“Dear God!” he cried as he finally collapsed down beside her on the bed, and Alice was brought to an abrupt awareness of the intimacy of their situation.
At once alerting Alice to the fact that within hours of becoming Daniel’s wife, she had completely forgotten her resolve to hold herself apart from him until she was sure that he loved her.
As she loved him…?
Alice shied away from even thinking such a thing. “I believe my headache has returned more severely than ever.” She spoke distantly as she turned to pull a coverlet over her nakedness, keeping her face averted as Daniel stood up to refasten his clothing.
His gaze was mocking as he looked down at her. “Strange, lovemaking usually achieves the opposite.”
“What we just did—” Alice gave a shake of her head. “That was not lovemaking!” she told him scornfully.
His mouth twisted derisively. “There are many ways to make love, Alice. Before too long has passed I promise you will know all of them,” he assured her huskily.
“Indeed?” She gave a pained frown. “If this is an example of your ‘wooing’ of me, my lord, then I am afraid you have failed—abysmally.”
Daniel drew in a sharply angry breath. “I believe I have already informed you that I have no intention of wooing you.”
“You will not touch me again in this way until you have done so!” Her eyes glittered with her anger.
Daniel glowered at her. “Keep your precious virginity then,” he said as he strode forcefully across the room to open the door that connected their bedchambers. “But I advise you never, ever, to lock a door between us again!” he warned before slamming that door behind him.
Alice could hold back her choking sob no longer as she buried her face in her hands and began to cry in earnest.
She would hold out for Daniel’s love.
She could not accept anything less…
CHAPTER FIVE
“Where the deuce have you been?”
Alice calmly handed the bonnet and gloves that matched the green of her gown to Reynolds, the butler, before turning to face the man who had been her husband in name only for the past week. Daniel stood in the doorway to the drawing room as he looked across at her with brooding intensity.
It had been a long, trying week. No doubt for both of them, Alice privately admitted. Her hopes of a loving relationship developing between the two of them had been dashed time and time again by Daniel’s mercurial moods, one minute politely attentive, the next impatient and cutting because of her newly found resolve.
“I have displeased you by going out in the carriage, my lord?” she returned lightly as she joined him in the drawing room and heard the door softly close behind her.
“You are late returning for luncheon.” Daniel was scowling darkly as he moved to stand in front of the empty fireplace, the weather too clement to warrant it being lit. “And you did not leave word as to where you were going,” he added disapprovingly.
Alice raised her eyebrows. “Did I need to?”
“Of course—!” Daniel bit off his expletive, knowing he was as furious with himself as he was with Alice. For being concerned by her absence. “For all I knew, you could have been set upon by footpads. Or worse.” A nerve pulsed in his tightly clenched jaw.
“And would my informing someone as to my destination have prevented either of those things from happening, my lord?”
“You are being deliberately difficult, Alice.”
“Am I?” she replied before moving to sit in one of the armchairs to look up at him expectantly.
Daniel held on to his temper with difficulty. Something he seemed to have been doing rather a lot this past week. For one reason or another. And all those reasons had to do with the annoying young woman who was now his wife.
Why couldn’t Alice have been the shy and biddable wife of his imaginings? A woman who would happily spend her days doing embroidery or arranging flowers? Her nights spent in bed with him in an effort to provide him with his heir…
Alice did none of those things. Instead she spent her days going about the estate visiting his workers and the tenants farmers, often coming back with a list of things needed by one tenant or another, which she then presented to Daniel so that he could pass it on to his estate manager.
As for her nights…
Daniel had made a promise to himself after that incident on their wedding night that he would not enter Alice’s bedchamber again until she invited him to do so. It was an invitation that had so far not been forthcoming.
Instead Daniel was left to watch as his young wife charmed every member of his household, from the stiffly formal Reynolds to the lowliest housemaid. To witness the warmth with which Alice was greeted by the villagers on the two afternoons they had ventured out on social calls to neighboring estates so that he might introduce his countess to the local gentry.
“You could have accompanied me if you had wished…”
Daniel scowled as she sat in the armchair looking so fresh and beautiful. “I do not recall being invited.”
Her smile was chidingly mischievous. “I am sure that has never before prevented you from doing exactly as you wished.”
Perhaps not, but Daniel found himself increasingly uncertain of how to proceed with his young countess. An uncertainty he had never experienced before. A part of him could not help but admire and approve of the way Alice rode about the countryside in the carriage, much as his mother had done, offering help and advice to his tenants. But another part of him felt unaccountably resentful of this draw upon her time. It was time Alice could have spent with him. Getting to know him. Showering that warmth upon him.
Ridiculous. Daniel had never needed anyone. He had decided long ago that he never would.
Except…
Under Alice’s gentle guidance this past week, Wycliffe Hall had become a home again instead of a mausoleum that Daniel wished only to escape from. The household staff seemed to work more willingly and happily. The cook seemed to outdo herself with each meal she provided for their enjoyment. And on the occasions that Daniel rode about the estate, the workers he met now greeted him cheerfully as well as respectfully.
