Stealing the Bride (26 page)

“Still, how could he leave you alone? He left you to fend for yourself.”

“Not entirely,” Temple said. “Before he died, just as the sun was starting to spur hints of dawn across the horizon, he opened his eyes and smiled at me. Then he made me promise that I’d never forget his example, or forget my mother’s gentle influence. That I wasn’t just the heir presumptive to the Setchfield duchy, but the dragon slayer’s heir. That I had his and my mother’s legacy to continue.”

She swiped at the tears in her eyes, and the ones still lingering on her cheeks. For a time they sat silently watching the flames in the hearth, each lost in their own memories.

Then Diana let out a long sigh. “’Tis too bad you haven’t kept your word to him.”

“Kept my word?” Temple sputtered, setting her aside once again. “I have done nothing but honor his request.”

Diana sat up on her knees. “And how would that be? In this childish game you and your grandfather play of seeing who can vex the other more? Your father didn’t live to annoy your grandfather, he lived for love. Unlike you, he married the woman who caught his heart, no matter the consequences. He wrote his poetry and spent his time happily away from town.”

“Yes, but don’t you see what it cost him? Cost my mother?”

“Their deaths were but accidents of life. Yes it was partly your grandfather’s doing, but your father lived his own life.”

“I hardly see how I am not living my own life,” Temple said in his defense, though something inside him nudged him in the gut that this passionate woman before him was more likely to understand his father’s vow than he had.

“Is this how your father would want you to live? Alone? Constantly risking your life? And to what end? Don’t give me that ‘For King and country’ folly. You think by refusing to marry me you can spare me from the dragon. Keep me safe from the perils of the world? Bah!” she scoffed, her temper now rising above the storm, wild and full of fury. “You do it to protect your own heart. You safeguard yourself, you selfish bastard. You’re as bad as your grandfather in that you don’t believe in love.”

Diana stalked over to the table and grabbed up his father’s book of verse and thumbed through it. Her eyes sparkled for a brief moment as she found the lines she searched for.

She snapped the book closed and shoved it into his hands. “The man who wrote those words would be appalled by your example. And so am I.”

Then in one last defiant act, she caught up the special license and threw it into the flames—well rid of an unwanted marriage. Well rid of any desire to marry him.

T
emple sat in one of the dry, dark corners of the cottage, Diana’s accusation weighing heavily on his thoughts. His back up against the wall, he nudged at the loose stones in the dirt with the toe of his once immaculate boot. More than once, he looked up and cast a furtive glance at the sleeping beauty curled up on his cloak before the fire.

Could he have been wrong all these years? Temple suspected that his grandfather’s scorn and distrust had wheedled their way into his heart until they had become part of his very soul.

Could Diana be right that the best use of his father’s command wouldn’t be to avoid love, but to live in its reckless joy and uncertain future?

To find his own lady for which to slay dragons
.

Irritating his grandfather was easy. Slipping in and out of France, a challenge to relish. Loving someone, letting one’s heart open up? It terrified him more than he could imagine.

For once you loved someone, truly gave her your heart, you risked everything.

As he looked down at her still figure, her soft features, he realized the disquieting truth of the matter. The one he’d done his damnedest to ignore for so long.

Words echoed through his thoughts, urging him to renew his life, his destiny.

Grow bold, my love, and deliver me from this need.

It struck him as ironic that the only truth he could find at this very moment, the only words he could recall, was a single line of poetry from his father.

They rang with a legitimacy that urged him to be honest. Honest with himself and with Diana.

Yes, he lived his own life, but he had disavowed his heart.

And of all his sins, that was the worst.

He pushed off from the wall, rising to the challenge of the vow he’d made so many years ago. The one he’d made to Diana and been unwilling to acknowledge until she’d opened his eyes. And his heart. Suddenly everything that he’d held dear, the independence of his work for Pymm, vexing his grandfather, living by his wits and Fate’s capricious call, seemed meaningless compared to one thing.

Diana.

As if she heard his silent plea, she stirred.

Her movement startled him. What was he going to do? Fall down before her and declare his heart?

Knowing Diana, she’d accuse him of having imbibed the contents of the flask Mrs. Maguire had sent along in the bottom of the sack.

She moved again, this time her head turning toward him, her lips parting slightly, as if she were offering them to some unseen lover.

Temple grinned. Those sweet lips had always been his downfall, his never-ending temptation.

Now they would be his salvation.

Crossing the space between them, he knelt before her.

From the other end of the hearth, Tully glanced up from where he slept and eyed Temple, as if trying to decide to challenge this interloper, or allow the indiscretion.

“Careful, you mutt,” he whispered. “I’m about to do the right thing.”

Tully let out a low growl.

