Pride & Passion (22 page)

To her shock, he pulled out a chair and sat down at the worktable. When he met her gaze, she could tell he
was settling himself in for a while. Rather like digging a trench in preparedness for their impending warfare.

“I’m certain my father informed you that I would be quite unmanageable in my present state of selfish indulgence.”

“He did.” He released a long, heavy sigh. “I don’t want to manage you, Lucy. I want…I want—”

“Yes, I know. A wife and broodmare. It’s what any aristocrat desires, is it not? Perhaps we should get on with it, shouldn’t we? Lay the ground rules, so to speak. What do you require of me in my role as your duchess?”

He frowned, but his gaze was watchful. “I know you are indulging in a fit of outraged womanly honor. I can appreciate it, actually. I’ll even accept it—for now. You have made your views clear, and despite all this, I would have you know that I vow I will take care of you. You’ll want for nothing.”

Just a different husband,
she thought viciously, just for the pure enjoyment of being hurtful.

“Well, that is something, your grace. But I cannot be bought. If your plan is to buy yourself out of my petulance, you may save your coin. As you see, I have little care for trinkets and baubles. Every man attempts to placate a woman’s ire with some piece he orders a shopkeeper to wrap up.” She glanced at the doll’s bed tucked lovingly in the chest. “No,” she murmured, “I have long ago learned to look past a glittering surface.” His gaze followed hers to the trunk.

“Tell me about it.”

“Why do you care?”

“Because I find myself wondering how you came by it.”

She shrugged off the pain of that long-ago day, and refused to meet his determined stare. “It hardly matters now, does it?”

There was an odd wistfulness to his voice. “It matters to me.”

Closing her eyes, she hardened her heart around that soft voice. She didn’t want his kindness or understanding. Despite her attempts to remain aloof, she started to speak. She had not even told Isabella the true story of that misshapen little piece of furniture.

“My…my friend. At least I would like to believe we were. I was only twelve when I met him.”

Sussex’s hand tightened around her wrist, as he watched her. “Him?”

“Yes, Gabriel. He was the butcher’s boy. He must have been a year or two older than me, but he was so much bigger that he looked older. He had such a fierce expression—almost wild. He came every Tuesday with the butcher.”

“And why were you in the kitchen? It seems a strange place for a young lady to find herself.”

She shrugged. “I always played in the kitchen. I used to get under Cook’s feet, but she wouldn’t scold me or send me to my room. She would laugh, and feed me, letting me help sometimes with the bread and cakes. You see, my parents never noticed me, unless it was to their advantage.”

Here is a new dolly, my dear. Now, you must be a good girl, and come to tea and behave yourself. You must be on your best behavior and make Mummy and Papa proud.

They had bought her—always. Never had they come
to her empty-handed, and never had they given her anything that did not have some hidden catch behind it. In truth, the gifts meant nothing. She had only wanted their affection, an embrace, and perhaps for them to come to her at night and tuck her in and tell her a story. But those were her governess’s duties and she had been every bit as frosty as her parents. The isolation had destroyed her, making her retreat into a hard shell. She had been a quiet, withdrawn creature, a gentle spirit with feelings that were easily hurt, and a heart that was just as easily broken. She knew she must harden it herself if she was going to survive.

“There’s more to it.”

She paused—stilled as she listened to the conviction in his voice. He would not pull this out of her—not take it away from her like her father had. Tears began to burn her eyes, and she forced them back. “There is nothing more to it. He came, and then weeks later, he presented me with this bed he had made for my dollhouse. Then he left, and I never saw him again. He’s probably dead. No one lives long in the rookeries.”

He wouldn’t release her hand, wouldn’t let her look away from him, either. “Why didn’t he come back?”

There was a darkness in his voice, and Lucy’s breath caught at his expression, the way his eyes watched her so carefully. The scar on his brow made her pause and she almost reached out to touch it, but she didn’t. His voice, insistent in the quiet, made her go on.

“Why did he leave?”

“My father forced him to,” she whispered. “He said he was nothing, treated him like rubbish and then…” She closed her eyes and told him. “Papa took the bed
from me, said I wasn’t allowed to have anything made by his filthy hands. He threw it in the rubbish bin—so carelessly—and it had been the only thing ever given to me that was not intended to buy me—and then…then papa struck him. He was bleeding. I can still see the blood running from his forehead. I tried to go to him, but Papa caught me, and Gabriel looked up at me and then left. I never saw him again.”

There was something that sounded very much like shock, and perhaps awe, in his voice when he said, “You took this from the trash and hid it, knowing your father would be livid with you for doing so.”

