“Isn’t it?” She strode up to him. “I married you when every instinct told me I was mad to do so, and do you know why?”
“Because you didn’t want to live as a ruined spinster in Torquay?” he bit out.
“If that were why, I’d have married Pomeroy, who wasn’t seeking to destroy my family.” She faced him squarely. “I married you because I trusted you. Because you were honorable and just, and I knew you’d do the right thing by Dolly.”
Her lower lip trembled. “But that was before I realized that the hatred burning in your heart was so powerful, it could overwhelm your more rational impulses.”
“Rational! You think it’s rational to take the word of a liar?”
“No one’s asking you to do that.I’m not asking you to do that. I’m asking you to give her story a chance. Go to France. See if you can determine the truth by independent means. Then if you can’t, and you still want to drag my family through the courts—”
“You’ll accept my decision,” he said sarcastically.
“Yes. Because then I’ll know you aren’t just trying to strike back at us because you can’t strike back at Theodore Frier.”
He sucked in a breath, disturbed that his wife could read his emotions so well. The truth was, he was already leaning toward doing as her father had asked, if only to satisfy his conviction that her stepmother’s claims were false.
But having his pretty little wife demand it sparked his temper. He’d sworn not to let her lead him about by the nose, and now she was testing that. “And if I don’t go to France? How long will you punish me by refusing me your bed?”
She cast him a look of weary regret. “If you don’t at least confirm her story, then I won’t be refusing you my bed, Lucas. I’ll be refusing you everything. You can do whatever you want, but I will be living with Papa and Dolly, helping them through the scandal you set into motion to flush out a dead man.”
The words crashed over him like waves battering a ship’s hull. She meant to leave him. After all they’d endured together, she would still—
“The hell you will.” The panic squeezing his chest was worse than any he’d endured in the priest’s hole. “Have your fit of temper if you must, but you’re my wife, and I won’t let you force my hand with idle threats.”
“It’s not an idle threat,” she said. “I can’t live with a man I can’t trust.”
He fought to hide the terror that her assertion roused in his chest. “As I recall, darlin’,” he said, struggling to keep his tone unaffected, “our marriage vows didn’t include the word ‘trust.’ But I do remember something about you obeying me.”
“And that’s what you want? A wife who will obey you blindly, like the soldiers under your command? Who will never voice her own opinion, never make demands on you?”
What he wanted was for her not to leave him. But he’d be damned if he’d admit that. “It doesn’t matter what I want, because I won’t get it, will I? You couldn’t be an ‘obedient wife’ if your life depended on it.”
“And you don’t want blind obedience in a wife, no matter what you think.”
He suddenly saw his chance to get what he did want—his pride preserved, and his wife where he wanted her.
“Why don’t we find out, darlin’? If you’ll be my obedient wife for one night, I’ll go to France. But you have to do exactly what I say. Because if you fail, if you show your usual willfulness, then I’ll do as I please with your stepmother, and there will be no more talk of living apart. Agreed?”
What an excellent strategy! His wife had failed at playing a half-wit when they first met; she’d never manage “blind obedience” for a whole night. So when she failed this, too, he’d win what he wanted.
Then, when he magnanimously agreed to go to France in the morning, it wouldn’t look as if he’d given in to her demands, but was being generous. And once he’d determined in France that he was right about Theo Frier, she wouldn’t object when he used her stepmother to flush the man out of hiding.
It was a brilliant plan—if she accepted the challenge.
For a moment, he feared she wouldn’t. Her eyes narrowed as she searched his face. Then she flashed him a suspiciously bright smile. “As you wish, my husband. When do we start?”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Dear Charlotte,
You have good cause to worry about Lady Amelia and her husband. An American marine officer is unlikely to tolerate impudence in a wife, and of all your pupils, Lady Amelia seems the most capable of impudence.
Your equally impudent cousin,
Michael
Now is as good a time as any,” Lucas said.
Amelia nodded. Not for nothing had she spent the past few nights warming her husband’s bed. She knew what he liked, and she’d begun to learn what he expected of her. An obedient wife wasn’t it, no matter what he told himself.
But it was time that he learned it. Whenever Amelia tried to reason with him, he balked at the challenge to his authority. She didn’t mean to have that battle every time some matter arose that they couldn’t agree upon. Nor did she intend to watch him destroy their future—and her family’s—because he couldn’t put his past behind him. If being obedient was what it took to get him to go to France, she’d do it. Because once he was there looking at a grave, once he’d talked to the people in Lisieux, how could he possibly ignore the facts?
So she would be obedient tonight if it killed her. And judging from the gleam in her devilish husband’s eyes, he meant to make sure that it did.
He strode over to her favorite armchair and settled himself in it, then gestured to the bags that had been brought over from Lord Kirkwood’s house. “You can begin, wife, by unpacking those and stowing everything away.” As she nodded and headed for the bags, he said, “And I want everything neatly folded. None of your messy habits, do you hear?”
She gritted her teeth.
For the next two hours, he barked orders like a general at the front lines, until she started to wonder if she’d been daft to marry a military man. After the unpacking came more intimate duties. He ordered her to remove his coat, waistcoat, cravat, and boots, which she did with the same cool efficiency he always showed.