“Listen well, my friend,” Temple told him, “look the other way this time and it will be beef bones and a warm fire for you for the rest of your days.”

Sensible little beggar that he was, Tully picked himself up and trotted to the other side of the cottage, curling up in a ball and politely putting his back to the couple.

Temple nodded his thanks and turned back to Diana. And when he did, for one panicked moment his mind revolted.

Don’t do this. Are you mad?
He took a deep breath, his gut clenched with fear.
Don’t succumb to her.

Temple glanced upward, holding his hands over his ears to still the voices within. He’d listened to that coward’s voice, his grandfather’s words, for too long.

What would his father’s advice be?

The howling wind outside filled his ears, followed by the haphazard beat of the rain as it pelted the slate roof overhead. Yet none of it could drown out the loud, commanding answer that rose from his heart and pushed him forward.

Slay the dragon, and steal the bride
.

The lips teasing Diana’s were as familiar as they were wanted.

So very wanted.

Yet hadn’t she suffered this haunting dream so many times before, awakening only to find herself alone?

She tossed and turned and tried to shake away the lazy warmth spreading through her veins, the wretched, aching need that seemed permanently coiled between her legs.

“No,” she murmured. “Leave me be.”

“Never again,” whispered her tormentor. His lips nibbled at hers, then covered her forehead, her cheeks, her neck, and her ear with little teasing kisses.

His heated breath tickled her senses, his lips ignited a hot trail of passionate promises.

Then the kisses became more insistent, the whispered words in her ear more fervent.

“I need you, goddess. I won’t be complete without you.”

“Temple?” she whispered. “I don’t believe you. You always leave.”

“Never again. I’m yours forever. That is, if you’ll have me.” When he ended his ardent appeal, his lips covered hers in a kiss that took her breath away.

Diana’s eyes sprang open.

“Temple!” she managed to say, that is, once he’d finished his kiss.

Diana was no fool. She’d never interrupt one of Temple’s mesmerizing kisses, dreamed or real.

“Temple, what are you doing?” she whispered. Truly, she shouldn’t ask, but just take hold of him with both hands and never let go.

“Slaying dragons,” he said, his fingers toying with a strand of her hair. His gaze, so full of need, locked with hers.

“And in the morning?” she asked, doing her best to ignore the way her heart hammered in a wild tattoo.

“In the morning?” he asked, his voice taking a deep, passionate tenor and sending shivers down her spine. “After we do this again, I’m going to hie you across the border and make you my bride.”

Diana frowned. All this was naught but another dream. Or there was one other explanation. “You’ve gone mad.”

“Mad? Yes. Ramshackle and around the bend not to have done this long ago.”

She matched his grin with one of her own. Did she dare believe him?

How could she not when he captured her lips with his, sealing the offer he’d made with a rapturous kiss.

Diana answered him the only way she’d ever wanted to—she wound her fingers around his head, his neck, and pulled him closer.

This time she wouldn’t let go.

And it appeared, neither would Temple. His hand swept away the cloak covering her, then returned without even a heartbeat between, to tug at the ribbon holding up her bodice. The palm of his hand covered one breast, leaving her nipple tingling beneath his heated touch.

As his fingers worked the ribbon loose, his kiss deepened, his tongue sweeping over hers, with a deep, anxious plea.

She opened herself to him, tasting him, teasing him, imploring him—especially when his fingers dipped beneath the edge of her neckline and began to caress her.

He’d touched her thus in Nottingham—that reckless, heated tussle that had given her a tantalizing and torturous hint of the heaven awaiting her in his arms.

As they had before, his fingers seemed capable of lighting fire beneath her skin as he cradled her breast and then found the raised, pebbled firmness of her nipple, leaving her willing to toss aside her reputation, throw away her virtue.

In Temple’s arms she could almost believe she was his goddess.

His goddess
. The words sent shivers down her spine. They also emboldened her. That, and years of frustrated waiting for him to come to his senses.

She arched her back, reaching up and pulling at her own bodice to free herself for his attentions. Her breasts ached for his skillful ministrations, ached and burned.

Diana loved his touch, craved it, for it sent her senses reeling, filling her with a careless, ravenous hunger for more.

His mouth tore from hers, the cold air biting greedily at her heated lips.

“No!” she gasped. “Don’t stop.”

“I must,” he said.

Her gaze must have reflected the murderous intentions in her heart, for Temple only laughed at her.

“No thunderbolts, goddess. I just haven’t heard you say yes.”

“Yes. Yes. Yes, to anything,” she told him, catching hold of his shirt and yanking him back against her.

He caught her wrists, pinning them over her head, while the weight of his body held her hips and legs securely in place. “No, no more protests, not until I know that you will consent to be my wife.”

