“I said you’re an arrogant oaf,” she repeated sweetly. “And do not call me madam, Bainbridge.”
Bloody hell, the woman was a menace. His cock stirred to life once more. This would not do. Her effect upon him was equal parts maddening and absurd.
He removed himself from the bed since he did not trust himself. She lay, beautiful and unashamed and bold, naked on the coverlets, her eyes dancing with defiant fire. She looked thoroughly fucked, and it made him long to fuck her again. To come on her porcelain skin this time, mark her with his seed. Christ, he was an animal.
“Spencer,” he rasped. “We are beyond the point of titles now, princess. Put on your robe and return to your chamber before…”
She raised a brow, and her knowing look had him ready to pounce upon her again. “Before what, Spencer?”
He made a choked sound. In the span of all but a week, she had gone from being an abstract irritant to being the woman he deflowered in the emerald chamber. The woman he could not seem to resist, regardless of how hard his rational mind worked to force him to realize she was wrong for him in every way.
She was too bold, too lovely, too sensual, too rebellious, far too outspoken. If he had to describe her in a simple phrase, it would be this: too much. And yet, the crux of it was that he could never have enough of her. She was opium and he was the addict, always chasing her, ready to lose himself in her. She had damn well beguiled him.
“Spencer?” Those big, vibrant eyes sparked with laughter. Her full lips, lush and deep-red with kisses, tipped into a smile that took his breath. “You did not seem to finish your command, and I do so wish to heed it.”
Her insincerity was transparent. The witch. He would not admit it. “Have you no shame? Cover yourself,” he growled, for his cock was painfully hard already, and he had to avert himself from her gaze in an effort to maintain the last remaining shred of his dignity.
With the grace of a feline, she rolled from the bed and stood facing him, raising her arms high over her head to stretch. His besotted gaze tracked the movement of her breasts rising and falling. Her nipples remained pebbled and hungry, pointing to him as if in invitation. He rather thought he would accept the devil’s invitation to hell in that moment if it meant he could suck those sweet, peach buds one more time.
“Since we are to be husband and wife,” she said, dragging his eyes back to hers at last, “there is one fact with which you ought to acquaint yourself. I do not—nor have I ever—possessed the capacity for shame. I am me, and I like me.”
She liked herself. What a strange creature she was. Here she stood, naked, ruined, debauched, and she remained as bold and unrepentant as ever. She wore nothing but the evidence of their lovemaking, and she made no effort to cover herself. She cried no maidenly tears at having lost her innocence.
The first time he had taken Millicent—the only other virgin he had ever bedded—she had sobbed uncontrollably in the aftermath. He had been far gentler, he thought, far less demanding on that long-ago occasion. But Boadicea was not anything like Millicent, and he was heartily grateful for that, at least.
I like me. Who thought such nonsense, let alone spoke it to one’s future husband while standing naked in a strange chamber without the benefit of marriage vows? She was so bloody ridiculous and yet so bloody captivating, and it was rending him apart from the inside out, rearranging everything he’d thought he had known about himself. He had gone three years without giving in to temptation. He had never wanted to take another wife. The notion of bedding another woman had filled him with nothing but cold dread. Yet, he just had, and he had relished every fucking moment of making her his. Could not wait to do it again.
And again.
He did not know what to say to her. They were two naked strangers who had just shared the most intimate act a man and woman could share, at a standoff. She confounded him. “Do you intend to walk back to the duchess’s chamber in the nude?” he bit out.
She gave him a regal shrug, another smile playing at her lips. “If it pleases me, I will.”
Damn her. She was goading him, and he knew it, but the thought of Boadicea strolling down the hall on full display to anyone who passed by made him feel positively vicious. “Your body is mine, for my eyes only.”
“And is yours mine alone as well?” she asked.
Yes, utterly.
He stiffened. “I will not have this discussion with you now, when it is imperative that you return to your chamber, clothed, before what we have done here has even greater ramifications.”
