The Third Duke's the Charm (6 page)

“That’s impossible?”

“That’s impossible for
you
.”

“What if I point out you’ve never understood me all that well?

“May
I
point out that you are becoming uncharacteristically irritated?”

He took in a breath and leveled a penetrating look in her direction. Carefully, he spread his hands on his desk, noting that the papers he’d been working on were still sitting there, unread and unsigned. “May I ask again if there is a purpose to this visit?”

“I suppose I just want to know . . . why?”

So she could whisper it to all of London? Lucien debated his answer because, quite frankly, whatever he did next, even if it was just to send Catherine off, would be repeated and interpreted and twisted to whatever story might prove to be most titillating at the moment. “I find her interesting,” he said in the end, which was perfectly true. He found Vivian very interesting indeed. “She is attractive and intelligent but without pretention.”

“Attractive?” Catherine’s fine brows rose, but then she said grudgingly, “I suppose she is pretty enough if one can get past those horrid gowns and her lack of a bosom.”

Thanks to that accidental episode where he had stumbled across that impromptu swimming race across the lake, he could attest she had a very shapely bosom indeed. It wouldn’t do to point it out to Catherine, who flaunted her breasts at every opportunity, that she was a bit overblown for his tastes. “Apparently I can.”

“That is what you want in a woman? No pretention? Forgive me, darling, but I still cannot see her as a duchess one day.”

“Since I wish my father a long life, I am not going to worry over that at this time.”

“Or a marchioness either.”

“Yet she soon will be.”

There was a moment when Catherine contemplated him as if they’d never met before, but then she laughed, though her eyes still held a tinge of resentment. “I think you really mean it.”

Chapter Six

Charles ro
lled over, encountered a warm female form, and pulled her closer into the protective circle of his arms, his mind absently registering the sound of rain.

Again.

Did it rain in Scotland all the time? Not that it mattered, for he’d rather stay in bed anyway, but the weather was appalling, or else he’d maybe just taken this journey at the wrong time of year.

But yet it was impossible to feel it had been a mistake. Maybe not the most opportune time of the season, but definitely
not
a mistake.

“Are you awake?” He nuzzled his wife’s nape, lifting her pale hair to give him better access to her smooth skin.

“You are,” she said in a soft, amused tone. “That is unmistakable.”

It was true, the press of his erection nestled against her bottom, one of his hands slipping up her ribcage to cup her breast. He nibbled on her earlobe. “Uhm. I am indeed.”

“Are all men . . . ravenous so early?” she asked, turning in his arms, her eyes luminous in the slanted rays of dawn coming through the rain-streaked window.

He had to grin. “Ravenous? How true. And how the devil would I know, as I haven’t slept with any. But I am certainly hungry for you. Now then”—he deftly parted her thighs with his knees and adjusted his position—“shall I demonstrate how much?”

This was still their honeymoon and he entered her slowly, careful to not be too demanding, too impetuous, and the leisure was perfect for a rainy morning.The soft sigh in his ear and her yielding body told him she was ready. Charles kissed her before he started to move, the gesture not passionate so much as an indication of his deep feelings; he’d changed his life for her. This wasn’t casual, this wasn’t laughter and lighthearted fun, and she wasn’t just another warm, willing bedmate.

His whole world had changed. Irrevocably.

As had hers.

“I love you,” he murmured against her mouth, meaning it, the words distinctive and punctuated by his first sliding withdrawal before he sank back in with the same measured control, pleasure inundating his senses. She was hot and slick around him, and he’d meant exactly what he’d said. He
loved
her.

Amazing. It had never happened to him before. In fact, he wasn’t sure he’d have known it if Vivian hadn’t pointed it out, and
that
conversation had certainly altered his perspective on that formerly abstract emotion.

But this moment—this was for them only.

His wife made a very enticing sound that seemed to be something between a moan and a sigh and her lashes drifted down over her very lovely eyes. “Charles.”

Whatever happened next, he decided as he began to move his lower body in tune to the subtle lift of her hips, it was worth it. Not because of the climb of orgasmic release—that he’d had before and it could mean nothing, he’d discovered, or mean
everything
.

“Like this.” He slid his hands under satiny bottom and lifted her into his next thrust, deeply penetrating, sexual enjoyment running along his skin like flickering fire.

Louisa reached up then to touch his mouth, a feather brush of her fingers, her breathy exhale arousing.

His entire existence right now was the woman beneath him.

“I need you so much,” he told her, his voice uneven, his control dwindling. “Too much. I’m bewitched, bedeviled . . . oh God, Lou . . . I can’t . . . can’t . . .”

