The Duke and the Accidental Bride (Duchesses of Convenience #5)

Extended Epilogue

Sally and James sprinted at full pace across the open field. Arms flailing. Joyous laughs erupting from their bellies. Their destination was a herd of cattle that sat on the other side of the field and if Duncan knew his children like he thought he did, the cattle were in for a very traumatic experience.

“James!” Duncan shouted after them. “Sally! Get back here!”

They did not listen. But that was typical. They were both four years old and already they were exhibiting some of the worst traits found in their mother. And the best, for that matter.

“Children! This is your father! I said get back here!” Duncan yelled.

And still, they did not heed his call. They were as stubborn as bulls, which might not have been such a bad thing if they were both not so fearless. That was why, when they had seen the herd of cattle gently moseying across the paddock, they had decided as one that it might be a good idea to try and chase the great beasts!

“Isabella!” Duncan spun back to his wife, who was sitting on a picnic blanket reading. “Will you do something?”

“What am I supposed to do?” she said without looking up.

“Stop them!”

“And how am I supposed to do that?” She did not bother looking up, her eyes trained on the book before her. It was a great big textbook, one that had been assigned to her by one of her lecturers. She had tried explaining it to Duncan already, but his eyes glazed over whenever she spoke of such things.

“More than what you are!” he snapped at her. And then, seeing as he was on his own, he turned back and sprinted after his two quickly running children.

Oh, how they frustrated him. It was almost a gift of theirs, that inane ability to do and say exactly what they seemed to know would annoy him the most. And what was worse, because of how much he loved them, a fact which they were aware of, they also knew they could get away with it!

He raced across the paddock, reaching the two children just as they breached the herd. His son was already at one of the cows, trying to grab its tail, which it whipped away as it mooed incessantly at him. While his daughter ran for a calf, which she then tried to climb on!

“What are you --” Duncan scooped Sally into his arms first.

“Daddy!” she cried out. “I want to ride it!”

“And I want a daughter who does as I say,” he sighed as he tucked her under his arm. “Now, where is your – James!”

James had the cow by the tail.

“Daddy!” he cried joyously. “Look! Look!”

“Let go of that!” Duncan ran for him, picking him up and tucking him under the other arm. “Honestly, what am I going to do with the two of you.”

His two children laughed and giggled as he carried them back, and they screamed for him to go faster.

“Mama!” Sally cried out. “Look! Look!”

“I see you,” Isabella said without looking up.

“Mama!” James screamed.

Isabella smiled to herself and shook her head. Then she sighed as she closed her book and rose to her feet, meeting Duncan just as he reached the blanket.

“Here.” Duncan handed James off to Isabella. “He’s your problem now.”

“A welcome one.” She hoisted James in the air and kissed him on the nose, then the cheek, then the other cheek, then the nose again.

“Mama, stop!”

“I will not!”

“What are you reading, Mama?” Sally asked as Duncan put her down on the blanket. The little girl tried to pick the book up, but it was too heavy for her.

“Nothing you would be interested in,” Isabella laughed as she fell down beside her daughter and pulled her into her arms. Then she snatched at James and held him close too.

“A story?” James asked.

“A story!” Sally agreed.

“A story!” Duncan chuckled as he sat down across from them. “Mama, tell us a story.” He winked at Isabella.

She rolled her eyes at him but then grinned. “Oh, I know the perfect one. Sally, James, do you want to hear a fairytale?”

“Yes!”

She looked right at Duncan. “It’s about a monster – a beast, in fact. Who kidnaps a princess against her will and tries to force her to live beneath his roof as his slave.”

“Subtle...” Duncan muttered.

“But then --” She winded her eyes at Duncan. “Then something wonderful and unexpected happened. They fell in love.”

“With a monster?” Sally pushed her lips together.

“Oh, he wasn’t really a monster,” Isabella laughed as she settled the two children. “He was just pretending to be.”

“Why was he pretending?” James asked.

“Because he didn’t know any better,” Duncan asked. He then shuffled closer to his wife and kissed her on the head. “But the princess understood him even better than he understood himself and despite his protests --”

“Of which there were many.”

“-- this monster opened his heart, let the princess in, and came to learn that she was an even bigger monster than he was!”

“Yes, yes, very funny,” Isabella muttered.

Duncan laughed and kissed her again. And then he fell on top of his wife and his two children, roaring like a monster as he pretended to overwhelm them. His children screamed playfully, his wife tried to escape, but he wrapped his big arms around them all and held them close.

He had them in his power, his control. Complete and utter dominance from which they could not escape. Funny that to Duncan, it felt the opposite, as if he was in their control and there was no way he could possibly free himself from it.

Not that he wanted to, mind you. His children, his wife, they had a hold over him that would not break. Like chains wrapped around his ankles and feet, he was theirs forever. A beast tamed. A monster subdued. A man utterly and completely in love for now and forever.

The End