She chuckled, feeling warm and soft and delirious.“Which would I prefer?”
“Both.We are going to have the most glorious affair a married couple has ever known.”
Eleanor sighed with contentment.“I wonder why you love me.I’m so ordinary.”
“Begging for compliments, my love?You’re intelligent, wise, brave, generous, and have, thank heavens, a sense of humor.You’re the most beautiful woman in the world to me, and you are totally, utterly fascinating.”He deftly unbuttoned the high collar of her dress and planted warm, soft kisses at her throat.
“Words cannot express it,” he said softly, looking into her eyes.“I need you in order to be whole.Now,” he teased, kissing her nose, “you must tell me why you love me.If you do.You’ve never said it.”
Eleanor looked at him and saw, with amazement, the uncertainty there.He was stripped of artifice.She raised a hand to caress his face.“I have loved you for so long!But you are so wonderful that any woman would love you, and,” she added with a naughty look, “I gather many of them have.”
A fire had started in his eyes, a fire of joy and, she thought, of passion.She did not see a trace of repentance as he smiled at her words and she didn’t care.
“Are you going to be a jealous and possessive wife?”he asked with a grin.
“Absolutely.”
“Then I will be a jealous and possessive husband.”He tipped her chin toward him and put on a severe expression.“You will have to disband that coterie of young gallants who’ve been squiring you around all year.”
“If I must,” she sighed.“Did you know Lucien came here?”
“I hoped he had.He needed a friend.”
“He needs a wife.”
“He needs a friend and a wife, as I have found…” They surrendered themselves again to the joy of touching and the bliss of kissing.
Eleanor’s gown was considerably more disarranged when she lazily said, “Your brother came here too.”
“No, did he?”he commented, more interested in the lace that still concealed her breasts.“Where did you bury the body?”
“I was very nice to him,” said Eleanor, staying his busy fingers.She’d be indecent soon.“I find I cannot hang onto my grievance forever, and as he didn’t criticize you we maintained civility.”
Nicholas gave up the attempt to free the lace from her hold and slid his hand beneath gown and corset.
“Actually,” said Eleanor, rather breathlessly, “I think if I hold anything against him, it’s the discussion I overheard between the two of you about my child.”
His hand stilled and simply rested there on her full breast.He puzzled over her words for a moment.
“That argument we had?I remember you became rather cool afterward.I thought it was because Amy had left and you no longer felt comfortable alone with me.What did we say to upset you?I’m sorry.I was only trying to upset Kit.He can irritate me sometimes.”
“It was horrid.I would have liked to spit fire at both of you!Talking about me like a brood mare to be passed around at your will.He indicated you had to be forced to marry me, then you said,” she remembered, firmly removing his hand and sitting straighter, “that if you tired of me, he could have me!”
“I did not.”
“You did.It’s etched in my mind.”
“Good God!”To her astonishment, he burst out laughing.
Eleanor jumped off his lap.“I did not find it funny.”
“Of course not.”He sank his head in his hands.“It’s a case of laughing rather than crying.”He controlled himself and stood.“I’m more and more astonished you’re willing to have anything to do with me at all.As matter of interest,” he asked, drawing her back into his arms, “what would you have done if I’d gift-wrapped you and sent you off to Kit?”
She looked up at him.“If I’d escaped hanging for your murder, I would have managed by myself, I assure you.”
“I have no doubt.Tell me how.”
“I’m not used to a life of luxury.I can care for myself.”
