His Sinful Secret (8 page)

The more quickly she became pregnant, the better. Then he’d send her to the country estate for her confinement and they’d both be protected. He would be shielded from any questions that might arise in the natural course of things over his often unusual hours and curious absences, and she would be spared having to wonder and ask them.

One couldn’t discount the reality that someone wanted him dead. He might not know her well, but he didn’t want to put her in any danger either. It would hardly be remarked on if they had separate lives. Many
ton
couples did.

The click of the latch lifting made him turn around.

He’d underestimated his young bride, Michael realized as the door between their rooms opened and she stepped inside. She was either less nervous than he imagined or more courageous.

His fingers tightened around the bowl of his glass as he took in a mass of lustrous loose dark hair waving to her shapely hips, a pair of magnificent indigo eyes, and the almost defiant tilt of her chin. She wore something white under a pale pink silk robe, just a glimpse of lace visible at the neckline.

She was, he decided, breathtaking.

To his surprise, the reaction he experienced to seeing her standing there on the threshold of not just his bedchamber, but the beginning of their marriage, was not resignation and a sense of finality or duty. It was quite different, and it wasn’t just about how he was struck with the beauty he’d done his best to ignore during their engagement.

Maybe it was the way she gazed at him, expectant, obviously not without trepidation, but . . . trusting.

His world was based on suspicion and deception.

Hers obviously was not.

Innocence was something he’d lost so long ago he could barely recall it. Maybe it was the novelty, but at this definitive moment in both their lives, somehow he found hers intriguing.

It could be his injury wasn’t so much of a problem after all.

I
t was natural to be apprehensive, and she knew this, but it didn’t help matters much. Julianne hoped her nervousness wasn’t too evident, but as composed as she wanted to look, the tall man across the room wasn’t fooled a bit.

She had the impression he wasn’t fooled often.

Under her robe she wore only a thin nightdress. It was something she was acutely aware of as she stood just inside her new husband’s open bedroom door.

The ajar door had a particular symbolic impact on not just her emotional state but also her physical one. He affected her; there was no denying it. Whether it was the quiet, collective nature of his distance or his vivid eyes, she wasn’t sure, but it was
there.

She’d liked Harry very much, but she wasn’t nearly as aware of him as a man.

There was no possibility she was going to be the one to speak first, and besides, she had no idea what to say, especially since Michael wore a dressing gown that was open enough she could see the strong column of his throat and an intriguing glimpse of his bare chest. He was a tall man, and that wasn’t a secret, but never had he seemed so
inordinately
tall.

This was going to happen. He was going to make her his wife in all ways, and she was not only powerless to resist, she wasn’t sure she wanted to in the first place. How very odd. Julianne hadn’t anticipated this breathless . . . expectancy.

“I imagine the gaiety downstairs will go on for hours.” The remark was said in a very offhand way, and her new husband took a sip of amber liquid from a glass balanced in his long fingers. “There is one advantage to being the bride and groom, and that’s the excuse of being able to escape the crowd and relax a little.”

If he thought she was relaxed, he was very much mistaken. “I suppose a person could look at it that way.”

“You can come in. I promise I’m quite harmless.”

Harmless? Why did she disagree? On the contrary, there was a certain dangerous air about him. Really, he should seem more ordinary—Harry had looked very much like him, and she’d been comfortable with him for as long as she could remember—but Michael was different.

Completely so. He was like an ordinary summer sky that could suddenly gather with clouds and turn volatile. The sunny blue was serene and attractive, and the impending storm dark and intimidating.

Yes, he was . . .
dangerous
. Why she knew it, she wasn’t sure, but she did.

“I
wish
for you to come in. Does that make it easier?” He spoke in a very soft tone.

It was a little mortifying to realize she still hovered just inside the doorway. Julianne moved forward, cast around for a place to sit down as far away from him as possible, fastened her gaze on a chair near the marble fireplace, and headed toward it. The room was furnished with masculine simplicity, in simple blue and cream, dominated by a massive bed made out of some dark wood. Griffins and other mythical creatures were carved into the headboard and the posts were topped with small rampant lions. Otherwise there was no ornamentation anywhere, not even a portrait or painting giving a better indication of his personal tastes. Even his dressing gown was plain black silk, unadorned with any touches, not even the usual family crest embroidered on it. The stark color suited him, somehow emphasizing the classic masculine lines of his face and the width of his shoulders.

Quickly she sank into the seat in a self-conscious movement.

“Julianne.”

She looked up, aware her cheeks were warm. Just the forbidden idea of being in her nightdress in front of a man—
this
man—was unsettling, not to mention she wasn’t all that sure exactly what he was going to do to her. “Yes?”

There was visible amusement in his green-gold eyes and in the slight twitch of his well-shaped mouth. “Let me clarify a few things. I know you are skittish over what comes next. There’s no need. I am not going to pounce on you. I am not going to seek to embarrass you either. I understand you’re uncertain about tonight. However, please keep in mind that men and women have been sexually intimate with each other for as long as there have
been
men and women. Neither you nor I would be here if our parents didn’t enjoy just such a relationship, so it really is nothing to worry over.”

Easier said than done. She said with more tartness than she intended, “I don’t know how to swim either, but telling me that if you toss me in a cold river I’ll be able to splash about and save myself doesn’t make me believe it. People
do
drown.”

He laughed. It was spontaneous and made him look younger and more approachable. “Sharing a bed is hardly the same as drowning.”

No, it wasn’t, but both were frightening if a person was ignorant of the process. She muttered, “I’ll be frank and tell you I’m not sure which one I’d prefer right now.”

“Would you be so nervous if it were Harry standing here instead?”

For a moment she was nonplussed at the direct question. Then she simply told the truth. “No.”

“Ah.”

