The Unmarriageable Collection (Books 1–3)

by Lancaster, Mary

Something leapt in his eyes. His fingers slid away from the stem of his glass, but otherwise, he did not move. “I am not an easy man to love. Certainly not for very long. I suppose that is why I rushed you into this before you could change your mind! But I can give you this time, if you wish it. I can wait for you, until you are comfortable.”

  “I don’t want to be comfortable,” she blurted. “I want to be with you.”

  Laughter sprang into his eyes, along with a massive surge of lust. “I shall try to deserve your trust,” he murmured. He raised the glass to his lips once more, and she wondered if his hand was quite steady. Then he set the remains of the wine down and rose with quiet deliberation.

  Her heart leapt and seemed to dive into her stomach as he walked around the table and held out his hand. It didn’t shake after all. She placed her own into it, felt his fingers curl around hers. She stood and walked with him to the door of the bedchamber.

  Cranston had gone, leaving a lamp burning on the table. The bedcovers had been turned back welcomingly. Verne left her, lighting the other candles scattered about the room.

  “More light?” she asked hesitantly. “I thought you would put them out.”

  “Oh no.” He dropped the spent spill in the hearth and came toward her, lithe, hungry. “I want to see all of you.”

  She trembled as he took her in his arms, yet welcomed his hot, deep kisses with abandon. Somewhere, she was vaguely aware of his fingers busy at her back, and yet she was astonished when he stepped away and all her clothing slipped to her feet. She gasped, but his hands, warm on her bare shoulders held her still while his gaze devoured her from head to toe and very slowly back up again.

  “My God, you are lovely,” he said hoarsely. “I am almost afraid to touch you.”

  “Don’t be,” she whispered.

  “I said almost,” he growled, pulling her hard against him while he ravished her lips once more.

  She loved the roughness of his clothing against her tender skin. His buttons dug into her. The exciting hardness between his legs ground against her abdomen as he dragged his open mouth across her jaw to her ear, her neck and lower to her breast. He bent her backward with the force of his passion and she grasped onto him, dizzy with delight.

  With a muttered oath, he swept her up in his arms and carried her to the bed. The sheets felt cold on her naked back, startling her into new awareness. She scuttled under the covers while Verne tore off his clothes. She had one shocking, glorious glimpse of his fully naked body, all muscle and so wondrously different from hers. And then he pulled back the bed covers and lowered himself into her waiting arms.

  She could not help the way her hips arched into him. He smiled breathlessly, sweeping his hand down the length of her before he shifted his weight to let him kiss and caress her tingling breasts. New pleasure soared, building deep in her belly. In wonder, she ran her hands over the warm, smooth skin of his back, feeling the muscles undulate to her touch.

  His hands roamed at will over her body, as though claiming it. And yet, he was not rough, or even demanding, merely coaxing, persuading, until she relaxed and her knees fell apart. His fingers slid up her inner thigh in intricate patterns while he kissed her mouth more deeply than ever before. She gasped at the play of his caresses between her thighs, her hips lifting and swaying without permission. And then he covered her, and it was not his fingers that invaded and stroked, but something much larger and more serious.

  There was an instant of resistance, of pain, but he did not stop, and she did not ask or want him to. She clung to him, her fingers lost in his hair, her head thrown back against the pillows as he moved within her, tender yet relentless. His eyes held hers the whole time, even when he kissed her, even when the sweetest, most intense pleasure she had ever imagined began to build and consume her. She cried out in wonder, and at last, smiling, he closed his eyes, pushing, until he fell on her, groaning with joy.

  *

  Cecily’s first night of love changed everything. Or perhaps just confirmed everything she had longed to believe. She had known she was in love with Verne. Now she was in thrall to him.

  She woke the following morning so full of emotion that she wanted to laugh or weep or just run for miles. Surely it was impossible to be still when her heart felt it would burst with love and joy. Perhaps she could rise and dress and at least take a long, brisk walk before he awoke. Only one heavy arm pinned her to the bed.