“I couldn’t be parted from it. It meant everything to me. He left, believing me to be like my father. I can’t bear to know that, to imagine him alive and thinking the worst of me.”

His gray eyes flashed. “He doesn’t. He couldn’t possibly think ill of you.”

There was stilling of that moment, when their gazes met. Fear mixed with curiosity shone in her eyes. “How could you know such a thing?”

“Men, from whatever walk of life, are not so different, Lucy. We all have honor and pride, and I know this butcher’s boy you talk of would be honored to know you saved his work. I know this duke is.”

“I don’t want your pride, in fact, I want nothing from you. But you desire something from me, or else you would not be here, would you?”

His jaw clenched and he hesitated. “About Thomas… The police found his body floating in the Thames. He carried identification on his person. I thought you should know.”

“Thomas,” she whispered, trying to sort out her feelings. She had been devastated the first time she had believed him dead. Now she was left feeling numb. She had her answer—he
had
been involved with this Orpheus. It had been him on the rooftop with Sussex—most definitely him the duke had seen murder Wendell Knighton.

She’d been so wrong about him—in so many ways. He’d made promises that he never meant to keep, and she was left with only one conclusion, that he had never really desired her in the first place.

“Black and Alynwick will continue to investigate how he came to be under Orpheus’s command, and how they both discovered the Brethren Guardians. I’ll share what I know with you. You deserve the truth, I think.” His head hung low, and Lucy watched as his hold slipped from her wrist, to her fingers.

“And is that all you have to say to me, your grace?”

“I must ask one thing—that you do not bring him up again.”

“Why, your grace, does it shame you to know your future wife has lain with another man?”

She was being intentionally mean, but she had to locate the coldness inside her once more. To hide behind it, to forget about both Thomas’s and Sussex’s betrayals.

His glare was furious, and she jumped as he unexpectedly reached up and captured her chin firmly in his hand. “No, it does not shame me. But mention of him makes me insanely jealous and provokes me to distemper that makes me want to unravel and smash things.” The violence of his words surprised her; so, too, the
way he looked deeply into her eyes. “I trust you will remember that, and not seek to intentionally provoke me. Jealousy is a very new experience for me, and I am just learning how to manage it. Although, you may rest assured I would never lay my hands on you—not in that way.”

He held her captive, while they looked into each other’s eyes. “And what later, your grace? Will you seek to find ways to invoke my envy?”

“What do you mean?”

“You won’t, you know. For I don’t care what you do.”

“Ah, so this is my carte blanche to take a mistress, is it?”

She flinched at the word, at the very thought of some woman rutting beneath him. Why she could be affected by it, she did not care to examine. It was too soon, she told herself, much too soon since that moment of unbridled passion they had shared.

“I will grant you one night, your grace. You may have access to my body to consummate this marriage.”

“Once? You owe me an heir.”

“One night,” she repeated. “That is all.”

“Ah, I see, I am to have you as many times as possible in that one night. You will lay there dutifully, with your prim white linen night rail raised to your waist, your gaze cast up upon the canopy while I grunt and work atop you, filling you with my seed until I am drained dry, and all in the attempt to consummate this marriage, and conceive my heir.”

His gaze flickered to her mouth as he reached out and brushed her bottom lip with this thumb. “And what
am I allowed, Lucy? What pleasures will you endure in the name of wifely duty?”

“You have me. For one night.”

“So you will endure anything I force upon you, is that right? Even suckling your nipples till they resemble dark cherries? What of indecent kisses between your thighs?”

She blushed, reminded of their exchange that night. “I will endure what I must.”

He smiled. “Oh, no. You will not endure. You’ll enjoy. And perhaps even beg.”

“I will not.”

“Then I will wait until you do. For I am not the sort to lie atop a woman and take my pleasure—it will be my pleasure to pleasure you, as well. Did you think I would not? I know you believe me cold and indifferent, but I would never just take, Lucy. I want to give, and I want you to take—and to give to me as well.”

“Then you will be vastly disappointed, your grace. For I want nothing from you, and I certainly have nothing to give you.” Her glare was mutinous. “Now, have you said all you wished to say?”

“Ah, you wish to continue your pursuit of sulking and petulance, is that right?”

“I wish to get on with packing. My father informs me that tomorrow morning we are to be married, and then you plan to depart the city for your estate in Yorkshire.”

“Yes. I think it best for the start of our marriage.”

“As you can see I have a great deal of work to do before that. So, if that is all?”

He stood, reached into his pocket and withdrew a
blue box, tied with a white ribbon. Placing it in front of her he said, “A wedding gift.”

