But her blood turned to ice as she went on to read the following lines:having declared to me that they are unmarried persons, have now been married after the manner of the laws…
Have now been married…
Have now been married…
The words echoed in her head like a cast iron pan landing on a kitchen floor.
The certificate was signed by two witnesses with the same last name as the man who’d signed as the priest.
“Who is Hedwig?” But she knew. He’d told her that Stone wasn’t his given name.
Gripping the document in panic, she spun back around to face him, shock and wrath thundering in her brain.
“Hedwig Buckley Spencer?” Her head nearly exploded. “And put on some clothes!” An unsettling glimpse of the contours of sinewy muscles and smooth skin only added to her confoundment. In addition to the perfect amount of hair sprinkled across his chest and trailing down until it disappeared beneath the counterpane.
If she wasn’t decently covered in a delightful pink but slightly too long night rail, her outrage might have had her imagining he’d ravished her.
Her astonishment was as much at her own behavior as at his near nakedness.
He had purchased the night rail for her, along with numerous other necessities from the mercantile. She glanced across the room where a handful of packages were stacked in the corner.
They’d not stopped at shopping when they’d gone out. More incredulity followed by an endless string of unspoken recriminations for both of them.
Unspoken because there were so many, they overwhelmed her ability to speak.
“What are you in such a state over?” Stone had stepped into his trousers and crept up behind her. Showing no manners whatsoever, he snatched the certificate out of her suddenly nerveless fingers.
“You did this on purpose!” she finally managed.
He’d plied her with whisky, and then pretty clothes, and shoes, and even a reticule to replace the one she’d lost… And then… he must have forced her to marry him. He had to have. Because she’d promised her father! She never would have…!
“Why in the hell would I do that?” But he was scratching his chin, which was hidden somewhere beneath his unruly beard. “Unless…”
She spun all the way around to glare up at him. “Unless…?” she prompted, annoyed with herself for struggling with the distraction of his bare chest. Although scarred and bruised, his pale skin looked silky and surprisingly touchable, and the smattering of curling dark hairs invited her to follow the trail.
Which dipped into his trousers. Only half the buttons on his falls had been done up.
Her fingers tingled with an inexplicable desire to touch the twin indents at the base of his chiseled abdomen.
The look he sent her was a reproving one. “If I’m remembering correctly, I believe this was your idea.”
“What?” He was blaming her for this? “How dare you?” She glanced around the room, searching for something to throw. Before she could get a hold of the empty pitcher used for water, however, he’d caught her wrist in his fist.
“Settle down,” he growled.
Despite her squirming and trying to wrestle out of his grasp, he didn’t so much as break a sweat but simply squeezed a little tighter, staring at the certificate, scowling.
“Release me now, you brute!”
“One of Culpepper’s men was following us,” he explained as though she wasn’t futilely attempting to wrestle out of his grasp.
His words niggled a few vague recollections in her memory. But…
“You certainly were quick to take advantage of that,” she accused.
Upon which, either her strength had taken on Herculean properties or Stone had loosened his hold, but she was able to break free.
“I want my own chamber!” she demanded, marching across the room. She would locate the innkeeper this instant!
