Marion Lennox - The Prince’s Captive Wife

‘I think we might just find room,’ she whispered. ‘If you truly mean it.’

‘How can I not mean it?’ He gave a whoop of triumph, lifted her high and brought her down to kiss her. ‘My love. My Cinderella wife.’

‘My Cinderella husband,’ she said. And then she had a thought. ‘Um…does this mean I’m not a princess any more?’

‘Inherited title,’ he said, sounding smug. ‘Ancient lineage. Titles can’t be removed by mere abdication. You’re still a princess.’

‘They won’t call you prince round here. You’ll get called Rass, like you got from the men when you worked with them years ago.’

‘Rass sounds great to me.’

‘Then R…Rass?’

‘Yes, my love?’

‘Do you suppose we could go inside?’ she whispered. ‘Everyone’s watching.’

‘And what would you like to do that you can’t do while everyone’s watching?’

‘Come inside and find out.’

It was almost two in the morning when she stirred. This had happened these last few nights, the vague feeling in the small hours that things were not quite right.

How could they not be right tonight? She was coiled in her husband’s arms, tucked tight against him, skin against skin, naked, exposed, as one with the man she loved.

This was where she wanted to be for the rest of her life. She knew it with the same certainty as she believed Andreas. He’d said it last night in the aftermath of lovemaking.

‘There’ll be times I have to go back to Aristo-for family reasons-but they’ll be visits. Short trips, Holly, and you’ll be at my side. As my wife. With no clipped wings, either. You’re not my captive wife, my love. You’re my heart, my family, my world.’

She listened now to the echoes of the words held in her heart all this night, and she knew his words would stay with her until the end.

But still this unease.

She stirred and he let her go, reluctantly, waking and smiling as she wound a sheet self-consciously round her nakedness and headed for the kitchen where the pile of groceries that had arrived the day before lay yet unpacked. It had been too big a day for Honey to find time to unpack the non-perishables.

Where…?

Ten minutes later she was back. Andreas was still awake, watching for her. He held out his arms to welcome her, but she shook her head.

‘Andreas, I have something…I have somewhere we need to be. Will you come with me?’

He didn’t question her or protest. Silently they slipped on jeans, shirts and boots. Deefer didn’t stir. It had been a big day for one small puppy, and he graciously let them go to the big outside without him.

Holly didn’t speak even as they left the house. Her heart seemed too full for speech. She took his hand and silently led her love down through the home paddock, to the ancient gum where her Adam lay.

She paused at the grave. Andreas looked at her for a long moment in the moonlight, searching her face-and then he stooped before the grave.

He ran his hands through the soft leaf litter, and then he traced the wording on the gravestone with one gentle finger. The moon was full. Holly could read the inscription plainly as Andreas traced the words.

Adam Andreas Cavanagh. Her baby, loved with all her heart.

‘My son,’ Andreas whispered at last, and there was a world of regret in his voice. He looked up at Holly and she knelt with him, her hand resting over his on the gravestone.

‘Adam was a blessing,’ she whispered. ‘A joy. Tomorrow I’ll show you photographs. He looked just like his daddy.’

‘I so wish…’

‘Hush,’ she whispered and she tugged his face to hers and kissed him tenderly. The grief she’d felt for all these long years was in his face now. A grief shared.

But it was right to share this grief. Adam had his father, here now to help tend his grave. And in the future…

‘Andreas, do you remember, years ago when we made love? Do you remember that we took precautions?’

‘They obviously didn’t work,’ Andreas said wryly.

‘No. They didn’t.’

Something in her voice gave him pause. He drew back, his brow snapping down into a question, searching her face. Stunned.

‘Uh huh,’ she said-and she managed a wavering smile. The emotions within her were almost too strong for smiles.

‘What…are you saying…?’

‘I’m saying we proved once we make a fiery couple,’ she whispered. ‘We’re a match for any condom, it seems. Us and our kids.’

‘Our kids.’

‘We’ve lost Adam,’ she whispered and her fingers traced the contours of grief still etched on his face. ‘But he’s with us still, in our hearts. And in eight months’ time…’

‘You’re pregnant,’ he whispered. ‘You’re pregnant!’

There was no mistaking his reaction. It was said with a hushed, whispered awe. Joy flooded his face, light after dark. ‘You’re having our baby?’

‘I didn’t know how to tell you,’ she whispered. ‘I wasn’t sure. I was just starting to suspect. But we had a load of groceries come in with the road-train today and I sort of happened to put a testing kit on the end of the order.’

‘So it’s confirmed?’

‘It’s confirmed,’ she said and smiled properly this time and waited for him to take her in his arms.

But he didn’t. It was almost as if he had too much joy to take in. Slowly he turned again to the tiny grave. He touched the headstone again, with such tenderness that Holly was awed herself.

‘I wasn’t here for your mother when you both needed me,’ he said softly, tenderly. ‘I swear I’ll be here for her from this day on. And you, my son…You’ll be a part of our family for ever.’

It was enough. She was weeping, smiling through tears, not caring that tears she’d always thought of as weakness were slipping down her face and there was no way she could stop them. She could see the glimmer of tears in Andreas’s eyes as well.

We’re a couple of cry-babies, she thought.

But then Andreas smiled at her and took her into his arms and held her against him. This was no cry-baby. This was her prince. Her man.

‘My family,’ he whispered. ‘My lovely, captive bride, captive no more. It’s me who’s the captive now. Captured by love. For ever.’

He tugged her back into the soft bed of leaf litter. He kissed her tenderly and he told her the things that were in his heart.

And later, back in the warmth of the house, he loved her all through the night, and into the dawn-and into the rest of their lives.

Marion Lennox was raised in a farming community in practically the only part of Australia that’s wet all year round. With no entertainment but reading and no one to talk to but cows, it’s no wonder she turned to writing. But they didn’t put romance writer in the career handbook at her local school, so she pursued something she thought might make her a better living.