The Unclaimed Duchess (16 page)

Anne flinched, but didn't draw away. “Am I so obvious?”

Lillian smiled, warm and genuine. “I'm afraid you are, but only to a friend.”

Words of contradiction died on her lips as she looked at Lillian. There was no use pretending, not if the other woman could see her heart so clearly. And honestly, Anne was tired of denying her feelings. Tired of pretending for the sake of propriety or the comfort of everyone else around her.

Finally Anne shrugged. “I've loved Rhys Carlisle for as long as I can remember. Those feelings are simply a part of the fabric of who I am, as much as my hair color or my eyes. I don't know what I would be without that.”

Lillian cocked her head slightly. “And now it's my turn to ask an uncomfortable question.”

Anne laughed despite herself. “It seems to be the day for them. What is it?”

“Today Rhys was kind to me and I sensed the beginnings of the shift in him that you mentioned,” Lillian began. “But…but he has not always been so. His reputation is well-known and he is often feared, even hated. But you're so different, with none of his snobbery. Even before I met you, I'd heard the rumors of your compassion and your acts of kindness toward those around you. So I must know…
why
do you love him when on the surface you seem so very different?”

Anne dipped her chin and looked at her clenched fingers on her lap. “You aren't the first person to comment upon our match, to mention that I'm more accepting and ask if I could be happy with someone so hard. But you see, I've always seen something
more
in Rhys. I have always known it was there, hiding…perhaps being protected by that cold shell he presents to the world. I believe…no, I
know
he has a capacity for true nobility beyond his rank, beyond the blood and family history he holds in such high regard.”

Lillian nodded, but Anne could see she remained incredulous and was driven to continue, not only to defend Rhys, but to offer some explanation of herself so Lillian wouldn't think her foolish.

“We were betrothed when I was still in the cradle,
though we didn't meet until I was six.” Anne smiled at the memory, thinking back to that sun-kissed day that had stayed with her forever.

Lillian drew back with wide eyes. “You
were
matched very young.”

Anne nodded. “Our fathers were friends and had always planned such a thing. It did frighten me a little to know my future was already planned. But the idea also intrigued me, even then. The first time I met him, Rhys came to my rescue, and from that day on I found myself observing him very closely whenever we met. As a child, he was open and friendly. He had a great capacity for kindness and often protected others who he felt were weaker. It was only over the span of years that I watched him change, both for the good and for the bad, and become the man who would be my husband.”

Lillian tilted her head. “What a strange experience that must have been.”

Anne laughed. “At times it was very odd indeed. But I think it also gave me a deeper understanding of Rhys. I saw things others might not have noticed because my attention was fixed on him in such a different manner. Yes, he is a hard man. He was trained to be that way by…” She shivered as she thought Rhys's late father. “Well, the last Duke of Waverly was not always a kind person, and
he
was
the one who taught Rhys that he was better than anyone else around him. He told him that title and blood were the only important concepts when one looked at someone new.”

Lillian frowned, and Anne couldn't blame her. Those very concepts had kept Lillian at the mercy of the
ton
and almost made her an old maid. It was no wonder Rhys and Lillian hadn't gotten along, though Anne had been moved to see Rhys try to make amends for his actions today.

“Still,” Anne continued softly, “even as Rhys accepted that concept that he was better or more deserving, I still saw flashes of goodness in him. His friendship with Simon, which was so close and loyal, was one thing that gave me hope about his true heart. His warmth to his mother and sisters was another. And as for me…”

She trailed off as a long string of memories flashed through her mind. From the first time he'd kissed her hand, to the way they danced together with such ease, to all the moments they had shared while sequestered away since their marriage.

“He may not have always been loving, but he was never cruel,” she whispered. “I know it's hard to see, but there
is
a man inside of Rhys who is worthy of love. Of saving. I believe that with all my heart, with all my soul.”

As the words died on her tongue, Anne realized that at some point she had risen to her feet and now stood, fist clenched over her heart. Heat filled her cheeks at the passionate display she hadn't been able to control, and she sank back into her chair and kept her gaze slightly away from Lillian.

But instead of judging or denying what Anne had said to be true, Lillian reached out and gently covered Anne's hand with her own. When Anne glanced at her, it was to find a soft and friendly smile on the other woman's face, one without pity or even doubt.

“
You
are a very good woman, Anne Carlisle,” she said softly.

“Either that or entirely foolish,” Anne said with a nervous laugh.

Lillian shook her head. “I don't think so. But if you've loved him all your life, you must have pictured your life with him for an equal amount of time.”

Anne nodded slowly. “I have indeed. I had such hopes—” She cut herself off, unwilling to ponder the details of what she had once desired and now feared was lost to her forever. “But that long-imagined future seems to be slipping away.”

