Lover Be Mine A Legendary Lovers Novel - By Nicole Jordan Page 0,61

with her and hold her and absorb her potent warmth all night long.… But sadly, his need to wrap himself in her special warmth would remain unfulfilled. Unless he could convince her that he wasn’t the blackguard she thought him.

Unless he could restore her trust in him.

Rolling onto his back, Jack stared at the flickering firelight on the ceiling. He couldn’t bear to see her so unhappy, knowing he was the cause. He’d abducted her and risked plunging her into a scandal—and yet his secretiveness was an even greater issue with Sophie than his high-handedness.

Jack took a slow, uncertain breath as he struggled with his next words.

“I don’t know how much Skye told you about my childhood,” he finally said in a muted voice.

Sophie didn’t reply, so he began talking in the hushed quiet of the room.

“I had an unusual upbringing, chiefly because my mother was caught between two different worlds. She was a member of the English nobility—a wealthy marquess’s daughter—yet she was essentially a foreign prince’s mistress. She was hopelessly in love, so much so that she gave up her former life and made Paris her home in order to be near her lover. She was also vivacious and enchanting and I worshiped her.”

Jack paused, remembering his mother. To a young boy, Lady Clara Wilde had been beyond wonderful—high-spirited and beautiful, with the kind of lively warmth Sophie had in abundance. But love had made her reckless and foolish. She’d remained in Paris despite the increasing violence against the aristos, not knowing she would become one of the many innocent victims of the French Revolution.

Jack shut his eyes at that last gruesome memory of his mother when he was six. For the better part of a year, it had been the two of them against a world gone mad. And then, that one fateful day, he’d watched his vibrant mother’s life snuffed out by a mob crazed for blue blood.

“I saw her killed right before my eyes,” he said in the barest rasp. “We were returning home when we were separated from our footman by a rabble mob. My mother only cared about protecting me, not her own safety. She screamed at me to run while she tried to fight them off with her bare hands, but I couldn’t leave her … and I couldn’t stop them. I watched as they beat her to a bloody pulp with clubs and pitchforks.”

Jack squeezed his eyes shut more tightly at the excruciating memory. “I couldn’t save her.”

Sophie spoke for the first time since he had put out the lamp. “You were only a young child, Jack. You could not possibly have saved her.”

“I know. But my father could have. Prince Raoul de Villars had the wealth and resources to protect her if he chose. Instead, he was determined to save his own skin. When the Revolution turned deadly, he fled Paris and left her to fend for herself and her young son alone.”

“That is why you hate him so much. Because he deserted your mother.”

“Yes.” Jack ground out the word. Prince Raoul had seduced Clara but refused to marry her even after she bore his child. Then, like a coward, he’d abandoned them to the hostilities of the Paris rabble and left them unprotected while he escaped to the safety of his kingdom.

“He is fully to blame for her death. He knew the dangers she faced—a woman alone, a foreigner, an aristocrat during the Reign of Terror. He knew she would never return home to England. She wanted to be close to him, even if he would never wed her as she deserved. He should have remained to protect her, or taken her home with him, or removed her from Paris. In truth, he should have married her. An honorable man would have done so. He chose to save himself instead.”

Jack was aware how hard his voice had grown. He never thought about his father unless he was forced to, but the fury was still there inside him. As were his long-smoldering thoughts of vengeance. He had a serious score to settle with his father.

“I always vowed that someday I would make Prince Raoul pay for his sins. But now … Now I am actually considering giving up my revenge in exchange for gaining his throne.”

All for Sophie’s sake.

An incredible shift of perspective, Jack reflected grimly. It was also remarkable that he was revealing his most painful, most private secrets to her. But the firelit darkness of the room, the