by Dara Joy
His chiseled lips lifted into a mocking grin. “If you wish to be taken seriously in life, Reggie, you must learn to take these things like a man.”
Her husband was toying with her much as Charles had toyed with the wig.
Ginny was irked; she did not want Reggie to become the object of his sport. After all, a fop had his pride.
“Really, milord, if there is something on your mind, then speak it. Surely, you understand that I could not attend your wedding due to the megrims; there is no need to be insulted.”
Tyler snorted into his glass. “The megrims, is it?”
Ginny bristled. “It is obvious you are in a foul temper, sir; for what reason I cannot say. Perhaps I should take my leave.” She started for the door.
His one spoken word– more a command– rooted her to spot.
“Don’t.”
Ginny hesitated. This did not even sound like Tyler! There was a strange, forbidding glint in his right eye. She pivoted on the ball of her foot. “I beg your pardon, sir?”
“Did I not make myself clear?” He finished off the drink in one gulp, then carelessly tossed the elegant crystal into the fireplace.
It shattered into tiny pieces.
“If you do not understand me, Reggie... I wager you soon will.”
His softly spoken promise was somewhat intimidating.
Ginny’s eyes widened as Lord Devon walked towards her. She consciously took a step back.
He kept advancing.
Ginny kept backing up.
That was until he backed her into a corner.
From his great height he glowered down at her.
She had never seen anyone actually smolder. Until now. His veiled eyes flamed from beneath sooty lashes; his well-shaped lips tightened into a firm line.
Her husband was on a burn, no doubt about it.
The breath caught in her throat.
Did he know about her ruse? No husband would be happy to have his wife cavorting around as a fop.
Still, Lord Devon wasn’t like any other husband. He wasn’t... real.
Tyler crushed the front of her frilly shirt in his fist and lifted her right up to the very tips of her toes. “I could use a bath, Reggie– how about you?” The smooth undertone was scored with menace.
Well, the rake was certainly a tad angry about something.
But was he angry with Reggie or Regina? If he didn’t know about her disguise, it probably would not be the best time to reveal it. She really had no clue what to do next.
“I-ah-I- that is to say, sir, I don’t think–”
“Oh, but I do.” He dragged her over to the tub.
“You should go first, lad, this being my home, my bedroom, my– Well, you get the gist, don’t you, sir?”
He drawled out his polite-sounding words with a false manner that was unsettling.
Ginny eyed him, somewhat anxiously. All right, so the man is more than a tad angry. Be honest. He is livid.
She never would have imagined her rapscallion of a husband having so much singularly directed passion about anything. Apparently, she had read him wrong on that score. In her defense, this was not the wastrel, laissez-faire lord of the manor she had come to know.
Or anyone else knew, for that matter.
“Um...” Ginny chewed the inside of her cheek, trying to think of an appropriate response. One that would get her out of hot water. Literally and figuratively. She glanced at the steaming bath.
Tyler released her shirt and began to unbutton the front panel of his breeches.
Oh, this was too much!
She was either going to have to admit her disguise or make a hasty retreat. Discretion being the better part of valor, Ginny spun around to make that hasty retreat.
“Stay right where you are, Reggie.”
Again, his clipped, authoritative voice froze her to the spot. There was something in the resonance of that tone that brooked no argument. The force of it was utterly commanding. This was Tyler?
Ginny stayed put, not sure what he would do.
He threw her a challenging look then proceeded to slide the loosened breeches over his lean hips.
Ginny responded by staring at the flocked wallpaper.
Miniature rams– inexplicably carrying little bows and arrows– cavorted over fluffy golden clouds all across the walls. Whatever for? She frowned as the decorating scheme distracted her. Who designs these absurd patterns? And why do we purchase them?
Her interest lasted for a brief moment. The real curiosity at hand, so to speak, finally got the better of her. Her traitorous sights drifted unerringly back to the one spot she knew she definitely should not be looking at.
Ginny had never viewed a naked man before.
Especially not that part.
The item in question was... Rather huge. And floppy.
Oh, dear. Not totally floppy.
Egads, there was a strange firmness to it that seemed to increase the longer she stared! As if simply by looking at it, the thing was being engaged.
It was like staring at a guillotine. There was a horrid fascination. One wanted to look away– yet one was compelled to stare at the morbid contraption.
Eventually, manners got the better of her and her gaze traveled up his body.
Only to lock eyes with Lord Devon.
The corners of his mouth lifted in a roguish-sort of way.
He knew she had been staring at him the entire time.
Ginny’s focus quickly darted back to the prancing rams on the wall, her cheeks flaming even brighter than the foppish rouge she was wearing.
She attempted a nonchalant whistle– like any man about town might– but all that issued forth from her parched lips was a feeble wheeze.
A splash sounded, and she realized he had finally entered the tub. Thank goodness! With him otherwise occupied, she could soon make her escape. She chanced a peek to see whether the coast was clear.
It was a mistake.
All the man had done was throw some soap and a washing cloth into the steamy water. He approached her with measured steps.
