Marrying Mr. English: The English Brothers #7 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 11) (9 page)

He ran the backs of his fingers across her cheek, soothing her. “‘A good woman makes a man honest, makes him work harder, makes him true.’ His words. That’s why he wanted me to get married. His goal all along was for me to find a woman who made me honest and true, who made me want to work hard for her comfort, for her happiness.” He pressed a sweet, swift kiss to her warmed-honey lips. “And he was right. A good woman can change the entire course of your life . . . if you want her badly enough . . . if you let her.”

She was staring up at him, her eyes searching and fraught, determining if his words were true. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips, and she sucked her bottom lip between her teeth for a moment before letting it go. And that was the moment—he watched it happen before his very eyes—that was the moment Eleanora Watters
became
Eleanora English.

“I’m going to fall in love with you,” she whispered. “I’m going to give you the big family you want. I’m going to be sure you never, ever regret choosing me. I promise, Tom. That’s my promise to you: I’ll spend the rest of my life making you happy too.”

“A dream and a miracle,” he murmured, drawing her back against him and closing the distance between their lips.

Haverford Park

Christmastime 2015

“. . . and he whispered, ‘A dream and a miracle.’” Eleanora English sighed as her daughter-in-law Emily Edwards English handed her another ornament, which she fastened onto a sturdy pine branch. “The end.”

The room was so silent, you could have heard a pin drop, and then . . .

“Wait!
What
?” exclaimed Jessica Winslow English, the wife of Eleanora’s third son, Alex. “What do you mean ‘the
end
’?”

Eleanora turned around to find six younger women—her husband’s niece, Kate, plus her sons’ wives and significant others—staring at her with their mouths gaping open, in various states of disbelief and indignation. She had invited the girls over for a tree-trimming party at Haverford Park this year, and was enjoying every moment with these smart, funny, wonderful women. When Molly, the brand-new fiancée of her fifth son, Weston, had asked to hear the story of how her future in-laws had met, Eleanora couldn’t help indulging them and had been spinning the tale for over an hour.

“The end,” said Eleanora again, gesturing uselessly with one hand. “Um . . .
the end
of the story.”

“I don’t think so,” said Valeria with a little bit attitude. She was the girlfriend of Eleanora’s fourth son, Stratton, and the most outspoken of the girls. Eleanora absolutely adored her for it because she’d pulled shy Stratton out of his shell and loved him for exactly who he was. “You can’t just end it like that.”

“What do you mean?”

Molly cocked her head to the side. “You’re really leaving us hanging, Eleanora. Did they move to New York? Did he find a job? Were they happy? What about Evie and Van?”

“Good question,” said Daisy Edwards English, her second son Fitz’s wife, who had just been upstairs to check on her daughter—Eleanora’s first grandchild—baby Caroline. Daisy picked up a plate of homemade cookies from the coffee table and handed them to her cousin, Emily. “We have to know what happened to ditzy, darling Evie! Did they end up together?”

Jessica pursed her lips, turning to Eleanora’s niece by marriage. “Kate, did you
know
your great-grandfather?”

“He sounds like a real piece of work,” added Valeria.

“Thankfully, no,” said Kate English-almost-Rousseau, looking disgusted. “He died before I was born. But my dad is much younger than Uncle Tom, and they had different mothers.”

“Did Tom ever get the money?” asked Jessica, turning back to Eleanora.

Eleanora grinned at her, and Jessica turned her sharp green eyes to Emily. “Susannah’s
your
mother, Emily. Did you ever meet Evie? Do you know how the story ends?”

Emily shrugged, shaking her head. “I can’t ever remember meeting someone named Evie. Ad even though I’ve lived at Haverford Park for most of my life, I promise, I’ve never even
heard
this story. Please, Eleanora, you’ve got to tell us the rest!”

Valeria leaned an elbow on Jessica’s shoulder. “No more ornaments until we get the rest of the story, Eleanora.”

Molly tucked an errant strand of red hair behind her ear, looking hopeful. Her enormous engagement ring caught the firelight and glistened merrily. “There’s a fresh thermos of hot cocoa here. We could take a break from decorating, and you could tell us the rest?”

