Page 99 of An Extraordinary Lord
Mercenary, convict, by-blow…When he looped one sleeve under her arm, she gritted her teeth so he wouldn’t know how much pain he was causing her. Not just the wound to her shoulder but the one he’d put into her heart. The same one he was now carving deeper.
“You’re unlike any other woman I’ve ever known. I knew it from the moment we met, and I don’t mean because you came after me with a sword.” For once, he wasn’t teasing, and his expression remained bleak. “When Joanna was killed, I couldn’t stay in England. I didn’t belong here. I didn’t belong anywhere.”
Her eyes blurred with hot tears. For all her life, she’d felt the same.
He cinched tight the tie around the bandage. “Since I returned, my life has been nothing but hunting—every night, every day… I thought I knew what I was hunting for, why I was out there. But I know now that I was wrong. I wasn’t hunting for that man.” He admitted quietly, “I was hunting for you.”
The pain was so brutal that she could barely keep her breath, and she whispered a plea for him to stop. “Merritt…”
“Now that I’ve found you, I’m not letting you go. I want a new life, one with purpose. One with you.” He tied off the sleeve and slowly lifted his gaze to fix on hers. “Marry me, Veronica.”
She couldn’t stop a tear from sliding down her cheek. “I have to leave, you know that.” She swiped at the tear, and the pain of jostling her arm was nothing compared to the anguish that pierced her chest when she rasped out her hoarse confession. “I care about you too much not to go.”
“That’s odd. Because I care about you enough to make you stay.”
She bit back a cry of desolation. God’s mercy, how hard it was to keep her resolve when he said things like that! “I’ll ruin your life.”
“You’ll be giving me a life.” He fussed with the bandage. “You’ll be pulling me back from the dead.”
She sucked in a ragged breath and desperately tried again. “I’ll ruin your career.”
He shrugged a shoulder as casually as if they were discussing the weather. “It’s ruined either way, because if you leave London, I’m leaving my position to come after you.”
Her watery eyes widened at that promise.
“I mean it, Veronica. If you go, we go together.” As he said that, a determination so fierce pulsed from him that the intensity of it made her tremble. “But I’d sure as hell rather stay right here with you.”
Her throat tightened as a second tear spilled free. “You can’t—wecan’t.” Grief swelled inside her as pitiless as when her mother died. “I’m a convicted criminal… You’re a baron, a King’s Counsel—”
“Damn King’s Counsel.” He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Damn the law.” Another kiss to punctuate his words. “Damn the barony.” He released her hand and leaned over to stare down at her. “Damn everything else but you and me.”
He reached toward her chest. She thought he would touch the bandage on her shoulder. Instead, he tenderly fluttered his fingertips over the breastbone that guarded her heart. Her pulse spiked beneath his fingers.
“Marry me and let me spend the rest of my life sparring with you, arguing with you…loving you. I love you, Veronica. I’d be mad not to.” He curled a smile for her. “You might just sink a sword into me if I didn’t.”
A bubble of laughter escaped through her tears.
“I need you, Veronica. And you need me.” He traced an invisible pattern over her breastbone. “So let’s just admit it and be happy together, all right?”
Heedless of the pain, she grabbed his shirt and pulled him down to her to stare into his eyes. His mouth lingered a hairsbreadth from hers. “Let’s get something straight, shall we? I’m strong and independent, more than capable of taking care of myself. I don’tneedyou, Merritt Rivers.” When he began to argue, she interrupted, “But I very much want to be with you.”
He held his breath. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes,” she whispered, unable to find her voice beneath the emotions cascading through her, a swirling mix that left her both light-headed and elated at the future now waiting for her. Forbothof them. “I love you, Mrs. Fitzherbert.”
He grinned and kissed her.
Epilogue
January
Three months later
Veronica held tightly to Merritt’s hand as they hurried down the front walk of Charlton Place. Large, delicate flakes of falling snow were rapidly blanketing the city and casting a white sheen over the ebony carriage waiting for them, with its uniformed footmen in dark-blue velvet and four matching black horses. On the path leading to the carriage, red rose petals from the Duke of Hampton’s greenhouse contrasted brightly against the snow.
Behind them, their friends and family spilled out onto the front portico of the duke and duchess’s grand London house. They’d all gathered to celebrate Merritt and Veronica’s wedding, and now they waved goodbye and tossed more rose petals into the air. When Veronica paused to glance back, wanting to imprint this scene into her mind forever, Merritt affectionately placed a hand to her lower back to guide her onward. Home was waiting for them.
The footman opened the door. Merritt tossed him a sovereign, and the man nodded gratefully. “Thank you, my lord.” Then he sketched a bow to Veronica. “My lady.”