Leaning forward, he reached across the table, pulled the ribbon free and opened the box. Pressing in, he lowered his face to hers. “Ear bobs, for I have been thinking of how very nice they would look dangling from your ears while I nuzzle your neck.”

Lucy glanced down at the pearl earrings with gold filigree. They were lovely and she tried not to be swayed.

“Pearls, because your skin is as smooth and luminescent as one, and because the first time my lips caressed your throat I thought your flesh as opulent and lush as one. Gold,” he whispered, moving closer, “because it reminded me of how your hair looked in the dying candlelight, how it burned and glistened, and how badly I want to lie in bed, in our chamber, and watch you at your dressing table, unpinning it for me. I will have that, Lucy, the rights of a husband to enter his wife’s room, to see her at her toilette, to watch what no other man will ever be granted. You do understand that? That I won’t settle for less?”

“You have made your line in the sand very clear.”

He grinned. “You can cross it anytime you wish, you know. You might even like it on my side.”

“I don’t think so. But thank you for the earrings. They really are lovely.”

His smile was pure devilry. “I didn’t simply order a shopkeeper to pick something and wrap it up. I went to several stores before I found what I was looking for, and I thought of you the entire time I was choosing them. It’s not a poor replica of a hand-carved bed, but the sen
timent is no less worthy. Till tomorrow.” His breath was a whisper across her lips. He didn’t try to kiss her, and Lucy was left to follow him as he departed the room. He turned back one last time.

“This is not how I wanted it to be, but I’m too ruthless and determined to regret it. I wanted you, and now I have you. I intend to keep you, Lucy. And I will do anything to make certain that you stay where you belong—by my side.”

“Is that all that matters to you? Am I some prize to be won?”

“No. But Lucy?
You
are my most treasured possession, and I will keep you just as safe as you have kept that little piece of carved wood.”

A
DRIAN HAD NEVER
anticipated seeing anyone more than he had his Lucy on their wedding day. She looked beautiful in her copper gown, her ears adorned with his gift. He was saddened to see that her eyes held nothing but coolness in them. He had hoped that somehow she might have found their union more agreeable, but apparently she did not.

When they said their vows, hers were repeated in a quiet voice. He had shuddered when she had repeated “with my body I thee worship.” He could hardly think of anything other than how he was going to endure this night—his wedding night—without being lost inside her.

She would not relent in her proclamation, and he would not give in and take her. One night was a farce. He needed to tread carefully where Lucy was concerned. He had believed she was thinking differently of him. Believed she might even return his feelings after that night in his Mount Street house, but then this had happened, and she believed him a coldhearted bastard, reduced to clandestine meetings in order to get what he wanted out of her.

“Shall we?” he asked as they walked arm in arm down the hall. “I thought we might have a word.”

“Of course.”

There was no warmth, no fire in her, and he thought he might die if he never felt that again.

They stepped into the salon, and she sat, her wedding gown spread over the cushions, reminding him of a crimson sky at sunset.

“You’re beautiful.”

She said nothing, but looked at him—or rather, through him.

“I… Things did not get off for us as I hoped. I wanted to win you fairly, not…this way.”

“Well, you have me. Whether you will still want me is another matter entirely.”

“I understand you’re hurting, Lucy.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I do. I know what you’re feeling.”

Something inside her snapped, and everything bottled up inside came crashing down. “You know nothing! Not me, not my feelings, nothing!”

“I have felt much the same before you. I know the feelings, Lucy.”

She began to rail and rage, to show him how pompous he was to even begin to think he understood the depths of what she was feeling.

“When have you ever done anything against the grain, your grace?” she demanded. “When have you ever broken the mold, or gone outside your unbearably proper and stuffy organized little world to risk anything?”

Oh, how she felt like striking him. The world and her future loomed heavy and lonely before her. She was filled with anger—and rage. The injustice of it all, the pain of having her life managed for her as if she were
too weak and feebleminded to manage it for herself. And while the anger she felt seethed and grew and all but consumed her thoughts and body, the duke stood silently, towering over her with his implacable granite like countenance that betrayed nothing of what he felt—if indeed he even felt at all.

“What do you know of what it is to live, to take a risk? You can have no understanding, no comprehension, because you live your life ordered and distant and controlled. You’re nothing but a title,” she taunted, baiting him, waiting for some flicker of
something
from those glacial eyes of his. When he would not rise and meet her challenge, she jumped from the settee and took a step toward him, the anger inside now a living, breathing thing, making her restless and destructive. But she must obey it. From childhood, she had ignored the pain, the heartache, hoping it would go away, but it hadn’t, and now…now her heart was shattering into a million little shards while her new husband looked on—remote, unfeeling. Not giving a damn, only caring that he had secured himself a rich, blue-blooded bride.

