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CHAPTER 35
She was on her knees on the floor, in front of her open closet… Crying over her clothes… She missed Damien. He was always busy, but until today, always within reach. She missed arguing and the comfortableness of working together. But, above all, Regina missed the intensity of his passion and the feel of her soul mingling with his.
The days were torture. The nights were devastating. They went to sleep, each on their respective sides of the bed. Some nights, lying there feeling useless and empty, Regina thought she’d give anything to have him curled against her back like he had that night in the hospital.
Sure enough, by morning they would be tangled together, and her heart broke all over again. Something had to give soon because having him close but not having him for real was killi
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TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 1
Damien Kennedy suppressed a shiver that had nothing to do with the afternoon thunderstorm raging all around him. For a moment, he remained as if rooted to the spot, staring at the elaborate scrolls carved into the heavy oak door before him. A door he’d promised himself he’d never pass through again… At least, not while his grandfather was alive. ‘I should have come back here only for you, Mother… Only to see you…’ But he’d sworn never to let himself be locked inside the walls of Kennedy Mansion again. Damien had thought he had all the time he would need to make his absence up to his mother. But fate slapped him hard… In his youthful ignorance, he hadn’t realized everything
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 2
Oh, he remembered her… Only too well. And from her ramrod-straight back, Damien gathered she remembered his little nickname for her. That stubborn I will get my way look brought it all back. Regina Duquesne used to look at him that very same way when they were teenagers after he’d brushed her off like an annoying mosquito, dismissed her without a care for her feelings. Just a pesky little kid always hanging around, begging his family for attention. Until that last time. The time he’d taunted her for trying to horn in on a family that didn’t want her. Her tears had imprinted on his conscience, permanently.“Damien,” she acknowledged him with a cool nod. Then she turned her attention back to Theo
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 3
Regina listened to the men spar with one another as if from a distance. Shock cocooned her inside her own bubble of fear. As he spoke, Damien’s gaze tracked the lawyer’s movements, but Regina remained focused on Damien. The impenetrable mask of rebellion and pride that shielded any softer emotions. The breadth of his shoulders. The ripple of muscles in his chest and forearms, reminding her of his strength, his dominance. Could a man that strong prevail over someone with Theodore’s history of cunning maneuvers, both business and personal?“Well, old man… Why don’t you just lay it out for me,” Damien said, his voice curt, commanding the immense space of the master suite. A shiver worked its way down Regina’s spine.“The condensed version, pl
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 4
“Oh, that’s so sweet of you, young lady, but maybe you should wait, since I have one last thing to add...” When spoken by Theodore Kennedy, those were not the words Regina wanted to hear. Yes, she said Damien she’d marry him, but now she wasn’t so sure about it… Not when Theodore was preparing to throw another bomb. Regina eyed the door to the suite with longing. Only a few more feet and she’d be free... From the old man and his grandson… For now...“Just wanted to let you know that a platonic relationship between you two isn’t acceptable. My goal is a legacy. I can’t get that with separate bedrooms or no sex between you.” Panic bubbled up beneath the surface of her skin until Damien replied with a droll.“O
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 5
There were flutters of panic in Regina’s chest as she remembered that last face-to-face meeting with a seventeen-year-old Damien. She’d mooned over him from afar every time she came to visit Kennedy Mansion. Sometimes the hope of seeing him had drawn her just as much as Iris’s company, but that day had taught her well how little he felt for her. Whenever she’d come near Damien, he’d demonstrated the same unpleasant endurance as her parents, who also looked at her as a pest that they wished would disappear. He’d called her ‘Invader’ many times over the years she’d hung around, aching for a bit of Iris’s attention. Yes, that was definitely how he’d seen her time here at Kennedy Mansion. After that final rejection, Regina had stayed as
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 6
Damien’s uncharacteristic urge to curse like a sailor was starting to irritate him. As he snatched one of the cookies Junee had left cooling on the kitchen counter, he contemplated the grim facts. His lawyer hadn’t found a way around the legal knots Theodore had tied. There wasn’t evidence to have him declared mentally unstable. He was, but then he’d always been a crazy son of a bitch. If being or acting like a son of a bitch could be considered a mental condition. And any legal proceedings to steal guardianship of his mother would take too long. Damien wasn’t willing to take a chance on his mother’s health and well-being. He owed her too much. She had suffered too much. So, his bad mood was justified, but when Damien found himself stomp
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 7
Arguments? He had a few, but none that were effective. Excuses? A whole hay wagon full, but none he dared utter in the face of the threat to his mother’s well-being. Other women? Damien could think of many a delectable armful over the last ten years, but none interested in anything as dull as marriage. He’d stayed far away from the home-and-hearth type.“No,” Damien conceded, then stepped aside to let her pass. “I don’t think I could pay my assistant enough to move to the middle of nowhere and put up with me 24/7.”“It’s hardly the middle of nowhere,” Regina said with a light tone as she scooted past, brushing the far wall in an attempt not to touch him again. Which was just as well.“We might not have the culture of New York City,” she continued, “but there’s stil
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD CHAPTER 8
Regina enjoyed reading to Iris. Sometimes she would indulge in short verses from a book of poetry, magazine articles, or a cozy mystery. Today the words from a story set in a small town like theirs eased over them both until muffled bumps and bangs erupted from the adjoining room. She cocked her head, hearing more thumping sounds. A quick glance reassured her Iris was okay, so she set the book down and hurried through the dressing room. The noise grew as she approached the door that led from Iris’s dressing room to Regina’s bedroom. ‘What was going on?’ Opening the door, she found herself facing a... wall? A mattress wall? Going back through Iris’s suite to the other exit into the hallway only gave her time to get good and angry.
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