When he commanded her to clean and polish his boots, she had to forcibly hold her tongue. He was giving her a servant’s duties when they both knew that officer’s wives didn’t do such menial tasks. He was trying to bend her to his will as an officer bends a soldier to his.
Very well, let him do his best. He’d soon learn the depths of a woman’s will.
By the time she was done with his boots and they shone to a high gloss, Lucas didn’t look quite as smug as when they’d begun. No doubt he’d expected her to give up being “obedient” before she got to this point.
He eyed her for a long while, and finally pointed to the door. “Your stepmother cut short my dinner, wife. Go downstairs and assemble a tray of food suitable to assuage my hunger, then bring it up.”
“Yes, husband,” she said in the same mousy voice she’d used all evening.
This time it made him arch one eyebrow. “And no purgatives.”
“Certainly not,” she said as she turned for the door, though the idea grew more appealing by the moment.
She took the backstairs to avoid running into her parents, but then dawdled in the kitchen. He hadn’t said to hurry, after all.
In fact, there were a number of things he hadn’t been specific about. Perhaps it was time she took this obedience game to the extreme.
When she returned to the room some time later with a tray containing black bread, sausage, and stewed apples, her frowning husband had moved to her bed. He was sitting propped against the headboard with his legs stretched out, his stocking feet crossed at the ankles, and his shirt unbuttoned.
“You took your sweet time, didn’t you?” he grumbled.
“The kitchen staff has retired for the night,” she said, as if that explained everything.
Despite his obvious d
ispleasure, she didn’t approach him with the tray after pushing the door shut behind her. Instead, she stood there perfectly still.
“Well?” he said. “What are you waiting for?”
She hid a smile. “Your orders. I don’t know where you want the tray.”
With a scowl, he tapped the bedside table beside him. Giving him a servantlike nod, she walked over and placed it there, making sure to give him a thorough glimpse of bosom when she bent over. His sharp intake of breath afforded her some satisfaction.
That satisfaction only increased when he hauled her onto his lap. She sat there primly, regarding him with the expressionless gaze of a soldier as he studied her. Then he glanced over at the food, and his scowl deepened. “You know I don’t like sausage or black bread.”
“You said food. You didn’t specify what you wanted.”
“Wouldn’t an obedient wife bring what her husband likes?”
“Blind obedience is what you demanded. Since you didn’t say what meal to bring you, I gathered what was ready to hand.” She smiled sweetly. “I brought you apples, and you like those.”
“I sure do. So why don’t you feed me some?”
His husky voice sent desire curling in her belly. Drat him. If he turned her ploy into a sensual game, she’d never be able to make her point.
Then again, perhaps she could use even that to her advantage. “All right,” she murmured, wriggling her bottom as she reached forward for the fork.
“Not with that,” he said. “With your fingers.”
No doubt he was waiting for her to protest that stewed apples didn’t lend themselves to that manner of eating, or complain about his eating on her bed.
She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. Forcing a smile, she picked up a slice of apple, dredged it heavily in juice, then carried it dripping to his mouth.
With the juice trickling down his chin, he ate the apple, then pointed to his jaw. “Clean this up.”
“I’ll fetch a rag.” She started to leave his lap.
“No,” he drawled. “Use your mouth.”
Her mouth? Oh, he was devious. If she licked his chin, matters would progress naturally.
So she’d have to thwart him. “As you wish, husband,” she murmured, then leaned forward and scraped the juice from his jaw with her teeth.
“Ow!” He jerked back to scowl at her. “What are you doing?”
“You said use your mouth.”
“You know very well what part of the mouth I meant.”
She cocked her head. “I would never dare to assume—”
He cut off her words with a kiss and she nearly responded, seduced by the taste and touch and scent of him. But she caught herself and forced herself to sit unmoving while his mouth caressed hers and his tongue pressed against her closed lips.
“Kiss me back,” he growled.
So she did, but only with her mouth. She kept her body still as a stone, her hands folded in her lap.
At first, he didn’t seem to notice. He plundered her lips as ardently as ever, his tongue driving deep as his hands swept knowingly over her hips, her belly, her breasts. But when she continued just to sit there, he drew back to glare at her. “I said, kiss me back.”
“I am.”
“But you’re not touching me.”
“I’ll be happy to touch you as soon as you tell me what to touch. And how. And when.”
“So that’s your game. If I don’t give the exact command, you don’t act.”
“I’m merely being an obedient—”
“The hell you are.” He stared at her a long moment. “Fine. I’m more than happy to command you in even the smallest detail because sooner or later you’ll rebel. You can’t help yourself.”
She just stared at him, more determined than ever to continue her campaign of passive resistance.
“Stand up and take off your clothes,” he demanded. “Oh, and in case you mean to misinterpret the word ‘clothes,’ I want you naked. Understand?”
“Perfectly,” she said, and rose to her feet.
She started out slowly, but within seconds her husband anticipated that teasing tactic, and murmured, “Quickly, darlin’. You have one minute.”
