by Jaimey Grant
Had he hesitated at all, Verena would never have uttered the words that slipped past her lips then.
“Make love to me.” She closed her eyes against tears, the mere thought of what she was asking more terrifying than she’d expected it to be.
His fingers touched her face. She flinched, whispering words of apology as she did so. Connor didn’t move away. Indeed, he stepped closer, winding one arm around her waist and drawing her into his embrace.
He waited.
Daring to peek, Verena blinked up into compassionate blue eyes. “You needn’t fear me, Doll. I’ll never intentionally hurt you.”
He’d told her the same thing so many times that the words seemed imprinted on her brain. She nodded. “I know.”
Anything else she might have said was smothered by Connor’s lips. Flames shot through her, fear and desire, a sense of urgency and a sense of panic. He didn’t touch her. In fact, he dropped the arm he’d had around her waist, indicating quite clearly that she could end the embrace when she wanted.
Thankful for his consideration, Verena plunged in anyway, sliding her arms around him and pressing her body to his. He groaned against her mouth, pulling her so close she could barely breathe.
Then he pulled away. Gasping for breath, eyes hot as they raked her face, Connor gasped, “Not here. Too public.”
Horror at the thought of her wanton behavior threatened to douse the flames she’d so recently enjoyed. To act so with one’s husband was one thing. To do so in the drawing room where anyone could walk in and see…her face flamed in a way that had nothing to do with passion.
But Connor’s no-nonsense attitude helped her brush the embarrassment aside. He grasped her hand and pulled her out the door. It was only after they’d passed an astonished chambermaid that Verena realized her hair must look a fright. Indeed, her entire mien must appear distressing.
Her husband, apparently, had little patience when it came to certain matters. In mere moments, he pushed open his bedchamber door, pulling her inside and back into his arms. His lips burned hers, his hands moving over her shoulders and down her back to press her full-length against him.
Verena could do nothing but follow where he led, her mind caught up in new sensations, new emotions, old fears, and secret longings. They moved across the room, toward the one piece of furniture that dominated it.
Verena, despite the advances she’d made in conquering her fear, sucked in a shaky breath, utter panic rising to the fore.
“No. Please.”
Connor stopped, pulling away from her with an apologetic sigh. He didn’t release her, rubbing at her upper arms in a distractedly soothing manner.
“God, Doll,” he said, his voice strained. Releasing her arms, he shoved both hands into his hair, his eyes glued to her face. “Do you have any idea…” He turned away, hands still on his head. Verena flexed her fingers in her skirts, fingers that curiously ached to touch him, to comfort him in some way. She knew what he needed and everything in her screamed at her to run.
Except for one tiny voice. One whispered apology, one heartfelt outpouring of sorrow on behalf of an unknown girl, beaten and raped, hovered in the deepest recesses of her mind.
He’d saved her life when she lay broken and bleeding, then rescued her again mere months ago. Was gratitude reason enough to make love to her husband?
No, perhaps not. Love was, though, and Verena loved her husband more than she’d loved anyone.
For the second time, Verena made the first move. Putting her palm on his back, she whispered, “I am not turning you away. I will not turn you away again.”
He didn’t move. “I should not ask this of you. As much as I love you, I should be stronger than this. You need never accept me as a lover.”
He spun about, his action so swift that she jumped. Cupping her face in his hands, he leaned close. “I love you enough to never touch you. Do you believe that?”
Verena’s breath caught. His sincerity, a characteristic she’d never seen in a man, touched something deep inside her. Eyes darkened by love, passion, fear, and anxiety stared down into hers, willing her to believe his words.
“It’s not right, Connor,” she whispered. “It’s not right for a woman to deny her husband.”
He was shaking his head before she had finished speaking. “I don’t care about that, Doll. If you are too frightened, I will leave you in peace. I don’t give a damn what Society or God thinks of the matter.”
Shocked at his blasphemy, she nonetheless smiled. “It’s not right for a woman to deny her husband”—her fingers clenched in his waistcoat—“when she loves her husband so very much and wants nothing more than to lie in his arms.”
Connor needed no more reassurance of her own sincerity. He swept her into a heated embrace, his restraint evident in the way his fingers grasped but didn’t remove her gown. Verena allowed his kisses, feeling an answering warmth within her. The fear, however, lingered on the edges of her consciousness.
In moments, they lay in the bed, clothing removed in the most haphazard fashion, staring at each other as if they weren’t quite sure what to do next.
Verena, at least, wasn’t sure what to do next. She knew what Connor wanted but the fear that lingered on the edge took the opportunity to flare to life.
She shivered. Connor frowned, his fingers brushing over her arm. “I shouldn’t have released you,” he murmured. He slid his arm around her, drawing her closer. “You may touch me, if you wish. I will not hurt you and it may be easier for you to believe that if you took the lead.”
A new fear threatened to take hold. What did she know about lovemaking? Indeed, what did any lady know of it?
Something of her fear must have shown on her face. Connor grinned and took her hand, placing her fingers on his chest. “I belong to you just as you belong to me. You will not, you cannot displease me. I swear.”
