Surrendering to a fiery.., p.29
Surrendering to a Fiery Lady: A Historical Regency Romance Novel, page 29
“Know this,” Elliot muttered darkly. “Come near my wife again, and I will make your life miserable. Seek out a way to drive us apart and I will not be so merciful as I am this time as to not hurt you. In fact… I think you should leave the country.”
“W-what!” Lord Chester spluttered.
“Leave, for good.” Elliot pushed the man away, watching him stumble and struggle to stand. “Or I start telling the ton of what kind of man Lord Chester really is, paying the staff they trust to turn against them, and using actresses to cause trouble at home. Do you wish the ton to hear of your scandals?”
Lord Chester stumbled back further, turning red in the face.
“Speak!” Elliot demanded, wanting to hear the defence of a man who had worked so hard against his happiness.
“She shouldn’t have married you,” Lord Chester muttered angrily.
“Greedy man. You only ever wanted the money.”
“And you did not?” Lord Chester asked wildly, gesturing to Elliot. “A penniless duke? Look at her and tell me you wanted anything but that.”
Looking over his shoulder, Elliot saw Ophelia approaching him, her eyes wide. Elliot extended his hand, waiting for her to approach. She did so quickly, placing her hand in his.
“She means everything to me,” Elliot said, not taking his eyes off Ophelia. “Much more so than I would deign to explain to a manipulator such as yourself.”
The more Elliot thought of it, the more he realised that since the moment he had met Ophelia, there was something there between them. The attraction, the excitement, the bond that had them returning to one another, even when they were confused—they’d always had the capacity to fall in love. He just had to wait for it to happen.
“Remember my warning,” Elliot said, turning his gaze on Lord Chester. “Leave, or I tell the ton of who you really are.”
As Elliot led Ophelia toward the door, he smiled to see her wave at Lord Chester, a final goodbye that she clearly took pleasure in giving. Once they were out the door, they both strode toward the carriage that awaited them, climbing in quickly.
“What now?” Ophelia said, so happy that she could not sit back in her seat.
“We could journey home,” Elliot offered, then gestured to her upright posture. “You look too excited for a long journey in a carriage, though.”
“I am overawed. Yes, that is the best way to describe it. I am full of all this agitation I harbour toward Gertrude and Lord Chester. I find I cannot relax yet.” She shook her head, unable to do it. “There is something I want to do, but doing it seems too absurd. I wonder what you will think…” She eyed him as she spoke, her blue eyes narrowing a little.
“If you wished to confuse me, then you have accomplished it quite brilliantly,” he pointed out, watching as she leaned past him, looking out toward the carriage window. They turned two streets before she knocked on the wall of the carriage, urging it to stop. “Why are we stopping?” he asked.
“Because before we leave, there is somewhere I wish to take you.” She stepped down from the carriage before Elliot could, leaving him to trail after her. “We will be back shortly!” she called to the driver, then she led a hurried path down the road.
“Ophelia? Care to give me a hint as to where we are going?” he called, practically having to run after her. “Ophelia!”
He was reminded once more of her athletic nature, for she ran with ease, clasping the skirt of her gown around her legs. He had to sprint to catch up with her, turning a corner where he nearly collided with her. They both spun in a circle, grasping onto one another to stop themselves from falling over.
“It’s here.” She nodded her head behind him. “See? This is the house I told you not to sell. It is the home I grew up in with my father.”
Elliot angled his head, looking to the house he’d heard so much about it. It was a fine house, built in the Palladian style and made of red and white brick with pillars at the front. Each window was vast, no doubt flooding the interior with great beams of light.
“It’s quite something,” Elliot said softly, realising that this house now belonged to him and Ophelia. “We should come stay here some time. We should bring Grace, too. I think she would like it here.”
“I’d like that.” Ophelia’s smile grew wider at his side. “For so long this has been my home, but I wanted you to know something I realised this last month when I was away from you.”
“What is that?” he asked, watching as she looped her arm through his.
“My home is with you.” She seemed to laugh at herself with the words. “How odd that sounds!”
“Odd? Why?”
“Well, I have made a home with a man I pulled out of a river. It’s a good job I pulled you out, is it not? God forbid I had left you there to drown!”
He laughed with her, agreeing with her without hesitation.
“I am very glad indeed that you, of all people, were there to pull me out.”
Epilogue
Seven Months Later
“I should have heard something by now. Shouldn’t I have heard something?” Elliot paced back the other way across the hall, his gaze constantly darting up the nearest staircase to the landing above. It didn’t matter or help, for no one came to update him. He was left alone to his thoughts and worries.