“You can have no idea what it is to risk all for happiness.” She took another step, and then another, heedless of the fact her body was trembling, and her bottom lip quivering, and her eyes—how they misted with the scalding heat of tears. One slipped down her cheek and she tasted it, the bitterness of betrayal and pain, and the engulfing melancholy and despair that filled every fiber of her being. Another fell, unchecked, a testament to her sorrow, the pain of having every last one of her hopes and dreams dashed by one negligent, selfish wave of both her father’s and the duke’s hands.

“What?” she demanded, taking another step toward him, until her burnished-golden gown brushed over his trousers, and shoes, and she was forced to tilt her head back to glare up at him. “Damn you, Sussex, what do you know of risking all for the one thing you want most?”

The seconds ticked by, marked by the delicate clicking of the mantel clock. Between them, the air, which had been settled, seemed to change. It was a subtle thing at first, but then it seemed to crackle, to take on new life, to hum between them as Sussex lowered his gaze to her face, letting it travel over her tearstained cheeks, then to her mouth, where it lingered, robbing Lucy of breath.

“What do I know of risk?” he murmured, his voice deep and velvety, as luring as the nap of expensive velvet against her fingertips. “What do I know?” he repeated, this time his voice darker, more compelling, and when he stepped closer, and the heat from his body, and the scent of his cologne washed over her, he seemed to take the air straight out of her lungs—the room—possibly the very Earth.

“I know risk,” he said, and she heard the rustle of her gown swishing around his legs as he moved closer. “I’ve tasted it. Felt its heady call.”

“You’ve never heeded the call,” she accused.

“Oh, but I have. I know what it is to take the greatest risk of my life, for the one thing I want most.”

He had backed her up against the wall, and the marble pillar that stood on either side of the salon door pressed cool and unyielding against her shoulders.

“The greatest risk of my life was today, when I made
you my wife. When I vowed to love and protect and stay faithful to you. When I vowed to worship you with my body.”

To remind her of that, he brushed against her, his body melding and pressing against hers in an erotic reminder of what would happen between them. Another brush, another waft of his skin, and hair, and everything that made a man a man, told her that he would use this body against her to subdue her, break her—worship her. The whispered reminder—in his voice—made her skin grow warm and taut, her breasts swell as her body seemed to grow weak and willing beneath the subtle erotic pressure of his.

He was crowding her, his big, tall body encompassing her short one. Surely that was the reason she had suddenly reached out and grabbed the lapels of his jacket; why his hand was wrapped around her waist, his strong fingers squeezing, pressing into the bodice of her gown.

“Today, I tasted that risk when I made you my wife, knowing that you might never feel the way about me as I feel about you.”

His hand, so hot and strong, was sliding up her midriff, his fingers gliding over her ribs. The tip of his index finger lingering beneath her breast. Their gazes were locked, and she felt some inexplicable force pull her to him. But she would not give in to that power.

“I am but a pawn in the game of powerful men. A possession to be bought and placed on the shelf for your friends to admire.”

“No.” The word was a deep whisper against her flesh as he lowered his head to hers.

“A duchess to play hostess for you. A wife to see to the running of your household, and your social and political ambitions.”

“No.”

“A…a…” She floundered, trying to find another analogy for his purpose in marrying her, but he stopped her with the delicate brush of his mouth above her jaw.

“A friend. A companion. A beautiful, passionate lover to spend the days and nights with. A woman to carry my children, a partner to share the triumphs and failures. A woman I can share my dreams with, and who will share hers with me. A woman who I can comfort and hold in times of need, and who will hold me when I am weak, and sorrowful, and in need of the sort of succor only a wife can give to her husband. A woman who I want so desperately to make love to. You, Lucy, you are that woman.”

Their gazes met, and she could not resist asking him the question that burned in her mind. “H-how…” She wet her lips, tried to speak again. “How do you feel about me?”

His eyes, those cold, mysterious eyes, stared down at her, haunting her with their ghosts and mysteries. But they were not the eyes of the duke, she thought in wonder as they grew warmer—almost silver. These were the haunted, troubled eyes of the man behind the title, the man who had known pain and coldness. The man who was her husband and who held troubling secrets deep within.

“My dearest Lucy,” he said, his gaze never wavering from hers, “I would die for you.”