“When would you prefer to have it, Your Grace?” She tilted her head, her expression faintly mocking, as was her tone.
Bleeding hell, he could not think properly when she stood before him like a pagan sacrifice. Every part of him roared to take her in his arms, throw her on the bed, and fuck her until she spent so hard on his cock and his tongue that she forgot how to be impertinent.
“Cover yourself,” he demanded, forcing a coolness into his voice that he did not feel. Indeed, he was a raging inferno, about to combust and do something even more foolish than bedding his betrothed in the midst of the morning beneath the noses of their family members and a belowstairs full of gossip-loving domestics.
“I will not be bellowed at, Spencer.”
While he was gratified that she was calling him by his Christian name at long last, he was still staring at a naked goddess, doing his damnedest not to drag her back to the bed. Or fall on his knees before her and worship her with his eager mouth. He could still taste her, and it was better than the finest delicacy he had ever consumed.
She stared at him, pursing her lips. Her breasts rose and fell. Even the indentation of her navel bewitched him, and he longed to dip his tongue there, kiss a path over the slight curve of her belly to the juncture of her thighs.
Damn it all. “Please. Cover yourself.”
Apparently, he had appeased her, for she bent and scooped up her dressing gown in one elegant motion, shrugging it on and belting it at the waist, putting an end to his unabashed ogling but not his arousal, which refused to abate. Stifling a curse, he found his breeches and slid them on, fastening them and hissing out a breath at the friction of the fabric over his sensitive cock.
“I meant what I said,” she said, and now that she was ensconced in the robe, she looked less like a siren and more like the young, lovely innocent that she was. Or rather, that she had been prior to his unfettered lust. “I do not need you to like me to accept myself. But if we are bound together, you could try not to look upon me with such distaste any time you are not running your hands or mouth all over my body. You are marrying a woman who reads bawdy books, who is not afraid to say and do things that are inappropriate, who feels strongly about her beliefs, and who will not bend to any man’s whim. Who will not bend to your whims, specifically.”
She thought he looked upon her with distaste? He had to admit that his reaction to her had initially been both visceral and unkind, borne as much from the way she drew him to her as from her rebellious nature. He could hardly fault her for her poor opinion of him, as he’d earned it. But in truth, his opinion of her had slowly changed.
Now, if there was distaste, it was only for himself, for how little control he possessed over his reaction to her. Once again, he did not know what to say. She stared at him, defiant as ever, and he wished she had not done as he’d asked and donned her robe. He missed her skin, the curves of her waist and hips, those luscious breasts.
“I am sorry. If I look upon anyone with distaste, it is myself. Not you. Never you.”
He felt as startled as Boadicea looked by his apology. For so many years, he had either been trapped in the untenable hell of his marriage to Millicent or paying the price for her death. It occurred to him now that he did not know how to conduct himself with a lady. With his future wife. With this vibrant, gorgeous force before him. But it was true that while he did not understand what she did to him, he had no wish to cause her pain or embarrassment.
A pink flush crept over her cheeks. “Thank you, Spencer. I can only imagine how much that cost you.”
He smirked, which was unlike him, but he could not seem to maintain jurisdiction over any part of his anatomy, so his mouth may as well go rogue too. “You have no idea.”
She smiled back at him, and it was an intimate smile. Soft and warm and secret. “I daresay I may have an inkling. And just so we are clear, I will marry you in haste because I do not wish to delay my enjoyment of the marital bed, and not because you ordered it.”
Her enjoyment of the marital bed. He could not speak.
But he didn’t need to, for she chose that moment to sweep from the chamber, head high, auburn curls rioting down her back. It took every bit of restraint he had not to go after her, catch her in his arms, and bring her back where she belonged.
eddings were meant to be joyous, celebratory occasions, but the breakfast immediately following Bo’s vows with Bainbridge in the chapel at Boswell Manor possessed the stilted air of a funeral. Silence reigned among the sparse guests, all close friends and family with the exception of the Duke and Duchess of Cartwright.