“Elliot, calm yourself.” Grace’s words made him turn on his heel and pace back the other way.
In the sunlight that was fading through the windows, the room had turned a murky shade of grey. The darkness was only fought off by the single candle that the butler had lit and left beside them on the hall table. Grace’s face was now lit by that lonely candle, in an orange glow.
“How can I be calm?” Elliot asked wildly, not once desisting with his walking. “You can tell me to be calm, but I can see it in your face that you are worried too, Grace.”
His sister did not deny it. Grace turned her face down and her hands fiddled in her lap, like a child looking for something to toy with to distract herself.
Elliot let his eyes dance across his sister for a minute before he returned to the incessant glancing toward the staircase and the landing above it.
In the last seven months, Elliot’s sister had changed a little. At times, there was still something of the child about her, but mostly, she was growing up. He had seen how Ophelia’s attentions and friendship had made Grace blossom. She no longer hid in rooms or acted out to find some wanted attention. She offered opinions of her own in debates, opinions that were well read and researched, and she made more effort to act her own age.
Ophelia has done this. She has given Grace a new lease on life.
Elliot longed to talk to Ophelia of how much had changed in these last few months, but at this moment, he was forbidden from being allowed anywhere near her. Ophelia was tucked away in her chamber in a distant room of the house. The only thing audible from that room were Ophelia’s occasional cries of pain and the doctor’s hasty orders, delivered to maids to fetch more hot water and sweet tea.
When footsteps sounded across the landing, Elliot practically ran to the bottom of the steps, jumping up on the lower step and angling his head high, waiting for news. Mrs Mouser appeared, running hastily with the skirt of her gown in her hand.
“Mrs Mouser? Is all well? Is anything wrong?” Elliot asked with impatience. He’d heard enough horror stories to know that nothing was certain. Childbirth was a dangerous affair.
Please, Ophelia, you must be well. You must survive this.
His mind kept turning to the child that was to be born, too. He wondered if it would be a boy or a girl, and whether they would look more like him or Ophelia.
“Mrs Mouser?” Elliot’s heartbeat seemed to slow in his chest as Mrs Mouser had still not answered him. She hurried down the steps and stopped in front of him, the lines in her face revealing her tiredness and showing just how many hours she had been upstairs with Ophelia, preparing for the arrival of the child. “Please, tell me all is well.” Elliot held his breath, fearful of the answer.
When Mrs Mouser smiled, he could have danced with his relief.
“All is well, Your Grace,” she declared, her excitement palpable as she clasped her hands together. “The child is here. Healthy too, all ten fingers and ten toes, chubby little cheeks, quite red as well.” She giggled with delight. “Oh yes, quite the picture of health.”
“And Ophelia?” Elliot asked, taking a step up the stairs.
“She is tired, Your Grace, but yes. She is well.”
It was all Elliot needed to hear. He looked back to Grace, who smiled with relief and dabbed her eyes, clearly fighting off the tears that threatened to fall.
“You can go up now, Your Grace,” Mrs Mouser said, gesturing to the landing.
Elliot needed no more encouragement. He sprinted up the stairs, taking them two, sometimes even three steps at a time. On the landing, he nearly fell into the far wall in his effort to turn fast and run down the hallway. At the end of the corridor, he could see two of their maids leaving, both looking tired. One dabbed her brow with a cloth and the other yawned. They jumped out of the way as he reached their side, and one of them pushed open the door for him.
“Doctor, His Grace is here,” she called inside, barely preparing those in the chamber for Elliot’s arrival.
Elliot stumbled to a stop in the doorway, looking back and forth at the sight before him. The chamber was full of so many candles that it was bright, the apricot light dancing back and forth across the cream silks of the bed and the white marble fireplace that had been lit nearby.
Sat up in the bed was Ophelia, her head turned in Elliot’s direction. Her hair hung loose around her ears, damp and stuck to her neck in patches. There were shadows under her eyes and a pallor to her skin.
“Ophelia?” Elliot whispered, hurrying toward her as the door closed behind him. He was so relieved to see her well that he capitulated beside her on the bed, falling to his knees and reaching for her hand.
She smiled at that touch, plainly watching him as he lifted her hand and placed it to his lips.
“Worried you, did I?” she asked, with her usual teasing tone.
“Perhaps a little,” he confessed.
“Did you wear the floorboards thin?”
“No,” he lied, watching as she smirked with humour. The smile was rather weak because of her tiredness.
“Such a fibber,” she said, giggling. “I shall have to ask Grace for the truth.”