All, Daniel felt sure, because of the attentions his young wife gave to them and their welfare.
The life Daniel had led in London—one of hedonism and dalliance—now somehow seemed like a lifetime ago. Certainly it no longer held the appeal that it once had.
Instead Daniel had found himself taking an interest in the estate, and he was even thinking of taking up his seat in the House once Parliament returned in the autumn. His friend Hawk St. Claire, duke of Stourbridge, had certainly been encouraging Daniel to do so for some months now.
He could not leave the estate to the care of his manager, however, if he did not first put some retraints upon his young wife’s behavior; his estate manager was one of the few people Alice had not succeeded in charming since her arrival here. “Alice, I appreciate the changes you have wrought within this household—”
“I did not realize you had noticed them, my lord.” She smiled at Daniel warmly.
“I have noticed them,” he grated. “I approve of them,” he allowed tersely. “But your continued interference about the estate is another matter, however,” he added with a frown.
Alice lowered her lashes. “Interference, my lord…?” she echoed innocently. “You call it interference when I bring to your attention the fact that one of the tenants’ children is in need of a doctor? Or—”
“You know to what I refer, Alice,” he reproved. “I have now been informed that you have made promises to the estate workers that all their cottages will be thoroughly examined during the next week, and then repairs carried out if necessary.”
Alice looked unperturbed. “Informed by whom, my lord?”
“The who does not signify, Alice,” Daniel replied impatiently.
She looked at him intently. “You do not approve of rendering the estate workers’ conditions a little more comfort
able, my lord?”
He was irritated by the implied critisism. “I did not say that—”
“Then it is someone else who does not approve,” she acknowledged mildly. “Mr Carter, perhaps? Whose job it is to see to these things—”
“You really must leave these matters to me, Alice,” Daniel snapped in frustration, not at all enjoying the experience of being chastised by his young wife.
“Of course, my lord. It is only that I believed you to be a fair and just man…”
“I am a fair and just man, Alice!” he said impatiently.
“Yes, my lord,” she agreed. “Then perhaps you might also see fit to ensure that James Carter exhibits those same traits?”
She was like a dog worrying a bone, Daniel acknowledged irritably. But a justified dog with a bone…? Perhaps.
“Carter will leave if you do not desist, Alice.” Daniel scowled.
She gave an unconcerned nod. “I am sure you would do a much better job of managing the estate.”
“An earl does not himself cater to the wants and needs of the people on his estate.”
Alice gave a confident smile. “Then perhaps you could start a new trend, my lord…?”
A reciprocal smile played unwillingly about Daniel’s sensually sculptured mouth. “You are mocking me, Alice.”
“I am teasing you, Daniel,” she corrected huskily.
Daniel turned away to stand in front of the window looking out across the neatly manicured lawns of Wycliffe Hall. He could not before recall, ever, having anyone tease him. Or explain why he liked having Alice do so.
Oh to hell with the disgruntled James Carter! Let the man leave if he so wished; Daniel would just engage another manager to take his place. Or take on the role himself…?
Alice took advantage of Daniel’s averted profile to look upon her husband, her heart, no doubt, in her eyes.
The love she had suspected she felt for Daniel had deepened during this past week. His devilishly handsome good looks were indisputable, and just looking at him made her heart pound faster, but the things Alice had learned about the Wycliffe family had helped her to understand him better too. To realize why he was the man that he was. Why he shunned and mistrusted even the idea of love between husband and wife.
From the cook Alice had learned that this had not been a happy household under Daniel’s father, the sixth earl of Stanford. That Geoffrey Wycliffe had spent most of his time in London, ignoring the wife who loved him in favour of the mistresses he kept there.
From Reynolds she had heard that Daniel had adored his mother, the beautiful Diana.
From the people in the village Alice had discovered that Daniel had been mischievous and well liked as a child and a young man, but that he had rarely returned to Wycliffe Hall after a row with his father immediately following the funeral of his beloved mother ten years ago.
Adding all those things together, Alice had come to realize that Daniel’s mother had loved his father deeply. That the emotion had not been returned. In fact, it had been callously rejected in preference to other women.
Was it any wonder that Daniel distrusted the mere idea of the emotion of love? That he shunned the very idea of falling in love with the woman who was his own wife, and so leaving him open to the same pain and anguish that his mother had known in loving his father?
Having learned those things about her husband Alice was more determined than ever that Daniel would one day come to love her in the same way that she now loved him. He did not know it, refused to acknowledge it, but Alice believed that Daniel needed to love someone as deeply as he needed someone to love him.
As Alice did love him…
CHAPTER SIX
Alice stood up. “I was late returning for luncheon, my lord, because I have arranged a surprise for us this afternoon.”
Daniel turned slowly back to face her, his expression wary. “A surprise…?”
Alice refused to be deterred by his obvious reluctance. “I have had Cook prepare us a picnic, my lord. I am informed there is a glade, with a river running through it, which is an ideal place in which to enjoy a picnic.”
Daniel knew the glade to which Alice referred, having spent many happy hours there as a boy throwing stones into the water with the children of the village. Before his father became aware of what he was doing, and with whom he was associating, and put a stop to it.