Lillian's fingers closed around Anne's upper arms and she squeezed gently. “Fight for it while you still can, Anne! I cannot believe I'm saying this, but fight for
him
. If you don't, you'll live with regrets, and as
I said, I have some experience with that. It isn't for you.” She smiled as she released Anne. “I only hope Rhys will one day recognize how lucky he is to have a wife with your heart and passion. And that he'll endeavor to deserve your love and loyalty once you win this battle.”

Anne tilted her head. She could well imagine how difficult it was for Lillian to say those words when Rhys had recently been so unkind to her. But that fact somehow gave her order more power. Lillian was telling her to love Rhys, not allow him to let go, even though Lillian didn't approve or even believe that Anne's thoughts about his good qualities could be true.

“Thank you,” Anne whispered. “Thank you for offering me your friendship so willingly.”

“You deserve it and so much more,” Lillian said with an open and warm smile that touched Anne to her very core.

Before she could respond, the door to the parlor opened. As she and Lillian rose, Simon stepped inside with Rhys at his heels. From the taut expressions on the faces of the men, it was clear they had been having as intense a conversation as Lillian and Anne had shared.

“There you are,” Lillian said with a smile and a light laugh as she crossed the room to her husband.
Her expression was purposefully blank, but Anne noticed that when she took Simon's hand she squeezed ever-so-gently in what was an obvious gesture of comfort.

Anne turned her gaze on Rhys. He appeared tired, rung out as if he had been twisted in knots during the time they were apart. She couldn't help herself, she crossed to him and stopped just before him. He stared down at her, looking at her face with a dazed intensity she'd never seen before.

Reaching out, she gently touched his hand, letting her fingers glide down the shape of it softly, but she said nothing. She could only pray he would feel her reassurance and that it would help him.

“Will you stay for supper?” Lillian asked.

Anne shook her head, the spell that had kept her eyes on Rhys suddenly broken by the interruption. She turned to face their hosts, but it was Rhys who answered.

“Thank you for the offer, but it's been a long day of travel. I think it would be best if we returned home.”

“Perhaps another night,” Anne offered.

Rhys's gaze shot to her and her heart dropped into her stomach. His expression clearly stated that there would be no other nights. Whatever he'd said to Simon, it hadn't changed his mind about leaving her.

They said their good-byes as Simon and Lillian led them to the foyer and watched them go to their carriage that was parked on the drive. The sun was setting, and as the door closed, only a dim light pierced the vehicle.

But even with little illumination, Anne could see clearly. She saw Rhys's pain. She saw his determination. And she saw that Lillian was right. It was time to make another stand in defense of her future, of her marriage, and of her love for Rhys.

It might be her last chance.

R
hys paced the length of his office, restlessness plaguing him while the clock steadily ticked away the night. He'd been alone for the last two hours. Anne had said her good-nights just after a late supper and gone upstairs to her chamber.

He would never admit it out loud, but he missed her. Actually it went deeper than that. He
longed
for his wife. He ached for her touch, for her smile, for all the ways she'd comforted and aided him during their time alone in the countryside.

But he had sensed a shift in her today, both during and after their visit with Simon and Lillian. Anne seemed tense, distant, and distracted on the way home, barely speaking and never asking him what he and Simon talked about, although he was certain her questions lingered.

Once they arrived home, she had been nervous, only picking at her food and hardly engaging in
conversation until she finally abandoned him for her bed.

The change was perfectly logical, of course. Rhys had made it more than clear that their marriage would soon end. Perhaps she was finally accepting that fact, surrendering to it. She might simply be attempting to make the ultimate end of them a little less awkward and painful.

He frowned as he stopped walking the room. Somehow he didn't like the idea that Anne would simply
accept
the end of their union. She'd fought so hard to stay at his side and sacrificed so much, the thought that she would then submit to his will actually caused a bit of a sting.

Which was markedly unfair and he knew it.

Rubbing a hand over his eyes, Rhys groaned. He had hoped today would somehow make his future path all the clearer, but Simon had muddied everything rather than clarified it. His brother's points about the fate Rhys would present to his mother and sisters if he revealed the truth of his parentage were good ones. And Simon's shock that he would leave Anne resonated in Rhys as well.

Whether he admitted it aloud or not, the fact was that the idea of losing Anne was beginning to make him feel physically sick. It was funny, he'd been betrothed to the woman for years, as close to
her as he could ever wish to be, but he had taken her for granted.

It had taken
this
, it had taken the fact that he wasn't who he thought he was, that he couldn't have the life with her that he had so meticulously planned, it had taken her unexpected reaction to chase him when he left…
that
was how he had truly come to know the remarkable woman who was, at least for a short while longer, his wife.

And he would regret losing her for the rest of his days.

