Horrified shock sent DuMond’s brows flying toward his hairline. “My God. Youforcedher?”
Outrage snapped Argyll’s spine ramrod straight.
“How dare you?” he demanded. “As though I would need to force a lady—or would ever wish to. What sort of blackguard do you take me for?”
Asking if I would rape a woman.
“Do you even know me?” he spat.
“My apologies, Argyll.”
Appalled, physically ill his friend should doubt him so greatly, he shook his head.
“…I do not want you coming to my bed after you’ve spent the day in some woman’s arms, Gregory. I will not do it…”
And yet, you took offense that your wife of not even a full day should have drawn the conclusion she had.
Argyll turned and selected the next most expensive bottle from DuMond’s sideboard.
“Why don’t you begin again?”
If he weren’t so bloody desperate, he’d have told the marquess to take his offer and stuff it up his arse.
“I referred,” he said tightly, “to a new bride wanting to…” Never. “Wait to consummate the union?”
This time he poured a modest measure of brandy into a snifter. Best to affect nonchalance. Far preferable to drinking straight from the bottle—even if that was precisely what he wanted to do.
“Argyll.”The weird quality to his friend’s voice brought him around. “Iwas the one who delayed my wedding night to my marchioness.”
Argyll sprayed amber liquid across the room, choking on what little he had managed to swallow. “Y-You—”
No. He could not even say it. And not merely because apoplexy had seized him whole.
DuMond crossed the room swiftly and thumped him between the shoulder blades.
The touch—so reminiscent of his mystifying wife’s assistance upon their first meeting—had Argyll jerking away at once. He glared murder at his friend and partner.
DuMond redeemed himself somewhat by sparing him the need to ask.
“I was occupied commissioning a token in honor of our wedding day,” he explained.
Argyll absorbed that slowly.
“A token,” he repeated, nodding. “For your wedding day.”
My God. Of course. What a bloody fool. Why had he not considered that?
“The ladies do enjoy a bauble,” he murmured thoughtfully. “Thank you, DuMond. This has been…most illuminating.”
He patted the other man’s shoulder, set his glass aside, and turned for the door.
DuMond stopped him at the threshold. “Argyll? Something tells me it wasn’t.”
“Oh, go to hell. If there’s one thing I understand, it is knowing what pleases a woman.”
And with the laughter filling the other man’s pronouncement, Argyll took his leave.
Chapter 17
