She glided to the settee and gathered her skirts to take a seat. “Would you care for some tea?” she asked in a voice that was far too high and unsteady.
“No,” he said, striding toward her. “All I want is to hear your condition.”
She cleared her throat, hoping that would help with the high-voice issue and settled onto the edge of the settee. “Always direct to a fault.”
“Did you expect any less of me?” He grinned.
“No, take a seat, Mark.” That was a negotiating tactic. If he was sitting too, they would be equals.
A disgruntled look on his face, Mark reluctantly sat. He chose a chair at right angles to the settee and leaned toward her, forearms braced on his thighs, his powerful frame so close she could smell the scent of his lightly applied cologne. Spicy and reminiscent of the forest. She closed her eyes. More lust. Not helping.
“Look,” he began. “I know what you’re going to say.”
“You do?” She furrowed her brow. She’d seen him speaking to Louisa, theDuchesse de Frontenac, last night. Surely her friend had not told him what she wanted, had desperately wanted for years.
“Yes,” he replied. “I’ve been thinking about it all night. I’m certain there’s a way we can determine how to make it work.”
She forced herself to smother her laugh, pressing her lips together awkwardly. “Make it work? I thought perhaps you already knew how it worked.”
He shrugged. “I do, of course, but there are complications. You must know that. It’s far from simple.”
She pressed her lips together harder this time. Unexpected laughter bubbled in her chest. “I’ve never considered itsimple,but precisely what do you mean by… complications?”
“You know, the usual. Legalities, gossip, that sort of thing. And there is always the issue of timing.”
She narrowed her eyes on him. What in heaven’s name did he think she was asking of him? “Timing? Legalities?”
Mark straightened a bit. “Yes, with my new role, the timing of the thing will be of the utmost importance. Surely you can understand that. A divorce has the potential to cause a great deal of scandal for both of us as well as our families.”
A wave of cold shock stiffened her spine and she gasped, pressing her fingertips to her throat. “A divorce!”
“Yes,” he replied, squinting at her. He hesitated. “Isn’t that what you want?”
Nicole sagged against the settee cushions, her heart thrumming madly with a mixture of exasperation and trepidation. “No, you dolt. I don’t want a divorce. I want you to have sex with me!”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Mark sat on the green-and-white-flowered Louis XIV chair in the middle of Nicole’s well-appointed French drawing room, completely dumbfounded. His mouth opened and closed, his eyes blinked repeatedly, and his head cocked to the side as he tried to make sense of the words that had just emerged from his wife’s lips. Surely, he had been wrong before a time or two in his life. When he was younger, a child, perhaps. It had been a long while, but incorrectness wasn’t acompletelyforeign feeling to him.
He just couldn’t precisely recall a time when he’d been wrong. He sure as hell couldn’t recall a time when he’d beenthisbloody wrong. For the love of God, he’d been as wrong as Napoleon’s timing at Waterloo. As wrong as wrong ever got.
It was an unexpected feeling. As a result, he was anything but his usual calm, collected self when he staredat Nicole and echoed in a stunned voice, “Havesexwith you?”
She shot to her feet and strode to the mantel, crossed her arms over her chest, and whirled to face him, her eyes blazing green fire. “Yes, you idiot. I want a baby. What in Hera’s name made you think I wanted a divorce?” There was a slight redness to her cheeks that made her all the more appealing. She was magnificent when she was angry.
“Last night you said thecomtewanted to marry you,” he retorted. Wait. What? She wanted ababy?
“He does want to marry me, but that doesn’t mean I want to marryhim.”
Mark stood too. He followed her to the mantel and stopped not two paces from her, his arms crossed over his chest. He’d let thebabycomment go for the moment. “Then why did you mention it?”
She hastily shrugged one shoulder. “You seemed preoccupied by his presence.”
Mark pressed a fist to his forehead where a headache was beginning to form. How the hell had he misread this situation so damned badly? “The duchess led me to believe you have a bevy of admirers.”
“Also true,” Nicole clipped.
“Wait.” He shook his head, still trying to come to terms with what she’d said. “Are you telling me youdon’twant a divorce?”