So much for the skilled lover who could dispense pleasure with aplomb, find his own satisfaction, and then walk away. The thread of control vanished altogether, and he shuddered into a climax that sent him into a blissful oblivion, and luckily, they were enough in accord that she cried out even as he poured into her, the tiny contractions of her inner muscles telling him she had found the same glimpse of paradise.

He must have drifted back to sleep afterwards, because when he finally opened his eyes his wife was sitting in her plain dressing gown, her hair damp from bathing, and there was a tray with tea, bacon, and biscuits by the side of the bed. When he sat up, the sheet falling to his waist, he shoved the hair out of his eyes. “Is it still raining?”

Louisa nodded, her silver eyes shadowed. “Of course. All it has done is rain.”

“It’s Scotland,” he said pragmatically, running his hand through his hair.

“A bad omen, do you think?”

He shouldn’t have told her he thought they should head homeward today. He should have made love to her and packed quietly while she slept, but instead it appeared to be the other way around. Her small valise was already by the door, her traveling gown draped over the chair. “No, my love, I don’t it is a bad omen at all. I think it is just Scotland.”

“Your father—” she started to say, her nervousness evident.

“Will be stiff-backed and disapproving,” he interrupted, not without his own trepidations. True to character, he was the errant son, and this marriage was a perfect example. “But he will grow to love you. His opinion is not something I wish for you to worry over.”

“I wish you had discretion over what I worry over, but you don’t.” Louisa got up to pace the room, her lovely face set, her hair shimmering in the muted light. “I know it was a very romantic ideal . . . to elope and marry because we love each other, but we still need to accept the responsibility that our families may not support our decision.”

Charles decided it was prudent to pour his own cup of tea even though normally she would have done it for him. This conversation was inevitable and she was correct. He was fairly sure his father would relent eventually, but not at all able to promise her he would. “I have an inheritance from my grandmother. It is hardly a grand fortune, but it will see us through. We won’t starve, nor sleep in the woods.” He was joking, or he certainly hoped he was. The fear of being disinherited existed, but then again, she was worth it.

Call him a sentimental idiot with stars in his eyes, their love was worth it.

His wife turned, her eyes shimmering. “That is fine and good, Charles, but that is not what I meant. I don’t wish for your family to be ashamed of me.”

He jerked enough that he spilled hot tea on his hand and had to stifle a very colorful curse he was not allowed to voice in front of a lady. “Lou,” he said in exasperation, grabbing a napkin from the tray and swabbing at his stinging hand. “That is ridiculous.”

“I knew we couldn’t stay here forever.” She looked very young and forlorn, sinking down in the chair again, her dressing gown pooled around her slender form, slight shadows under her eyes. “There is going to be a reckoning and I have chosen to ignore it, and while I have no regrets, I am also not blind to reality. The world will think you married beneath you. Vivian Lacrosse’s father is a baronet.”

“I know that. I’ve been acquainted with Sir Edwin all my life.” He took a steadying sip from his cup and swallowed, weighing his words. “You are intelligent woman and you know in your heart it doesn’t matter who is what, and certainly titles and all the fanfare that go with them promote a lot of attention but the measure of a man is how he deals with his life. This is how I chose to deal with mine. I would rather follow my heart than the dictates of my family, and Viv would be the first one to applaud me. She was, actually, when I told her I was going to move heaven and earth to make you my wife. No wonder, since it was her suggestion.”

It was so true. He’d been persuaded into his decision to ask Louisa to marry him, but then again, it had been done out of friendship, and he knew it.

“Maybe she could be the one to face your father then.” Louisa gave an endearing hiccup. “He terrifies me.”

“She was going to have to face him often, so perhaps that is why she foisted me off on you,” he said teasingly.

A mistake. His wife burst into tears.

Instantly he was putting his cup into the saucer, his feet on the floor, going to kneel before her, his arms around her trembling shoulders. “Lou . . . don’t. It will be fine. All of it will be fine. I vow it to you.”

***

He had no idea.

Charles was a product of his privileged life. She had known that from the very beginning, and it was far too late for her to panic now; logically she knew it. But it was more than just the formidable duke, but also her own stern father she would soon have to face, and it would not surprise her in the least if her family cut her out of their lives forever.

She’d married the Duke of Sanford’s rakish son, she had lain with him, and even as she slipped her arms around his neck and pressed her face against the strength of his muscled shoulder, she hoped his love for her hadn’t ruined his formerly carefree life. As his wife, she wanted to bring him joy, not the ridicule of his class or the disdain of his exalted family.