“Oh, for mercy’s sake, Temple.” She squirmed and wiggled in his grasp. “Do you really need to ask?”

“Aye,” he said, his voice smoky with emotion. “I need to hear you say it.”

Diana knew what he was really asking. If she forgave him. How could she not? As he’d described his childhood, the loss of his parents, she saw only the small, frightened, lonely boy lost in his grandfather’s exacting world.

What had Temple’s examples of love been? His father’s broken heart and his grandfather’s heartless example. No wonder love and all its powerful mysteries left the man terrified.

That he’d crossed this tiny cottage to declare his heart meant more to her than if he’d crossed oceans—for it meant he’d conquered and slain all the fears that had bound his heart, held him hostage.

And kept them apart.

“Yes, Temple, I consent to be your bride.”

He leaned down and kissed her, tenderly and completely.

Then he went to release her, loosening his grip slightly, but changed his mind, holding her fast. His features shifted with a wolfish delight. “I rather like you like this…” He eyed her open bodice and winked.

Given this was Diana, her eyes lit with a wicked appreciation. “I rather like
you
like
this
…” She struggled a bit more. “Is that wicked of me to enjoy this?”

“Terribly,” he told her, nipping gently at her earlobe.

“Good. Now let me go so I can be truly wicked.”

“With pleasure,” he drawled. Temple released her, but only enough to capture her once again, this time with his lips as he devoured her in a voracious and hungry kiss.

“Love me, Temple,” she whispered. “Love me.”

“For the rest of my life, goddess. For all my days.”

She sighed happily and let him claim her heart, her body. His mouth blazed a trail of one steamy kiss after another from her lips down her neck, until it wound its way to one of her breasts, eagerly lavishing the nipple with scorching laps from his tongue.

Her hips rose of their own volition to meet his, and what she found there made her sigh with delight.

Straining beneath his breeches, his manhood tempted her with its stiff, enticing welcome.

Diana was only too glad not to be some young, naïve bride. Over the years she’d overheard enough of married women’s conversations to know she should either be terrified or would face the world in the morning with a deliriously happy blush.

As Temple’s fingers began to draw up the hem of her skirt, brushing over her legs, her thighs, over the curls in that very private place, she knew which type of married lady she would be.

She opened her mouth to say something, to say anything, but at that moment Temple once again covered her mouth with his, and between the way his tongue teased hers and his fingers slowly stoked the fires below, she felt herself floating toward the heavens.

Her body rose to meet his touch, her legs opening to him.

She’d never imagined anything so glorious, that is, until his fingers delved a little deeper and he pushed her past the clouds.

“Oh my,” she gasped, her eyes opening wide. “Do that again.”

He grinned at her. “Bossy chit.”

“On this I insist,” she said, her hips swaying in an urgent cadence. “Do that again.”

And when he did, stroking the swollen and heated nub, liquid fire bolted into her veins.

Diana heaved a sigh of relief. She hadn’t been dreaming.

“Oh, again,” she whispered.

“As you wish,” he said into her ear, nibbling a path from her neck to her bare shoulders and back to her nipples.

Yet even as Temple heated her senses into a molten delight, she realized she needed more. She needed to feel
him
.

It was her turn to propel him to the clouds.

And she knew just where to start.

The moment Diana’s fingers ran over the length of his hardness, Temple wondered if he’d ever again remember how to breathe. Instead of the tentative explorations one would expect from one’s virgin bride, Diana reached for him as she did everything in her life—with a bold, demanding statement.

Her hand started at the root and ran up his length until her fingers closed over the sensitive tip, rubbing it until he made the same appreciative moan she’d issued not moments before when he’d touched her so intimately.

“I thought as much,” she whispered.

He smiled to himself. So she was going on an exploration of her own.

And it didn’t appear she needed Billingsworth for this journey.

Her fingers fumbled for just a moment over the buttons at his waistband, but what they lacked in experience, they made up for in pure, unadulterated enthusiasm. Before he knew it, she had his breeches undone and was kneeling before him, tugging his boots off.

She made quite a delicious sight, her hair tumbling down in a disarray of curls and tousled strands, her bodice open, allowing him to see the delightful curves of her breasts, her rosy nipples hard and peeking through the thin muslin of her chemise.

Her face was a study of serious intent, her brows furrowed, her mouth in a taut line as she faced the enemies standing in her path to passion.

His boots and breeches.

She would have put the best valet to shame in her efficiency and tenacity.

And he was rewarded with the sound of a breathless, anxious sigh of delight when she vanquished her foes and spied her reward.

Her eyes widened at the sight of him, then a wicked, sly smile tipped her lips. No maidenly fears in Diana, only appreciation and determination.