“God’s liggens,” Ash grumbled when they finally reached his suite. “That was our last dinner party.”

“It was our first dinner party,” his wife pointed out.

“Precisely. One was enough. I thought they’d never go home.”

“It’s only ten o’clock. I thought our guests left rather early. We’d scarcely finished opening Christmas gifts.” She unloaded an armful of objects onto the bed. “I must say, Nicola’s is the most delicious.”

With that, Ash heartily agreed. He stole a bite of plum cake from the slice in Emma’s hand. “All her talk of science and precision is only a ruse, I tell you. That woman is a witch with an enchanted oven.” He plucked a mysterious knitted thing from the heap and dangled it from his thumb and forefinger. “What is this? Is it for the baby?”

“Perhaps. But who can know with Penny.” Emma took it from his hands and turned it this way and that. She counted the holes that one might surmise were meant for chubby infant arms and legs. “One, two, three, four . . .” She poked her finger through another round opening. “Five? Oh, Lord. I think she’s made us a jumper for the cat.”

“Good luck dressing him in it.”

She gave him a coy smile. “I think Khan appreciated your early Boxing Day gift.”

He went to the dressing table to remove his stickpin and undo his cuffs. “The man’s been going on and on about being owed a pension. I managed to get my revenge.”

“How is giving him a cottage at Swanlea a form of revenge?”

“Isn’t it obvious? He can’t get away from me now. He’ll be wishing he were a butler again when I send our son over for cricket lessons.”

“Oh, and there’s this one.” Emma sat on the bed. She lifted a hand-bound scrapbook into her lap and paged through it lovingly. “What a dear Alex was. I can’t imagine how much effort this must have taken, compiling all these headlines.”

Ash was a bit peevish. “Well, what about the effort I went to, generating them?”

His wife ignored him. And justly so.

Miss Mountbatten’s gift was secretly his favorite, too. She’d collected all the broadsheets and gossip papers with the Monster of Mayfair’s exploits splashed across them, then carefully cut and pasted them into a memento book. The closest thing to a biography he’d ever have, and considerably more interesting.

He turned away from the dressing table and crossed his arms over his chest. “I hope that scrapbook has an empty page or two.”

“It won’t need any.” She raised an eyebrow in warning. “The Monster of Mayfair will not make the papers, ever again.”

“Too late, I’m afraid.”

Ash reached into a drawer for the early copy he’d wrangled of tomorrow morning’s Prattler. Then he held it up for her, revealing the headline:

Duke Tells All.

She gasped. “You didn’t.”

“Oh, but I did.” He read aloud from the first paragraph. “‘The Duke of Ashbury reveals the tragic tale behind the Monster of Mayfair and professes his undying love for the seamstress-turned-duchess who healed his tortured soul.’” He flung the paper on the bed near her elbow. “Sensationalist rubbish, naturally.”

She covered her mouth with one hand and reached for the newspaper with the other. He watched her face as she scanned the page. Her eyes reddened and watered.

Ash didn’t make much of it. Along with feeling poorly in the mornings, she seemed to be on the brink of tears at any time of day.

She sniffed. “This is best gift I can imagine.”

“Is it? I suppose you don’t need the other, then.” He pulled the small box from his pocket and placed it on her lap. “I’ll let you have it anyway. You never did have a proper one.”

She stared at the box with weepy eyes.

“It’s a ring,” he said.

“I love it.”

“Emma, you haven’t opened it.”

“Yes, I know. I don’t have to. I love it already.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“No it’s not. We won’t unwrap this child in my belly for months yet, and I already love him.”

“Or her,” he added.

Ash had taken to hoping for a “her.” A baby girl meant they would need to try at least one more time.

After a moment, he grew tired of waiting on her and opened the box himself, revealing the ring—a heart-shaped ruby set in a gold filigree band.

“Oh,” she sighed.

“Don’t weep,” he warned her. “It’s not even that big of a stone.”

Sitting down beside her, he removed the ring from the box and slid it on her third finger.

She held her hand away from her body and wiggled her fingers so the ring could catch the light. Then she hopped to her feet and ran to the dressing room. When he followed, he found her standing before the full-length mirror, admiring her reflection as she pressed her hand to her chest, then laid a finger to her cheek, then extended her hand as if offering Mirror-Emma an opportunity to bow over it for a kiss.

Ash chuckled at her little display of vanity. Then he looked into the mirror and regarded himself.

Other than the small one he used for shaving, he hadn’t viewed himself in a mirror for more than a year.

It actually wasn’t that bad.