  She turned her head on the pillow. Her heart missed a beat, for there was new, sweet intimacy in watching him sleep. In the beam of morning sunlight filtering through the half-closed bed curtain, his jaw had darkened with stubble, and his hair fell boyishly across his forehead. In sleep, he lost the harsh, sardonic expression that kept the world at bay. Like this, he was innocent, contented. Her husband.

  She smiled tenderly, and discovered that after all, she did not want to be anywhere else but there. She turned, resting her cheek against his shoulder and waited for him to wake.

  *

  It was not unusual for Verne to wake in the throes of lust. It was rarer to feel the softness of a female form in his arms, ready for loving. With a little growl, he rolled her under him and opened his eyes to a new wonder.

  He smiled in delight. “Cecily.”

  “You needn’t sound so surprised.”

  “But I am. I still cannot believe you married me.” Nor, as his memory flooded back, could he believe his luck in finding her so sweet and responsive a lover, her passion eager and almost as urgent as his own. This was Cecily. His wife… he lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her. “Would you mind very much if I made love to you again?” he whispered.

  She swallowed. “I think I might insist upon it.”

  He smiled. “As you command, my lady.”

  *

  There followed three weeks of blissful fun for Cecily. Lost in her husband’s companionship, and the ever-changing pleasure of his physical intimacy, she fell deeper in love with every passing day. They laughed a lot and talked interminably, learning each other in increasing detail. They spent a couple of days in Edinburgh, where they attended the theatre and danced at the elegant Assembly Rooms in George Street, before traveling on to Alvan’s secluded estate further north. There they enjoyed an idyllic fortnight, riding and walking and simply sitting quietly together admiring the spectacular scenery.

  It was there that Cecily first discovered her husband suffered from nightmares.

  Although two bedchambers had been prepared for them, Verne slept every night in hers. She had wondered if he would prefer merely to visit her when he desired—which was the custom, Lady Barnaby had explained to her, in most upper-class households. When Verne showed no interest in his own bed, Cecily was relieved and delighted.

  “I wondered if you might prefer to sleep in your own chamber,” she murmured, stroking his hair as he lay in her arms after making love to her. “Now that we have the space.”

  He lifted his head from her breast, “Do you want me to?”

  She shook her head. “It’s unexpectedly wonderful sharing a bed with someone. With you.”

  “I’m glad you added that,” he said with a wry smile. He lowered his head once more, kissing her damp skin. “This is all new to you. When the novelty wears off, when you want your chamber to yourself, you must tell me.”

  Cecily frowned over the inevitability he implied. Her arms tightened in protest. For actually, it was more likely to be he would tire of her constant company and seek his own solitude. But not yet. Not yet.

  She drifted into sleep, her limbs entwined with his.

  She had no idea how long had passed when she was jerked awake by his anguished groan. At some point, they had fallen apart in sleep, or he’d pulled away from her, for he now lay on his back, his head thrashing from side to side on the pillow, his whole body making small but somehow desperate motions. He muttered incoherently, clearly in the throes of some thoroughly unpleasant experience. Frightened that he was ill, she reached for the flint and hast
ily lit the bedside candle.

  She leaned over him, searching his desperate face, but he was still asleep, his eyes darting feverishly behind the closed lids.

  She clasped his naked shoulder. “Patrick. Patrick, you’re dreaming.”

  “Arthur,” he uttered, clearly distressed. “Arthur, no. No, don’t, don’t…”

  Oh, God, was he dreaming of the fire? Reliving the terrible death of his brother who had caused it and perished by it. She shook him more urgently. “Patrick, wake up. It’s Cecily.” Somehow, she detached his clinging hand and carried it to her lips.

  His eyes flew open. Haunted, agonized, they took a moment to focus.

  “You were dreaming,” she said gently.

  He swallowed convulsively. “I’m sorry I woke you.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said impatiently.

  He lifted his hand to her face. “You are my talisman, to frighten away the terrible nightmares.”