Naturally, the dowager duchess—who wore the pained expression of someone walking barefoot upon a bed of hot coals whenever she deigned to speak to Bo—had ignored her wishes and invited the duchess anyway. Just as the dowager had insisted upon orchids to adorn the chapel, when Bo had wanted orange blossoms and lilies. And just as Bo had selected the wedding breakfast menu only to discover upon reviewing the fifteen-course menu card before her that the dowager had once again superseded her.
Bo could not abide by fish and had made the grievous error of imparting that fact to her mother-in-law. Which was why the dowager had chosen it to be the keystone of every dish except aspics during the entrées froides portion of the menu and the entremets.
Astonishing that her mother-in-law had not finagled some way of landing kippers in the meringues à la Chantilly, but if the menu card was to be believed, Bo would need to placate her rumbling stomach with thoughts of sponge cake and chocolate cream while she drowned her sorrows in the wine glass a blessedly capable servant continued to refill.
She lifted her crystal goblet to her lips and took another fortifying sip. The wine did nothing to numb the clawing fear within her that she had just made the greatest mistake of her life, but it did fill her with a pleasant enough warmth. Yes, perhaps she ought to get soused. And then cast up her accounts on the dowager’s gown, which she had kindly confided to Bo she had worn to Bainbridge’s first wedding as well.
The notion of vomiting on her mother-in-law should not be so entertaining, but now that it had infiltrated her mind, she could not quite squelch the inappropriate laughter rising within her. Perhaps spurred on by her admittedly generous consumption of wine, a giggle bubbled forth, slipping past her lips, ruining the silence and the clink of cutlery on delicate china. All eyes turned to her, and she was acutely aware of the scrutiny of the reserved man at her side.
In the month since she had shared such scorching passion with him, he had been icy and polite, perfunctory in all his correspondence, withdrawn whenever their paths had crossed. They had not even had a moment alone since that day. Bo was certain it was by design, but the haste of their wedding and the distance between her family estate and Boswell Manor had not made matters easy either.
“What amuses you, Duchess?” he asked quietly, the timbre of his voice sending a tremor of something warm and delicious down her spine.
Duchess.
How strange to hear it said aloud, by him. To realize she was, in fact, married to the Duke of Bainbridge. It was not what she had wanted, not at all the fate she had once envisioned for herself, but it was her reality now. If only they could bypass the breakfast and be alone, for she longed to discover whether or not the fiery lovemaking had been a fluke.
She glanced at him from beneath her lashes, knowing she could not very well reveal to him before their assembled guests what had caused her to laugh. “Can a bride not be happy on her wedding day, Duke?” she asked instead, arching a brow and daring him to question her further.
Another glass of wine and she just may be inclined to share so that the entire assemblage could laugh as well. She raised her glass toward him in a mock toast, and downed half the contents. It was rude, and she did not care. Her corset was too bloody tight, her mother-in-law detested her, her new brother-in-law continued to send her lovelorn glances when he thought no one else watched, her husband still seemingly disapproved of her, and she was famished with nothing but thirteen courses of fish to eat.
At her own wedding breakfast. Or rather, at the breakfast for the wedding she had not wanted to the man she had not wished to wed. Bed, yes. Wed, decidedly not. She frowned fuzzily at her glass, thinking the last quaff had rather more of an effect upon her than she had anticipated.
Her husband leaned nearer, and his decadent scent washed over her. All the irritation she felt toward him dissipated in the beauty of that scent and the sight of his handsome face in such proximity to hers. If nothing else would come of this miserable match, at least that frowning mouth was now hers to kiss whenever she wished.
“My dear, perhaps you are too happy,” he murmured into her ear.
Her eyes narrowed. Of course he would ruin her equanimity with a suggestion that she was ineriab—inedriab—inebriaterated? No, that did not sound right. Oh dear. Perhaps the dreadful man was correct after all. But her wine glass was once more full, so how could she have over imbribed? Er, over imbibed?