To unhook and unsnap and unlace everything ? Drat him, he was determined to tax her patience. It took her the full time, so only when she was done and standing there while he looked her over did she realize how unnerving it was to be fully naked before a clothed man. The last time she’d stood naked before him, he’d been naked, too. That had felt far, far different.
This felt more like their encounter on the xebec, when she was his “captive.” But that had been a game, with stakes smaller than these. Because theirs wasn’t a game. It was a war. And it remained to be seen who’d win it.
He took his time about looking her over, letting his intimate gaze linger on her unbound breasts, her trembling belly, the rapidly dampening curls at the juncture of her thighs.
She had to dig her fingers into her palms to keep from covering herself. When at last he lifted his eyes to hers, she could read in them a determination to conquer her that mirrored her own.
“Do you remember our wedding night,” he asked, “when you wanted to watch me pleasure myself?”
Warily, she nodded.
He smiled with all the sly charm of a born seducer. “Now it’s your turn. I want to watch you pleasure yourself.”
Lord help her. A blush spread over her cheeks as she realized what he meant.
But she could never…had never…well, she had, but not like this. She’d touched herself in the secrecy of her own bed, under the sheets, furtively. This would be utterly mortifying.
And he knew it, too, the wretch, for his smile broadened. “Now,wife. Put your hand between your legs and caress your tender parts for my enjoyment.”
She searched frantically for a way to misconstrue his request, but she was too flustered to think of one. Blushing from head to toe, she did as he demanded.
Her flesh was already damp and aroused, but now it seemed to pulse against her fingers, so violently that she was sure he could see it. She wouldn’t know, however, because she couldn’t bear to watch him watch her.
He realized that at once. “Look at me, darlin’,” he said, in that sensuous drawl that always sent delicious shivers down her spine.
She lifted her gaze to find him staring not at her busy hand, but at her flushed face.
“Use your other hand to caress your breasts,” he ordered.
When she did so, however, he didn’t watch that; he just kept watching her face.
Then she realized what he was doing. It was her reaction that mattered to him, her embarrassment that he wanted. And perhaps he also wanted to see her lose herself in pleasure and give up the control that he wanted to gain for himself.
Hah! Now she knew how to thwart him.
So she did exactly as he said, caressing the slick petals of flesh, rubbing her finger over the tight, aching little nodule. But she steeled herself against any reaction, though it took every ounce of her will. She forced herself to caress her body mechanically, as if she were grooming herself or brushing her teeth.
It wasn’t easy with him watching her, searching her face, hoping for signs of a break in her control. But having his heated gaze on her sparked her temper, making it easier for her to be cool and distant as she worked her fingers over her private parts.
The longer she did it, the deeper his scowl became until his eyes were blazing at her, not just with desire but with anger. “Come here, damn you.”
“As you wish, husband.” She approached the bed, ruthlessly suppressing her smile of triumph. He could command her to do many things, but he couldn’t command her to feel pleasure, and he was finally beginning to realize that.
“Undress me,” he ordered.
“As you wish, husband,” she repeated blithely.
“And stop saying that,” he growled.
“All right.”
She set about undressing hi
m, but it was more difficult than she expected. Not so much because of the awkwardness of getting trousers off a seated man—an aroused, seated man—but because she could smell him and feel his breath quick and hot against her cheeks.
After she’d stripped him down to his drawers, he launched into a new torment. He began to kiss and touch her. As she worked the buttons free, he kissed her cheek, her brow, her ear. He took down her hair, caressing it, rubbing it…twining it over her breasts over and over.
And then, when he had her nipples taut and aching, eager for a firmer caress, he stroked them…but with a feathery touch that could only arouse, not satisfy, until it was all she could do not to shove her breasts in his mouth and beg him to suck them.
Which was exactly what he wanted.
Beast. Devil. She wouldn’t let him win. She would not .
She worked his drawers off, fighting to ignore his caresses. But it was not so easy to ignore the rampant erection that reared up before her very eyes, demanding her attention.
When he caught her staring at it, he said hoarsely, “Touch me.”
Her gaze swung to his, and the savage intensity of those dark eyes nearly banished her resolve.
But her will was stronger. Holding his gaze with a perfectly cool one of her own, she very deliberately fondled…his ankle.
A foul oath erupted from him. “You know damn well that I want you to touch my—” He caught himself. “Never mind, I have a better idea. Get up on the bed astride me.”
She blinked, not quite certain what he meant, but when she climbed up over his legs, he caught her by the waist, then positioned her so that she sat straddling his thighs just below his erection.
“Put my cock inside you where your fingers just were,” he rasped, leaving no room for misinterpretation.
So that’s what he wanted. How very intriguing and different…and adventurous. Of course. The devious scoundrel knew exactly how to tempt her to lower her guard.
Could she do what he asked without succumbing to him?
She could. She must. Tonight she was fighting for their future.
Casting him a curt nod that deepened his scowl but didn’t seem to dampen his arousal, she maneuvered herself onto his rigid staff, which took some doing since he still sat with his back against the headboard. But when she sank down fully, fitting herself firmly against his groin, he slid his eyes shut with a look of pure ecstasy.
Never Seduce a Scoundrel Page 26
