His heart pounded at the thought of her fading away, and he tilted her face up to his. “Hear me, Mara Lowe. There is only one place for you. Here. In my arms. In my life. In my home. In my bed. If you were to leave, you would not give me the life I wanted. You would leave my life with an enormous, empty chasm at the center of it.”

He kissed her again, and said, softly, “I love you. I think I’ve loved you from the moment you attacked me on a dark London street. I love your strength and your beauty and your way with children and piglets.” She smiled, tears welling in her eyes. “You left your gloves at the home.”

“My gloves?”

He lifted her hands in his, pressing kisses to each set of bare knuckles. “The fact that you don’t wear them makes me at once mad with frustration and mad with desire.”

She looked down at her hands. “My bare hands make you mad with desire?”

“Everything about you makes me mad with desire,” he said. “Chase has Lavender, by the way.”

Confusion flashed in her beautiful eyes. “Why does Chase have Lavender?”

“It’s a bit of a tale, but the short version is that I couldn’t bear to be without her. Without some part of you.”

She laughed, and he realized he would carry that pig for the rest of his life if it would keep her laughing. “I love your laugh. I want to hear it every day. I want to be through all this darkness and devastation. I want happiness now. I want our due. I want what we’ve deserved from the beginning.” He paused and stared deep into her eyes, willing her to understand how much he loved her. “I want you.”

She nodded. “Yes.”

He smiled. “Yes?”

“Yes! Yes to all of it. To happiness and life and love.” She hesitated, and he saw the dark thought spread through her. Saw it in her eyes when she looked up at him. “I’ve done so much to ruin you. To hurt you.”

“Enough.” He kissed her quiet, lifting his lips from hers only when she was loose in his arms. “Don’t hurt me again.”

The tears welled over. “Never.”

He wiped them away with his thumb. “Don’t leave me ever again.”

“Never.” She sighed. “I wish we could start anew.”

He shook his head. “I don’t. Without the past, there would be no present. No future. I don’t regret a moment of it. It all brought us here. To this place. To this moment. To this love.”

They kissed again, and he wished they were anywhere but here, in front of all of London.

She broke the kiss and smiled at him, bold and beautiful. “I won.”

He matched her smile. “You did. The first time anyone but me has won in this ring.” He waved a hand in the direction of the oddsmaker. “Mark it in the book. The win goes to Miss Mara Lowe.”

The crowd roared their disappointment, proclaiming foul play and bad bets. He didn’t care. Chase would manage them, and the most bitter among them would no doubt be gaming before the hour was out.

“What do I win?” she whispered in his ear.

He grinned. “What would you like?”

“You.” So simple. So perfect.

“I am yours,” he said, kissing her. “As you are mine.”

She laughed. “Always.”

And it was the truth.

Epilogue

On the eve of her wedding, Miss Mara Lowe stood at the window high on the third story of the family wing of Whitefawn Abbey, staring down into the dark gardens below. She pressed her hand to the cold glass, watching as the window fogged beneath her touch, then removing her hand to reveal the blackness beyond, dotted with reflections of the candles lit around the room behind her.

With a small smile, she traced a finger between the little starlike spots, connecting the dancing flames, distracted enough by the task not to hear her future husband’s approach until he came into view, framed by her marks on the glass.

And then his arms were around her, his hands spreading wide across her body, pulling her back against him as he set his lips to the place where shoulder met neck in a long, lingering caress. “You smell like lemons.”

She smiled and sighed, leaning into him, her own arms coming to capture him where he held her, fingers threading through his.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked when he finally raised his head.

She turned in his arms and told the truth, a lovely, freeing thing. “Another time here at Whitefawn. Another time here, in this room.”

He did not pretend not to have noticed where they stood. Instead, he looked to the bed where she’d left him twelve years earlier and said, “Do you think anyone’s slept in it since that morning?”

She laughed at the unexpected reply. “I don’t, honestly.”

He nodded, all seriousness. “It’s a pity.”

“It’s to be expected, don’t you think? After all, I was to have died there.”