Emily and Daisy had already cuddled up together on the overstuffed couch, and Molly squeezed in beside Daisy. Kate poured them all steaming mugs of cocoa, and Valeria sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the fire. Jessica, still standing beside the tree with her hands on her hips, shrugged at her mother-in-law with a saucy grin as she gestured to the armchair by the fire.

“Fine! You girls win,” said Eleanora, laughing as she sat down and accepted a steaming cup of chocolate from Kate. “But I warn you, ‘the course of true love—’”

“‘—never did run smooth,’” finished Valeria gently. “That’s okay. We still want to know.”

Jessica sat down on the love seat next to Kate, and Eleanora took a deep breath, thinking back, remembering what came next. Her eyes teared for just a moment, but she took another deep breath.

“We were falling in love. We were . . . full of hope,” she started, letting her memories carry her away.

Haverford Park

Christmas Eve, 1981

Eleanora and Tom walked back up the driveway toward Tom’s car, their hands bound together as gleaming white gravel crunched under their feet. Eleanora’s mind was spinning from the decision they’d just made together: Tom had turned down fifteen million dollars—an almost unfathomable sum of money—so that he could give their two-day marriage a chance.

It felt foolish and reckless, and his impetuousness frightened her.

It also made her heart swell with tenderness and her body tremble with longing.

Eleanora had never been anyone’s first choice for anything. How in the world did she find herself here—with a man who had, literally, chosen
her
over diamonds and gold?

Looking up at the austere exterior of Haverford Park, she gulped, counting the sparkling windows nervously as she wondered if Grandfather English was watching them and hoping he wasn’t. He was a hateful, hurtful old man who’d judged her before knowing her, and she couldn’t wait to get back into Tom’s car and leave Haverford for good.

She’d just asked him,
What about the money? How can you do this? How can you turn it down for me?
And he’d sweetly—and resolutely—answered,
I want you more.

Clutching his hand more tightly as they approached the car, she made him stop and face her, ignoring the tears that blurred her vision.

“Are you
sure
, Tom?”

He glanced up at the old house, narrowing his eyes and tightening his jaw before looking down at her upturned face with such gentleness, she couldn’t keep the tears from spilling over the edges of her eyes.

He nodded, using his thumbs to swipe at the wetness before it could wind down her face.

“Positive.”

A quiet surge of pure joy lifted her heels from the ground as she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down to kiss her. His arms— so strong and so certain, it twisted her heart—pulled her against his solid body, her thrift shop coat colliding with his carmel-colored cashmere.

The kiss lasted only a moment before Tom rested his cold cheek against hers, still clutching her tightly.

“We’ll be okay, sunshine. I promise.”

“You don’t know what it’s like,” she said softly, looking over his shoulder at a tennis court and a swimming pool in the distance, “to be poor.”

“We won’t be poor,” he said. “I have some savings, and as soon as I get a job, we’ll have a decent income too.”

“You don’t know what it’s like to be alone,” she pressed on, fearful for him, “without family.”

“Believe me, a crotchety grandfather, an ineffective father, and a kid brother I barely know don’t constitute a family. Somehow I think I’ll get by.” He leaned back, grinning at her. “Plus, I have you, baby. You’re my family now.”

She clenched her eyes shut against the welcome sweetness of his words, rubbing her cheek against his soft shoulder as tears ran over the bridge of her nose and plopped onto his expensive coat.

“Let’s go,” he rumbled near her ear. “I want to be alone with my family.”

She heard the humor in his voice, but also the hunger, and she sucked in a deep breath as she realized how desperately she wanted to be alone with him too—in his bed, underneath his body, sharing the most private parts of herself with him.

“Me too,” she said, pulling away from him and wiping her eyes.

“Smile for me,” he said, cupping her cheeks in his cold hands. “It’s my birthday.”

Tomorrow she would think about their future.

Tomorrow she would close the floodgates to the overwhelming waves of emotion that so compromised her common sense today.

Tomorrow she would rationally explore what lay before them and try to figure out how best to conserve what resources they had until Tom found a job and they landed on their feet.

