“I’d feel no compunction gloating over William’s disasters if my sister and nephews weren’t plunged into penury with him.”
“What about your penury? You’re damned quick to care about the fate of Roberta and her brats.”
She raised her chin. “In two months, I turn twenty-five. William’s guardianship ends and I’ll receive an allowance from my father’s will. It’s not much—a plutocrat like you would scoff—but it will establish me away from my brother-in-law’s tantrums. I have plans for a useful future. I intend to set up a house of my own and teach indigent girls to read so they can make their way in the world.”
The idea of Sidonie slaving her life away as a spinster schoolmistress struck him as a tragic waste, but he knew better than to say so. He’d caught the militant light in her eye when she mentioned the unappealing scheme. “I’m surprised William hasn’t married you off. Especially if you already have a dowry.”
“I meant it when I said I’d never wed.” Whatever she saw in his smile, it discomfited her enough to make her try to shift away. He didn’t let her go. He began to suffer the alarming fantasy that he’d never let her go.
“Not all husbands are like William. Or like your father.”
Her expression turned bleak. “It’s pure luck, though, isn’t it? The law gives a husband ownership of his wife. I value my judgment too dearly to sacrifice it to another’s. And there’s no escape—the contract binds until death. A married woman is little better than a slave.”
“Not an opinion popular at Almack’s.”
She shrugged. “For six years, I’ve lived as William’s pensioner and watched him brag and bully. Even though my sister’s dowry was all that kept clothes on his back. Unmarried, I’m at the mercy of nobody’s mistakes but my own.”
“Don’t you want children?”
“Not at the cost of freedom.”
He frowned. “Such a solitary path you map. What about love?”
“Love?” She spat the word as though it tasted sour. “You surprise me, Merrick. I doubted you’d acknowledge the concept.”
“Astonishing, isn’t it?”
He waited for some derisive comment, but she remained silent. Perhaps because of that silence, he lifted the veil on the bitter truth he never mentioned. Ever. “I’m not a fool. I’ve seen devotion. My father loved my mother till the day he died. His heart broke when he lost her. And his heart broke anew every time the world called her ‘whore’.”
Damn it, he’d said too much. Revealed too much. He knew it the moment he saw Sidonie’s face whiten with distress. All his life he’d survived by standing alone, relying on nobody but himself. Yet these uncharacteristic confidences placed him even further under Sidonie’s spell.
He needed to remember that isolation offered safety, whatever the appeal of pansy eyes and soft female compassion.
Chapter Seven
When Sidonie entered the dining room that evening, Merrick rose from the throne-like chair at the end of the table. He sported coat and neckcloth and looked fit to grace a London drawing room, if one ignored the uncivilized marks on his face. No wonder he regarded life as his adversary. He’d paid dearly for everything he had—and still the deepest injury remained. He’d been proclaimed bastard. Nothing could change that. Nothing except the knowledge she concealed and couldn’t reveal without jeopardizing the people she loved.
His bitterness when he spoke of his parents still echoed in Sidonie’s mind, although he’d immediately realized he’d spoken too frankly. He’d retreated to playing the pleasant, if acerbic companion she’d occasionally glimpsed since arriving at the castle. The weather had kept them inside all afternoon and she’d enjoyed exploring his library. But one look at his face now warned her he was again the predatory man who had terrified and infuriated her last night.
She was sick to her stomach of being frightened. Tensing, she glared at him. “Don’t you like my dress?” she asked sharply, lifting her chin.
“Don’t you?”
“I’ve never had clothes like this in my life.” At some point since her arrival, he’d ordered some gowns from Sidmouth. She wore a dark green dress Mrs. Bevan had altered to fit.
“You could thank me.”
She surveyed him without favor. “I assume a verbal expression of gratitude will suffice.”
He winced theatrically. “Why, Miss Forsythe, you suspect ulterior motives?”
“Hardly ulterior.”
She stood in quivering stillness while he prowled toward her. “Turn round.”