It was too late to change it, and she wouldn’t, even if given back the opportunity. She swallowed back the tears, doing her best to compose herself, pulling back a little. “My apologies. I have no idea what just happened. I really rarely cry.”

Her husband, impossibly handsome with his tousled dark hair, wiped the dampness from her cheek with his long, elegant fingers, concern in his eyes. “We don’t have to depart today if you wish to wait.”

“No. You are right, we need to return, and besides, eventually we will have to face everyone. Perhaps it won’t be as difficult as I imagine.”

“Very few things in life worth having come easily.” His mouth curved in a wry smile. “That happens to be my father’s favorite saying and I might remind him of it when we next see each other.”

He rose, unselfconsciously nude, and went to where his velvet coat was draped carelessly over a chair, retrieved a handkerchief and returned to hand it to her. “I slept longer than I intended. I’ll bathe and dress and settle matters with the innkeeper and we can be on our way then.”

Louisa nodded, resolute, knowing she would miss this cozy room and the quaint little village, but the fairy tale was over. It was time for practicality, and at heart, she thought of herself a pragmatic woman.

An hour later they were on the road in the private carriage Charles had hired to bring them north in the first place, the cheeriness of the driver in the face of the dreary weather making her wonder just how much her husband had paid him to take them the distance and then stay in a small village for the duration of their honeymoon. Charles might just have to learn to curb such extravagance if his father decided to banish him.

Perhaps that had already happened. Not even Charles with his assurances that all would be well had tried to tell her his father would be pleased with his precipitous marriage.

All the men she knew from her upbringing had an occupation. Though educated at Eton and Cambridge, Charles did not as far as she knew. It was odd to think she knew him in some ways so intimately, and in others, not at all. It was difficult to find a way to delicately ask the question without sounding insulting, so she finally settled for a roundabout approach. “You told me you have property in Sussex.”

Sprawled in the opposite seat, his booted feet extended, Charles lifted his dark brows. “I do.”

“Is that where we will live?” She felt she had the right to ask
that
question.

“I never have.”

That was the very aspect of all this that had her in such a fluster. She really could not picture herself in a ducal mansion, surrounded with servants. “I like the country,” she told him, her hands folded in her lap as they bumped along roads rutted with rain.

“You are
used
to the country,” he corrected with one of his very engaging smiles. “You will enjoy London also, love. I promise.”

“Miss Lacrosse, you once told me, deplored it.”

“Viv,” he responded with equanimity, “has good reason to deplore it. She was pushed into the quest for a fashionable marriage by her enthusiastic mother with all the force of a tropical typhoon. By nature she is more intellectual than social. Her mother viewed—and vocalized it freely—her first season as an abject failure. She doesn’t dance—she isn’t accomplished at it, trust me—and botany is her favored topic of conversation. Were she a man, she would probably be lauded for her scientific pursuits. But since she’s female, that she was able to grow by two seeds she acquired at the expense of her entire allowance saved for over a year a very rare orchid only seen on a small, almost uninhabited tropical island is not considered an accomplishment but to be
degage
. It doesn’t matter that she is beautiful not just outside but inside, the
ton
does not see that. Her intellect makes most men turn away. The superficial attitude annoys me.”

There might have been a small twinge of jealousy over hearing her husband’s former fiancée referred to as beautiful, but then again, he’d chosen
her
instead. Louisa was still daunted more than she would admit by the idea of London society, but at least she was gaining some insight into it. “But yet you agreed to marry her.”

“Don’t make it sound like an act of pity. We would have muddled along quite well together had I not met you and realized the difference.”

“The difference?”

“Between true passion and affection.”

All envy of Vivian Lacrosse’s relationship with her husband vanished. Louisa smiled for the first time that day, despite the persistent rain and the jolting ride. “I . . . see. I, too, didn’t know that love was so . . . consuming.”

“We are teaching each other.” His voice was soft, his tall body relaxed in the seat across from her. “It will be a lifelong lesson.”

“I look forward to it.”

“As do I.”

When he smiled at her that way, it was as if the sun had finally come out. She murmured, “I don’t think we have much choice at this time, do we?”

“No.”

His sangfroid was reassuring and she settled back, suddenly tired from a lack of sleep and the rhythm of the vehicle. “I’ve been up since dawn.”

“I fully remember waking you. And what came after. If we could greet every single day that way I would be a happy man.”

She laughed on a low exhale and couldn’t help but blush. “I think I’ve married a rogue.”

“You’ve married a man who loves you to distraction. Would you like my shoulder as a pillow, my lady?”