The Beloved One by Danelle Harmon

Author:Danelle Harmon [Harmon, Danelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Romance, Historical, Fiction
ISBN: 9780380792634
Google: XW4ZPQAACAAJ
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1998-11-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

With Amy before him, Charles slowed Contender up before the Leighton's house three minutes later. He sent the horse trotting around the house and into the back garden; there, safely out of sight from the road, he leaped down, pulled Amy from the saddle, and held her against his chest as though he'd never let her go.

He was shaking with fury.

"Amy." He felt the blood pounding in his ears. "Amy." He rested his brow against the top of her hooded head and just held her for a long, emotional moment. "What the devil would have happened if I hadn't chanced to come along when I had?"

"Oh, they would've left me alone, eventually," she said, her voice muffled against his chest. "They just like to have a little sport with me, but I don't think they'd actually —"

"Have a little sport with you?"

"Well, not much. You see, last week Mira gave me a knife that I could've used if things got beyond my control —"

"I'd say they were already well beyond your control, madam, when I happened along! Does Sylvanus know about this?"

"No." And then, with a little shrug of her shoulders, "You know he probably wouldn't do much about it, anyhow. I — I am not Ophelia or Mildred."

She said it without pity or sadness; just a simple acceptance of her place. "Oh, poppet," Charles murmured, his heart aching for her, and reaching down, he pushed her hood back, cradled her face between his hands, and turned it up to his.

She was lovely. The past sixteen months had further defined her already striking features, but otherwise, she was unchanged. The same huge dark eyes still gazed up at him. The same glossy hair was still parted in the middle, plaited, and pinned up beneath a little cap. The same sweet mouth still warmed him with its shy smile.

The same craving to kiss it still burned up his blood.

"Amy," he said softly, as he lowered his head to hers, and before he even realized it, he was kissing her with a hunger too long denied. She melted against him. Sweet, soft lips clung to his with a passion that rocked him to his boots. Her tongue came out to touch, to taste, his, and he felt her hand against his heart, where such a great swell of emotion rose that it nearly sent him to his knees. And somewhere deep inside of him, that part of him that he dared not listen to, and had tried to ignore all these long, lonely months, sang with joy and leaped with happiness and screamed that this was what he'd been searching for all this time, this was what he had needed to heal, this — this quiet love, this unconditional acceptance of all his flaws and weaknesses — was the key to finding his way back to himself, and the man he had once been. Oh, Amy, Amy, Amy. . . .

So lost was he in the kiss, so lost was she in returning it, that neither saw the figure who appeared at the door and stopped short with a gasp.

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