Anne Herries - The Rebel Captain's Royalist Bride

‘Yet at this time it would not be right or proper of me to marry a man who is the enemy of my family.’

‘I am not your enemy,’ he said softly, ‘but I respect your feelings and I shall wait until the time is right to ask again.’

He would ask her again! For a moment she could not breathe.

Babette's throat tightened and she wished that she could throw caution to the winds, tell him that she liked him more than any man she had ever met and go with him. Yet if she did she might never see her brother again, for he would think that she had betrayed him and his cause. The pain about her heart was intense, but she turned her head aside so that Captain Colby should not see her indecision.

He took hold of her, both hands about her waist, tossing her up on her horse's back and giving her the reins. She felt as if her body were on fire and wanted to cling to him, to let him kiss her until she forgot all else—but common sense made her hold back. She could not love the enemy.

AUTHOR NOTE

This book is the latest in the Melford Dynasty series that began with FORBIDDEN LADY. The previous book was A STRANGER’S TOUCH.

James is a Roundhead Captain, and Babette a secret supporter of the King. They should be enemies, but love does not respect a man’s beliefs or a woman’s wishes. Torn apart by war and prejudice, can they ever find happiness?

I hope you will find pleasure in this story.

You can contact me for more details of this series at www.lindasole.co.uk

The

Rebel Captain’s

Royalist Bride

Anne Herries

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ANNE HERRIESlives in Cambridgeshire, where she is fond of watching wildlife and spoils the birds and squirrels that are frequent visitors to her garden. Anne loves to write about the beauty of nature, and sometimes puts a little into her books, although they are mostly about love and romance. She writes for her own enjoyment, and to give pleasure to her readers. Anne is a winner of the Romantic Novelists’ Association Romance Prize. She invites readers to contact her on her website: www.lindasole.co.uk

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Afterword

Prologue

James Colby stood by the grave of the woman he had loved, then bent to place a single delicate flower on the grass, which now covered it. He had come to say his final farewell before riding off to the war and an unknown destiny. Perhaps before too long had passed they would lay him in the earth beside his sweet Jane and the sorrow he had known these past eighteen months or more would be ended.

‘Forgive me,’ he whispered as a gentle breeze seemed to stir and grief caught his throat. ‘You were too young and lovely to die. If a life was forfeit, it should have been mine.’

For a moment the sun came out from behind the clouds and it was as if a kiss grazed his cheek. He seemed to see the face of the girl he’d loved and hear her voice.

‘You were not to blame, my dear one,’ the voice said close to his ear. ‘Forgive me that I was too young and foolish to wed you when you asked.’

James cried out in agony. For she was so close that he could almost touch her, and he wanted to breathe life into those white lips, to bring her back to the world of sun and laughter.

The world was so much less without the innocent, gentle girl he had loved and cherished with all the tenderness of calf-love. Turning away, his heart wrenching because he must leave her there, James began to think of the months and possibly years ahead. The war was certain now that King Charles had set up his standard. He had tried to arrest the five members of the Houses of Parliament and his action had led to outrage and an upsurge of feeling against the tyrant who believed that only he could judge what was best for England.

‘What is best for Charles Stuart more like,’ Cromwell and Hampden had said when James talked with them about the future. ‘If the people of this country are ever to be free from tyranny, we must rise up and fight for our principles.’

James could only agree. He enjoyed his life as a landowner, a man of peaceful habits who had no wish to argue with his neighbours, but he now understood that for his way of life to continue he must fight. The King had imposed unfair taxes to fund his disputes and laws that were biased against the common man. Although James would have preferred not to take up arms, he knew he had little choice for soon the whole country would be split.

Besides, perhaps some action would ease the ache about his heart and the sense of having failed Jane, though he did not know what he might have done differently.

Donning his hat, which had a wide brim and a curling feather, James walked away from his betrothed’s grave. He did not think he would return again. He must put the unhappiness of Jane’s death from his mind and begin his life again.

Lost in his thoughts, he did not see the shadow lurking behind a huge oak tree at the edge of the graveyard, nor did he see the expression of hatred on the man’s face.

‘You killed her, James Colby,’ the man said out loud as he watched him walk away. ‘You were responsible for her death—and because of that I shall kill you one day soon...’

Chapter One

Babette was in the orchard, pulling ripe plums, when she caught sight of a small party of horsemen riding towards her uncle’s house. Calling to her cousin, Angelina, and their servant, Jonas, to follow, she picked up her basket and walked hastily through the orchard to the kitchen gardens of the modest manor house. She’d seen the figures outlined against the ridge of the hill some distance away and was not sure whether the soldiers were Royalist or Parliament men.

‘Aunt Minnie,’ she cried, ‘there is a party of horsemen riding fast towards us. I do not know whether they be Cavaliers or rebels. Where is my uncle?’

‘Sir Matthew has gone down to the long field. They are cutting the wheat today. Had you forgot?’

In her haste to return and warn her family, Babette had completely forgotten that her uncle had decided to set the men to cutting his wheat. Because Sir Matthew Graham had not chosen to fight when King Charles set up his standard, some of his neighbours suspected him of being for Parliament and the Royalists amongst them eyed the family suspiciously when they attended church.

It was everywhere the same in a country torn by civil war. The quarrel betwixt King Charles and his Parliament had blown up suddenly the previous year, seemingly out of nowhere, except that Aunt Minnie’s second cousin, Henry Crawford—who was close to his Majesty—said that the trouble had been brewing beneath the surface for a long time. When the King tried to arrest five members of Parliament only to discover the men he considered traitors had been warned and fled, he decided that only a war could bring these unruly men to heel.

‘Whatever shall we do?’ Babette’s aunt asked, looking flustered. She wiped her hands on her apron. ‘Should we lock the doors against them or welcome them as friends?’

‘It depends who they are and what they want,’ Babette said, though in truth she was not sure which side her uncle would choose if forced to take sides. Babette knew her own heart, but for the moment she kept her silence. ‘I think Jonas should go to my uncle with all speed and tell him that visitors are on their way.’