It was hard to tell what that meant exactly. His face was an impassive, good-looking mask of sculpted lines and defined hollows, his vivid eyes compelling. She waited a moment and then struggled to explain. “I knew him better.”

“True.”

“I was betrothed to him almost all my life.”

“An irrefutable fact.”

“You were gone.”

“Vacationing in Spain. Yes, I remember.” His mouth twisted just a fraction, but enough for her to catch the sardonic edge in the reply.

Risking his life and limb for England was hardly something to mock, and she knew she was more out of her depth than ever. Maybe it was an unforgivable thing to do on their wedding night, but she asked impulsively, “Do you miss him?”

Now, why did she ask that? Maybe because he looked so very much like his older brother. Maybe because she was nervous and stammering. Maybe because there was something about him that was dark and unapproachable and she wanted to know something—
anything
—about his feelings.

He went still, his glass arrested halfway to his mouth. Then he said with a rasp in his voice, “Yes.”

For whatever reason, that was a relief. The sign of vulnerable human emotion eased some of her fears. So much so, tears stung her eyes.

Michael went on, his voice now cool and controlled. “If I could trade my life for his, I would. Yet with all of those bullets, all of the blood and disease and French columns marching at us, he dies and I live. Who would think it would work out this way?”

He was right. It was ironic that he had deliberately embraced danger and Harry had stayed in England, yet the duke and duchess hadn’t lost their more reckless son but instead the more carefully protected heir. Julianne said slowly, “I believe fate toys with us. We tell ourselves our choices form the course of our lives, but it isn’t true. From the moment we are born, chance is a variable we cannot control.”

“Is that so?” A chestnut eyebrow edged upward. “You are a little young to have settled on that conclusion so quickly.”

“Am I? I didn’t know there was a limitation on how old one must be to have a certain perception on life.”

A fleeting look crossed his face but she couldn’t really interpret it. “Nor should a debate on the vagaries of chance be part of the evening after a marriage ceremony, at a guess. Forgive me, if you can, for asking the question that sparked it in the first place. Maybe we should start over. Let me say I think you are very lovely.”

A nice effort from a man she sensed, even with her inexperience, did not use poetic language very often or bestow compliments. They were both on uncertain ground, it seemed, though in very different ways.

Julianne smiled, still nervous but not maybe as apprehensive as before she’d steeled herself to walk into the room. “Thank you.”

“I’ve asked myself how to make this as easy for you as possible.”

She wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she said nothing.

“Perhaps you should come here.” He set aside his glass on a small polished table of dark wood.

Go to him? Well, she’d promised to obey during their marriage ceremony, though just now his request didn’t sound as much like a direct order as a suggestion. He stood there very casually by the window, his chestnut hair just slightly tousled, the width of his shoulders imposing under the dark silk of his robe.

I can do this.
Slowly she rose and walked toward him.

When she was close enough for him to touch her, she stopped, trying to gauge his expression.

That was as futile as ever. She’d never known anyone so good at not
having
an expression at all.

“This is all new to me also.” He touched her cheek, just a brush of the back of his fingers.

Julianne quivered as the caress slid down along her jaw and followed the curve of her throat. “Somehow I doubt you’re inexperienced, my lord.”

“I’ve never had a wife, I assure you.” He began to ease her robe from her shoulders. “Nor would I touch a virgin.”

An oblique way of saying there had been women, but she wasn’t surprised. He was handsome, wealthy, and from an illustrious family, not to mention twenty-six years old. Harry hadn’t been celibate either; she knew that very well.

“We’ll have to learn together, then,” she whispered as the material of her dressing gown glided down her arms to pool on the floor.

“I believe that is the idea of a marriage in the first place.” His smile was nothing more than a faint, wry curve of his lips. “A mutual journey of discovery.”

Those lips. She couldn’t help but recall how he’d kissed her after their vows. Though there hadn’t been anything passionate about it, it had been quite . . . well, nice. Since he’d just confessed he’d taken the time to consider how to approach what was about to happen between them, that in itself was reassuring.

Now, when she could tell he was about to kiss her again, she wanted moonlit passion and a pounding heart. This was her wedding night, and though he wasn’t Harry and it was all different, maybe Malcolm was right. Maybe it was possible she and Michael were better suited than she realized.

He gazed down into her eyes and one long finger followed the neckline of her nightdress, just barely touching her. She tried to suppress a shiver as the caress skimmed the curves of the tops of her breasts, an unaccountable sensation coiling in the pit of her stomach. The heat from his tall body warmed her she stood so close, and the faint tang of brandy had a heady effect.

One arm came around her waist and urged her even closer, up against him, nothing but the barrier of the delicate linen of her nightdress and the silk of his robe between them. His mouth lowered and touched hers, at first just like he’d kissed her in the church, with subtle, warm pressure. Julianne’s lashes drifted downward and her pulse beat rapidly in her wrist.

Then everything changed.

“You even taste like innocence,” he murmured against her lips.

She stood very still, trying to absorb the sensation of being held so closely . . . and kissed in an entirely different way than when they’d stood in front of witnesses.

Like her dreams, this was . . . not what she’d expected. Not that she’d known exactly
what
to expect . . .

His hand crept up to her nape, cradling her head, and his tongue explored the seam of her lips, insistent upon entrance. When she realized what he wanted she was startled, and then a little panicked as he won the silent battle and her lips parted. The first brush of his tongue against hers made her stiffen, but after a moment she relaxed, the unique sensation causing her breathing to quicken.

It went on that way, his mouth possessing hers with increasing pressure, her now tingling breasts against his hard chest as she caught and learned the nuances of the dance of tongue and breath.

When he finally broke away, his mouth traveled with exquisite slowness across her cheek to finally brush her ear. “Let’s move to the bed.”