  “Are they so terrible?” she whispered.

  He moved suddenly, rolling over her, his hands urgent. “I don’t know. I never remember.”

  Before the passion took over, she knew he was lying. It didn’t seem to matter at the time. She was more than happy to be his distraction.

  *

  Although sorry to leave their isolated idyll in Scotland, Cecily looked eagerly forward to beginning her new life as mistress of Finmarsh.

  “Would you object to more servants in the house?” Cecily asked diplomatically as the carriage rattled southward.

  “You must engage whom you like,” Verne said. He cast her a rueful glance. “I expect servants will be more eager to come now that there is a mistress at the house.”

  “We should probably have a housekeeper, and a butler, too. If Daniel is meant to be your valet, he cannot run the house and the stables, too.”

  “You are quite right.” He stirred, stretching out one leg which had no doubt grown stiff from prolonged sitting in the coach. “And then there is Shilton. I know you have no use for another lady’s maid, but I would not like her turned off.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t do that,” Cecily assured him. “But I feel she would be better with suitable employment. As it is, she seems merely to drift around the house talking to ghosts.”

  “Ah, you’ve heard her, have you? She isn’t mad, you know. Just… distressed.”

  Cecily nodded, although she wasn’t convinced the woman was entirely sane, whatever the tragic causes. “I’ll have her help me with household inventories and things, just at first, and talk to her about her future, whether that should be with us or with some other lady.”

  “Thank you,” he said with a quick smile. “It isn’t every wife who would be so accommodating. I know what they say of her and me but it isn’t true and never was.”

  “I never thought it was.” Except very briefly in the first couple of days she had stayed there. She hesitated for a moment, then said, “What about our other problem? We cannot live comfortably with people trying to kill you.”

  “I wish I hadn’t told you about the incident at Mooreton.”

  “You didn’t. Alvan told me.”

  “Well, the thing about it is, these attacks—whether on Jerome or me—only seem to occur where certain people are gathered in the same place.”

  “Namely you, Henry, Torbridge, and Renarde.”

  He smiled. “I should have known you would have noticed. Except, of course, that Renarde had left the Hart several hours before that shot was fired at me.”

  “Isabelle had not,” Cecily blurted.

  Verne blinked. “She was right behind us, in the company of the Longstones, Torbridge and several of my men!”

  “Yes, but women are just as capable as men of hiring people to do their dirty work.”

  A frown tugged at his brow. “Isabelle would not hurt me,” he said with finality. As if his words made it irrefutable fact.

  “Because you are her lover?”

  He stared at her. “Because it is not in her nature.”

  It was almost a quarrel, because she was stepping where he did not wish her to go. Where unresolved jealousy had compelled her to go. She didn’t know if Isabelle was truly in his past. She did know that by all the rules of good breeding, she should neither inquire nor appear to notice. But she could not be that good a wife, not to Verne.

  And so, she folded her arms and drew back from the quarrel she was not yet ready to make and hoped she would never have to.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The contrast between her first sighting of Finmarsh House in the forced company of her abductor, and arriving now as its mistress, couldn’t have been greater. In the summer sunshine, the house stood proud and beautiful, with none of the menacing quality she had once associated with it. Plus, it appeared to be a hive of activity. Men swarmed across the roof, presumably laying slates.

  “They must have finished rebuilding the north wing,” she observed, peering out of the window.

  Verne didn’t look. His gaze seemed to be on her. “I’m glad.”

  She slipped her hand into his. “You need this. To let go of the past and the guilt that was never truly yours.”

  He squeezed her fingers, but did not speak. Only when the carriage had halted at the familiar front door, he ignored the step and lifted her down, swinging her around before letting her slip to the ground.

  “I’m glad you’re with me,” he said softly and, careless of the workmen, the coachman, and the stable lad who wandered toward them, he kissed her.

