no longer young, we will need help with our new baby.’

Leonora protested with a laugh. ‘How ungallant, my lord!’

He slipped an arm around her waist, pulled her close and continued, ‘We have both stared death in the face and need now to grasp hold of life. Time is fast fleeing and happiness so precious; if I have learnt anything, it is that we can rely on very little. My life with Leonora begins on this auspicious day.’

He took her hand and turned to Mrs Priddy. ‘Before you and Leonora return to the Manor, may I have your permission to take my future countess upstairs to help her dress?’

This scandalous request did not shock Mrs Priddy who merely looked unruffled and offered no objection. ‘Since I first knew you, Master Alistair, convention has never constrained you. And in my dearest Nora, you have found yourself a woman who can match you in independence of spirit.’

‘You mean we are both laws unto ourselves?’ Leonora smiled, turning her old nanny’s favourite description of the Earl back on her.

‘Indeed, I don’t think anything I might say would change either of you.’

Alistair Rokeby bowed his head in thanks and took Leonora’s hand. She looked at him, her heart beginning to race. Nanny P had warned her he was a law unto himself, but what did the wild Earl have in mind?

‘Lord Rokeby—Alistair.’ Saying his given name out loud was another moment of thrilling intimacy. ‘Alistair, Alistair,’ she sighed, ‘when were you ever a lady’s maid?’