As her fingers moved over smooth skin and hard muscle, she marveled over the perfection that was her husband. He didn’t move, allowing her to touch and look her fill. When heat crept up her cheeks as her gaze traveled lower, he smiled, drawing her to him with obvious purpose. “Enough. Now, it’s my turn.”
Verena felt her face flame and obediently let her hand drop. The bedsheet fell way but Connor wasn’t in the mood to just look. He pulled her into his arms, hiding her nakedness as well as any sheet could.
Panic flared to life in Verena’s mind, making her body stiffen in response. But she forced it back, using every bit of will she’d ever possessed. She trusted Connor more than anyone she’d ever known. She was determined to prove it.
Gradually, the panic left, allowing her to experience all the wondrous things happening to her. Every movement of his lips on her mouth, her cheeks, her body, every featherlight touch of his experienced fingers, she felt them all, the wonder finally overcoming the fear.
The pleasant sensations Connor aroused, coupled with her newfound understanding of her husband, awakened something in her. The part of her stifled by the brutal theft of her innocence, that primitive urge necessary for the survival of the human race, came to life.
Verena gasped. In the split moment where girlish confusion and fear gave way to womanly awareness, her husband claimed her, making her irrevocably his.
*
Twenty-Three
Connor awoke, his mind full of the night just passed. Beside him, his wife slept on, unaware that the turmoil she’d brought into his life was far from over.
He pushed himself up on his elbow and stared down at her, his memory going over every moment of their lovemaking. Where he should have been pleased, smiling, and just a bit smug, he was uneasy.
Then there was her father. The man may not have been the threat Connor had assumed. Sure, he was angered at having been thwarted in his matrimonial ambitions for his daughter, but he had so far showed himself as nothing more than an impotent bully.
Connor suspected Winters was the real source of the rumors circulating the drawing rooms of the
upper ten thousand. With the help of Lady Marigold Danvers, of course.
His eyes glazed over, no longer seeing the beauty he called wife. Turning away, he lay back, hands pillowed under his head, eyes focused somewhere in the vicinity of the canopy overhead. Meechum had entered at some point while they slept, stirring the coals in the fireplace and adding more fuel to the meager flame.
Good servants, Connor mused, were worth their weight in gold.
Which gave Connor the idea that the best way to fight gossip was with new gossip. He would speak to Meechum and Crummers that very morning.
He glanced at Verena’s pale cheek. Her glossy black hair covered her back as she lay on her stomach, her breathing deep and even. She probably hadn’t slept so peacefully in a very long time.
Rolling to his side, Connor gently brushed a dark curl from her face, marveling at the beauty and purity of her features. She didn’t stir, but mumbled something in her sleep, a soft smile touching her lips.
Then she shifted to lay on her back, the bedclothes shifting with her. As Connor was about to draw them up and over her, his eyes were drawn to her abdomen.
He sucked in a breath. Tiny marks blanketed the lower part of her belly, the kind of marks a woman could get when her belly stretched to accommodate a growing child. Connor had seen the marks many times in the years he’d practiced medicine, especially on those women who birthed a babe every year or two.
Verena had borne a child. Where was the child now? With her father’s obsession with appearances, there was no doubt a bastard child would have been farmed out to anyone willing to take it. Verena’s wishes would not have been consulted.
He looked away from her, pulling the blankets up as he’d planned. The hand he lifted to lay atop the covers clenched in his own.
“Connor.”
He looked into her sad dark eyes, unsure what emotion showed in his own. “My love.”
“I’m sorry.”
Her misery touched him. He drew her into his arms, pressing a kiss into her hair. “You have nothing to apologize for, my love.”
“I do. I didn’t tell you’d I’d become pregnant. I didn’t mention losing the baby or the doctor telling me that children may not be in my future.”
His arms convulsed around her. Telling himself it didn’t matter if she never conceived, he told her the same thing. She snuggled closer, shoving away the blankets that had become wedged between them so they lay skin to skin.
Connor felt his desire stirring but he resisted it. There was too much to discuss.
“Verena, tell me why you are so sad.”
She stiffened and then pulled away from him. Mouth firmly closed on any more confidences, she just stared at him, resolute.
“Come now, my love. Surely you know by now that you may tell me anything. I will not judge you. I only want to understand you better.”
He waited as she battled whatever fear remained. Finally, she said, “I was sad.”
Connor said nothing, quite sure she wasn’t referring to that particular moment in time. He waited for her to elaborate.
A huge sigh issued forth and she leaned back, shoving one hand into her thick hair much the same way Connor did when he was distressed. She was unaware how the action exposed her breasts and made him think perhaps they could put off their discussion until later. Much later.
“When the baby died, I was sad. I mourned the loss just as if it were a child of my heart instead of the abomination it was. Indeed, how could a child conceived in violence be anything else?”
His ardor sufficiently cooled, Connor could only murmur, “Indeed.”
“But that baby was half me, Connor. Half me. I would have had the raising of it despite what my father planned.” A tear escaped the outer edge of her eye, winding a lonely path into the hair curling by her ear. “When the movements in my belly stopped, I wept for days before I’d let the doctor near me. And then, my body took over, expelling the child. It should have been a relief. It should have been a relief.”
