Mad for the Marquess

by Jess Russell

  “I have never seen the countess in person. She is quite reclusive, I believe.” Margaret had risen and now stood at her side. “Surely Devlin has exaggerated her beauty. I imagine one does when one is in lov—” Margaret laughed uncomfortably. “I mean, no one can have eyes of that color. She is only a fantasy.”

  Looking into those violet depths, Anne had a terrible feeling Margaret was dead wrong.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  His father’s hunched figure appeared in the pier glass above the sideboard. What was he doing up at this hour of the morning, let alone out of bed? The doctors had swarmed over the house since Dev’s return.

  He was not ready to face the old tyrant.

  Unfortunately, the mirror caught him backing out of the dining room, and his father looked up.

  Damn.

  “Ah, here you are, Devlin. Tally said if I arose early enough I would catch you before you disappeared into the library, and then to—where ever you go for much of the day. And night.”

  He toyed with the idea of turning tail, but he would have to face the man sometime. He dumped himself into the nearest chair.

  His father sat before a bowl of grayish porridge, very like the stuff Dev had been given ad nauseam at Ballencrieff. It was all he could do to keep his seat and hold down the little food he had in his stomach.

  A footman came by with coffee, but he waved him off. “Ale. I would like some ale.” What he wanted was a brandy. He had gotten one of his father’s lackeys to bring in a case, but the hour was still too early, even for him.

  “How is the girl faring?”

  And too early for an interrogation. He shoved his chair back.

  “Don’t pull up stakes, boy. You know what must be. You must see to her.”

  The ale arrived just in time. He took a long pull. Yes, better. “And why the devil should I? You of all people should not be counseling me on how to attend my wife, sir.”

  His father humphed and dug back to his porridge.

  He stuck his nose in his ale. Over a week with no sleep and too much drink had him nearly shaking. He flexed his shoulders. His bones felt sharp beneath his skin, as if they might break through.

  That horrible, empty painting haunted him day and night. Each time he approached a freshly primed canvas, he panicked. His brushes felt foreign in his hands, the light was wrong, the model wrong. Even the smells were wrong. If only Macready were here, Dev would wring answers out of him.

  “You look like hell.”

  He raised his glass in salute. “As do you, sir.”

  His father humphed again.

  “What do the doctors say?” The question popped out before he could stop it.

  His father waved the question away like an insistent fly. “Those quacks will poke and prod and feed their leeches with my ducal blood. All I need is an heir, and I will be right as rain.”

  Mouth still parched, he took another long pull.

  “I told them they had much better see to the marchioness upstairs.”

  Ale sloshed over the rim of his mug as he lurched to his feet. “You bloody well will not. I will choose Lady Devlin’s doctor. I will not have you interfering.”

  “As you say.” He blotted his lips and carefully folded the napkin. “I just want to be clear, if she is not with child, she had better be increasing. And soon.”

  Enough. He shoved his chair under the table startling the footman who normally jumped to assist him. “If you will excuse me, sir, I find I have no appetite.”

  The rattle of dishes stopped him. His father stood clinging to the edge of the table, the cloth pulled askew, his reed-thin arms visibly shaking beneath his coat. The footmen rushed to his side, but the duke waved him off.

  “What would you have me do, Devlin? I ask you, what would you have done if you thought your son and heir had truly lost his wits?”

  Christ. His fingers bit into the edge of the doorframe.

  A bout of hacking coughs sent the old man collapsing back into his chair. The footman jerked forward but again his father stayed the man.

  “Leave us. I will see to him.” The servant hesitated but then bowed and left.

  He handed his father a fresh napkin and then poured him a glass of water.