Yet another fish course was whisked away from her, untouched. She reached beneath the table to give his thigh a reassuring pat, but missed his thigh. Instead, she found his hard length straining against his trousers.
“Oh,” she whispered to herself, snatching her hand away. Bainbridge was fully aroused, and the knowledge sent a pulse of forbidden, delicious warmth to the flesh between her thighs. Not a fluke, then. She knew the sensation for what it was now—hunger, desire, need.
“Yes,” he muttered darkly, his gaze burning into hers. “Oh.”
Heat suffused her cheeks. She looked away from him, meeting Cleo’s concerned gaze. I am fine, she reassured her sister with a pointed look. Of course, Bo was anything but fine. She was likely soused, in addition to being terrified, dismayed, suspicious, and eager, simultaneously and not necessarily in that order.
She forced her gaze to move on. Thornton at Cleo’s side was tucking into the next course, quite pleased. None of her sapskull brothers were in attendance, which was just as well for Bo, nor was her beloved sister Helen who was in America with her husband. Her sister Tia, ever the wild one despite being the Duchess of Devonshire, gave her a gamine grin. Her husband the duke offered a commiserating smile.
Then there were her parents—Father seemed quite pleased with the fish courses as well, and of course there was the matter of his final daughter having been safely married. Mother stared at her with a disconcerting intensity, and given that she had been the least impressed by the forced betrothal and wedding, it was hardly surprising. Bo reached for her glass, taking another hearty sip. The dowager duchess glared at her as if she were a bug that had dared to befoul her hem, and her bosom bow the Duchess of Cartwright was little better. Her husband, perhaps not entirely to his credit, reserved his glowers for the servant tarrying too long in refilling his wine.
How she wished her best friend Clara had returned from her extended honeymoon in Virginia and New York. The haste of Bo’s nuptials had not allowed it. And then, Bo’s gaze stopped on the last guest in attendance. Lord Harry. He was staring at her with equal parts frustration and…oh, dear. Something else that was wholly inappropriate when aimed toward the woman who had only just married his brother earlier that morning.
Bainbridge’s words returned to her then. He fancies himself in love with you. At the time, she had thought it an overstatement. Unrealistic, but looking upon Lord Harry now, she could not deny that he seemed genuinely upset. Guilt pricked
through the wine-soaked haze clouding her mind.
She sent him an apologetic smile, wishing for his sake that things had been different. That she had cared for him in the same way he had cared for her. How much simpler would life have been if she and Lord Harry had fallen hopelessly in love, and she sat with him at her side now rather than a cool, imposing stranger who desired her physically but could not abide by her otherwise?
“Regrets, Duchess?” Bainbridge’s voice, sotto voce, penetrated her introspection once more.
She swallowed, turning her attention back to the man she had married. He watched her with an impassive expression, but his green eyes were flat and cold. His tone too had been deceptively smooth. The wine had addled her mind and she knew it, but she could still see that Spencer was livid. He hid it well beneath his icy façade, but there was no mistaking the underlying fury in his eyes, his tone, his clenched jaw.
“What of you, Duke?” she countered rather than responding.
His lip curled. “An endless ocean of them.”
Of course she would be the biggest one. That he had been weak enough to want her, to touch her, to compromise her when he did not even like her—for a man who governed himself with such control, it must still smart. Just as his careless divulgence smarted.
His words should not have hurt her, but they found their way past her bravado, beyond her carefully built defenses, and hit her heart with the unerring precision of a honed dagger. His admission pained her. Made tears prick her eyes. For as much as she had not wanted any of this, neither did she wish to feel as though he would rather have married anyone else but her.
“How lovely to know,” she said with false cheer, reaching for her glass and draining it yet again, only to be rewarded with the vigilant servant whose role it was to ensure she never went without wine. It occurred to her that perhaps this was the dowager’s doing as well—yet another crafty attempt at sabotage—but she was too far gone to care.
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