"Honeymoon?" Alex blurted out. "I have appointments all week that-"

"Can be canceled." He was walking toward the door.

"Not all of them."

"Then, I'll let you out of bed occasionally to attend them," he said, exiting into the quiet of the hall.

"Don't think you can just-"

"Make love to you day and night?"

"No… I mean"-she took a small breath-"did you say day and night?"

He smiled. "And anytime in between…"

Her answering smile was instant. "With such cogent argument, how can I refuse?"

"How indeed, considering I'm so much larger than you-which you like, as I recall. Also, I'm intent on having my way with you-which you also like, and aside from all this talk of sex, I'm thinking at my age we really should seriously contemplate having a child right away. So you see, making love becomes not only a pleasure but a duty. Are you interested in being a dutiful wife?" he inquired, a wicked gleam in his dark gaze, his deep voice lush with suggestion.

"If you agree to be a dutiful husband."

"You have my word on it, Lady Ranelagh." He smiled. "I'll be diligent in my duty, zealous even."

"How nice."

"Almost as nice as my finding you," he replied, gracefully descending the main staircase as though she were weightless in his arms. "I bought Leighton's painting, by the way."

"Knowing him, it cost you dearly once he knew you wanted it."

"It was worth every shilling. I prefer my wife not be naked on the walls of Grosvenor House. And Cassels turned out to be cooperative too."

Her gaze took on a new directness. "I hope you're not implying censure of any kind."

"Not in the least, darling. Pose nude all you wish." He nodded at the footman opening the front door. "I'm not averse to having a very large personal collection of your modeling."

"Would you buy them all?"

"I already have." His shoes crunched on the gravel of the drive as he moved toward his waiting carriage.

Her eyes widened. "You're going to be very hard to handle."

Leaning through the open carriage door, he deposited her on the seat. "So will you."

She grinned. "It should be interesting."

"It'll be more than that, darling." His smile was tantalizingly close as he sat down beside her, his voice heated, low. "It will be pure, undiluted pleasure…"

Epilogue

The viscount's family enlarged apace, with a baby born in each of the first three years of their marriage. The two boys and a girl brought enormous joy to Sam, who had given up the hope of ever having children. While Alex found that happiness wasn't so much in independence as in the heart of the whirlwind that made up her life as wife and mother. Her golf improved as Sam designed more courses; their children turned into youthful prodigies on the Lennox fairways. And the parents who had questioned the suitability of the match came to be the most partial advocates of the union-not to mention the most adoring of grandparents.

As a great admirer of his wife's artistic talents, Sam encouraged Alex to open a gallery of her own, and in the bargain he had his own private gallery of all her portraits he'd purchased. And now when Alex chose to sit as subject, in deference to the man she loved she posed in a modicum of clothing.

They would remark from time to time, with loving glances, how lucky they were to have run into each other that day at Leighton's. In the interests of harmony, Sam always refrained from mentioning he would have found her wherever she was. In those days, he'd been single-minded in pursuit.

With marriage, his former amusements were no longer of interest. He'd found love and contentment in full measure, and even the most skeptical in society were silenced. The Viscount and Viscountess of Ranelagh, despite the brevity of their courtship, were truly a love match.

It just went to show, the gossips would say-not without a certain incredulity-even the most unbridled libertine could be tamed.


Susan Johnson

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