My Naughty Minette (14 page)

The idea rattled August. Yes, she ought to have been engaged to someone else, anyone else. “My father’s getting worse,” August said. “That’s why I told Minette to stay in Oxfordshire.”

“Not the only reason,” muttered Warren.

“No, but a damn good reason. The closer he gets to the end, the wilder his fits. Mother is beside herself. My father’s heart is as bad off as his mind, and the doctor says...”

A matter of months. The doctor had said it was a matter of months, but August feared he meant weeks. There was no comparison between the formerly robust Marquess of Barrymore and the thin, deranged man he was now.

“I’m sorry,” said Warren. “I’m sorry about your father. I’m sorry everything’s falling on you at once.”

“I’ll survive.” He reached to pluck a dried brown leaf off a hanging twig. “But Minette shouldn’t be here. I don’t have the time or patience to be the proper husband she wants. I lost my temper today over this Esme caper. If you hadn’t shown up, she would have been over my lap.”

Warren sighed. “Look, I’m not going to judge you for spanking Minette now and again. I even gave you a paddle to do it. Sometimes it’s the simplest way to teach a naughty wife a lesson.” He stopped and kicked at a clump of dirt. “But if the lesson you’re teaching Minette is that you don’t want her, I take issue with that. Understand this, August: I won’t stand by and allow my sister to endure a miserable marriage.” He emphasized these words with quiet intention. “I don’t care how you do it, but I want her happy.”

“What if I can’t make her happy?”

“That’s not an option. Damn it, man. She’s loved you for so long.”

August leaned back against a tree and shut his eyes. He’d like to pummel Warren the way they used to. August had always been bigger and stronger, and had usually prevailed by brute and stupid force. He did everything by brute and stupid force, and now he had this delicate, perfect wife he was terrified to touch.

“I’m afraid I’ll hurt her,” he said, opening his eyes and looking at Warren. “I want you to take her away.”

“No, you don’t want me to take her away.” Warren’s sharp rejoinder crackled in the stillness of the garden. “You love my sister as much as she loves you. If you want to wait a while yet to”—he grimaced and passed a hand over his eyes—“to take her to bed with you, then explain your reasons so she doesn’t believe she’s at fault. But in the meantime you must find ways to make her happy. Tease her. Smile at her. Let her shine, and accept that she’s going to be Minette sometimes, and drive you out of your mind.”

“I’m giving her music lessons,” August said. “The pianoforte.”

“There you go. A nurturing and intimate activity. Does she enjoy them?”

She spent the entire time mooning and smiling at him, very much as she had when she was a child. “I suppose she enjoys them,” he said to Warren.

They began to walk again. “You always loved your music,” said his friend. “You were always the reclusive one, the perplexing enigma of our rowdy little bunch. I wonder if Minette won’t be good for you in the end.”

“She has enough personality for us both,” August said ruefully. “But she ought to have gone to some other more animated chap.”

“Be that as it may, she’s gone to you, and you’ve got to make the best of it. Townsend and I didn’t start out with auspicious marriages, you remember. They took a bit of work, and you’ve never been afraid of work, old man. How long have you been handling your father’s estates? Seven or eight years now? Listen, you’re a decent person, the sort of man I would have wanted for Minette, that is, if you weren’t my friend, and a crashing sex fiend, and broody as a woman. Still.” He stopped as they neared the house and fixed August with a look. “I know you would never hurt Minette, not if you could prevent it. I believe in my heart that you love her, and that you want her to be happy. You’ve picked her up too many times to let her fall now.”

This encouraging talk was well and good. Warren was always a wonder when it came to words, like his garrulous sister, but in his heart, August still felt doubt.

“If I can’t make her happy, do you promise you’ll take her away from me?” he asked. “Even if I don’t want to let her go?”

Warren crossed his arms over his chest and let them down, and scuffed his boot against the ground again. “Like I said, it all depends on my sister. Now, let’s go have tea with Minette like civilized gentlemen. And if you don’t smile at her at least ten times before we’re through, I’ll slap a glove in your face, and neither one of us wants that.”

*** *** ***

Minette felt very cross tonight, and so she worked at embroidery in her private sitting room, making a handkerchief for August, painstakingly embroidering it with an ornately swirling
A
. Whoever would have guessed an
A
would prove so difficult to craft?