  Ignoring both, his father sat back in his bath chair, eyes fixed on the plate in front of him, but it was clear he was not seeing the pasty gruel. “You are like your mother. A sensitive soul.” His thin lips twitched. “We were not—well suited—the duchess and I.” He fingered the unused knife in the line of cutlery at his place setting. “But I did my duty. The match went forward.” He took a long wheezing breath. “I gave up trying to make her happy. Until you. You made her happy. For a time…”

  His sire waxing on about old disappointments and regrets? He pulled out the chair next to his father and sat, then dragged the pitcher of ale to him and tipped another healthy dose into his mug. God, they were a pair.

  “Then she died.” The old man thumped his fist on the table, and the silver jumped.

  His mother had produced him in their fourth year of marriage and then, after more than three years of barrenness, she had the temerity to expire from what seemed a trifling cold.

  His poor mother was barely cold when his father replaced her with Lady Beatrice. Austin had arrived a scant seven months later.

  “You are my heir, damn it.” His father’s bloodshot gaze bore into his. “And by God, I know my duty. I had to get you away.” This last tirade seemed to have exhausted him. He shook his head. “Austin’s marriage looming, the Queen nearly getting involved, my heart unsteady.”

  Now this was more like the father he knew and despised. “God forbid there should be a whiff of scandal around the Malvern name.”

  “A whiff? The stench from your—debacle—would have leveled the Queen’s guard.” He sighed heavily. “Austin was supposed to see that you were well enough.” He leaned forward. “Do you imagine sending you away was easy for me? The last I saw of you, you were thrashing about, held down by no less than five footmen, and could not stop talking about all the blood. You could not ‘stop the blood’.”

  The picture assembled itself in vivid color. Another memory restored as ale roiled in his empty stomach.

  “Believe me, I would be happy enough to shuffle off this mortal coil, but I will see you well established, and by God, I will see my grandson first.”

  The foam on the rim of his mug ran creating a pattern of dark and light. “It may be a girl.”

  The duke frowned as if the possibility of a female child had never occurred to him. “Nonsense. The Drakes always have boys,” as if his saying so decided the matter.

  “If you’ll excuse me—”

  “Why?” His father wheeled his chair into Dev’s path. “Why this girl? Was using her your only option?”

  “You think she is lucky to have me?”

  “You are a marquess and my heir. Any woman would want you.” He sagged a fraction in his chair. “Well, not any woman. You certainly burned your share of bridges. Got to be I couldn’t get anyone of quality to take you and, by God, I wouldn’t settle for the dregs. You got near dregs, boy. A half-French penniless aristocrat without an ounce of polish.”

  Leaning down over the chair he gripped its arms. “You don’t see it, do you? She is—never mind.” He heaved himself away. “You could not begin to understand.”

  “What I wish to see is her belly swell. That will be enough for me.”

  “Right, the succession must go on no matter how cruel we become. You say I am like my mother, but you are wrong. There is more of you in me than you know.” He turned and rang the bell. The footman appeared a mere second later. No doubt he had been lurking by the doorway should his grace call out. One never knew what his depraved son might get up to.

  “I wish you a good day, sir.” He took one more look at the congealed mush of gruel and left the room.

  ****

  Anne should not have been in the garden. It was too early and too wet. The
window should not have been opened, but it was. She should have moved away when she’d heard the old man and his son talking, but she had not.

  The thought of lying in that bed and having to, once again, face her maid’s inquiring eyes, had her hastily dressing and descending the back stairway like the servant she felt like, and still should be if fate had not intervened.

  But fate had intervened. She had been useful to these people for a brief moment, and now they had to live with the result. Her lie the catalyst for it all.

  The old duke was right. She did not belong. She was a fool to think otherwise. To think her husband could really care for her.

  Yet, what’s done was done. The marquess was free, and she must live with her part in it because if she hadn’t tried to save him, she could not live with herself.

  Mrs. Abbot had always said, “You make your bed, and you lie in it.”

  Well, she would. She would lie in it with this stranger, and they would make a child.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  One…two… The fire was almost ashes now. And three.

  Anne counted the mantel clock’s chimes just as she had over the previous hours. Just as she had over the last eight days.