That Alice had learned of the often sun-dappled glade in the week she had been here should not have surprised him. “I am a little old for picnics, Alice—”
“One is never too old to enjoy the informality of a picnic, my lord,” she assured him lightly.
“There are things I need to do this afternoon—”
“Surely they can wait a little longer. Please, Daniel.” Alice crossed the room to link her arm through his as she looked up at him encouragingly.
It was the first time that Alice had voluntarily touched him since their wedding night. Neither was Daniel immune to the warmth in those beautiful deep green eyes as she looked up at him so pleadingly. The thought of being alone with Alice in the sun-dappled glade certainly had its attractions, too…
“I received a letter from Jonathan this morning, informing me that our stepmother has gone on an extended visit to a relative in Devonshire,” Alice murmured.
“Really?” Daniel drawled. “That must come as something of a relief to both your brother and his wife.”
“Most assuredly.” Alice nodded, her eyes dancing with mischief. “Except that we do not have any relatives in Devonshire. Do you have any relatives in Devonshire, my lord?” Her tone was deceptively innocent.
He shrugged. “I may have…”
“The dowager duchess of Penfield, perhaps?”
“Perhaps,” Daniel allowed gratingly.
“I knew it!” Alice grasped his arm excitedly. “You arranged for this visit so that Jonathan and Charlotte might finally have some time alone together! You really are not as cynical and dismissive of the plight of others as you like to appear, my Lord.”
Daniel wasn’t sure that he cared for the description “cynical and dismissive of the plight of others,” but he could find little to complain about in the warmth and approval he could see in Alice’s gaze as she looked up at him so happily.
He gave a grimace. “My great-aunt—the dowager duchess of Penfield—is not a woman who listens or even hears the word no. In fact, she is as overbearing as she is unpleasant. It seemed to me, from what you have said of your stepmother, that the two women would deal extremely well together. Once they tire of each other, I have several more titled relatives, equally as unpleasant, with whom Lady Constance may visit.”
“How wonderful!” Alice approved as she regained her bonnet and gloves from Reynolds before she and Daniel strolled outside together, the open carriage already packed with the picnic basket and waiting in the driveway.
Daniel assisted Alice inside before dismissing the groom and taking up the reins himself, finding himself strangely happy as the carriage bowled along the narrow country lanes. It was a beautiful summer’s day. The sun was shining. The birds were singing. A glowingly approving Alice was seated beside him…
He brought his thoughts up short. What did it matter to him whether or not Alice approved of his actions? He had arranged for his great-aunt to issue the invitation to Lady Constance as a means of keeping his brother-in-law from the card table, and possibly bringing disgrace to the family, not as an effort to gain Alice’s approval.
Hadn’t he…?
Whether Daniel had or had not was of no real importance when it had resulted in his being given this opportunity in which to seduce his young and beautiful wife.
“It is delightful here, is it not?” Alice murmured happily as she lay back upon the blanket on the ground once they had eaten their fill of the food Cook had provided for their picnic, and its remains had been packed away in the basket. “We should come here often when we are at Wycliffe, Daniel.” She stared up at the blue of the sky
through the bower of green leaves overhead, dreamily likening that blue to the color of her husband’s eyes.
Her own eyes widened as Alice realized that she no longer need make that comparison—to the sky’s detriment—as she now found herself looking up into her husband’s sensuous blue gaze, her breath catching in her throat as Daniel plucked a blade of grass and began to trail it slowly down the length of her throat and across the firm swell of her breasts, at once sending quivers of awareness down the length of her spine.
Alice nervously moistened her lips. “My lord—”
“My lady,” he whispered.
Alice had tried very hard this past week not to think of her wedding night, to recall the intimacies she and Daniel had shared, of his lips upon her breasts, and other parts of her body she blushed just to think of. She blushed anew as she recalled the daring way she had touched and kissed Daniel in return.
She had rarely succeeded in blocking those memories from her mind, of course, and as she thought of them she had found herself roused all over again. As she recalled the beautiful hardness of Daniel’s body. All of it. How she had felt the leap of Daniel’s response beneath her caressing fingers. How she had tasted his release even as she reached that pinnacle herself.
For days, nights, Alice had longed to feel all of those things again…
The desire she now read in her husband’s eyes assured her that he felt the same way.
Alice was tempted. So very tempted. That temptation added to by the gentle strokes of that blade of grass against her breasts, Alice barely breathing now as she looked up into her husband’s sinfully mesmerizing face and felt herself falling deeper under the sensual spell he cast, as she imagined the two of them naked together beneath the dappling trees.
She wanted Daniel so much! Wanted to lose herself once again in his caresses! Wanted to touch him in return, and this time to know the fierceness, the ecstasy, of his full possession!
But above any of that she wanted Daniel’s love…!
Alice turned her head away before Daniel’s mouth or anything else—could make contact with hers. “We really should return to the house, my Lord,” she told him firmly as she quickly stood up and put some distance between them.
Convenient Wife, Pleasured Lady Page 3
