AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Gabe laughed. “I just wish I knew what the gibberish was that he said. You think we’re actually married?”
“Oh!” Sophie gasped at the suggestion, and she drew him to a halt. “Do you think there’s a chance we’re not?”
The light-hearted twinkle in Gabe’s eye was one she hadn’t even realized she’d missed until that moment. Once upon a time, he’d teased her quite mercilessly, but he was so serious these days. “I’m joking, Sophie. We signed our names in his book. I don’t speak Gaelic, but he told me in perfectly clear English to kiss my wife. We are well and truly married. There’s no escape from me now.”
Relief washed over Sophie and she smiled up at him. “It took so long to catch you, the last thing in the world I’d ever want to do is escape from you.”
He gently urged her toward the inn. “That is good to hear,” he said. “Because you are quite trapped now, Mrs. Prideaux, and I have certain plans for you.”
“What sort of plans?” Sophie asked.
Gabe winked at her. “Plans that involve divesting you of that dress and kissing every inch of your skin.”
Oh, those plans did sound delightful. Giddiness rose up inside her.
“I’ve been a veritable saint the entire trip north, but now that you’re mine…”
“In that case, we should hurry,” she laughed and increased her step, urging him into the inn just as quickly as she could.
It didn’t take much urging, and as they entered the charming little inn lobby, Gabe was laughing right along with her. Sophie couldn’t remember a time when she was so joyful or so filled with hope for her future, but then…
Papa stood beside the innkeeper’s desk with his arms folded across his chest and the most murderous expression on his face. He looked Sophie up and down as though she was a stranger, one he didn’t particularly care for.
“Papa!” she breathed out. Goodness, hehadcaught up to them. They hadn’t really dawdled along the way. Of course, they had spent longer than they should have at that first inn outside of London. Even still, Papa must have been quite intent on catching them for him to already be in Scotland.
“I am beyond disappointed in you, Sophia.”
The innkeeper made a quick escape into a back room as Papa turned his scathing look to Gabe.
“And,you, I thought I’d been quite clear with you in our conversations, Prideaux. But you absconded with my daughter anyway.”
“Lord Beckbury—” Gabe began.
“Papa!” Sophie interrupted Gabe and released her hold on his arm to start toward her father. After all, things would just be better from here on out if she could prevent the two of them from coming to blows now. “He didn’t abscond with me. If anything, I absconded with him.”
Her father scoffed as he lifted his hand out to Sophie. “Come along. We’ll head home and figure out a way to extricate you from this situation.”
Sophie quickly backed away from her father. “I’m not going to London. My husband and I are headed to Fairhaven Cottage and then onto Northend to see to the Northwold holdings.”
His glare on her intensified, and Sophie gulped. No one ever contradicted him in such a way, not even her. But she couldn’t let Papa steal her back and return her to London. She just couldn’t let that happen.
“And I don’t want to extricate myself from the situation, Papa. I would do the same thing all over again if given half the chance.”
Her father’s gaze flicked back to Gabe. “As Charles Prideaux’s son, I’m certain you’ve already defiled my daughter a number of times along the way here.”
“Papa!” Sophie’s face burned at the suggestion. It was certainly not one she ever thought her father would say nor one she ever thought she’d have to respond to. “Major Prideaux was honorable and gentlemanly the entire trip to Scotland.”
“Is that so?” Papa’s cold eyes speared her where she stood. “You know I can have a doctor verify you’re still wholly intact, Sophia? And then we can have this regrettable marriage annulled just as quickly as possible.”
A doctor to make certain she was stillintact? What an awful suggestion. She couldn’t even imagine suffering through such an examination.
“Now see here,” Gabe began, his deep voice sounding quite menacing all of a sudden.
“I cannot believe you would even think to subject me to such humiliation, Papa,” Sophie interrupted. “But it wouldn’t do you any good in any event.”
For a moment, he looked like he was about to be ill. “So you’renotas innocent as you claim, then?”
“My husband is not his father and I am just as innocent as I said.” Sophie shook her head in frustration. “What I meant is the state of my innocence one way or the other will not do you any good. I’mnothaving my marriage annulled, Papa. Not now, not ever. I love Gabriel Prideaux and I always have.”