  What did he do in the evenings and into the small hours of the morning? The image of the beautiful Nora Havermere took shape next to her, managing to crowd her in this huge bed.

  The door lock clicked. Her eyes snapped open as her breath froze in her throat. Deprived of air, her heart fluttered in her breast like a hungry hatchling.

  A shadow drifted by the window and stumbled. The same breeze that ruffled the curtain brought the scent of him to her. Sweet tobacco and smoke, what she thought must be some strong liquor, and a spicy perfume.

  She willed herself to lie still.

  He came right up to the bed. She closed her eyes, pretending sleep. His breath came fast and heavy, as if he had been at some vigorous exercise.

  Would he stay? Would he pull back the coverlet and lie beside her? Would his hands find her?

  Still, she waited. The shadow of his body blotting out the faint light beneath her eyelids shifted. He was moving away. Leaving her yet again.

  No.

  The time was right. Time to make a baby. And she wanted him. He was her husband. She wanted to know this man as so many other women had known him.

  “James,” she whispered.

  The shuffling stopped.

  “Stay, I want you to stay.”

  He stood poised like an acrobat on a wire, halfway between her bed and the door.

  “James?” she repeated, hoping to infuse the atmosphere with some of the ease of their past.

  His feet shifted. “I’m sorry. I did not mean to wake you.” He glanced longingly at the door obviously thinking that way the safer route.

  “You didn’t. I was not asleep.” She propped herself on her elbows.

  “You must get your rest, Owl.” His words were soft and slushy, but not like when he had been dosed. Drink. He must have been drinking.

  “Why?”

  He shook his head. “What?’

  “Why must I get my sleep?” She sat up fully, her fingers finding the smooth shape of his ring. “I have done nothing all day but drink tea and read.”

  “Then you have accomplished far more than I.” He started to leave.

  “I want a child.”

  That stopped him mid stride.

  “It is the right time, now. The moon is full,” she pressed.

  A bark of laughter. “You sound like Beauchamp.”

  “Stay. I want you—to stay.”

  Every sinew canted toward him, every nerve, every hair on her body primed for his touch. Every bit of her ready to claim every bit of him. Mine. This is mine to have—to take.

  “Anne, not this way. I am half-foxed.” But his words had lost their round, laxness. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat.

  “Stay. I am used to you being—out of sorts.”

  “Once done, there is no going back. You understand?” Her demands seemed to have sobered him right enough.

  Did he want the option of nullifying their marriage? Before she could back down she lifted the corner of the coverlet.

  “Sweet Athena, I can deny you nothing when you look like that.”

  He fumbled with his loosely tied neckcloth, finally wrenching it off. His other clothes soon followed.

  The moon being their only light, it rimmed the furniture, the bed, and his body in an otherworldly glow.

  She moved over, the cooler sheets a relief against her hot skin.

  So what if he came to her out of duty? She would get something from it. She must or she would go crazy with her love for this man. This want would fill her up and choke her. He must at least give her an outlet—a child.

  The air was thick with vibrations, that delicious, expectant humming so uniquely theirs. Did he feel it, too? Yes, she thought so. Their miracle.

  The bed dipped as he lay down, and she rolled toward him. He hissed as if she burned him and took her mouth immediately, pressing his tongue deeply into her. She tasted spirits. His hand cupped the back of her head, fingers working to unravel her braid. His other hand found her buttock.

  “Oh.” The word came unbidden then was lost in a tangle of tongues.

  He yanked the silk of her nightgown up and up until it caught under her arms. She sat up to accommodate him, but in his impatience the fragile fabric tore. At the sound he threw himself back on the bed away from her. “I am sorry. Don’t be frightened, Anne. I will leave you. I am—”

  “No.” His arm was lean, hard, muscle against her fingers. “No, you will not leave me. You will be my husband this night.”

  The muscle rose and bulged as he raised his hand and raked his fingers through his hair and down over his face. “Your husband,” he sounded almost reverent.

