Читать книгу The Complete Regency Bestsellers And One Winters Collection - Rebecca Winters - Страница 69

They arrived back in England twelve days later having apprehended the riff-raff of Delsarte’s minions and dispatched them into the hands of the British Service. They had also taken Sylvienne to a village outside Paris, to be installed in a beautiful old farmhouse Hawk had procured.

Her mother had been full of praise for her new husband and kept whispering that this was exactly the sort of man she would have picked had she been young again. This reconfirmed for Aurelia that Sylvienne had always been an adventurer and the marriage to her academic and timid father had been doomed from the beginning. Their parting was not their daughter’s fault after all, and even that small understanding released a guilt that Aurelia had been cursed with.

Braeburn House was quiet as they came up the front steps and she hoped that her father’s health had not failed and that the house had run smoothly in the weeks she had been gone. She had written before they had left for Paris, explaining everything, and Hawk had employed a man at the warehouse to deal with business there.

Leonora saw her first and her eyes rounded in delight.

‘Lia. Lia. We knew you were coming because Mr Shavvon had come to tell us, but so early…’ She threw herself at Aurelia, tears of joy running down her cheeks, but pulling back a little as she saw Stephen beside her.

‘Lord Hawkhurst. Welcome to our family.’ The words were shyly said and, looking up at her tall and beautiful husband, Aurelia could well see why. There was not one single part of him that looked ordinary.

‘Rodney will be here soon and Mr Beauchamp.’

‘Mr James Beauchamp? Why?’

‘He is not at all as we thought him, Lia, and he has formed an attachment to Prudence which she heartily returns.’

Such news was so surprising Aurelia could hardly ask the next question. ‘How did you come upon him?’

‘Rodney brought him around.’

‘And Papa? How did he take to all this?’

‘He smiles at James as if he knows him. In a way he does, too, because from the drawings of Papa as a young man there is a family likeness.’

The shouts of Harriet and Prudence stopped speech as the twins rushed in. ‘We have been watching for you, Lia, from the bedroom.’ They curtsied to Lord Hawkhurst before gathering Aurelia to them and Harriet began to speak. ‘The warehouse has been run by Mr Steele since you have been gone and he comes in with news of the day each evening.’

‘A good choice, then? I should have known you would be able to find a stellar employee.’ Aurelia turned to her husband with a smile on her face.

‘He hired a nurse for Papa, too, Lia. A real nurse who has been using ways to get Papa to walk more and eat by himself. A doctor comes, too, each day, from the hospital.’

Later that night Aurelia and Stephen lay together in the Hawkhurst town house, rain against the windows.

‘Before you came into my life, everything was difficult.’ Aurelia’s finger ran across his chest drawing circles as she spoke. ‘I thought that I should never know this…this…’

‘Bliss?’ he supplied and smiled as she looked up at him. Tonight under the candles her eyes glowed with a quiet happiness and her hair lay across him, the silk binding their bodies together. ‘Perhaps there is some God-given rule that allows those who have gone through hell to find heaven afterwards?’

‘Your uncle Alfred certainly thinks so.’

‘I have never seen him as happy as I did at dinner tonight.’

‘When we return to Atherton it would be lovely if he could come with us. He does not enjoy the city and…he seems lonely here.’

Hawkhurst swallowed, a sudden thickness obstructing his throat.

‘I cannot imagine what would have happened to me if I hadn’t found you, Aurelia. You are the only person who has ever truly understood me.’

He rolled across her, enjoying the curves of her body, lifting her hand up to kiss the small ring on her third finger that he had procured for her in Paris.

‘This is for ever, my darling, and I promise I will always love you.’

‘For ever,’ she returned and then her lips came up against his own, sealing the bargain.