Once Upon a Christmas by Nancy Lawrence

Author:Nancy Lawrence
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: christmas, historical, regency, clean romance, georgette heyer, christmas tree, traditional, yuletide, austen inspired
Publisher: Anglocentria, Inc.

Chapter 11

In the long gallery at Bridgewater House the very next afternoon, Breck Davenant brought Nerissa Raleigh’s fencing lesson to an unexpected and abrupt halt.

“Enough!” he said impatiently. “There is no use pleading with me, for the answer is still no!”

He had stripped off his form-fitting coat, the better to teach her the proper manner in which to grip the foil. His hand had helped position her slim fingers over the hilt, and when her wrist had sagged from holding the unaccustomed weight, he had stepped up behind her to grip her wrist, adding his strength to hers. Thus he stood, with Nerissa’s delicate frame backed against him, his long arm extended out with hers and her shining black curls nuzzling against his chin.

“Please, won’t you reconsider? I don’t see any harm in it, truly,” Nerissa coaxed, turning just enough to look up at him with an impossibly naive light to her brown eyes.

Breck doubted very much that Miss Nerissa Raleigh ever failed to get her way whenever she directed just such a gaze toward another living creature. Heaven knew, he was having a deuce of a time resisting her.

He let loose his hold of her and took a few steps away, and said with as severe a tone as he could manage, “You are wasting your breath. No matter how beguilingly you may beg, I will not take you to a gaming den and I shall never smuggle you into a boxing saloon!”

“Then how am I to learn of such things?” she asked reasonably. “How am I to describe Count du Laney’s foray into a gambling hell unless I have seen one firsthand?”

He frowned slightly. “‘Who the devil is Count du Laney?”

“He is the hero in my book. I told you that before,” she said in a mildly accusing tone. “He is the very sort of character who would gamble away a fortune, then kidnap an heiress and force her to marry him just to replenish his coffers! So you see, I must know about gaming and such things.”

“You would do better to write about him attending church services on Sunday,” Breck recommended darkly. “You shall not learn of such things from me. I have been many things in my lifetime, but a corrupter of innocents, I am not!”

“I am not an innocent,” Nerissa replied in a tone that did little to hide her keen disappointment.

Breck’s anger abated slightly. She was as innocent as a lamb, but he didn’t think she would at all relish being told so. He said instead, “Let us not argue. My mind will not be changed on this, Nerissa, so you may save your pleas. Now, shall we continue your instruction in the finer points of swordplay?”

She wanted to argue with him, or at the very least plead with him to take her to some dangerously masculine haunt; but the rather pointed look he cast her convinced her she would be better served to let the subject drop.

Nerissa picked up the foil and assumed the stance Breck had shown her earlier.

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