To Woo a Widow (The Heart of a Duke #10)(40)

“You don’t have to—”

He slashed the air with his hand. When he spoke, his words were steeped in impatience. “This is not about what transpired last evening.” And what now littered every scandal sheet in London. “This is about me, asking you to not leave with your family, but to remain here. With me.” He held her gaze squarely. “Marry me.”

And just like that, he held out every gift she’d never believed possible for herself. “Miles,” she said, her voice hoarse with emotion. How did he not see that in being here, he was taking apart her heart?

“Please,” he added, the faint entreaty reaching inside her.

She closed her eyes a moment. “I cannot,” she said with an aching regret, which knifed away at her insides. “I—”

“I love you,” he said.

The air left her on a swift exhale and Philippa pressed a palm against her mouth.

“I love you,” he said cupping her cheek with infinite gentleness and she leaned into his caress. “And if I were skilled in verse, I’d offer you the pretty words you deserve.”

“I never needed sonnets and poems,” she said achingly.

“But you deserved them, anyway,” he rasped, stuffing the special license in his jacket front. “If you reject my offer because you do not love me, I can accept that with the hope you will find a man deserving of you, who earns the gift of your heart.”

A sound of protest stuck in her throat. How could he not know that he was the only man her heart would ever beat for? “I love you,” she whispered. “And that is why I cannot marry you.” A tear slipped down her cheek. Followed by another. And another. He caught them with the pad of his thumb, dusting away the remnants of her sadness. “There will come a time when you require your heir, Miles—”

“My mother had no right speaking to you about what I required.” Oh, God. He knew that. “I do not require an heir,” he bit out. “My brother can carry on the blasted bloodline.”

“Then want one,” she amended. “You will want one.” For isn’t that what all gentlemen ultimately wanted?

“Oh, Philippa,” he said, his words husky. He cupped her cheeks in his hands. “Do you truly believe I would ever think an heir more important than your life?” He passed his strident gaze over her face. “There do not have to be babes. There are precautions I will take. I would neither want nor ask you to risk your life for that. You are all I want. You, Violet, and Faith.”

A shuddery sob spilled past her lips. Oh, God. How was it possible to love him any more than she already did? And yet…in this moment, she fell in love with him all over again. Tears flooded her eyes. She wanted to be selfish and she wanted to take what he offered, and spit in the face of his mother, and all Societal conventions. But she could not. “You deserve more.”

He pressed his forehead against hers and released a painful laugh. “Do not decide for me what I need or deserve. You are more. You are everything. I want you. I love you. And I will love your daughters as if they are mine and you three will be all I ever need.”

Her shoulders shook with the force of her silent tears. For so many years she’d been taught to believe she served one purpose so that she’d come to believe it—until now. Now, with Miles promising her his heart and forever, putting her before all, he gave her the one gift she’d thought to never know. But the doubts lingered…she wet her lips. “You are certain? You—?”

Miles took her mouth under his in an aching kiss and then drew back. “I love you,” he whispered, his breath fanning her lips. “Marry me?” he asked, once more. “Let me spend the rest of our lives showing you the happiness you have been so robbed of.”

As the years’ worth of self-doubt and purposelessness lifted, she was filled with a buoyant light. Philippa touched the necklace at her throat. “There is something I must do,” she said softly.

His arms fell uselessly at his side. The muscles of his throat moved.

She smiled slowly. “I must inform my family that we cannot leave yet.” He went still. “Not until at least after our wedding.” And as Miles took her lips under his once more, warmth suffused every corner of her person.

After years of having given up on happiness for herself, it seemed she’d been wrong—happily-ever-afters did exist.





Epilogue


Sussex, England

One month later

“What is it? Pleeease, tell me,” Faith pleaded, as she walked between Philippa and Miles through the gardens of their Sussex estate.

Miles set aside the picnic basket and snapped open a white sheet. It fluttered in the early summer breeze and then he laid it down on the ground. “Soon,” he promised.

“Soon. Soon.” Violet parroted back and, squealing, all but leapt from Philippa’s embrace into Miles’.

As he took the small girl in his arms and tossed her into the air laughing, easily catching her, Philippa stared on. Warmth swelled in her breast. And just as she’d fallen in love with Miles Brookfield, the Marquess of Guilford, that day in Hyde Park just over one month earlier, she fell in love with him all over again in the gardens of their country estate.

Faith turned to Philippa and pleaded with her eyes. “What is the present, Mama?”