“But for all the blackguard set into motion.”
“Plus I’m nearly naked—as are you.” A grin on his face, his hand went along her shoulder, his fingers sliding under the loose locks of her wet hair as all the pins had long since been lost to the sea. “He sent you to me, even if the goal of it was my downfall. But were it not for him, I never would have met you.”
She took a deep breath, filling her lungs, and then seethed it out. “That does not seem enough to wipe his sins clean.”
“Don’t worry, love, he will get his due.” Reiner glanced to the rear of the cove. “Maybe not today, but a man like that will get his due. It is coming.” He looked to her. “I thought you had given up vengeance.”
“The man made me hate you—hate you, Reiner.” She shook her head. “I am rethinking the thought that vengeance does have its place.”
His hand curled around the back of her neck. “No, you were right.”
“I was?”
“I’m sorry—it was my blasted need for vengeance that put you in danger. Vengeance that fed my bloody arrogance in that you and Vicky would be safe no matter what twisted minds were at Wolfbridge. And I was wrong. Vengeance obscured what I should have easily seen in front of me—the threat to you and Vicky.”
“You couldn’t have known Bockton was a lunatic.”
“I should have.” His head lowered between them.
She lifted her hands, sinking her fingers into his hair, tugging his look up to her. “You didn’t fail me, Reiner. I wanted you to catch him. I wanted to help to unhinge the terror he and his partners have spread across the land. I wanted that peace for you.”
His head leaned into her left hand, the scars brushing his cheek. “Vengeance is not a game I am willing to play any longer—not when I have the world sitting in front of me.”
She inhaled, relief sinking into her lungs. “But what of Bockton?” She pointed out to the now empty sea, the waves lapping lazily on the shore.
“Falsted told me the name of the ship before we left Wolfbridge. I already sent word to the Royal Navy to pursue theMinerva. Wherever Bockton goes, the navy will be after him. And they are under direct orders to drag him back to England to stand for his crimes.”
Her bottom lip jutted up in a frown. “Then let it be soon.”
“Exactly.” He leaned toward her, his lips brushing against hers. “But until then, it is not worth our worry. Not worth another breath of our time. Especially when I have a twice-made duchess to bed.”
She laughed, pulling away for a second as she looked about them. Emptiness. Her gaze travelled back to him, a wicked smile on her lips. “Then what is stopping you?”
He gave a strangled groan, setting the length of her backward into the sand and hovering above her for a long breath, as though he were imprinting the picture of her body against the sand into his mind. “Absolutely nothing, my duchess. Absolutely nothing.”
{ Epilogue }
The Wolf Duke was alone no more.
Far from it.
Especially not with his three-year-old son, Jacob, dangling from his neck, wedged onto the left side of his lap and making faces at his younger sister, Penelope, cradled in Reiner’s right arm.
His body hadn’t been his own since his son had started walking. The boy was always climbing atop him. Clearly born with his mother’s love for scaling precariously tall objects.
But he wouldn’t have it any other way.
From the settee, Reiner looked across the library at Sloane lifting their other twin girl, Priscilla, in her arms and set the babe’s cherub face just above her shoulder. Priscilla gurgled up air, then smiled at him, her chubby cheeks expanding impossibly wide.
Both of his girls smiled far too much for their six months on earth. So much so, it was unnerving at times. Also a trait from their mother.
But he’d take that too.
Happily so.
Sloane leaned over the table, her look studying the seating chart Vicky had just created for the upcoming house party that would descend upon Wolfbridge in a few days. She shifted Priscilla tight into her bare left arm.
His look paused for a second on Sloane’s scars. To see them now, he had to truly stare, for they had become just a part of her—just as her eyes and her nose and her smile and her hair were.