Page 59 of How the Duke Saved Christmas

Her fingers trembled as she lifted her hand to look at it in the darkness, as if she simply couldn’t fathom it. Or as if she knew what words he was about to utter, and feared them.

He held her gaze in his as he brought her hand to his lips and kissed the ring. “We’ve been given a second chance at the future we were meant to have, and this time, I won’t let you go.”

“You’re…proposing?”

“You can’t tell?” He sent her a teasing grin. “I’m naked. Please don’t make me lower to one knee on the floor.” He kissed her and mumbled against her lips, “Marry me, my love.”

“No.”

The single word gutted him. How the world didn’t open up and swallow him he had no idea. All he could do was stare down at her and somehow remember to breathe.

He rasped out, “We’ve been through this—”

Hell.He’d been through hell since the accident, since almost watching her die before his eyes only for her to rip his heart out when she broke off their engagement. Two years without each other…two years of comparing every woman he met to her and unfairly finding every woman lacking. Two years of coming to the realization that he would never find love again, only for fate to thrust her back into his life. He wouldneverlet her go again.

“We’ve been given a second chance, don’t you see? We belong together, and I want that, Clara—I want to marry you, but I also want to do it right this time. No secret understandings, no breaking off…because I still love you.” He allowed himself a leisurely sweep of his eyes down her body as far as he could see beneath the covers and drawled, “And I’m pretty certain you still love me. So marry me. Give us another chance at a happy life together.”

Her eyes filled with tears, and she choked out, “That’s the problem.” She brushed his hair away from his forehead with trembling fingertips and shook her head. “I can’t give you a happy life.”

“But you can. You’ve proven that you can claim back the life you once had, and you willneverbe a burden to me.” He turned his head to kiss her fingers. “I would be blessed to have you as my wife.” He lifted a brow. “Besides, you might not have a choice in the matter.”

Her lips parted with surprise. “What do you mean?”

“We weren’t careful tonight. If we’ve gotten with child, you’ll have to marry me. I won’t let my child be born a bastard, and I certainly won’t let you face scandal and ruin.”

Grief darkened her face. “I haven’t gotten with child.”

“You don’t know that.”

“But I do.” She pulled in a shaking breath and admitted, “I can’t have children. And that’s why—” She swallowed hard and breathed out, “That’s why I can’t marry you. I can never be a true wife to you.”

He searched her face for answers and found none. “What makes you think you can’t have children?”

She rolled onto her side, putting as much of her back to him as possible, and buried her face in the pillow. “After the accident, my courses…stopped. Only recently have they come back, and they’ve been unpredictable…sometimes barely there, sometimes not at all. The doctor said that it was a sign that the accident had changed my body, that I should never expect to have children.” She whispered into the pillow, “I can’t give you the children you want or the heir the dukedom needs.”

He slipped his arms around her and pulled her against him. Her pain seeped into him— No, it was more than pain. It was utter anguish, and he could feel her slipping away even as he tightened his hold around her.

Then, she whispered so softly that he barely heard her, “You need…to marry someone else.”

He stilled with his mouth against her nape as quick anger burned through him. “The hell I will.”

He shoved himself out of bed and began to pace to shed the pent up frustration that had been eating at him since she arrived on his doorstep.

She watched him at each step, her eyes glistening with tears in the dim firelight. A glutton for punishment, he grabbed up the fireplace poker and stirred the coals until small flames flared up and lit the room, until he could see the wet streaks on her cheeks.

“I won’t marry a woman I don’t love.” He stalked slowly back toward the bed, his frustration growing with each step. “Damn it, Clara—I wantyou. No one else. Can’t you see that?”

“But you also want a large family, at least a half dozen children to fill up Northbourne.” She shook her head. “You could never have that with me.”

He couldn’t lie and say that didn’t matter to him. Butshemeant so much more. “Then we’ll adopt. Lots of children are in need of loving homes, and we’ll give them exactly that.”

“You’re a duke.” The look she sent him was one of desolation, and he knew that she must have made these same arguments to herself dozens and dozens of times since the accident. “Adopted sons aren’t allowed to inherit titles. Heirs of the body only. If we marry, every time you look at me you’ll be reminded of all I can never give you. You’ll grow to resent me, and I can never live with losing your love like that.”

“I already have good heirs for the dukedom.” He stopped at the edge of the bed. “I have my brother Tristan, and Aaron and Bennie will continue into the next generation. What I don’t have is you.” He touched her cheek. “I won’t leave you, Clara, and I sure as hell won’t let you leave me. Not again.”

He leaned down to kiss her, and the salty taste of her tears on her trembling lips nearly undid him.

“So marry me, Clara,” he murmured. “Having you for a wife and whatever kind of family we ultimately have together would make me the proudest, happiest man in the world.”