“And now, I am afraid it is time for you to come clean, Reggie. Dear. Boy.”
Chapter Sixteen
Oh, good God, he knew!! He knew.
Before she had time to even think what to do, he seized her by the shirt and rent it asunder. The bound breasts popped proudly into view.
Ginny gasped. The tight strips of material pushed up the plump mounds of her now heaving chest making quite an indecent display.
“My, what odd cleavage you have, Reggie-boy.” he murmured wryly.
Ginny cleared her throat. “I-I can explain, Tyler–”
This in her own voice, not the affected one of the fop Reggie.
Tyler had been focusing on her chest, but he quirked a brow as he stared down at her. “Can you, dearest?”
“Yes, you see I–”
“Wanted to deceive me.” He finished the sentence for her.
“Perhaps make light sport of me as you enjoyed the seamier aspects offered to the ton?”
“No! Not at all! And it has nothing to do with you, I–”
That seemed to make him angrier.
“Spare me the tales of your wanton larks. I can assure you there is nothing you can divulge that I have not already engaged in myself. In truth, I have no desire to hear what manner of revelry you have partaken of, madam.”
She was nonplussed. Revelry? Her? She seethed.
He completely misinterpreted her meaning. And how dare he compare her to his degenerate self! The reprobate just admitted to every sordid debauchery under the sun! Good Lord, did he think she did not know? Everyone knew. He was an utter tomcat! It was all the ton ever talked about.
She lifted her powdered chin into the air. “Do not compare me to you, sir! The insult is not warranted.”
His mouth parted, yet her argument had temporarily befogged him. There was no way he could even answer it! He was doomed either way he spoke.
He
weighed her with narrowed eyes.
Ginny rubbed her bottom lip. Her earlier assessment was right; apparently no husband, including the wastrel one, would allow a wife to dress as a man and go cavorting about an establishment like Frock’s.
Which was why she had never wanted to marry in the first place!
She had gone into disguise to write her articles and to observe another side of life. It had absolutely nothing to do with him.
“I don’t see why I have to explain myself,” she retorted stubbornly. “It is not as if we have an actual marriage.”
His brow lowered. The last person that so challenged him was making a bunk with the barnacles. Ginny was the only one to somewhat turn him into the Lord Devon he might have been had his life not been taken away by betrayal.
But he was who he was.
If she expected him to react like a dandified gadabout, she was about to learn differently.
“Have a care,” he warned in a silken undertone.
Showing not a lick of sense, she glared at him. “I will do as I please.” If Mabel had been there, she would have groaned aloud. One did not fire a pistol into the mouth of a loaded canon.
Tyler did not wait to hear any more.
Before she could say anything else, he yanked the cloth strip at her chest and tugged sharply. Ginny spun round and around as it unwound. Yelling all the while.
“Stop! Stop! Stop!”
He didn’t stop until the last scrap had been unraveled.
Her breasts sprang free, bouncing in front of him. The corners of his lips curled sardonically. “At least I will enjoy my pillow this eve, sir.”
Ginny gasped. She had no trouble figuring out what that meant. “You will do no such thing!”
“Aye, I will.”
“You, sir,” she pointed imperiously at him, “will behave yourself!”
A full throaty laugh was not the response she was seeking.
Chills skittered down her spine. It was not the kind of laugh that made one want to laugh along. By any means.
He was not reacting like the predictable wastrel the ton had gossiped about for all these years. There was a hidden authoritative command to the man she had never once suspected. It occurred to her that Tyler Devon was not a man that simply flaunted the rules of proper decorum; there was a part of him that was a renegade to such strictures altogether.
She started to back up again thinking she might actually get to make a dash for door. This stranger was unnerving her. She took one step forward.
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” he intoned darkly.
The look on his fiercely handsome face was all the convincing she needed. She bolted.
He caught her up in his arms with just one move.
Powerful hands were around her waist like a vise; he effortlessly lifted her aloft. Ginny kicked at him, yelling bloody murder.
“Let me down you oaf! You cur! You...” A proper description defied her for a second. “You blackguard!”
“Blackguard? Now there’s a name for me, me heartie.”
He chuckled cynically as he walked over to the bath.
Ginny stopped struggling for a second. “What are you going to do?”
“This.”
He stripped off her pantaloons and buckled shoes and tossed her unceremoniously into the water.
Half of the contents of the tub splashed over the sides. The man paid it absolutely no mind.
The water had already chilled considerably during their confrontation. “Argh! It’s freezing!” she shivered.
He kneeled by the side. “What a pity.”
He did not seem sorry at all.
He seemed rather ruthless.
Instead of being contrite, as any gentleman would, he placed his palm at the back of her head and dunked her face straight into the water.
Ginny came up splashing. The wig she had been wearing floated to the surface between her legs like a splayed, drowned rat.
“You- you bounder!” she sputtered.
He did not respond; he simply took a washing cloth and began to scrub the garish makeup off. Ginny tried to grab at his wrists. It was as effective as a gnat pestering a dragon.
“Buggerall!” She’d heard that one at Frock’s.
