Epilogue
“‘As their boat sailed into the sunset, Sir Barnabas enfolded Lady Felicity in his manly arms, safe now from all their enemies and assured of future happiness,’” the Duchess of Ravenhill read aloud from Mrs. Cadwallader’s latest romance novel with a contented sigh.
Beside her on the sofa, the Duke of Ravenhill rubbed his wife’s feet under the woolen blanket and glanced to the fire to make sure it required no further logs yet. The room was warm and cosy on this cold February night and Rose’s cheeks glowed pinkly.
Dorian had invited her to read her latest romance novel to him more out of enjoyment in hearing her voice and seeing the animation of the story on her face rather than from genuine curiosity about the words of Mrs. Cadwallader.
Now, however, with the final paragraphs, his interest was more stirred.
“‘You will be my wife, Felicity, he said fiercely, fixing her with the deep blue gaze that had made the pirates quail and now thrilled his beloved’s heart,’” Rose continued.
“‘I am already your wife, Barnabas,’ answered Lady Felicity’s voice with complete certainty.
‘I knew it the moment I set eyes on you in Constantinople.’ Their lips met, the promise of their love was fulfilled and Lady Felicity knew that they would never be parted again. ’”
With a somewhat less contented sigh now, Rose laid down the book.
“That is where these books always end,” she complained. “That is my sole criticism of Mrs. Cadwallader and others like her. They lead you on through the romance of the story and then stop at the altar, if not before, as though marriage itself were not the greatest part of the adventure.”
Dorian’s dark eyes twinkled with fun as he took up the book and glanced through its pages.
“You wish to read of their housekeeping arrangements and how often they visit one another’s relatives?” he inquired blithely. “Or do you want to know the fabric Lady Felicity chose for their drawing room sofa?”
Rose giggled and shook her head.
“When you put it like that, I suppose I don’t,” she answered although her expression remained thoughtful. “Still, I am left wishing to hear more of Sir Barnabas and Lady Felicity after the story ends.”
“I think you want to know exactly how ‘the promise of their love was fulfilled,’” Dorian suggested with a raised eyebrow and curve of his shapely mouth. “Indeed, I think you want to hear of how Lady Felicity was filled full by Sir Barnabas, not merely fulfilled.”
Rose laughed again, her face now blushing with something more than the warmth of the room.
“Perhaps I do,” she admitted, welcoming the kiss Dorian bent to bestow on her lips. “That is what comes of reading so many of your naughty books in the library downstairs.”
“My books, Duchess Rose? They are half yours,” he told her with mock indignation and reveled in her further blushes and laughter.
He could not then resist tickling her and stealing further kisses when she was helpless. Rose halted him with a deep kiss of her own and a hand that stole down to his groin and took possession of his most intimate parts.
Dorian gave a groan of surprise and then pleasure as she pressed and rubbed him gently, causing an immediate surging of heat in his blood.
“I cannot resist you, Rose, any more than I think your Sir Barnabas could resist his Felicity,” he declared. “I believe he claimed her there and then in that boat, on top of the pile of sailcloth.”
“Really?” Rose mused, her blue eyes big and wondering and her lips softly brushing his as she spoke. “The pirates didn’t get very far from land before Sir Barnabas broke free, rescued Lady Felicity and sank their ship. They could have rowed back and found a priest first.”
“Back to civilization first?” Dorian laughed, shaking his head.
“Out at sea, they are bound only by their own morals, not society’s.
No, Sir Barnabas would not have waited and it seems to me that Lady Felicity’s blood was equally hot.
They would have consummated their marriage first and found a priest later. ”
“Well, then, maybe Sir Barnabas rowed them to an island and built a fire and put the sailcloth out on the sand,” suggested Rose. “Lady Felicity had never even kissed a man before Sir Barnabas, you know. He would have wanted to make her comfortable.”
Dorian nodded at this, tenderness in his eyes as he stroked Rose’s face. He glanced across at the rug in front of the fire and then back to Rose.
“Yes, he would. You are right. Remind me, what were they both wearing?” he asked her.
“At the end? Lady Felicity was dressed in the disguise of a Spanish gypsy woman. Sir Barnabas…I’m not sure but he was definitely shirtless by the time he fought the pirate captain, look.”
Rose flicked back through the pages of the book to one of the few sketched illustrations, its lines showing a square-jawed and strong shouldered man clashing swords with an earring-wearing pirate captain of evil expression. Tied to the mast of the ship, the buxom Lady Felicity looked on in horror.
Grinning, Dorian stood and unfastened his waistcoat and shirt, his jacket having already been abandoned earlier in the evening once the fire had warmed the room sufficiently. Pulling the shirt over his head, he stood bare-chested before Rose and extended a hand down to her.
“I have built us a fire for warmth, Lady Felicity, and found us a haven of perfect privacy on this beautiful island. Now, I must make you mine before the world comes to find us.”
As he had hoped, Rose immediately grasped and responded to his play-acting, clasping his hand and allowing herself to be drawn to her feet.
“Barnabas, I have wanted you for so long, but I am afraid,” she said in character. “You must show me what you mean.”
“My ring is already on your finger and my heart is in your keeping,” replied Dorian. “Put your body now in my hands and I will show you the greatest of joys.”
He ran his hands lightly over Rose’s curves, finding her breasts fuller and more delectable than ever. His wife’s breath caught in her throat as he began to kiss and gently bite at her neck while his fingers worked at the fastenings of her dress.
“Yes, oh yes, oh yes,” she sighed and then recollected herself slightly. “Ah, but Lady Felicity does not know yet what awaits her, does she? I ought to ask you what you are doing.”