But if he never told anyone the truth, he could protect his family. And he could keep Anne. A bewitching thought, indeed. If only a blackmailer wasn't looming on the horizon, a harbinger of doom and scandal.

“Damn it,” Rhys growled as he threw the door to his office wide and exited the suddenly stuffy chamber.

He was only tired, that was why he could almost convince himself he could keep his life. Once he slept, all the fog would clear and he would be able to stop allowing his emotions to lead him. He would remember what he was, who he was, and the duty he held to his father's title and its future. And then he would figure out how to handle all those unpleasant answers to equally difficult questions.

He moved up the stairs in the quiet. Most of the servants were already abed or finishing their daily duties. In these moments he could almost pretend he was alone.

Except he wasn't.

He reached the top of the staircase and looked down the long, dim hallway to his left. In a chamber just a short distance from his own, his wife slept. His beautiful, beguiling wife.

He moved toward her door and there he hesitated, looking at the smooth surface for what seemed like an eternity. If he knocked, she would allow him in. Even if she was distancing herself from him, he knew…he
hoped
on some level…that she still cared.

Certainly there remained a spark of awareness and desire between them that wouldn't be denied if he allowed it even the slightest opening.

But as exciting as that thought was, as much as he longed to fall into the shelter of her arms and spend the next few hours tasting her tempting body, it wasn't fair of him to consider such a thing. To touch her would be to give her false hope, and it would only serve to torment him more once the night was over.

With a sigh, he abandoned her door and went to his own chamber. He stepped into his dressing room. The bell for his valet was near, but he decided against
it. He'd been undressing himself for some time now in the country. He could do it again.

He shed his jacket, cravat, and shirt where he stood, then sat down in the chair beside the fire to remove his boots. When he stood back up, clad only in trousers, that was when he saw her.

Through the open door that led to his bedchamber, his big bed was visible. And lying across it, her dark hair down around her pale shoulders and her slender body just barely clad in scraps of silk and lace, was Anne. She was on her side, propped up on her elbow, and all she did was watch him with those green-blue eyes that seemed to see his soul even when he tried to conceal it.

She didn't move or speak, she simply lay there waiting. For him.

She was temptation embodied. He moved toward her, almost against his will, and only stopped as he stepped over the threshold into the other room. He gaped at her silently, unable to help himself.

Even on their wedding night what seemed like a lifetime ago, Anne hadn't worn such sensual attire. Then he had found her in a plain cotton night shift, her hair back in a loose braid, the perfect picture of innocence. And it had driven him wild, almost out of control.

Tonight there was no innocence in his wife's stare,
nor in her nightgown. It barely skimmed her thighs, and the white lace that covered the rounded curves of her breasts couldn't conceal the thrusting pinkness of her hard nipples beneath. This gown was meant to seduce and tempt.

It did its job fully, for Rhys felt so hard that he might explode if she so much as touched him.

“Anne,” he managed past dry lips. “What are you doing here? I thought you went to bed.”

Slowly she pushed to her feet. The silky folds of her gown shifted, brushing over her bare skin the way he longed to do with his hands, his lips. She moved toward him in a few hip-swishing steps, and he caught a whiff of her subtle perfume on the air. God, she smelled like sunshine and lilacs and happiness. He wanted to bury his face in her hair and breathe her in until he never lost the scent.

Instead he clenched his fists at his sides and awaited her answer to his question.

“I did go to bed,” she said softly. “Your bed.”

He swallowed hard as she moved forward a second time. Now her body almost touched his, and he felt her breath on his skin when she looked up at him.

“
Your
bed is where I belong, Rhys. You know that to be true.”

She reached a hand up and rested her fingers against the bare flesh over his heart. Rhys was cer
tain she could feel it beating wildly, out of control because of her.

“No,” he managed to croak out, but the denial didn't sound very convincing.

He squeezed his eyes shut in an effort to give himself some focus, but the image of Anne lingered in his mind, even when he couldn't see her. In a flash, he fantasized about all the pleasures they could share this night.

“No!” he repeated, this time with more force as he wrapped his fingers around her wrist and gently removed it from his chest. “I cannot do this.
We
cannot.”

He thought he saw a brief flash of uncertainty as he released her, but then it was gone and the seductive hint of a smile tilted Anne's lips.

“Oh, I don't think that's true,” she purred, moving closer again. This time the soft silk of her gown brushed against his naked skin. “I know for certain we are
able
to do this. We've done
this
and so much more before. To both of our great pleasures. Or do you now deny that?”

Rhys stared at her, wide-eyed. This was a new side of Anne. Another part of her he'd never been aware existed. But he could hardly resist her sensual tone, the way her fingers felt as she pressed the tips of them to his chest once again. Only this time she
let them slowly glide down his stomach and to his waistband.