Elliot was about to ask more of Ophelia’s health when he heard the sound of a baby’s cry. He jolted at the sound, angling his head round to see the doctor on the other side of the room, with his back to them.
“He’s here,” Ophelia whispered to Elliot.
“He?” Elliot felt choked up, struggling to swallow around a lump in his throat.
It seems I have my heir—the next Duke of Northmore.
“Here you are, Your Grace.” The doctor turned back to face them with a grand smile on his face. In his arms, there was a bundle, wrapped up in tight linens. “He’s as fine a boy as I ever did see. Would you like to hold him?” he addressed Elliot.
Nerves shot through Elliot at once, but Ophelia urged him on, elbowing him. He could picture well enough she’d tease him later for his initial hesitation, but he didn’t mind. He was both elated and apprehensive. He wanted to hold his boy, but with something so delicate, he feared how to hold him right. Fortunately, the doctor passed the boy into Elliot’s hands with extreme care, even giving him tips on how to hold the boy’s head to protect him.
“I’ll give you three some time alone,” the doctor said kindly and retreated from the room. As the door closed behind him, Elliot turned and sat beside Ophelia on the bed, unable to take his eyes off the boy in his hands.
“Are you going to cry?” Ophelia whispered to him. “Do not worry if you wish to. I have cried many times. I cried with pain. Then I cried with happiness when he arrived. Mrs Mouser mopped my tears so many times there cannot be a dry handkerchief in the house!”
“It is just… I did not know this feeling was possible.” Elliot gazed lovingly down at his son, recognising the blue eyes that were so like Ophelia’s own. “This happiness.”
“I know what you mean.” Ophelia rested her head on his shoulder. “I love you, Elliot.”
“I love you, too.” Elliot angled his head, kissing Ophelia quickly on the forehead, before he looked down at his son. “And I love him.”
“Him… we shall have to think of a name, you know.” Ophelia reached past Elliot and laid a finger on the boy’s hand, watching as he twisted his hand round, trying to grab her finger. “What about Oliver?”
“After your father?” Elliot smiled to hear the name. It suited the boy well and it kept the man’s memory alive. “I think it a perfect name, indeed.”
THE END
Can't get enough of Ophelia and Elliot? Then make sure to check out the Extended Epilogue to find out…
How will Grace respond to Ophelia’s kind gesture and what will she confess?
What will Elliot think of his future brother-in-law and will he express any of his concerns?
Who will the man that Grace decides to marry be and will it be a true love match?
Click the link or enter it into your browser
http://henriettaharding.com/ophelia
(After reading the Extended Epilogue, turn the page to read the first chapters from “A Duke's Most Tempting Saviour”, my Amazon Best-Selling novel!)
A Duke's Most Tempting Saviour
Introduction
The enthralling Lady Amelia Croweley has an alternate identity to those at the local hospital where she volunteers. They know nothing of her nobility, and that is the way she and her family like it. However, problems begin to arise when the head doctor requests that she takes on a very special task… When she finds herself treating Michael, the miserable son of a Duke, her life will turn into the most scandalous adventure of all. Trouble is, once she has tasted his sinful kiss, she wants it all.
She was not looking for passionate love, but what will Amelia do when it finds her?
The fiery Lord Michael Ross, eldest son to the Duke of Rosswell, has had his entire life laid out before him. What nobody saw coming was the upcoming war, though. After a horrendous accident, Michael is at risk of losing everything to his younger brother, including the only woman he has ever desired. Just when he decides there is no point in trying to get his old life back, can a tantalising nurse change his mind?
Michael soon finds himself torn between old desires and new…
Sibling rivalry, a seemingly irreversible injury and a wicked secret of a false identity threaten to rip Amelia and Michael apart, but passion proves stronger than even the most wicked intentions. Will their sizzling connection be enough to withstand the pressure mounting against them? Can a cruel and painful accident really turn out to be fate setting two scandalous lovers on the right path to find each other?
Prologue
Waves beat mercilessly against the side of the ship, tossing it to and fro until the injured soldier, Michael Ross, son and heir of the Duke of Rosswell was not sure whether it was his injuries that pained him or the jostling of the vessel.
For days, Michael laid there in his own filth, barely able to move, only able to turn his head enough to vomit over the side of the makeshift bed that had been allotted to him. All around him were the moans and cries of other agonised men, all injured in the Napoleonic Wars that had taken them far from home just to spit them out again.
That particular night was one Michael would never forget, one when a mighty sea storm had ravished the ship so badly that men were flung from their stretchers and beds where they had been packed in like sardines.
