“I didn’t have expectations,” she said softly.
The faintest thread of sadness crept into her voice, suggesting she spoke of far more than her new accommodations.
A dull pressure gathered in his chest.
Yes, well, asking the lady why she’d come and found you certainly wouldn’t make for a happy bride.
Daria’s unnervingly bold gaze slipped. “You’ve hurt yourself,” she murmured.
“Hmm?” With a frown, Argyll angled his head down in search of the injury in question.
Drifting closer, Daria helped him locate the mark. She glided her long fingers along that entrancing vein against the sensual hollow of her throat.
There was a slight uptick in his breathing, and at that innocuous little caress she gave herself.
Daria abruptly stopped. “Oh.”
His neck grew warm.Bloody DuMond.
“It is inconsequential.” His voice emerged too thick for the smoothness he’d intended. He cleared his throat. “Certainly not something to merit your wifely concerns.”
Instead of alleviating those fears, Daria’s saucer-round eyes grew stricken. She took two steps away from him and eyed the exit.
He’d wounded her. Argyll gave his even tighter neck another rub. What in blazes had he said to earn this profound sadness?
When she turned back, he let his arm fall.
“No, you are correct,” she said.
Too long a pause between whatever he’d last said, he shook his head.
“It is most definitely not my concern, Your Grace.”
The blankness in her voice pulled his lips into a frown. Her sudden use of his title, though, grated. Why, he could not say?
Studiously avoiding his eyes, his quixotic bride inserted the corner of her index finger into her mouth and nibbled at the flesh. Her actions were wildly erotic—that from another woman would have been craftily employed to seduce—but he’d discovered Daria, when distressed, troubled that delicate digit.
Argyll frowned and closed the gap she’d placed between them. “Hush now,” he said soothingly and lightly took her wrist.
Her graceful fingers shook. “I-I did not say anything.”
She was determined to keep pulling uncynical smiles from him. As he perused her poor, abused finger, he stroked circles upon her palm. “It is an inane soothing sound,” he explained.
He inhaled, searching for the floral scent she favored. “Where is your rosewater, love?”
“My r-rosewater?”
Argyll placed his lips behind the delicate shell of Daria’s ear. “Yes,” he said, the husky quality of his voice not feigned. What about her drove him mad with hunger? “You place it here.” He lightly kissed the spot where she dabbed the soft, womanly fragrance.
Daria’s body trembled against his.
“And here,” he murmured, touching his mouth to the hollow of her throat.
Her breath caught noisily. He hid a satisfied smile behind her other earlobe.
Without warning, Daria stepped away, and Gregory’s kiss went unfinished.
He frowned.