Well, the scars looked bad. That wasn’t in question. But he’d grown used to that fact by now, and he felt a bit stupid for avoiding his own reflection all this time. It wasn’t as though he could change it.

He stepped forward, embracing her from behind and laying a hand on her stomach. “What if he’s afraid?”

“Afraid of what?”

“Of me.”

She leaned back against him. “Oh, my love. Don’t ever think it.”

“I had hoped—” He cleared his throat. “I had been thinking, if he’s raised with me from the beginning—in the country, where there aren’t so many people about . . . maybe he wouldn’t be quite so frightened.”

“He won’t be frightened at all.”

Ash wished he could share her certainty. He knew how small children reacted to the sight of him. How they cringed and clung to their mothers’ skirts. How they cried and screamed. How every time, it ripped his wounds open all over again. And how it would gut him to be beheld that way by his own son.

She didn’t know. She couldn’t know.

He didn’t speak again until he could keep his voice measured. “Even if he isn’t afraid, he’ll have friends. He’ll go to school. Once he’s old enough to know, he’ll be ashamed.”

“That’s not true.”

“I know how boys are. How they treat one another. They tease; they bully. They’re cruel. When he’s a young man, it will be different. Then I can teach him about the estate, his responsibilities. But as a child . . .” He blinked hard. “My father was perfect in my eyes. I couldn’t bear to be a source of shame to my own son.”

“Our children will love you.” She turned in his embrace, putting her arms around his neck. “Just as I do. When they’re still in arms, they’ll tug at your ears and tweak your nose, and coo and laugh just as all babies do. A few years later, and they’ll beg to ride on your shoulders, never caring if one of them is injured. When they go to school, they will be nothing but proud. A father who’s a scarred war hero? What could be more impressive to boast about in the schoolyard?”

“Being injured in battle doesn’t make a man a war hero.”

She stared deep into his eyes. “Being their father will make you their hero.”

His heart twisted into a knot.

Drawing him down to her, she pressed her forehead to his, nuzzling. “It will make you my hero, as well.”

He put his arms around her, clinging tight.

Emma, Emma.

Had it truly been only a matter of months since she’d burst into his library? Little could he have known that a vicar’s daughter in a hideous white gown would be the ruin of all his plans. The undoing of him, as well. What had she done to him? What was he going to do with her?

Love her, that was what.

Love her, and protect her, and do anything she asked of him and more.

Perhaps he hadn’t accomplished any feats of extraordinary valor at Waterloo. But he would do grim, bloody battle for her, and for the child she carried, and for any other children God saw fit to give them.

He made a silent vow to her—and to himself—that he would never hide the scars again. The entirety of his wretched past had led to this moment, and to deny them would be to deny her. Others might view the scars as his ruin. Ash knew the truth. They were his making.

And Emma was his salvation.

He turned her around so that they both faced the mirror. “Well, if this is a portrait you’d be willing to hang in the stairwell . . .”

“Proudly. And it’s going in the drawing room. Right over the mantel.”

“It will have to be a large painting to fit us all.”

“All?”

“You, me, and our ten children.”

Her eyes went wide in the mirror. “Ten?”

“Very well. You, me, and our elev—”

A furry lump of gray uncurled from an open hatbox, stretched, and walked over to rub against Ash’s leg, emitting a sound like the rumbling of carriage wheels over cobblestones.

He amended his statement once more. “You, me, our eleven children, and a cat.”

“This is becoming a very crowded portrait.”

“Good,” he said.

And, to his own surprise, he meant it.

Good.

Then he caught her hand and turned it over, peering at her fingertips. “Have you been stitching?”

“Goodness, the way you say that. As if it’s embezzling or smuggling.” She pulled her hand away. “As a matter of fact I have been stitching. I’ve been working on your Christmas present.”

“What could that possibly be? You already have me full up on waistcoats and trousers and every other possible garment.”

“Oh, this present isn’t a waistcoat, nor any other article for your wardrobe. It’s mine to wear.” From the back of the closet shelves, she withdrew a small bundle. “Be forewarned, if you dare compare it to unicorn vomit . . .”

“I will not.” He held up one hand in an oath. “On my honor.”

“Very well, then.” She held two of the tiniest straps he’d ever seen to her own shoulders, and let the remainder of the bundle unroll, all the way down toward her toes.

Ash was speechless.

Black silk—and not much of it. Black lace—even less. A few spangles here and there—the perfect amount.

Emma Grace Pembrooke, I love you.

“Well?” She cocked one hip in a saucy pose. “Do you like it?”

“I can’t tell,” he said. “You’d better put it on.”