But today? Today she was Mrs. Thomas English—someone’s wife, someone wanted, someone precious . . . someone who, judging by the dark look in her husband’s eyes and the growly way he said he wanted to be alone with her, wasn’t going to get a wink of sleep tonight.

She couldn’t have stopped herself if she tried.

She beamed at Tom as he helped her into his car.

***

It’s not that Tom
only
wanted to jump his wife . . .

. . . but that Tom
absolutely
wanted to jump his wife.

From the moment he’d seen her, giving a wiseass tourist what-for in the restaurant where she used to waitress, he’d wanted her. Eleanora Watters English was young and stunning—her body slim but curvy, her hair a natural blonde, her eyes a bright blue, and her lips a pink and pillowed marvel. He’d kissed her more times than he could count now, but his body was starving for more.

He wanted to kiss more than her lips. He wanted to touch his tongue to every secret valley of her body until she writhed beneath him, begging him to slide into her waiting heat and take her to paradise. He wanted those gorgeous lips clamped around his swollen sex, her eyes soft and dark as she sucked him to the point of madness and allowed him to finish down her throat. He wanted her tits in his mouth, her nipples pebbled and proud as he licked them into hard points. He wanted to hear the noises she made as she came—and feel the way her body tightened around his, squeezing him, milking him, taking everything he wanted to give her, until they were both sated and exhausted, wrapped bonelessly around one another until dawn.

But he also wanted her to understand how precious she was to him. How his fists had clenched with the certainty of his renunciation of his grandfather. How his breathing had almost stopped when he realized she’d fled, and how his heart had swelled with protectiveness and gratitude when he saw her small body at the gates of Haverford Park. She had asked him—three times now—if he was sure about his decision to turn his back on his fortune, and she couldn’t possibly understand the sense of freedom and satisfaction he was presently enjoying. She had given him a reason to finally say no, to break the oppressive English yoke around his neck and choose a different course for his life. She was his angel, his reason, his salvation, and his partner.

Yes, he wanted to
fuck
her.

But more importantly, for the first time in his life, his mind, heart, and body were one in the all-consuming need to
make love
to a woman.

To his
wife
, who, he realized, was riding along beside him in utter silence.

“Eleanora?”

“Hmm?” she murmured, turning her head to look at him.

And again, as always, his world was rocked by her beauty—the flawless perfection of her skin, the dusting of freckles over her nose, the alertness in her blue eyes
.

I will never tire of this face,
he vowed wordlessly.
I will always strive to see happiness and pride in these eyes.

And love?
whispered his heart.

He cleared his throat.

He wasn’t ready to apply the word
love
to their situation yet.

“Yes?” she prompted.

“Umm . . .” His mind had scattered,
love
reverberating like an iron pipe hitting an iron pipe behind his eyes. “Stores’ll be closing soon. Need anything?”

She glanced at the dashboard, where the clock read “3:45,” and nodded. “Can you stop at a grocery store? I’ll get a few things for tomorrow.”

He nodded, marveling at the simple domesticity of her request.

“I’ve never . . .,” he started, then winced.

“Never what?” she asked.

“Never been inside a grocery store,” he admitted.

“What?” Her jaw dropped, and she gaped at him. “How is that
possible
?”

Grinning at her, he shrugged. “Always had someone else to go, I guess. And most of them deliver.”

“For a fee!” she cried, laughing softly as she shook her head.

To his shame, he had no idea what grocery stores charged to deliver food. It had never really crossed his mind to find out either.

“Well,” she said crisply, smoothing her black skirt, “at some point soon, I will give you your first tour of a grocery store. But tonight, I go alone.”

“You’d deprive me of watching you shop?”

“I don’t
shop
,” she said, her eyes serious. “I choose carefully—only things I need—and then I pay for them before I can be tempted to buy anything else.”

“You don’t have to do that anymore,” he said.

She sighed. “You don’t have a new job yet.”

“But I will.”

“I know,” she said lightly, giving him a sweet smile. “But I have my own reasons for going solo tonight.” He pulled into a parking spot at an A&P and kept the engine running. She leaned over the bolster and kissed him quickly. “I’ll only be a minute.”

