Excerpt of Cherished by Elizabeth Thornton

As ever, the orchards and flower gardens in Kent that summer were among the first to bloom in the whole of England. Emily walked the ancient cloisters and flagstoned paths of Rivard Abbey, absorbing far more than the profusion of sights and sounds around her. She felt awakened, as if the color and scent of that particular summer pulsed with her own heartbeat, promising she knew not what.

She was lost in contemplation when he came upon her at the water fountain, a young girl poised on the threshold of womanhood. Her looks were as patrician as her lineage, pristine pure and as fair as his were dark. He said her name softly and she lifted her head, shading her eyes with one hand against the glare. •

For a moment, she did not recognize him. She saw only a young gentleman in his mid-twenties who seemed out of place in her flower garden. He was too arrogantly male, too arrogantly uncultivated.

"Your guardian told me that I would find you here,” he said.

The smile on her face froze.

To give herself a moment to recover from the shock of seeing him again, she plucked a crimson blossom from one of the rhododendron bushes that screened the fountain from the house. "Leon," she said, and had the presence of mind to offer him her hand. Unexpectedly, he pressed a kiss to her wrist and the heat of his lips seared a path along her arm, clear through her chest to her throat, choking off her next breath.

The man's charm was potent. Emily had never doubted it. What was mystifying was why he should be turning that charm upon her. She and Leon Devereux had been at daggers drawn since he was a leggy school- boy and she was a grubby hoyden in pinafores. They disliked each other intensely. The last time they had been alone together, he had dunked her in the pond.

Striving for a natural tone, and remembering both her manners and the fact that she was now a young lady of fashion, she said, "When did you arrive in England, Leon? Aunt Zoë said nothing to me. Was she expecting you?"

He answered her cordially, as though there had never been anything between them but amity and goodwill. He had wanted to surprise everyone, he told her. No, he had not told his sister that he was coming. He wouldn't have missed Emily's birthday ball for the world.

"Don't gape, brat" he said, touching one finger to her open mouth. "It's not becoming in a young lady of your advanced years: His eyes made a slow sweep, taking inventory, and he grinned. "Your figure has filled out quite nicely, though I am not sure that I approve the way you have dressed your hair. It suited you long:

She checked the impulse to grind her teeth together and smiled tightly. Now this was more like the Leon Devereux she knew. From beneath her brows, she slanted him a sidelong glance. "You haven't changed a bit," she told him.

He laughed, and patted her consolingly on the cheek. "Do you know, your eyes change color when you are in a temper? They are glowing like amethysts now:

The words to put him in his place-were slow in coming. She was out of practice--two years out of practice to be exact, two years since Leon Devereux had relieved her of his hateful presence to make his way in the world under the wing of a married sister and her husband who lived in New York. She huffed and puffed and made do for the present by throwing him a glare shot with invective.

Leon didn't catch it. His eyes were wandering over the fields and orchards, taking in the setting. There were no acres of manicured lawns as graced other great English houses. Rivard was formerly a monastery. The gardens and farm were very much as they had been in the monks' day. Only the interior of the main building had been substantially altered, and that was not evident from the outside.

"When I thought of you," he said, "I pictured you here. An English rose in an English country garden. Safe. Cloistered. Inviolate:

His odd changes of mood were confusing her. If Leon had given her a passing thought in the last two years, she would be astonished. Without lowering her guard, she said carefully, “How long do you plan to stay, Leon?"

His eyes narrowed to slits but he responded pleasantly enough. "Not very long. New York is my home now. There is some unfinished business I must attend to here in England, then I shall be on my way?

With perfect sincerity, she was able to say, "I hope your business is concluded satisfactorily before long?

"I'll just wager you do,” he said, and dazzled her with a slow, lazy grin.

She was still blinking rapidly to dispel the effects of it when Leon made another lightning shift in mood. "Tell me what you have been doing since I was last here," he said.

As they conversed, he had been directing her steps along the flagstoned paths, halting from time to time to admire a bank of honeysuckle or a particularly fine bed of early roses. When they came to a stone bench, he indicated that he wished her to be seated. He remained standing.

"You have been away at school, I believe?

Slowly at first, then with growing confidence when it became obvious that he wasn't going to pounce on her and hold her up to ridicule, she began to relate some of the events of the previous two years. There was very little to tell. She had made a few friends at school and had been granted a fair number of awards on graduation day. What she did not tell him was that she would have traded all her prizes for one-tenth of her sister's popularity. Sara did not have an academic bent but she was the most sought- after girl in school. Emily told him nothing of this because Leon had once accused her of being jealous of her younger sister.

She ended by saying, "Sara will be so disappointed that she is not here to welcome you. When school was over, she went off to visit some friends, but she will be here by the end of the week in time for my birthday ball?

He had no comment to make on this, and after a long silence, he said, "And what of the future, Emily? What does that hold for you?"

She shrugged faintly. "A season in London. Balls. Parties. That sort of thing?

She did not elaborate because she could not believe that Leon Devereux was interested in such things. His life was far more exciting than hers. He was a fur trader, and in little over two years, with only a modest investment of capital, he had made himself a rich man.

"Tell me about America and Canada," she said. "I hear from Aunt Zoë that you have done remarkably well for yourself. Are you still with your sister Claire and her family?"

"Do you mean remarkably well for a French refugee who arrived in England as a boy with little more than the clothes on his back?"

With those fierce words, the mood was shattered and Emily would have started to her feet if Leon had not pressed her back.

"No, no, I don't mean to quarrel with you. That slipped out before I was aware of it? When she stopped struggling, he released her. "Yes, you might say I have done remarkably well for myself. I had help, of course, from two very generous brothers-in-law. I am no longer the poor relation, depending on the charity of others. I don't have to answer to anyone, Emily?