The Mills & Boon Sparkling Christmas Collection. Kate Hardy

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       EPILOGUE

      TRUE TO HIS WORD, Xavier rented Wimble Manor for the next Christmas, requesting the biggest and most brightly decorated tree possible. He couldn’t believe how lucky he was to have Tilly in his life and he looked at her as she entered the grand hallway. The wedding dress she wore was beautiful and the faux fur-lined hood of the cape framed her face, one that shone with happiness as she looked at him.

      This time last year he had hated Christmas and anything to do with it. He’d thought he didn’t deserve to marry and settle down, but now he knew he’d just been waiting for Tilly to waltz into his life.

      ‘Hi,’ his beautiful bride whispered, as she joined him where he waited for her among their close friends and family. There was a nervous tremor in her voice and he knew it was after what had happened almost two years ago, but there was no possible way he was going to turn his back on her. How could he when he loved her so completely?

      ‘Sei bellissima.’ He took the tips of her fingers and raised them to his lips, not taking his eyes from her once as a blush crept over her cheeks. ‘You didn’t bring the snow with you this time?’

      She smiled up at him and whispered mischievously, ‘Not yet.’

      * * *

      Tilly’s heart swelled as her new husband kissed her for the first time. They were standing at the bottom of the stairs, next to a fantastically decorated tree that held pride of place in the centre of the large hallway. Exactly the same spot they had first shared a kiss and where Xavier had arranged for them to be married.

      Around them applause sounded and she turned shyly to see her mother, her father’s brother and his family and Vanessa, her maid of honour. It was a perfect day and soon it would be followed by a more than perfect night in the arms of the man she loved so tenderly yet so passionately.

      There was a tinge of sadness because she would be leaving behind her mother and her best friend when she and Xavier moved to Italy in the New Year, but wherever he went she would go too. It was hard to recall that last Christmas had been so lonely and now, just one year later, she was married to the man of her dreams.

      She smiled up at him. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered, and his brows quirked in that sexy kind of way she’d come to adore.

      ‘What for, mia cara?’

      ‘For arranging all this. When you told me you would organise the wedding, I never imagined this.’

      ‘Wimble Manor is where I first met you, where I first fell in love.’ He lowered his voice so their wedding guests wouldn’t hear. ‘And where we first made love. It will always be a special place.’

      ‘I wish we were alone like that again.’

      He pressed his lips to hers, sending a shiver of awareness down her spine. ‘Soon, my beautiful bride, soon. Once our guests have gone, it can snow for as long as it likes.’

      * * * * *