The door slammed, and he watched her go—her black boots barely touching down on the wet pavement, her steps nimble and certain. And she was his.
His
wife.

The word left him breathless, and his chest swelled with pride. He looked to his right and left, hoping to see some other young husband waiting for his new wife, with whom he could share a knowing grin and wink that said
Yes, she’s mine. Do you know this kind of happiness, brother?
But the cars on either side of him were empty. Everyone was inside, bustling about, buying Christmas groceries in an unknown store the size of a football field filled with food.

It was absurd that he’d never been inside a grocery store, and he mused, for just a moment, about the changes imminent in his life. For all of his adulthood, Tom had had access to a trust fund that had allowed him a truly luxurious lifestyle. A new car for New Year’s? Sure! Skiing in Zermatt at a week’s notice? Absolutely! Purchases weren’t considered—they were made. Country club membership fees were paid; the mortgage on his penthouse, which technically belonged to the English Family Trust, had been paid in full over fifty years ago, when his grandfather was a twenty-something financial wunderkind.

As much as he didn’t want to think about it, let alone admit it, Eleanora was right. Things were going to change.

With his savings of several thousand dollars, they could find an apartment in any city, pay the first and last months’ rent, and live comfortably, if not luxuriously, for two or three months. But the money would eventually run out. Now, if Tom used his family and college connections to secure a job on Wall Street or in one of the Hartford insurance agencies that he’d dealt with professionally for years, he could assume a lifestyle of wealth and comfort that wouldn’t include a new car every January, but wouldn’t prohibit one every two or three years, either. It would be a different life for Tom—more modest, less luxurious, but still steeped in comfort. And anyway, Eleanora might not like a stupendously rich lifestyle—surely modest wealth and comfort would be more palatable to her.

Besides, it was a temporary lifestyle, wasn’t it? He narrowed his eyes as the snow began to fall, adding a chill to the warmth of his musings. One day, when his grandfather arrived on their doorstep and begged Eleanora’s forgiveness on his knees, their fortune would be restored.

***

“And write ‘Happy Birthday, Tom’ on it, okay?” she asked the baker. “Do you have candles?”

He nodded at her, his smile lazy and appreciative. “Of course, pretty lady. Aisle 12. With the greeting cards.”

She nodded at him, ignoring his borderline-lecherous looks. A card was a great idea. “I’ll be back in a few minutes for the cake, okay?”

Without waiting for his response, she turned around, checking out the contents of her wire basket as she walked briskly to the cards: orange juice, a dozen eggs, shredded Cheddar, sausage, Wonder Bread, milk, pancake mix, Crisco, bananas, butter, and maple syrup. She planned to make a casserole tonight, soaking the white bread in whisked eggs and crumbled sausage, then topping it with cheese. Tomorrow, when she baked it, it would be as light and fluffy as a soufflé. And tonight, for his birthday, she’d make banana pancakes with butter and syrup, so thin, they could almost be crepes. They were her two best dishes, and for Tom’s birthday and their first Christmas together, she wanted everything to be as perfect as possible.

Turning down the stationery aisle, she looked for the birthday cards, finally stopping before the ones marked “Husband” with widened eyes. She set her basket on the floor and rubbed her hands together, willing them to reach out and take a card. Her fingers trembled as they touched lightly over the cards on the top row, but she couldn’t seem to choose one.

My Darling Beloved Spouse . . .

To the Father of My Children: I’d Choose You All Over Again . . .

To the Man Who’s Been With Me Through Thick and Thin  . . .

For My Soul Mate: I’d Be Lost Without You . . .

They all felt too heavy-handed for Tom, and suddenly she felt like a child who pretends to be a princess by wearing dress-up, for whom the illusion is shattered when her mother calls to her to set the table or take out the garbage. Here she was, in bona fide Wife Land, and she felt nothing like a wife. It’s not that she felt like an impostor either, and maybe she’d feel differently after they’d consummated their marriage—but mostly she just felt new. And young. And, to her great shame, as she considered Tom’s sacrifice, uncertain.