“Preparing to strip you naked and feast my eyes on your naked charms, as is my right as your husband,” Dorian pronounced, speaking both for himself and for Sir Barnabas as the bodice of her dress gave to his ministrations and then the skirts and underskirts too, Rose’s little sighs and moans of pleasure music to his ears.
“Then, I shall feast my hands and lips…”
Dorian pulled Rose down to the rug before the fire with him now, naked except for her gartered stockings, her shapely limbs rounded and rosy in the firelight. She gave a gasp at the first light touch of his fingers on her mount of Venus.
“I shall satisfy your desires and then my own,” he whispered to her, drawing up a stockinged thigh to his hip as he kissed her. “When I am done, none may ever take you from me, by natural right as much as law.”
How sweet were Rose’s cries as Dorian’s fingers found her womanhood and lightly traced the slippery folds and the tight, warm entrance.
“Softest, sweetest wife,” he breathed, sliding within and caressing her swollen nub with his thumb as he returned to their island fantasy.
“What treasures your body and mine contain, Lady Felicity. What hidden delights you will discover with me. I promise that your maidenhead is not worth one hundredth of the joys of our marriage bed.”
Rose’s moans grew attuned to the rhythm of his hand as Dorian’s expert fingering continued between his words and light suckling of her breasts.
“Yes! Dorian, yes…” she cried out after some minutes of these attentions, arching her back as her body spasmed in its pleasure. “Oh, Dorian.”
“Surely, you mean, Sir Barnabas,” he teased her, despite the growing demands of his own lust. “It would be a terrible thing to call your husband by another man’s name on your wedding night.”
Pink and damp with pleasure and happiness, Rose laughed breathlessly, sitting up and taking Dorian’s face in her hands to kiss him while he unfastened his lower garments and produced his manhood.
“Sir Barnabas!” she exclaimed with pretended shock and very real appreciation. “What can you possibly be planning to do with that?”
“Come here and I’ll show you, Lady Felicity,” he growled and they wrestled one another back to the rug, the firelight playing on their naked limbs.
Cuddled safely in Dorian’s arms after their game, Rose closed her eyes and smiled to herself, biding her time. Physically and emotionally contented, she also had a secret she had been keeping, waiting until she was sure, and then for the right moment to share it.
“So, that was the story of Sir Barnabas and Lady Felicity’s wedding night,” said Dorian, stroking Rose’s back lazily. “Should I write it down and send it to Mrs. Cadwallader, do you think?”
“I can’t imagine Mr. Cadwallader would like that,” Rose giggled. “He might call you out, or publish a complaint in the papers. You had better not, Dorian. Or, if you do write it down, share it only with me.”
“Yes, you’re probably right. Next time, I do think we might play with the boat idea too. Maybe they stop on the way back to shore and Lady Felicity kneels down.”
“Mmmm,” Rose breathed, snuggling into Dorian’s shoulder again and wriggling her hips slightly in response to this suggestion.
“We both like that idea then. After the boat, what do you think happens next?”
The moment had come. In response to her husband’s question, Rose now took his hand and placed on her belly, just above her mount of Venus. She covered it with her own.
“This happens,” Rose told him very softly, and then tipped up her face to see his expression.
Dorian’s realization was quick. He was no innocent and must have known it was a growing possibility and yet her communication still seemed to affect him profoundly. The tenderness on his face deepened and then he rapidly kissed Rose’s belly, her breasts, her throat, her lips, in rapid succession.
“You’re sure?” he asked and Rose nodded. “Do you know when?”
“I haven’t bled since our first night together,” she told him. “I spoke to Jane and her midwife and they both thought that would likely mean a September baby.”
Dorian’s handsome face seemed to suffuse with the same joy that Rose felt.
“I wondered if it had happened yet but I was afraid to hope,” he admitted. “I didn’t know how to hope, or even if I should.”
“Our child is coming,” Rose confirmed with a smile. “You are to be a father, Dorian.”
He laid his head against Rose’s belly, smiling.
“I will be here to welcome you when you arrive, little one,” he said to the still almost undetectable presence in her womb. “I promise that you will be as loved as your mother, and that nothing will harm you while I live…”
Rose stroked Dorian’s dark hair.
“He or she will be a playmate for Jane’s Charlotte and little Hal,” she smiled. “A kind of cousin. I have said nothing of this to Jane, but it seems to me that the past is so far away from such little children. We need never specify what kind of cousin, as long as we are all discreet.”
Dorian raised his head and nodded.
“They will be cousins; our baby, Charlotte and…Hal,” he agreed, laughing as he spoke and lying back down beside Rose. “Charlotte still persists in calling her new brother ‘Ginger Biscuit’.”
“It is very funny,” Rose laughed too, “but Jane should have thought before telling Charlotte that she might name the new baby. He does have a fine head of red hair. You did well to convince Charlotte that her little brother would better be named for King Henry VIII who was also red-headed but clearly she still prefers her first choice.”
“Indeed. Well, Charlotte will not be invited to name our baby. Have you thought about names?”
“If it’s a boy, I would like one of his names to be Ambrose for my father,” Rose admitted, to Dorian’s approval. “If it’s a girl, I was thinking of Juliana. It’s a little old-fashioned, I know, but…”
Dorian kissed Rose’s lips.
“If we have a baby girl who looks like her name should be Juliana, then that is what we will choose. Julian is a fine name for a boy too.”
“Ambrose Julian…” Rose mused. “Ambrose Julian Dorian Voss.”
“Juliana Eugenia Rose Voss…” returned Dorian.
On the rug before the fire, the Duke and Duchess of Ravenhill whiled away the rest of the evening making love and dreaming all the possible names and features of their future children.
The End?