“Tsk-tsk, where are your manners, my lady?” He dipped the cloth in the water to rinse it and then slapped it across her face again, scouring the last remains of Reggie off.
Fed up with his high-handed attitude, Ginny cupped her palms and hurled a water cannonade at his head. The propelled water sluiced over the side of the tub like a miniature tidal wave. It hit the target dead on.
With his palms still clamped on her shoulders, Tyler stared stonily at her as water dripped off his forehead and chin. His hair had caught the salvo as well; the silken strands below his shoulder sprayed droplets of cool water onto her arm.
His aquiline nostrils flared.
Was the rogue actually counting under his breath?
The absurdity of the situation suddenly struck Ginny.
How would she even begin to describe this bizarre scene to Henley?
Her sense of humor was ever her undoing. She threw back her head and roared with laughter.
He, however, did not appear to be as amused.
Ginny wondered if she had mistakenly eaten a bit of Sardinian plant at Frock’s and would soon keel over dead at the end of her maniacal, convulsive cackling.
What else would explain laughing on the precipice of one’s own doom? Perhaps she was being too dramatic...
Not by that look on his face.
She guessed correctly that his lordship was remembering every single torture she had ever put him through as Reggie Moore, fop extraordinaire.
There was an unsettling gleam in his eye.
“Let me see how else I can amuse you, my lady,” he purred ever-so-softly. Too softly.
Ginny broke off mid laugh. As if the silken threat wasn’t alarming enough, his heated stare now blazed a path over her exposed body clearly visible above and beneath the churning water.
Fustian! In all the commotion, she had forgotten she was starkers in the tub!
Her mouth parted in surprised dismay before she tried to cover up the embarrassing bits with her hands and the Lilliputian washing cloth.
Seeing immediately that it wouldn't work, she attempted to stand up. His hands held her put.
“Tyler, let me up! This has gone as far as it can go.”
He exhaled slowly and met her challenge dead on.
“Oh, it can go much farther.” A settled expression came over his face as if he had made his mind up about something. “And I think it’s high time it did, wife.”
So saying, he pulled her out of the tub and tossed her over his shoulder in one fluid move.
It took Ginny a moment to realize that she was now hanging upside down over the reprobate’s shoulder. His smooth skin pressed against her damp thighs. It was indecent! Yes, indecent.
She decided to bite him.
“Madam.” The flat of his palm slapped her bare bottom. Without a by-your-leave.
Ginny almost choked on her breath. “How dare you!”
she sputtered.
“How dare I?” he snickered. “How dare I not?” He glanced over at her rounded backside as it wriggled next to his chin.
The opportunity presented itself.
Lusciously.
He bit her back.
Ginny wheezed, horrified. “You, you sir, are not civilized!”
He agreed completely. “You do not know the half of it.
Ask anyone.”
He tossed her down onto his bed.
Chapter Seventeen
Ginny gazed up at him with a look of dread. “You wouldn’t.” Her traitorous voice quavered.
He stared down at her, all traces of the Tyler Devon she knew gone. ”Aye, I would.”
The expression on his set features told her he meant it.
She quickly dashed under the covers and pulled them to her nose.
“I will not let you kiss me, Tyler.” Her voice was muffled from behind the counterpane.
Unconcerned, he flopped on top of the bed, next to her. Ginny kept the quilt firmly over her mouth.
He rolled onto his side and stared at her, brow arched. Ginny’s narrowed eyes were engaged for battle. Albeit above the edge of a fluffy blanket.
He snorted. “Exactly what are you doing, madam?”
“You are not to kiss me!” Her cheeks flamed as she realized he might not have been thinking of doing any such thing. Now she had gone and put the idea into his Casanova head. A small groan escaped her lips.
He viewed her askance. “What is this strange fixation you have with kissing?”
“Do not act as if you do not know.”
He gave her a deadpan look.
She sighed, disgustedly. “Do you not recall your promise to never kiss me? ‘Tis the crux of our bargain.
We are married in name only.”
“Aye, you have been named my wife...” His white teeth flashed as he gave her a sly grin. “Only.”
Did he think that interpretation to be humorous or witty? Her eyes narrowed further.
Tyler’s fingers brushed back some strands of her hair. Rather gently considering his overall mood.
“And I am your husband.”
“Very good. We know our titles. Now may I go back to my room?”
“No.”
“Why ever not?” She glared at him.
To board such an elusive ship, he was probably going to have to change course at full sail. He had always been a cunning adversary and much of his success had come from the simple fact that to win, he was always ready to change tack with nary a qualm.
So he battened down his ire. At least outwardly.
“This will be your room from now on, Ginny.” He drew her hand away from the coverlet and brought it to his pirate mouth. Soft lips pressed deftly against her palm.
Ginny started at the velvet touch.
The tip of his warm tongue swirled small, delicate circles in the center. He pulled his head back slightly and then gently blew on the damp spot he had just created.
His features were in silhouette, but she could discern a dimple carved next to the corner of that sensual mouth. Even those spiky lashes were comely.