“I’m not a toy in your playbox.”
His smile held a hint of wickedness. “Oh, yes, you are, carissima.”
“This toy has spikes,” she growled, not shifting.
“I’ll handle you with care.” He wandered around her in a leisurely inspection that seemed to endure an hour. Devil take him, he set the very air vibrating.
“Very nice.” He stepped forward to straighten the blond lace trimming the disgracefully low bodice. With mortifying swiftness her nipples hardened. She hoped to heaven he didn’t notice.
“The dresses are indecent,” she said stiffly, the rich silk flowing against her body like water.
“But pretty.”
She shot him another fulminating glance. His eyes lit with that unholy glint she’d learned to mistrust. “Admit it. It’s a gorgeous dress and you look gorgeous in it.”
“It’s made for a courtesan.”
He snorted. “What do you know about courtesans, sweet little lamb?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Knowing about courtesans is no character recommendation.”
“Cutting.” His smile reeked satisfaction. “Yet still you wear the gown.”
“Mrs. Bevan took away my muslin.”
“She must need a dishclout.”
She didn’t know why she argued. Who could object to wearing something so stylish? While the silk might cling to her body, it wouldn’t raise an eyebrow in any London salon. Especially on a lady no longer an ingénue. “No respectable woman would wear this dress.”
He trailed one finger down her cheek, tracing a prickling path of awareness. “But, amore mio, you’re no longer a respectable woman. You’re a monster’s paramour.”
Heat flared in her face and she jerked away. “Not yet.”
The fascinating lines around his eyes deepened with the laughter that always warmed her to her bones, in spite of everything she knew about him. “Not yet? By Jove, you offer hope.”
“Arrogant pig.”
He pulled a heavy oak chair from the table. Reluctantly she moved forward. He might be a somnolent tiger as he regarded her with a possessive light in his gray eyes. But she could never forget he was still a tiger. His lips twitched. “Relax, Sidonie. I promise not to accost you over the buttered parsnips.”
Instead of taking the master’s chair, he chose a place opposite her. He reached for the claret decanter and poured two glasses. The ruby ring glinted in the candlelight. Tonight it didn’t remind her of blood. It made her think of passion. She heartily wished it didn’t.
Taking a deep breath to settle the wild ballet of her nerves, she raised the glass to drink. William’s cellar contained sour, young vintages. This wine tasted like everything rich and forbidden. The warmth was a frail echo of the heat stirring in her belly as she looked at Merrick, watching her, always watching her. This afternoon’s confidences, however unwillingly granted, had deepened the unspoken bond between them.
She struggled to return to the prosaic world, even if a prosaic world of gourmet food and luxury and a man whose every word promised seduction. “Tell me about your travels.”
Jonas gently opened the bedroom door, his hand shielding a candle.
After Sidonie had left him with his brandy, he’d lingered for hours in the library, climbing up to the balcony, as if being ten feet above ground could change his perspective on an increasingly complicated situation. Deciding to cuckold William had been the simplest of decisions. Working out how to han
The woman who now lay sleeping in the shadowy bed across the room.
The looking glasses reflected an endless sequence of tall, dark men in scarlet dressing gowns. His face was indistinct, but after all these years, he hardly needed reminding of his ugliness. Still he couldn’t break the habit of filling his bedrooms with mirrors. He’d started as a youth when a few of his more spiteful lovers had mocked his ugliness while he’d been lost to passion. He’d sworn then that no woman would catch him so vulnerable again. Later, he’d discovered other ways of distracting his paramours, but by then he derived grim entertainment from the perpetual reminder of his deformity in comparison to the beauty of his eager bedmates.
He wondered why his scars didn’t terrify Sidonie. They damn well should. People he’d known for years couldn’t bear looking at him. From childhood, his scars had marked him as a pariah, something wicked and inhuman to be avoided, not approached. Odd that this untried virgin remained so sanguine.