She didn’t know if it was the embroidery that made her cross, or whether she was naturally drawn to needlework when she was out of sorts. She only knew that she mainly plied her needle when she was angry, which perhaps explained why all her monograms came out looking a mess. She was angry at herself and August, and her brother, who had not solved anything the way he normally did. He had stayed for tea and made polite conversation, and then left her with a kiss on the forehead and a whispered admonishment to
“Be a good girl.”

“Blast,” she muttered as her needle slipped. She fluttered the handkerchief in irritation so the candles guttered and almost went out. At the same moment, there was a knock at the door.

Minette turned as August entered the room. He was in shirtsleeves, with no coat or cravat. For the thousandth time, she thought of their night at the Townsends’, and the way he’d looked in the morning before he’d hurriedly dressed. Broad shoulders and bronze skin, defined muscles, and that masculine part of him she couldn’t forget. That was what he looked like all the time under his clothes, as much good as it did her. He hadn’t come tonight to romance her. She could tell at once by his shuttered expression, and his rigid stance.

“May I speak with you a moment?” he asked.

She looked back at her embroidery. “Of course.”

Now she felt cross
and
shy. And nervous. He peered at her design as he sat beside her on the chaise, being careful of her dressing gown.

“You need more light,” he said.

“No, I don’t. If it looks awful, it’s a lack of talent, not candles.”

Goodness, that had sounded very cross. And she’d just put in a crooked stitch because of his nearness, and the intensity of his gaze. She laid the handkerchief down in her lap and faced him with all the bravery she could muster. “I apologize once again for my behavior earlier. For going to visit your...well. I understand now that it was very foolish and ill-advised. She didn’t really teach me anything, except to be sensual and open, which I am not very good at.”

“You shouldn’t have gone.”

“Yes, I know. Although I am curious about the books.”

“You’re not going to read the books. They’ll be returned to Esme tomorrow.”

“Oh. I had rather hoped—”

“No.”

She gave a soft sigh and pulled at the edges of the ivory silk square. “Very well. And I suppose you may still spank me if you believe I deserve it. I shouldn’t have run away from you earlier. I’m a terrible coward when it comes to such things.”

His eyes looked more black than hazel as he regarded her in the dim light. “Why didn’t you go with your brother?”

“Go where?”

“Leave. Go. Why do you stay here with me?”

How impossible he was. Handsome or not, he was brainless. “I stay here because I’m your wife. I belong here with you. Everyone will talk about us if I go live with Warren and Josephine.”

“Everyone’s talking about us anyway.”

She turned a bit away from him. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for everything.”

“I didn’t come to scold you again, or spank you. But Minette... Look at me.” She somehow managed to raise her eyes to his. “There shall be no more visits to Esme, or letters, or correspondence. You’re not to look at any more volumes of a lewd sort. It’s not proper for a lady.”

“Esme told me that you read them. That all gentlemen do.”

“Minette.” His voice held a warning note. “Do you understand? Or do you need that spanking after all?”

Hmm. If he spanked her, at least he’d be touching her. But oh, it would hurt. She picked up her embroidery and attempted to look adequately chastened. “I understand. No more lewd volumes. Whether you read them or not.” She was poking at him. Pushing at him as clumsily as she pushed her needle through the fabric. “It doesn’t matter anyway, what I know or don’t know about such matters, if you see me as a sister and nothing else.”

“I’ve asked you for time,” he said. “I’m sorry if you’re frustrated.”

Frustrated?
She’d loved him as long as she could remember, had enjoyed one night of passion in his arms—well, mostly enjoyed it—and was now trapped in a platonic marriage, taunted by his nearness, his sensual lips, his deep hazel eyes, his tall and virile body. Frustrated was not a strong enough word. She gripped her embroidery frame harder.

“It’s nothing to do with you,” he went on. “Please understand it’s my own sense of discomfort. I do think of you as a sister, a young woman who needs protection from villains like me.”

“You’re not a villain.”

“I can be.” The way he said it gave her a chill. “I don’t want to be. Which is why I wish to leave you alone for now.”

“Forever?”

“I don’t know.” He leaned closer with an apologetic expression. For a moment she thought he might kiss her, but he only looked sideways at her work.

“What are you stitching there? Is it a dove?”

