Her head spun as she covered her mouth, trying to keep a wave of emotion from crashing over her. Suddenly it all made sense. His absolute insistence on ending the line. His emotional distance from his father, the way he believed himself to be unworthy. “Ash.”
He still held her in his arms, his body radiating heat, but his back was stick-straight as his voice was cold. Icy even. “Even that name is a remnant of my humble beginning.”
“But Dashlane…” she started, her voice trembling.
“My given name, that my father gave me, is Preston. My mother named me Michael at birth. Not that it mattered. There was no record of me before my father. She was so frightened, she hid me away for the longest time. The other girls in the house, they called me Ash. You see, I’d grow cold in our attic room and I’d find my way down to a warm grate, still burning with embers, so that I might not freeze, and then I’d fall asleep there. In the morning, I’d be covered with bits of ash. Hence the name.”
Pain and sympathy settled like a stone in her stomach. One person should not have had to endure all of that. “How did your father find out about you?”
“She grew ill. I learned that later. She reached out to him to tell him that she’d bore him a son and begged for his help. He came. I bear too many Dashlane traits to deny my parentage. And so, he took me that very night. Apparently, I was the only child he’d successfully been able to conceive, and his first wife had already passed. He thought I was his last hope at carrying on the legacy.”
She pressed deeper into him. “And you don’t want to continue the line that was so important to him.”
He shook his head. “Everything I told you about his cruelty was true. But it was so much worse. In his mind, I wasn’t really worthy of the title. I was trash. I never did anything good enough. One misspoken word, I’d get the crop. One bent collar, I’d be sent to bed without dinner. Sometimes I didn’t eat for a week.”
She couldn’t contain her cry of anger that someone would treat a small boy so cruelly.
He looked at her then, his eyes so full of pain, she ached for him.
“If anyone were to know my secret…”
She nodded, lacing her fingers through his. “I understand. I’ll never tell a soul. Not even my sisters.”
He looked down at their joined fingers. “I’ll understand if you don’t want to marry me after this. I’m not a quality man. But I beg you. Stay away from Balstead. He’s a terrible excuse for a lord.”
Emotion had been swelling in her heart, but it wasn’t loathing or a need to reject him. She shook her head, catching his eye. Didn’t he understand. “Not marry you?”
He nodded. “I’m not the real viscount. I’m no one.”
She drew in a deep breath. “You are someone to me. You’re the man that I love.”
“Cordelia.” He crushed his mouth against hers, his kiss desperate and wanton. “Thank you for saying that but…”
“Ash.” She gave him a soft smile. “Did it ever occur to you that I never wanted a lord? That I planned to go unwed rather than be tied to one of those men?”
He pulled his chin back staring down at her. “It did not.”
Cordelia put a hand behind his head, pulling his mouth down toward hers once again. Then, she kissed him. Long and hard. “Your past is the very thing that makes you different from them. And I know that it must have been awful, but I love the man you are now. The one who is willing to let me spread my wings and fly. The one who wants to build a life together rather than just have me decorate his.”
He kissed her again. “You’re sure about getting engaged, married? I’ll understand if you want to end it.”
“End it?” She gave a small laugh. “We’ve only just begun.”
Chapter Fifteen
Cordelia sighed into his kiss. She’d never been more certain of anything or anyone in her entire life.
The fine strands of his golden hair slid through her fingers as his firm lips kissed her over and over, his tongue dancing with hers.
Their bodies pressed together, Cordelia wishing to be closer still.
She leaned back, looking up at him as the darkness settled about them like a blanket. “I know you wanted to burn down your title.”
He trailed his hand down her neck to her chest, settling on one breast, then caressing the soft flesh. “I did. And I know that by having children the title itself will live on.” He moved to the other breast as she shifted to grant him access. Her nipples were forming into stiff peaks as she squirmed for his touch.
&n
bsp; “It will,” she gasped. She was attempting to concentrate on their conversation, but he was making it rather difficult.