Read Online The Mammoth Book of Regency Romance by Candice Hern, Bárbara Metzger, Emma Wildes, Sharon Page, Delilah Marvelle, Anna Campbell, Lorraine Heath, Elizabeth Boyle, Deborah Raleigh, Margo Maguire, Michèle Ann Young, Sara Bennett, Anthea Lawson, Trisha Telep, Robyn DeHart, Carolyn Jewel, Amanda Grange, Vanessa Kelly, Patricia Rice, Christie Kelley, Leah Ball, Caroline Linden, Shirley Kennedy, Julia Templeton - Free Book Online

arms. She should regret his weakness, his absence, but all she felt was vast relief. Her mind dwelled on Kinvarra’s unexpected gallantry. The fleeting moments of affinity. The powerful memories of their life together, memories that tonight stirred poignant sadness instead of furious resentment.
    Kinvarra had turned the chair towards the hearth and all she could see of him was a gold-limned black shape. He was so still, he could be asleep. But something told her he was as wide awake as she.
    “My Lord?” she whispered.
    “Yes, Alicia?” He responded immediately. “Can’t you sleep?”
    “No.”
    Their voices were hushed, which was absurd as there was nobody to hear. The wind rattled the windowpanes and a log cracked in the fireplace. He had been right, the weather had worsened.
    “Are you cold?”
    “No.”
    “Hungry?”
    “No.”
    “What is it then, lass?” He sounded tender and his Scottish burr was more marked than usual. She remembered that from their year together. When his emotions were engaged, traces of his Highland childhood softened his speech.
    Strangely that hint of vulnerability made her answer honestly. “Come and lie down beside me. You can’t be comfortable in that chair.”
    He didn’t shift. “No.”
    “Oh.”
    She huddled into the bed and drew the blankets about her neck as if hiding from the cruel truth. Hurt seared her. Of course he wouldn’t share the bed. He hated her. How could she forget? He just played the gentleman to a lady in distress. He’d do the same for anyone. Just because Alicia was his wife didn’t make her special.
    When they’d first married, she’d tried to establish some rapport between them in the daylight hours, but when she’d rebuffed him in bed, he’d rebuffed her during the day. He hadn’t wanted her childish adoration. He’d wanted a woman who gave him pleasure between the sheets, not a silly little girl who froze into a block of ice the instant her husband touched her.
    She blinked back the tears that had hovered close so often tonight. She’d cried enough over the Earl of Kinvarra. She’d cried enough tears to fill the deep, dark waters of Loch Varra that extended down the glen from Balmuir House, his ancestral home.
    “Hell, Alicia, I’m sorry. Don’t cry.” She opened her eyes and through the mist of tears saw he’d risen to watch her. The fire lent enough light for her to notice that he looked tormented and unsure. Nothing like the all-powerful earl.
    “I’m not crying,” she said in a thick voice. “I’m just tired.”
    His mouth lengthened at her unconvincing assertion. He reached out with one hand to clutch the back of the chair. “Go to sleep.”
    “I can’t.” She wondered why she didn’t let him be instead of courting further misery like this.
    “Damn it, Alicia …” He drew in a shuddering breath and the hand on the chair tightened so the knuckles shone white in the flickering firelight.
    “I’m not … I’m not attempting to seduce you,” she said, and suddenly wondered if she was being completely truthful. What in heaven’s name was wrong with her? Surely she couldn’t want to revisit the humiliations of her married life.
    Kinvarra was as taut as a violin string. Tension vibrated in the air. “I know. But if I get into that bed, there’s no way I’ll keep my hands to myself. And I don’t want to hurt you again.
I couldn’t bear to hurt you again.”
    She was shocked to hear the naked pain in his voice. This wasn’t the man she remembered. That man hadn’t cared that his passion had frightened and bewildered his inexperienced bride.
    This man sent excitement skittering through her veins and made her ache for his touch. She raised herself against the headboard and drew in a breath to calm her rioting heartbeat. Another breath.
    Her voice was soft but steady as she spoke. “Then be gentle, Sebastian.”
    Alicia hadn’t used his Christian name since the earliest days of their marriage. The shock of hearing