An Unconventional Heiress Read online

  She had imagined beforehand what it was about making love that set all the poets writing, which had so tempted many otherwise honourable men and women that they had relinquished everything—wives, husbands and children—so that they might be with a forbidden love, so powerful was it.

  And now she knew.

  Alan, exhausted, lying drained beside her, shook his head and said slowly, ‘No, not always—with some it is never like this. We are among those fortunate beings who are truly two halves meeting. Philosophers argue about the nature of love and desire, but I do not believe that they can be rationally explained. We are among the blessed for we love one another in the truest fashion since we have no wish to hurt others by it.’

  ‘Blessed, indeed,’ said Sarah drowsily. ‘Will you feel hurt if I tell you that what I most want now is to go to sleep? Preferably in your arms—and without my nightgown.’

  ‘No, indeed, for that means that we have reached completion together—something else that is not always achieved. Besides, we shall enjoy ourselves all the more next time if we are not sated, and since this is your introduction to love-making, your body needs to rest a little before we enjoy ourselves again.’

  Alan had never been a promiscuous man: he had taken his pleasure with women only infrequently, but he had never before experienced such a profound consummation as he had just reached with Sarah. If he had ever doubted that she truly loved him as much as he loved her, that fear had disappeared. The cynic who had said that in love there is always one who truly loves while the other merely turns the cheek was wrong.

  Safe in one another’s arms, they slept until it was almost dawn, whereupon they celebrated their marriage again. This time their love-making was slow, and sweetly long-drawn-out since they were now secure—the deceits and lies of the past, which had kept them apart, had disappeared.

  Later, Alan was to tell Sarah that the perfection of love and fulfilment that they had then reached was because each of them sought to please the other as well as themselves, to give, rather than to take—thus they were able to achieve that transcendence of self in which loving becomes more than mere lust.

  After their second love-making and its fulfilled sleep, Sarah awoke to the realisation that in her private life she was now travelling in an enchanted and unknown land. She had left the plateaux of ordinary living and had scaled the mountain tops. She was not foolish enough to believe that she and Alan could live permanently on these heights, but when they descended to the valleys again, the memory of them would always be there.

  She had sailed to a New World from an Old One. She was now committed to that world and to the man who was sleeping beside her. England lay behind her, before her was the unknown—except for one important thing.

  At this point in her musings Alan woke up and said, sleepily, when she gently stroked him, ‘You are awake, Sarah?’

  ‘Yes. I have been thinking.’

  ‘How to please your lord and master, I trust.’

  ‘That, too,’ she told him, ‘but do you realise, Alan, that we are, in the truest sense, guests in this land? If, however, we have a baby it will be born as—what was Macquarie’s word?—an Australian. He or she will be a true native, not brought here in chains, or for the convenience of the government or of trade, or like me by curiosity—but here by right.’

  Alan was silent for a moment, before replying, ‘True, and their descendants—for I hope that we shall have more than one child—will not care how we came here, because this will be their land from birth. And now, Mrs Dr Kerr, since you have presented me with such a profound truth, how about setting to again, thus making sure that our own little Australians will not be long in coming?’

  ‘Agreed, Dr Kerr, on the double, as the military say.’ They turned into one another’s arms again—and united to make Sarah’s prophecy come true.

  Australia, not Terra Australis, was coming into being with every baby that was born there.

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-4008-7

  AN UNCONVENTIONAL HEIRESS

  First North American Publication 2004

  Copyright © 2003 by Paula Marshall

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

  ® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

  www.eHarlequin.com