He pulled her close again, lifting her arms around his neck. “But you didn’t,” he said softly, and the sheer pleasure in the words sent a thread of excitement through her.

She met his gaze. “I did not.”

“Neither did you marry that morning.”

She shook her head. “I did not.”

He brought her tight against him, their bodies aligned to each other without an inch of space, heat spreading through her as though they were discussing something altogether different than that day, twelve years earlier. “Lucky me,” he said before stealing her lips in a long, lush kiss, his tongue stroking deep, a promise of pleasure to come.

Again and again.

From this day, forward.

She was so enthralled by the caress that she did not notice that he had walked her across the room until the backs of her knees were against the bed. She gasped in surprise as he toppled her to the bedsheets with virtually no effort, following her down. “You see what a shame it is?” He teased, dropping a line of soft, stunning kisses along her jaw. “This is a very comfortable bed.”

Her hands moved of their own volition, coming to settle in his hair. Lifting his mouth from her. “Temple,” she said, softly.

He looked up, dark eyes entirely focused on her.

There were a dozen things to say. A hundred.

He shook his head. “No. No more demons. No more memories.”

Tears sprang to her eyes. “How could you say that? Here, of all places?”

He smiled, and his hand came up to caress her cheek. “Because the past is the past. I’m far more interested in the present.”

He was a magnificent man.

“I love you,” she said, wanting to make sure he knew it. Wanting to make sure he never doubted it.

He kissed her soundly, and there, in the caress, she found contentment.

When he broke the kiss, it was to reach his bad arm above her head and say, “Since we are speaking of presents . . .”

She marveled at the ease with which he moved, so soon after he’d been wounded. Feeling was returning to the arm, and while he might never be able to fight with his former precision, he was expected to mend.

Thank God.

Unaware of her thoughts, he produced a parcel that she hadn’t noticed on the bed earlier. “Happy Christmas, my love.”

She smiled. “Christmas is tomorrow.”

He shook his head. “No, tomorrow, we marry. Christmas will have to come early.” He grinned at her. “Open it.”

She laughed. “You look like one of the boys.”

The boys, all of whom had come to Whitefawn for the holiday—all of whom would likely stay on the enormous estate for years to come, no longer orphans, but wards of the Duke of Lamont.

He was their protector. Just as he was hers.

She put her hand to his warm, evening-rough cheek. “Thank you.”

He raised a brow. “You don’t know what it is, yet.”

She smiled. “Not for the gift. Well, for the gift, but for all the others as well. For loving them. For loving me. For marrying me. For—”

He leaned down and stemmed the tide of words, distracting her with a long, lovely kiss. “Mara,” he said softly when he finally lifted his lips from hers. “It’s I who should thank you, love. For your strength. And your brilliance. And your boys. And for marrying me.” He dropped a quick kiss on her lips. “Now open your present.”

She did, pushing him off her to sit up and unwrap the package, spreading brown paper back to reveal a familiar white box, embossed with an elaborate golden H. She lifted the lid from the box and pushed back the festive red paper to reveal . . .

Gloves.

He’d bought her gloves. A dozen of them. More. In more colors and fabrics and lengths and textures than she could imagine. Yellow kidskin and lavender suede and black silk and green leather.

She lifted them from the box, laughing. Spreading them across both their laps and the bedcovers. “You’re mad.”

He lifted a long white velvet opera glove, sliding the fabric through his fingers. “I want you to have as many pairs as there are days in the year.”

She smiled up at him. “Why?”

He lifted her hands to his lips. Kissing the rough hewn knuckles one at a time, punctuating his words. “Because, I never want you to be cold.”

It was strange and frivolous and entirely beyond understanding. But it was the most beautiful thing anyone had ever said to her. And they were beautiful gloves.

She lifted a pair of short gloves in silver satin and moved to put them on.

He stayed her with a touch. “No.”

She smiled up at him. “No?”

He shook his head. “When we’re alone, I like you without them.”

Her brow furrowed. “Temple, you’re not making sense.”

He smiled and pressed a kiss to her neck before lifting his head and whispering, hot and wonderful at her ear, “When we’re alone, I shall keep you warm in other ways.”