She grimaced. “It’s supposed to be an
A
for Augustine. But it’s become such a mess, I suppose I’ll have to undo the entire thing and start over.”

“If you do, make it a
B
. I won’t be Augustine much longer.”

Oh dear. His father’s illness. “I wish there was a way to fix him,” she said, looking up at her husband. He didn’t seem sad, only resigned and perhaps a little closed off. Minette thought to herself,
I wish there was a way to fix you.
She stabbed the needle into the cloth just to have something to do, since she couldn’t embrace him the way she wished. “I shall work a
B
for Barrymore, then. How strange to call you Barrymore instead of August.”

“And you’ll be Lady Barrymore, when you’ve just gotten used to being Lady Augustine.”

She bit her lip, saddened by the dull acceptance in his voice. “Why must we lose people we love? I wish there was no sickness or sadness in the world, or hunger, or people who are in pain. I wish everyone might be happy and warm and well fed, and content. Sometimes I think I have a difficult life, but I don’t. Your poor father, and you and your mother...” Her embroidery work blurred with the effort not to cry, and she jabbed her needle right into the pad of her finger with regrettable force. “Ouch.” She hissed and shook the injured digit.

“Be careful,” said August.

At least she believed that was what he said. She wasn’t sure, because right afterward he took her finger and drew it to his lips, and brushed a kiss across its tip. His lips felt warm and soft, and his touch so infinitely tender.

And gone too soon.

He let go of her finger and considered her handkerchief again. “If embroidery is not your talent, have the servants do it,” he said. “Or commission some monogrammed handkerchiefs in town, if you’d like them for gifts or whatever.”

She looked down at her lap, feeling dejected and ashamed. “I wanted to embroider some for you myself. So you would have something of mine. Something special. Don’t wives do those sorts of things? I mean, anyone can buy something already made.” She shrugged and looked back at him. Thank God she had managed not to cry. “Perhaps I will go into town and find some grand ones embroidered quite perfectly. When I’m so awful at making things, I haven’t much choice.”

“Make me one with an
M
,” he said in a rough voice. “For Method. I’ll use it no matter what it looks like.”

“Everyone will laugh at the clumsy embroidery.”

“I don’t care.”

She couldn’t tell if he was angry or joking or simply tired of her. His color was high, and his expression cloaked as ever. “All right then,” she said. “I’ll make one for you.”

“Thank you.”

“It shall make me feel very much like a wife. And I am happy to be your wife, no matter if you need more time to get used to thinking of me in that way. I’ll try to be patient.”

“Thank you,” he said again, with curt formality. “I suppose I’ll leave you to your embroidery and go to bed.”

She stood when he did, and stared up at him with her frame and needle clutched to her chest. “Will you give me a good night kiss? You could do it as if I was your sister. I wouldn’t mind.”

He gave a strangled kind of laugh and rubbed his forehead, and gazed at her again in that mysteriously intent way. He had enthralled her with that gaze so many years ago, and he still enthralled her to this day.

“Please.” She was not above begging. “I think it will help me sleep better. A chaste kiss and embrace.”

His arm came around her. She could feel his muscular strength through the fine linen of his shirt sleeve. He smelled divine, like cologne and musk. “Don’t stick me, if you please.”

“What?”

He nodded at her hands. “The needle.”

“Oh.” Before she could pledge to keep him safe from any and all needle sticks, he brought his other arm around her and held her close, right against his chest. His thumb came beneath her chin to tip her face up. For a moment, he just looked at her. Minette licked her lips, trying to remember Esme’s advice about being alluring and sensual. His mouth covered hers, a short, firm press of warmth. She hardly had time to enjoy it before he pulled away.

“Do you think that will do?” he asked. “To help you sleep better?”

She swallowed hard, trying to find her voice. “Perhaps one more,” she finally managed to say. “I’ve been so restless.”

She saw a glint of humor in his eyes, a small quirk to his lips. He kissed her again, and this time she was ready to appreciate everything about it. The softness of his lips, the teasing contact, the way his nose brushed against her nose. She concentrated on feeling and remembering, and it seemed to her that this kiss lasted longer, but perhaps it was only because she was trying so hard to imprint it upon her soul. Lord knew when he would hold her like this again. It might be weeks, or months. When he released her, she quaked inside at the loss.