Page 22 of A Happy Beginning

“Unrepentantly.”

He slid ever closer to her. “And if I promise to spend time beneath your bedchamber window here, will you spy on me some more?”

“Spend timewith me, Duncan, and I’ll have no need to spy.”

That was an offer he would gladly accept. “I’ll spend every minute I can with you, love.”

She sighed, her breath tickling his lips. “I love when you call me ‘love.’”

He brushed his mouth over hers, kissing her slowly. She slipped her arms around his neck once more. He settled his arms around her waist. The late evening sun shone warm on them as he held her and kissed her and thanked the heavens for bringing her to Scotland.

“I have something for you,” he said.

“You do?”

He held her hand in his and led her out of the garden. “I explained to Squire Reynolds that you were owed back wages— that Haddington wouldn’t pay what you are owed.”

“I was afraid he would refuse.”

They turned the corner of the house and took the path leading to the stables. “Mr. Reynolds is a good man. He insisted that Haddington either send with me the money he owed you, or that he pay you in kind.”

“I’m to be paid?” She’d grown so accustomed to being mistreated that a good outcome fully surprised her.

Duncan slipped his arm around her waist and tugged her up next to him. “Haddington owed me wages as well, so we worked out an agreement.”

He led her into the stables, past Will and Johnny, past Aiden, and to a small, windowed stall at the back of the building. “I accepted this as payment of his debt.”

“The filly?” She looked up at him, eyes wide.

“She is yours, my dear. Yours to raise and train and make your own.”

“Where will—shelive?”

There was far more in that question than the stabling of a horse. “She will live here, my dearest, sweetest Sophia. She will live here with us.”

A sudden redness rimmed Sophia’s eyes. “Us?”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Will you stay with me, love? Will you stay here and make this a home for the both of us?”

She took a shaky breath. “Us?”

“We’ve a tradition in the Buchanan family, one only recently adopted. A cantankerous, stubborn Scotsman finds himself desperately in love with a warm, caring, beautiful Englishwoman, whom he somehow convinces to marry him.”

Her heart leapt to her throat.

“I’d like to continue the tradition, my dear,” he said. “Would you consider it?”

“Marrying you?”

He brushed his thumb along her jaw. “I’d be the happiest man in all the world if you would.”

Joy bubbled through her, filling the aching voids left by a lifetime of heartache. “And I’d be the happiest woman.”

He kissed her fully, truly, then pulled her into his arms. “I love you, my darling.”

She nestled more snugly into his embrace. “Ours is to be a happy ending, it seems.”

“A happybeginning, love. A tremendously happy beginning.”