A draft pursued him inside. Quietly he shut the door. Still Sidonie didn’t stir. How surprising that she felt at ease in his bed. She slept as trusting as a child in a nursery.
He prowled across to her. The time had come to lift the stakes in their contest. After this morning’s miraculous kisses, he’d retreated to allow her to catch her breath. Eventually she’d stopped jumping like a scalded cat every time he ventured near.
His chicanery had resulted in some deucedly enjoyable hours. Conversation wasn’t usually what he sought from a woman. He wanted one thing and one thing only, that instant of profound self-negation when he plunged into a soft, warm body. But in this as in everything, Sidonie Forsythe confounded him.
He stared down at her curled up in his bed in her champagne-colored robe. It was a cold night, but he wasn’t naïve enough to imagine that was why she retired so encumbered. No, the foolish beauty imagined mere velvet protected her. Carefully he slid his robe from his shoulders. Usually he slept naked but as concession to her modesty, he wore a shirt and silk trousers. He blew out the candle and slipped gingerly under the covers, careful not to touch her.
“Jonas?” she murmured, rolling in his direction.
His heart lurched at her ready acceptance of his presence. The sound of his name in that drowsy voice made him hard as an oak tree. Her eyes remained shut and her lush mouth curved gently. A more optimistic man might imagine she was happy he was here. At least she didn’t leap up screaming.
She made another sleepy, questioning murmur and under the noise of sheeting rain outside, he heard the covers rustle as she moved. The sound was beguilingly sensual, evocative of bodies sliding together. He tensed, waiting for her to send him to the devil, but she merely drifted back into unconsciousness. Perhaps his arrival merged with her dreams. He hoped so. Even more, he hoped her dreams were pleasant.
Closing his eyes, Jonas invited sleep to descend. Last night he’d managed little rest and today’s fever of thwarted desire left him jaded. Unfortunately sleep proved elusive. Sidonie’s nearness tormented him. The sweet drift of scent. The hint of heat spanning the carefully calculated inches between them. The knowledge that if he moved his hand infinitesimally, he’d touch her.
His lips stretched into a wry smile as he stared into the mirror above. It was going to be a long night.
Sidonie reluctantly emerged from a wonderful dream of warmth and safety. God help her, she was snuggling against Merrick as if there was nowhere else in the world she’d rather be. His arm was lashed around her, holding her close. Her heart somersaulted with fear and the sleepy languor drained from her body. How had she slept with her tormentor slumbering beside her?
She should be grateful slumbering was the only thing he’d done. She was certainly grateful he wasn’t naked. He lay sprawled on his back and her cheek rested on his chest, the cambric shirt a fragile barrier between his skin and hers. It wasn’t long after dawn. Feeble sunshine bordered the drawn curtains with gold. The storm must have worked itself out overnight.
Her first instinct was to run, before Merrick woke and found her so conveniently placed for seduction. She tensed to rip away from his grasp. Then she caught sight of his face and curiosity, more powerful even than fear, captured her. Without dislodging his encircling arm, she slowly rose to look along his chest to his face. Observing him without his knowledge was a luxury.
She’d imagined that like most people, he’d look vulnerable in sleep.
He didn’t.
The angular bones remained rough-hewn. Nobody who saw those determined features would judge the man who owned them anything but a brigand. Dark morning beard on his jaw and cheeks heightened the piratical impression.
And his scars.
This quiet morning, they struck a discordant note. Relics of an evil Sidonie barely comprehended. It hurt to look at those marks of suffering. She’d feel for any injured creature, but with Merrick, her reaction was more personal than compassion, stronger than outrage. Gossip was silent on where the attack had happened. From what he’d said yesterday, she guessed that he’d spent his youth traveling with his scholarly father. Perhaps he’d received his injuries in some back alley in Naples or Cadiz, or in a skirmish in a wild corner of the Balkans.