T
HE CARRIAGE TRUNDLED
amongst the streets of Mayfair, before making its way out of the city along the old North Road that would take them to Yorkshire. The November sky was gray with the promise of snow. He had debated taking the train, and perhaps now, looking up at the sky, he should have made arrangements to do so. But then, he had not been thinking clearly these past days.

He studied Lucy from beneath the brim of his hat. She was gazing out the window, and he could not help but wonder if she was thinking the same thing, that he was a fool to drag them to North Yorkshire in this weather. Did she think her new husband inconsiderate? he wondered.

His
wife
. Air stuck in his lungs as the word whispered in his mind. They’d signed their names, and the clergy had blessed the rings they now wore on their fingers. She belonged to him in the eyes of the law and God. But she was not his. He was acutely aware of that fact. She was a wife in name only, and would remain so until he found a way to break through the icy shield she’d built around her.

She had said little that day—nothing but her vows, and a quiet goodbye to her father and Lady Black. She hadn’t spoken to him since her explosion after the ceremony. There was so much to be said, so many words that needed to be shared, but he was at a loss to begin.

It was strange how uncomfortable he was with the silence between them. How he longed to hear her voice in the quiet of the carriage. He’d never been one for talking, and yet he craved the sound of Lucy’s voice enveloping him.

Day by day he learned more about her. Today, he was discovering that his wife was at peace with the quiet. Strange. Every female he had ever known had chatted away, barely stopping to draw breath. They had tried to coerce and lull him into their web with words, but he had never been lured. But there was something in Lucy’s voice that made him draw near to her. Perhaps it was the fact he knew it might be the only thing he had of her—her conversation.

“It’s going to snow.”

His gaze darted from the lead-colored clouds to his wife. “You’re right. I suppose I should have arranged for the train to take us north.”

Dismissively she waved her hand. “People have been traveling north in the winter by coach for centuries. I’m certain we shall endure and survive the ordeal.”

“I shall see to it that we do.”

If she detected the smile in his voice, she did not let it show. “My father and I traveled by train to Whitby in March when we brought Isabella back to London. There was a sudden snowstorm, and we were stuck for days. You see, there really is little difference between track and road—both must be cleared for safe passage. At least by road, you’re more apt to come across someone who might be of a mind to help, or a little roadside inn that might have a room to spare. On a train, you’re stuck in the carriage on a track, with nothing around but open air. I’d rather take my chances on the North Road.”

“I imagine that it was somewhat more comfortable to be on the train than in a carriage.”

“No. It was just as cold in the train carriage as it
would have been in a coach. And I was rather irritated by the other travelers, always grumbling about the situation. What more did they wish the conductor to do? The snow was blinding and the drifts so deep over the tracks that the train was utterly immobile.”

That was Lucy. Practical. He never would have thought it but there it was. She might be a forerunner in fashion—a slave to the ways of the ton. She might have been pampered and spoiled but she was not the sort to carry on and indulge in theatrics. Hell, she’d had every right to do so when they had been discovered at the House of Orpheus, but she hadn’t. She’d borne it all like a vigilant little soldier, when he knew that her hopes and dreams had been shattered.

He probably should have felt remorse for being the one who had dashed all her hopes—it was the gentlemanly thing to do, after all—but he was no gentleman. Nor could he summon up the regret and remorse. He wanted her. Had wanted her from the very first moment he’d seen her. No, he was not one bit remorseful that the beautiful woman who sat across from him was now the Duchess of Sussex.

There were so many mysteries to her, so many complex layers, that he wondered if he would ever truly discover them, and know her as a husband ought to know his wife. Had she allowed Thomas to discover her? To learn her as a man learns his lover?

The pain of that thought made his expression blacken. He’d told himself that it no longer mattered. Thomas was dead, and Lucy knew the sort of man he had been. Besides, she was his now, and they were traveling far away from London for their honeymoon, a chance for them to get to know one another, to start anew.

There was melancholy in her; he could see it brimming there in her green eyes. She wasn’t happy and he’d give everything he owned, everything he was, for just one chance to change that. To bring a smile to her lips, and a glow to her eye.

“I need to apologize.”

The words cut through his thoughts, and he stilled then sharply gazed at her. She was wearing the dark green velvet cloak, and the white fur muff lay on her lap—her fingers warm and safely out of grasping range.

“Oh?” he mumbled, perplexed at her abruptness.

She swallowed and he followed the fluid line of her throat, the paleness of her skin. She looked so small sitting across from him, dwarfed by the heavy velvet squabs. He wanted to lift her up and haul her onto his lap, and hold her in his arms. He wanted to be the big brutish ruffian she had accused him of being, and show her that this big, brutish body could offer safety and warmth—and pleasure.