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Excerpt from "The Beauty Bride"
From Warner Books
January 2005
ISBN: 0-446-61441-6
©2004 by Claire Delacroix Inc.
Alexander, newly made Laird of Kinfairlie, glowered at his sister.
There was no immediate effect. In fact, Madeline granted him a charming smile. She was a beautiful woman, dark of hair and blue of eye, her coloring and comeliness so striking that men oft stared at her in awe. She was fiercely clever and charming, as well. All of these traits, along with the score of men anxious to win her hand, only made Madeline's refusal to wed more irksome.
"You need not look so annoyed, Alexander," she said, her tone teasing. "My suggestion is wrought of good sense."
"It is no good sense for a woman of three and twenty summers to remain unwed," he grumbled. "I cannot imagine what Papa was thinking not to have seen you safely wed a decade ago."
Madeline's eyes flashed. "Papa was thinking that I loved James and that I would wed James in time."
"James is dead," Alexander retorted, speaking more harshly than was his wont. They had had this argument a dozen times and he tired of his sister's stubborn refusal to accept the obvious truth. "And dead the better part of a year."
A shadow touched Madeline's features and she lifted her chin. "We have no certainty of that."
"Every man was killed in that assault upon the English at Rougemont - that no man survived to tell the tale does not change the truth of it." Alexander softened his tone when Madeline glanced away, blinking back her tears. "We both would have preferred that James' fate had been otherwise, but you must accept that he will not return."
He was pleased to note how Madeline straightened and how the fire returned to her eyes. If she was spirited enough to argue with him, that could only be a good sign. "Though I appreciate a wound to the heart takes long to heal, you grow no younger, Madeline."
Madeline arched a brow. "Nor do any of us, brother mine. Why do you not wed first?"
"Because it is not necessary." Alexander glared at her, again to no avail. He knew that he sounded like a man fifty years older than he was, but he could not help himself -- Madeline's refusal to be biddable was annoying. "I ask only that you wed, that you do so out of regard for your four younger sisters, that they too might wed."
"I do not halt their nuptials."
"They will not wed before you and you know it well. So Vivienne and Annelise and Isabella and Elizabeth have all informed me. I try only to do what is best for you, but you are all in league against me!" Alexander flung out his hands then rose to his feet, pacing the chamber in his frustration.
Madeline - curse her! - regarded him with dawning amusement. Trust her to be consoled by teasing him!
"It is no small burden to become laird of the keep," she noted, the expression in her eyes knowing when he spun to face her. "No less to be burdened with the lot of us. You were much more merry a year ago, Alexander."
"And no wonder that! This is hell!" he shouted, feeling better for it. "Not a one of you makes this newfound duty any easier for me to bear! I am not mad to demand that you wed! I am trying to assure your future, yet you all defy me at every step!"
Madeline tilted her head, her eyes beginning to sparkle and a smile lifting the corner of her lips. "Can you not imagine that it is a sweet kind of vengeance for all the pranks you have played upon us over the years? How delicious it is to foil you, Alexander, now that you are suddenly stern and proper! Think of all the frogs in my linens and snakes in my slippers for which I can now have vengeance.
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