Rhys sucked in a breath at the lightning pleasure of that act. His cock, already hard, seemed to swell further, pressing with increasing discomfort against his pants front.

“Do you, Rhys?” she pressed, even as she slipped one button of his fly free. Her gaze never left his. The green-blue sucked him in, forcing him to look at her with an unblinking stare. “Do you deny we have been
most
proficient in pleasuring each other?”

He could hardly find breath, let alone speak, but somehow Rhys managed to force a few words past his lips. “No. I don't deny that, Anne, but—”

Before he could finish, she leaned forward and her mouth pressed to his, silencing his words, ending his denials, and setting his already edgy body on fire.

“God,” he groaned into her mouth before he crushed his arms around her and drove his tongue between her open lips.

She cried out loudly, lifting up on her tiptoes to eagerly meet his aggressive tongue, sliding her silk-clad body against his until he was aware of each nerve ending he possessed because every one of them was screaming with intense pleasure.

He felt her hands moving, slower now because they were trapped by his embrace, but still able to
unbutton his trousers after a few struggling moments. His pants waist parted and the fabric slid down a few inches. This time when she moved against him, he felt the delicious sensation of silk stroking the base of his cock.

He drew away with a gasp of pleasure as his head dipped back a fraction. Anne smiled up at him, a possessive, feral expression he had never before seen on her otherwise serene and kind face.

But he liked it. Probably far too much for his own good.

“You see, my love,” she whispered as she shoved him backward toward the bed. “You need this. You
need
me, especially after what you endured today. Why do you fight what you can't deny?”

Rhys swallowed hard.
Need
. Anne was almost perfectly repeating his own thoughts in his office just a few moments ago. He did need her. And now, racked by pain, tormented by unpleasant, impossible choices, that need pulsed even stronger because he knew she could make him forget.

Couldn't he have just a short respite? Couldn't he accept this comfort she offered? He would end it before it went too far.

If he had an answer to his internal query, he didn't think it. Before he could, Anne pressed herself to him, leaning her full weight to his body, and kissed him a
second time, this time tasting him, rubbing against him in a most pleasing and overpowering way.

His hands tangled in her soft hair, maneuvering her for the best access to her hot, soft lips. Leaning against the edge of the bed, he surrendered himself to the feel of her, the flavor of her, the erotic escape she offered with every fiber of her being.

Anne struggled for calm, for air as she held Rhys closer and kissed him with all the love, all the desperation, all the hope for their future she still held in her heart.

She'd never seduced him before. Oh, she'd made a lame attempt to do so in the countryside at their picnic, but tonight was different. Tonight she had one goal in mind and she had to hold fast to that goal.

Difficult considering how swept away she was by the pleasure of Rhys's touch.

She steeled herself and gently pushed. Rhys fell back across his bed without any resistance, but he clung to her and she fell with him. His pants slipped farther down as they moved and his cock came free to stroke against her bare leg when she landed atop him.

She reveled in the stroke of Rhys's skin, and in the way her body reacted instantly and intensely. With hardly more than a kiss, her empty body clenched, hot and wet and ready for him. Her nipples tingled,
thrusting hard against the lacy fabric of the silky night shift she wore. Every touch, every breath seemed to resonate on some deeper level of her being, more amplified because she was only focused on joining herself to Rhys.

She drew back, shifting until she was beside him instead of on top of him. That would come…later. Right now she needed to make him long for her. To bring him to the very edge of his control until he was so blinded that he couldn't resist what she offered.

But he seemed to have other plans. Without any effort, he flipped her onto her back and drove hard into her mouth with his tongue. He stroked and thrust, driving her mad as his hard body writhed over hers with a promise of pleasure and desire. Then he drew back and scraped his teeth over her throat, gliding lower with his mouth even as he caught the lacy straps of her nightgown with his fingers to lower it away from her shoulders. The shift was delicate, and the strength with which he pulled tore it.

“I'm sorry,” he groaned, though he never stopped dropping his mouth lower and lower.

“No you're not,” she whispered, arching against him as he pushed the ripped fabric aside and latched on to her hard nipple with his wet lips. “And neither am I.”

He sucked and her vision blurred. God, the things
he did to her, the way he made her feel. She was alive when she was with him. Womanly. Owned and cherished in the way she'd always dreamed.

She would
not
lose this. She refused.

He dragged his mouth lower, tasting her belly as he shoved the tattered remains of her nightgown away. She kicked it from her bare ankle and clenched her fingers into his hair as he finally reached the sensitive, throbbing place between her legs.

He tasted her delicately, with just the tip of his tongue tracing her waiting slit, but it was enough to begin the little tremors of release. It had been days since they joined together and Anne was on edge, more ready for him than she had ever been before.