I smooth the fabric over my hips. Over my stomach. I hesitate only a moment before opening the bedroom door, grabbing the veil at the last second. My husband is a kind man, but my mother’s words cut deep.
Grady looks up from the chair by the hearth when I enter.
The heat in his gaze is immediate, but so is the reverence. He stands slowly, as if I might bolt, as if the moment needs space to breathe.
“You’re beautiful,” he says.
Notdespitemy scars. Noteven withyour unfortunate tragedy.
Just beautiful.
The tightness in my chest relaxes. Welcoming my husband into our marital bed for the first time feels less like the obligation I was taught to fulfill and more like an act of trust. Fragile, terrifying, and entirely my own.
Grady
I’m a gentleman with manners that not even the dusty Texas plain can dull. There’s nothing gentle about the way I look at Rose. She’s come to me in a nightgown too sheer to be called respectable. The soft curves of her breasts hang heavy beneath thin fabric, and the cotton clings to her hips.
She’s beautiful. Standing before me with the innocence of a virgin but dressed like a seductress.
“Take it off.”
Her brown eyes snap to mine. A better man wouldn’t make her strip for him. A better man would carry her back to the bedroom and teach her pleasure with a kind hand.
For what I want to do, I’m no better than a beast. I knew the second she stepped off the stagecoach that she was mine.
Her hand trembles as she reaches up to slide the sleeves down. It’s not fear that makes her shake. Her lips part slightly and it’s with rosy cheeks that she steps out of the nightgown completely bare. She doesn’t cover herself, standing proudly as I look my fill.
My cock that’s been hard since she walked into the room with that skimpy nightgown aches with need. She has full breasts with nipples the same pink shade as her lips. Her wide hips lead to thick thighs with a dark patch of curls that hides her pussy from me. It’s the only covering I’ll ever allow when we’re intimate.
I want all of her, and I’ll settle for nothing less.
“The veil too.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she scoffs.
I see nothing absurd about wanting to see my wife. All of my wife. Her scars don’t repulse me. They don’t steal my focus or tarnish her beauty. Like the freckles that dance lazily across her pale shoulders they are just a part of her.
A mark of survival.
“Take. It. Off.” My voice comes out low and rough.
“No.”
Leaning back in my chair, I want to stand up and make her see reason. I want to snatch it off her head and throw it into the fireplace. But I don’t want to intimidate her.
“Rose. Take it off or I will throw it away.”
She stares at me in shock and to a degree I share her surprise. I’ve never considered myself a harsh man. I only raise my voice for hard of hearing customers. My threat sits heavy on my chest, but it’s for her own good. I won’t let her hide from me.
In this marriage we will be equal partners.
It falls to the ground, hairpins tumbling across the wooden floorboards, and finally I can see my wife in all her glory.
Rose
“There’s a good wife,” Grady praises me.
He stands from his chair, his tall frame casting a shadow over mine. Heat pulses through me. The fine hairs along my arms straighten as my skin tingles with awareness.