He supposed it was a natural feeling for one who craved love, for one who desired to give it almost as much as she desired to receive it.
Just as natural as it was to hate a child conceived in violent rape.
“It was no relief, was it? You mourned as you would have mourned a child conceived in love.”
Verena nodded, her eyes closing against an onslaught of weeping. Connor sighed, reaching out and gather her back into his embrace, ignoring her feeble efforts to resist his comfort.
“It is past, Doll. What matters now is this moment and every moment after. I love you even if you never bear my children.”
Verena, with only the barest hesitation, kissed him. Connor was more than willing to forget her father, Winters, or mourning a dead child.
Servants, Connor thought hours later, were worth far more than their weight in gold and so he told Meechum as that man placed a heavily laden tray on the small table in the bedroom. Verena, embarrassed at the valet’s entrance, hid behind the bed curtains, much to Connor’s amusement.
Meechum was dismissed and Verena peeked through the curtains as the door clicked shut. Eagerly, she asked, “Is there coffee?”
Connor laughed. “Indeed there is, my love, a whole pot. I believe the servants think we will need it’s restoring qualities to see us through the day.” Grinning at her horrified expression, he added, “Come breakfast with me.”
She emerged wrapped in the bedsheet. Chuckling at the way she fought the trailing makeshift garment while trying to maintain a semblance of dignity, he held up a gaudily colored silk banyan that matched his own. “Will this help?”
“Oh yes, thank you,” she breathed, nearly dropping her sheet in an attempt to grab the garment he held.
Consumed with a mad desire to tease her, Connor pulled it just out of reach in the same moment she made a concentrated effort to possess it. The results were all Connor could have hoped. Her sheet fell away, baring her beautiful form to his avid gaze. She squealed, grabbing for the sheet and wrenching it up to cover her, glaring at him awfully through the veil of her hair.
“That wasn’t fair, husband.”
He moved closer and wrapped the dressing gown around her shoulders. Kissing her nose, he said, “No, it wasn’t. But I enjoyed it nonetheless.”
Verena turned her back, slipping her arms into the dressing gown and allowing the sheet to pool at her feet. Connor watched her, a smile playing about his lips as she wrestled with the banyan, intent on tying it securely before turning back.
Stepping up behind her, he wrapped his arms around her, placing both hands over hers as they fumbled with the sash. Stilling her actions, he brushed her hands aside and tied it himself. He kissed her neck before he stepped away, satisfied with the sharp inhalation he heard as his lips left her skin.
Verena followed him to the table, her steps a trifle unsteady as tumultuous desire tripped through her veins. A few months ago, she’d have never suspected that a man could cause such feelings within her. Taking a deep breath, she allowed him to serve her some of the cold collation the cook had so thoughtfully prepared.
“I’ve been thinking,” Connor said as he swirled the coffee in his cup, “that there is a way to counter the rumors about you.”
Verena choked on her bread. Taking a sip of her own coffee, she composed herself before answering. “Is there?”
“It occurred to me that servants are the best source of gossip. As such, they are also the best way to start gossip.”
“You speak of them as though they are not humans at all.”
“On the contrary. They are definitely human. Hence the reason I suggest we use them to start a few rumors of our own.” He leaned forward, his pleasant features alight with intensity. “Meechum is a veritable font of information. He goes to certain taverns here in London that cater to the upper servants of the greatest houses in Town. If I asked him to whisper, confidentially, mind you, about certain things I know about Mr. Percival Winters, the ton would no longe
r care that you ran from his offer of marriage. They will no longer blame you for anything.”
“Except entrapping you,” she reminded him.
He snorted. “Nonsense. All they must do is see us together to know ours was a love match. I cannot hide how I feel about you and by the way you gaze at me now, you will not be able to hide your feelings either.”
She blushed. “Perhaps. But what of my past? The rumors include my licentious behavior before we ever met.”
Connor turned away. He stared at the bed for a long while, then rose. Verena watched him, her brows lowered in curiosity. He picked up a penknife from the escritoire and sliced open his hand.
“What are you doing!?” she cried, rising to move to his side.
He didn’t bother responding. He smeared the blood across the sheet, right about where Verena had slept.
Glancing at her, he wrapped his cravat around his hand, saying, “That should take care of that. The rumors were already out about the state of our marriage. Everyone knew it remained unconsummated. Now, all the rumors about your past will be scotched just as soon as the chambermaids clean this room.”
Part horrified and part impressed, all Verena could do was stare at him. “Appearances,” she murmured.
“I love you, Doll. No matter what. Remember that.”
*
Twenty-Four
Hours later, Connor and Verena were once more enjoying each other’s company in the most elemental way. Sated, they lay side-by-side, silent and happy.
…Until Connor broke the silence.
He propped his head up on his hand and gazed down at her. She wondered uneasily what he was going to say, as he looked far more serious than she had ever seen him.
“Would you like to leave London, Doll? We could go on honeymoon. To Italy or even France now that Napoleon’s been stopped.”
She wondered what he was really asking. While the idea of an extended journey spent in his company had its definite appeal, she sensed it was more than the desire to travel the world with her that had prompted his suggestion.