  She did not trust herself to say more. He seemed more frightened than she. Did he think a ripped piece of silk could send her scurrying for cover? He had much to learn of her. She would teach him a bit now.

  Sitting up, she pulled her arms though the ruined gown, and then tossed it aside. After all, she reminded herself, the sight of her naked was nothing new. He had seen it all before. Still, her skin felt tight as if she might burst like a chrysalis and fly. Before she lost her nerve, she threw a leg over him and climbed on up.

  The brush of her woman’s hair on his belly made her buck. How could she be so wet down there? Mortified, she eased off of him, but he pulled her back with a deep groan, pressing her to his flesh, indeed, arching to fill any space between them.

  “Anne…you are so lovely.”

  It wasn’t true, but it didn’t matter. No mirror could convince her she was not Helen of Troy at this moment. His words slid by, one by one, like pearls on a string. She would take them out later and run her memory over the pure, roundness of them… But for now she must savor each moment of this joining. This miracle.

  Deep depressions and too-prominent bones still etched his face, made deeper by the dim light.

  She touched the circles under his eyes. He was not sleeping either. His day filled with estate business and then out all night—

  Stop, do not think of that now.

  His body had changed. His muscles harder and fuller than when she had touched him back at Ballencrieff.

  She ran her fingers over his ribs, mellowed into rough hills as opposed to the sharp crags she remembered. His belly was ridged as well, but more subtly, like ripples in a pond.

  A dark arrow of hair lead down and met her darker triangle. She traced it with her finger.

  He hissed again and grabbed her hand. Her ring bit into her. He eased his grip and took her fingers between his. Her hand small and white, like pages in a book against his leathery cover. He turned her hand this way and that, and then traced the opal. His gaze found hers and he opened his mouth to speak. But instead, he pulled her hand to his lips and kissed her finger. A sort of benediction. An acceptance?

&nbs
p; Then, his hands where everywhere. She rose, lifting her arms and closing her eyes, feeling him feel her.

  “Oh!”

  He’d flipped her on her back. His gaze bore into hers that rogue smile on his lips. He dipped into her neck and bit. She stretched long, opening to him.

  He was speaking to her. More of a song. Whispering in her ear and to her breasts. Murmuring endearments to her belly and—lower. But she honestly could not attend. She felt only the vibration of his breath and the rumble in his chest and her own answering quiver.

  So very skillful—the way his fingers oh-so-lightly brushed her curls, and then his cheeks against her thighs, his hot breath there, and finally the flick of his tongue finding that spot. So sure of himself. So experienced. All those beautiful women…

  “Easy, love. Relax. Open yourself. Such a beautiful bud. Let it open to me.”

  Love. Air, long pent up, rushed between her lips. She imagined a tightly furled rose opening itself to the sun and rain. To capture life within its petals.

  “Yes,” he crooned.

  “Yes,” she echoed back. He sucked. Hard. Her hips bucked yet he held on. “Oh, yes!”

  His hands found her bottom, cupping and squeezing the full roundness. But his hot mouth was gone.

  Her eyes and mouth snapped open, her hands reaching to push him back down there. Please don’t stop, not now. Not when I’m so close. But one look at his face told her to trust him, that he knew her better than she knew herself.

  The hot tip of him nudged her opening. Her body a sheath for his sword.

  “Anne, I can’t stop. Don’t ask me to stop.”

  As answer she pressed toward that hotness. “Ahh!” Stinging pain gripped her.

  “Easy,” he soothed. “There, love,” he whispered. “No need to rush. Take little sips. That’s it.”

  His breathy words brushed her cheeks and fanned her lashes. Her smell on him. She turned her head to capture his mouth. Not unpleasant. The taste. Like the earth and salt. He pressed harder as if he sensed her attention straying.

  “Ah!”

  “That’s the worst of it. All downhill from here, sweeting.”