  *

  Shilton and the cook and a couple of the men Cecily recognized from their expedition to the seaside, came out to welcome them home. Discounting the men, whom she thought of more as bodyguards, that left two house servants, one of whom was superfluous. Plus, Daniel and Cranston, of course, who arrived with the baggage only a few minutes later.

  It struck her, however, that while the house might not gleam to the standards of an exacting housekeeper, neither did it look neglected or dusty.

  “Do you do the housework here, Shilton?” she asked curiously.

  “I got a girl from the village to help me,” Shilton said nervously. “I thought you wouldn’t mind, my lady,” she added with a quick glance at Verne. “Only there was so much dust from the building…”

  “Excellent idea,” Cecily approved. “Well done! Um… is this girl a good worker? Is she looking for a position? Because we certainly need more staff here.”

  Once inside, Cecily spoke to the cook about dinner, and then followed Verne around to the archway that led to the north wing. It had been boarded up before and painted to look like the rest of the walls. Now it gave an impression of light and much greater space. And beyond it, were walls, passages, rooms, and a staircase.

  Verne stood in the archway, gazing in. When Cecily went and stood beside him, he took her hand and led her through the rooms. They were all well-proportioned and mostly spacious, but with bare, unadorned plaster walls, they had little character, and certainly none of the eerie atmosphere that had seemed to haunt the ruin she had last seen in this place.

  “What was here before?” she asked.

  “Reception rooms. Marjorie’s morning room. And upstairs,” he added, leading the way, “their bedchambers and a sitting room. Still room,” he added, pointing to spaces that did not yet have doors, “and a linen cupboard. And the nursery.”

  “What would you like to have here now?”

  He paused, looking around. “I don’t know. Guest bedchambers, perhaps? It would give us more privacy in the south wing. I’m presuming we’ll have guests now that you’ve married me with Alvan’s approval.”

  He didn’t want to think about it. She suspected he’d have simply demolished the wing if it wouldn’t have made the house look so peculiarly lopsided. It warmed her heart that he’d rebuilt it largely for her, but he didn’t like it. He wasn’t remotely comfortable here.

  He needed good memories to drown out the old.

  “We could make a game
s room downstairs, if you liked?” she suggested. “Set up a billiard table, perhaps?”

  He regarded her with surprise. “That might be fun.”

  She took his arm. “Then we should look into it. Now, show me where I shall sleep.”

  They walked along the passage, through the door that had once blocked the ruin from the rest of the house.

  Verne waved one arm toward the bedchambers. “We can make any arrangement you like with these rooms. Have your own back, if you wish. Or come with me to my lair downstairs.” He stroked an imaginary moustache, making her laugh.

  “I might risk that for now,” she said primly. “But perhaps we could think of moving up here in the future? There is space enough for us to have connecting rooms, if you wish.”

  “So that I can get drunk without disgusting you?”

  “I’m sure there will be times,” she said tolerantly. “But I was thinking more of a dressing room. I’m not sure I shall want Daniel floating in and out of my bedchamber!”

  “Good point,” he allowed, guiding her down the main staircase and across to the library, which had been kept neater and cleaner than Cecily remembered it.

  Beyond the connecting door was the tiny room where Jerome had slept and on the other side, a spacious bedchamber with a small dressing room.

  Verne waved his hand to the latter. “There’s another door to the dressing room from the passage. I’ll tell Daniel to use that. Can you be comfortable here for a little? Or do you wish to sleep upstairs?”

  Cecily examined her surroundings. Like the library, it was alarmingly neat today, though she suspected it was normally cluttered and chaotic like its master. However, it had a pleasant feel, and was bright and airy.

  “All your things are here,” she said. “Besides, if we stay here, we can change things around upstairs and redecorate without being disturbed. Why did you choose these rooms in the first place? Were they always yours?”

  “No, Arthur and I had the north wing. The nursery was there, too, and then the schoolroom. I had to move somewhere when he married, and this seemed as far away as possible. I could come in and out in the middle of the night, in any state I chose without disturbing anyone.”