In wordless comfort, she rested a hand on his chest. Under her palm, his chest was hard, rising and falling with each slow breath. Lying like this created a heady intimacy. An intimacy that sapped defenses already under siege. Unwillingly, her gaze wandered to his mouth. Relaxed, it conveyed profound sensuality. That was no surprise. From her first sight of him, lounging like a great cat against his massive chair and sipping red wine, she’d recognized a man who appreciated physical pleasure. Unfamiliar weight settled in her belly as she imagined him focusing that appreciation on her when the time came.
If the time came…
Dear God, did she already concede victory? When everything she knew insisted she couldn’t give in to him. There wasn’t just the danger of losing her virginity, although she couldn’t welcome the chance of having her sins exposed to the world or bearing a child out of wedlock. More powerful was the unreasoning conviction that if she surrendered, he’d sap the strength that had maintained her through recent, difficult years and that would steer her into a self-sufficient, productive future.
Merrick’s eyelashes fanned against his cheeks. Black like the hair tumbling across his high forehead. Sidonie resisted the urge to brush those soft strands back from his face. When he was awake, she was too busy fighting him to betray such tenderness. Now, in this peaceful dawn, she ached to show him life offered more than cruelty.
Her longing to give him respite made her pause. He worked toward her ruin. He’d plotted to trap Roberta into scandal and disgrace.
He was…
He was the most fascinating man she’d ever met. He listened to her with an attention that fed her soul. He offered glimpses of a world she’d dreamed of discovering. He made her laugh. He kissed her as if he’d die before he stopped.
This weakening against her opponent was more frightening than waking up in his arms. She shut her eyes and whispered a silent prayer against the softening of her heart.
When next she looked, Merrick’s eyes slitted open and he regarded her with an intensity that made her tremble. In the strengthening light, his expression was unguarded as she’d never seen it. Fleetingly she read yearning to match hers in his eyes, misty gray as he surfaced to the day. Asleep he hadn’t looked younger, but he looked years younger now. His mouth curved into a welcoming smile that pierced her heart.
Then in a flash everything changed.
The softness evaporated as if it had never existed. She read unequivocal rejection of whatever he saw in her face. She must gawk at him like an adoring puppy. What price denials now? Leaden shame crushed her.
She shrank back. His arm tightened before she escaped. At the same time, he swiftly slid sideways so the bed hangings shadowed the face he turned away. The dawn light no longer illuminated his scars. His sudden movement was violent enough to shake the bed.
Lord above…
Her confusion dissipated. Usually Merrick flaunted his scars, daring the world to pity his disfigurement. This morning he hadn’t had time to don his usual armor against curiosity or disgust. With a sickening twist of her stomach, she realized that for all his defiance, he hated his scars. Hated them to the depths of his being.
He’d despise pity so she lowered her eyes. Still tears prickled. Stupid, stupid girl. She couldn’t stifle the longing to take him in her arms and comfort him against a lifetime of grief. An insane, dangerous longing.
“I must be losing my touch. If I polluted the purity of your bed, I was sure you’d howl your lungs out,” he said with familiar derision, at last looking at her directly. But after that revealing moment when he’d withdrawn so abruptly, she knew his careless manner was a defense mechanism.
The beautiful waking smile developed a mocking edge. She was a thousand times a fool, but she couldn’t help mourning the change even as she went rigid against him. “You’ll never make me scream,” she said repressively, although her heart wasn’t in it.
His face lit with amusement she didn’t understand. “Don’t be too sure, bella.”
He talked wickedness again. At least his jibes reminded her of what she hazarded in this bed. When she’d agreed to save Roberta, she’d imagined a hundred perils. Violence. Ravishment. Cruelty. She’d never imagined that the riskiest element of her ordeal would be the wounded soul of Castle Craven’s master.
“What are you doing here?” She fought to keep her voice steady.
“Not enough, obviously.”
With those three words, the sweet morning turned dark and threatening. This time she made a more convincing attempt to withdraw, but Merrick pushed her onto her back with insulting ease.
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