“You are right here,” she told him. “With me.”
He might be planning to leave her behind, but for right now, she wasn’t about to let him forget that—for right now at least—he waswith her.
She hitched up a knee so that his body could nestle more firmly against hers, and she thrilled at being trapped between the hardness of the table and the hardness of his body.
Again, he crushed his mouth to hers, and she could feel it so muchmorenow, the invasion of his tongue, the press of his hips against hers. She writhed on instinct, and he groaned, and for a moment Clio thought that maybe it could be all right between them. That maybe she could take this pleasure that they found between them and use it to fix everything else that seemed so determined to go awry.
After all, if she could make him feel like this—if he could make her feel like this in return—couldn’t they sort the rest out?
But then there were footsteps nearby, and even though they were man and wife, even though this was his house—their house—even though it was theactually thrice-damned day of their wedding, Hector leaped away from her like he’d been caught doing something unseemly.
For a moment, Clio was left staring at the ceiling, flat on her back and utterly abandoned.
But that was rather too pathetic, no matter how appropriate it might feel, and these days her pride was one of the few things she had left.
So, she pushed herself upright just in time to see a conflicted, almost frightened look on Hector’s face give way to a confident smirk.
“You know,” he said, “if you just admit that you are starved for the pleasure that only I can give you, I’m sure we could figure something out between us. You know perfectly well that I can make you feel good.”
It was … utterly crass, that comment. And, yes, it made her burn inside, but in a way that was more embarrassment than desire, though she could not deny that both were present.
What did he expect, though? That she would beg for him? That she would debase herself to a man who had married her only because he’d had to? Because she’d been unable to control her desires before and gotten them both caught in a compromising position?
And why would he even offer? Was it just masculine pride? Just a desire to know that he was desired—that his appeal was enough to send a proper young lady into a fervor?
She didn’t know. She didn’t know, and it drove her mad.
It was bad enough that he’d married her out of pity. She wasn’t going to make herself an object of ridicule in her own home.
“I willneverdo that,” she snapped, shaking out her skirts with trembling hands. “You will never,everhear me beg for you.”
She didn’t dare look to see how he reacted to this. Instead, she summoned all the dignity that centuries of aristocratic breeding had instilled in her, held her head high, and took herself off to cry in private.
After a week, in which Clio avoided her husband and read seventeen novels—whatever she could say for her new home, it had a well-stocked library, which she would need if she planned to hide in her bedchamber until Hector returned North—she decided to go see Phoebe.
A week was enough time that people wouldn’t make comments about her emerging from her newlywed bower too soon, Clio reasoned, hating herself for considering gossip, not to mention letting it control her comings and goings.
More to the point, a week was more than long enough for her to worry that she might quite literally lose her mind if she didn’t speak to anyone besides her maid.
Phoebe, bless her, was delighted by the unannounced visit.
“Clio!” she cried, rising from her writing desk, wiping errant smudges of ink from her fingers with a cloth. “I didn’t expect to see you!”
It was at that precise moment that it occurred to Clio that she ought to have sent some kind of note.
This wasn’t her home any longer.
Phoebe must have seen this realization in Clio’s face, because she crossed to Clio and wrapped an arm around her.
“None of that,” she chided, guiding them both to a settee. “You are always welcome here. Always. I only said as much because I think Aaron might have already left for the day. He is going out to the soldiers’ home this afternoon.”
Aaron had come away from his time in the war scarred, but with his body and mind intact, something that could not be said for many of the men with whom he had fought. In recognition of this good fortune, he funded a convalescent home for soldiers whose injuries meant that they could not support themselves or live alone. Phoebe was a great favorite at the home, and she often accompanied her husband.
“I’m not interfering with your plans, am I?” Clio asked.
Phoebe waved her off. “No, I wasn’t planning on joining him this time, anyway. It’s only fair that I sometimes let someone else win at cards. I just am sorry that you may have missed him.”
Just then, however, Aaron himself came through the door, hat in hand.
