DeliveredIntoHisHands by Charlotte Boyett-Compo Page A

her spine. Putting a bookmark into the old-fashioned
novel she had been reading, she closed the musty cover and laid the book on the
table beside the settee.
    “You are feeling better, milord?” she
asked, folding her hands in her lap.
    “I’m as back to normal as I’ll ever be,” he
said with a grin.
    “Are there abnormal things about you I
should know, milord?” she asked.
    He came into the room with the easy grace
of a man assured of who and what he was. His black silk shirt and black leather
pants fit his frame as though he’d been poured into the garments. Just watching
him was a delight for the eyes.
    “My friends would answer aye to that
question,” he told her. “May I sit with you?”
    “Please,” she said. Her heart was racing
and the closer he came to her the harder it pounded against her rib cage.
    He sat down beside her and turned,
stretched his arm over the back of the settee. “What were you reading?” he
inquired.
    “A silly romance novel,” she said and felt
her cheeks burn. She risked a look at him—expecting the condescending smirk
Alyx always gave her when he asked the same question.
    The Vampire wasn’t smirking. He was
smiling. “Is it any good?”
    “Not really,” she said, trapped in the blue
depths of his gorgeous eyes.
    He lowered his voice. “Is there sex in it?”
    “Bounteous amounts I’m afraid,” she
admitted.
    “Learning anything useful?”
    “Milord!” she reprimanded then realized he
was teasing her and not being vulgar. She gave him a tremulous smile. “You are
wicked, milord.”
    “You have no idea, milady,” he said with a
wink. “Trust me when I say you’d have me no other way.”
    Antonia felt a tightening in her lower
belly at that wink. It suggested things that she longed to experience.
    “I spoke with your mother,” he said.
    “Oh?”
    “She tells me you would prefer to remain at
Castle Blackthorn when we are Joined.”
    That was the first Antonia had heard of it
and she tried to hide her surprise. All she could do was latch onto the last
word he’d said. “Joined?”
    “Aye,” he answered. “Is that what you want,
milady?”
    “To Join with you?” she countered, trying
to buy time to understand why her mother would say such a thing. “I don’t
remember you asking.”
    “My pardon. I shall correct that,” he said
and slid from the settee onto one knee. He reached for her hand, turned it to
the side, brought it to his lips and kissed the underside of her wrist before
placing her palm flat against his chest—over his heart.
    Beneath her hand she could feel the steady,
sure beat of his heart. The silk shirt was cool but with her hand pressed so
tightly against him she could feel the heat of his body. He was staring into
her eyes with such intensity, she felt a strange ache between her legs.
    “Lady Antonia Blackthorn, I pledge my body
and soul to you. My sword hand to your protection. My wealth to your security
and my loyalty to you and you alone. I will do everything in my power to make
your life as enjoyable and comfortable as it is possible to do. I swear before
the goddess that I will never lay a hand to you in anger nor cast you aside for
another. All this I vow as my unbreakable oath to you. Would you do me the
honor of becoming my bride?”
    Her gaze roamed over his handsome face. He
was not as pale as he had been when she’d gone to his room that first night.
She visually traced the bold sweep of his eyebrows, the deep creases in his
forehead and beside his eyes, then lowered her scrutiny to his lips. They were
thinner than she might have preferred and the right side of his upper lip rose
higher than the left but the dimple in his chin made up for that. Moving on to
his broad shoulders and the hint of chest hair showing in the open neck of his
shirt, she had to contain the sigh that wanted desperately to escape. His
muscular thigh flexed as he knelt and she knew if she put her hand there, it
would be hard as