“I am sorry. If I look upon anyone with distaste, it is myself. Not you. Never you.”
He felt as startled as Boadicea looked by his apology. For so many years, he had either been trapped in the untenable hell of his marriage to Millicent or paying the price for her death. It occurred to him now that he did not know how to conduct himself with a lady. With his future wife. With this vibrant, gorgeous force before him. But it was true that while he did not understand what she did to him, he had no wish to cause her pain or embarrassment.
A pink flush crept over her cheeks. “Thank you, Spencer. I can only imagine how much that cost you.”
He smirked, which was unlike him, but he could not seem to maintain jurisdiction over any part of his anatomy, so his mouth may as well go rogue too. “You have no idea.”
She smiled back at him, and it was an intimate smile. Soft and warm and secret. “I daresay I may have an inkling. And just so we are clear, I will marry you in haste because I do not wish to delay my enjoyment of the marital bed, and not because you ordered it.”
Her enjoyment of the marital bed. He could not speak.
But he didn’t need to, for she chose that moment to sweep from the chamber, head high, auburn curls rioting down her back. It took every bit of restraint he had not to go after her, catch her in his arms, and bring her back where she belonged.
eddings were meant to be joyous, celebratory occasions,but the breakfast immediately following Bo’s vows with Bainbridge in the chapel at Boswell Manor possessed the stilted air of a funeral. Silence reigned among the sparse guests, all close friends and family with the exception of the Duke and Duchess of Cartwright.
Naturally, the dowager duchess—who wore the pained expression of someone walking barefoot upon a bed of hot coals whenever she deigned to speak to Bo—had ignored her wishes and invited the duchess anyway. Just as the dowager had insisted upon orchids to adorn the chapel, when Bo had wanted orange blossoms and lilies. And just as Bo had selected the wedding breakfast menu only to discover upon reviewing the fifteen-course menu card before her that the dowager had once again superseded her.
Bo could not abide by fish and had made the grievous error of imparting that fact to her mother-in-law. Which was why the dowager had chosen it to be the keystone of every dish except aspics during theentrées froidesportion of the menu and theentremets.
Astonishing that her mother-in-law had not finagled some way of landing kippers in themeringues à la Chantilly, but if the menu card was to be believed, Bo would need to placate her rumbling stomach with thoughts of sponge cake and chocolate cream while she drowned her sorrows in the wine glass a blessedly capable servant continued to refill.
She lifted her crystal goblet to her lips and took another fortifying sip. The wine did nothing to numb the clawing fear within her that she had just made the greatest mistake of her life, but it did fill her with a pleasant enough warmth. Yes, perhaps she ought to get soused. And then cast up her accounts on the dowager’s gown, which she had kindly confided to Bo she had worn to Bainbridge’s first wedding as well.
The notion of vomiting on her mother-in-law should not be so entertaining, but now that it had infiltrated her mind, she could not quite squelch the inappropriate laughter rising within her. Perhaps spurred on by her admittedly generous consumption of wine, a giggle bubbled forth, slipping past her lips, ruining the silence and the clink of cutlery on delicate china. All eyes turned to her, and she was acutely aware of the scrutiny of the reserved man at her side.
In the month since she had shared such scorching passion with him, he had been icy and polite, perfunctory in all his correspondence, withdrawn whenever their paths had crossed. They had not even had a moment alone since that day. Bo was certain it was by design, but the haste of their wedding and the distance between her family estate and Boswell Manor had not made matters easy either.
“What amuses you, Duchess?” he asked quietly, the timbre of his voice sending a tremor of something warm and delicious down her spine.
Duchess.
How strange to hear it said aloud, by him. To realize she was, in fact, married to the Duke of Bainbridge. It was not what she had wanted, not at all the fate she had once envisioned for herself, but it was her reality now. If only they could bypass the breakfast and be alone, for she longed to discover whether or not the fiery lovemaking had been a fluke.
She glanced at him from beneath her lashes, knowing she could not very well reveal to him before their assembled guests what had caused her to laugh. “Can a bride not be happy on her wedding day, Duke?” she asked instead, arching a brow and daring him to question her further.
Another glass of wine and she just may be inclined to share so that the entire assemblage could laugh as well. She raised her glass toward him in a mock toast, and downed half the contents. It was rude, and she did not care. Her corset was too bloody tight, her mother-in-law detested her, her new brother-in-law continued to send her lovelorn glances when he thought no one else watched, her husband still seemingly disapproved of her, and she was famished with nothing but thirteen courses of fish to eat.
At her own wedding breakfast. Or rather, at the breakfast for the wedding she had not wanted to the man she had not wished to wed. Bed, yes. Wed, decidedly not. She frowned fuzzily at her glass, thinking the last quaff had rather more of an effect upon her than she had anticipated.
Her husband leaned nearer, and his decadent scent washed over her. All the irritation she felt toward him dissipated in the beauty of that scent and the sight of his handsome face in such proximity to hers. If nothing else would come of this miserable match, at least that frowning mouth was now hers to kiss whenever she wished.
“My dear, perhaps you aretoo happy,” he murmured into her ear.
Her eyes narrowed. Of course he would ruin her equanimity with a suggestion that she was ineriab—inedriab—inebriaterated? No, that did not sound right. Oh dear. Perhaps the dreadful man was correct after all. But her wine glass was once more full, so how could she have over imbribed? Er, over imbibed?
Yet another fish course was whisked away from her, untouched. She reached beneath the table to give his thigh a reassuring pat, but missed his thigh. Instead, she found his hard length straining against his trousers.
“Oh,” she whispered to herself, snatching her hand away. Bainbridge was fully aroused, and the knowledge sent a pulse of forbidden, delicious warmth to the flesh between her thighs. Not a fluke, then. She knew the sensation for what it was now—hunger, desire, need.
“Yes,” he muttered darkly, his gaze burning into hers. “Oh.”
Heat suffused her cheeks. She looked away from him, meeting Cleo’s concerned gaze.I am fine, she reassured her sister with a pointed look. Of course, Bo was anything but fine. She was likely soused, in addition to being terrified, dismayed, suspicious, and eager, simultaneously and not necessarily in that order.
She forced her gaze to move on. Thornton at Cleo’s side was tucking into the next course, quite pleased. None of her sapskull brothers were in attendance, which was just as well for Bo, nor was her beloved sister Helen who was in America with her husband. Her sister Tia, ever the wild one despite being the Duchess of Devonshire, gave her a gamine grin. Her husband the duke offered a commiserating smile.
Then there were her parents—Father seemed quite pleased with the fish courses as well, and of course there was the matter of his final daughter having been safely married. Mother stared at her with a disconcerting intensity, and given that she had been the least impressed by the forced betrothal and wedding, it was hardly surprising. Bo reached for her glass, taking another hearty sip. The dowager duchess glared at her as if she were a bug that had dared to befoul her hem, and her bosom bow the Duchess of Cartwright was little better. Her husband, perhaps not entirely to his credit, reserved his glowers for the servant tarrying too long in refilling his wine.
How she wished her best friend Clara had returned from her extended honeymoon in Virginia and New York. The haste of Bo’s nuptials had not allowed it. And then, Bo’s gaze stopped on the last guest in attendance. Lord Harry. He was staring at her with equal parts frustration and…oh, dear. Something else that was wholly inappropriate when aimed toward the woman who had only just married his brother earlier that morning.
