Judith reached and brushed his hair away from his face. “My darling, it takes a great deal more than a thrashing nightmare to frighten me.” She kissed him, a butterfly caress of his lips. “Do you take to the streets to stay awake?”
“The theater. The gambling hells. To see Stella.”
“So the problem is not that youcannotsleep. It’s that you do notwantto.”
“It is rather treacherous territory.”
“Ah. Perhaps we can discover other entertainments.” Judith clambered over him, plumped pillows against the headboard, and snuggled in next to him. He watched every move, and as she took his hand and entwined their fingers, that smirk returned.
“Has anyone ever told you how retiring and demure you are?”
Judith laughed, squeezing his hand. “No. Not even in my first season. My only season. My mother considered one of her greatest failures to be that she could not convince me to keep my mouth shut. I learned the strictest posture and a mincing walk. I learned to play the pianoforte—somewhat—and to dance. I can tell the difference between a teaspoon, a soup spoon, a bullion spoon, a cream-soup spoon, and a dessert spoon, and where they go in a place setting. I have read Shakespeare, Plato, Defoe, and the novels of Mrs. Burney. I have studied Locke, Hume, and the writings of Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Astell. But I can barely thread a needle and have a serious distaste for being bored. I could never play the coquette. Despite Mother’s best efforts, I found the innocuous chitchat encouraged for young women to be nigh on intolerable. She once called me a harridan. But how often can you discuss the latest hat style before becoming as mad as the king himself?”
Mark shifted on his pillows to face her more directly. “I can honestly say I have never discussed hat styles with anyone but my hatter.”
“As it should be.”
He studied her a moment, his eyes narrowing. “Is that why you think you were Edmund’s second choice? Because you are clever and outspoken?”
Judith closed her eyes. The question took her breath away. How could he have possibly remembered that? “I was not his second choice.”
“Nor should you have been.”
“I was his fifth choice.”
A sharp intake of air made Judith open her eyes. He seemed truly surprised.
“You cannot possibly know—”
“He told me. Our first years were... unpleasant. He had been a second son, a widower with few prospects. He was far more interested in a bedmate and a mother to his sons than a wife who could manage his house. I know whom he courted and who rejected him because he made me aware of each name. No one thought he would be the earl, and he often threw up to me that if he had waited another year, he could have had his pick of eligible women.” Judith looked down at their clasped hands, unsettled by how much saying it had caused a deep ache in her chest.
“Then he was a fool.”
Mark’s kindness eased that ache a little, and Judith shrugged, looking at him again. “I made an excellent countess, and we grew to care for each other. I threw myself into running the household, and he grew to see value in that, if nothing else.”
He shook his head, then sat abruptly sat forward, twisting toward her and taking her face in both hands, pulling her close. “You are so much more than that.” Then he kissed her, pressing his lips against hers in a firm, determined way. His fingers curled into her hair, tugging the locks as his tongue pressed into her mouth.
With a moan, Judith surrendered into the kiss, the pressure on her scalp igniting a fire deep in her belly, and heat bloomed between her thighs. She thrust her tongue against his and wrapped her arms around him, her fingertips digging into the muscles of his shoulders.
Then he was gone—his absence so sudden that Judith cried out as he pushed off the bed. Mark stared down at her, his breath coming in deep gasps.
“What are you—”
He held out a hand. “Do not move.” He looked around, then scooped up her stockings from the floor and tossed them on the end of the bed. Then he opened the dressing room and pulled the sash from a banyan hanging on a peg behind the door. He disappeared inside a moment, then returned with the sash and one of his white ascots, both gripped in his left hand. His smirk returned as he came to the side of the bed, those blue eyes gleaming.
Judith wondered if she looked as confused as she felt. “What are you doing?”
“Do you trust me?”
Her eyebrows arched. “A little late for that question, do you not think?”
The smirk became a grin. “Depends.” He mounted the bed on his knees, holding the ascot and sash in front of him. “Do you trust me?”
Judith’s breath caught as his meaning seared through her, and she looked from his face to the fabrics in his hand, then his face again. Did she?
“Yes.”
Mark moved closer, placing the sash on the pillow next to her, then brushing her hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ears. His gaze never left hers as he raised the ascot and placed it over her eyes. Judith held her breath as he wrapped the fabric around her head, tying it on one side near her temple. She could still see shadows and movement through the fine silk, but she closed her eyes, waiting for his next move, already intrigued—and aroused—by his actions. And his words from the theater echoed again in her mind:I wish to own a part of you.
