by Julia Donner
The widow’s plump lips pressed into an unhappy line. Mrs. Rawlins visibly quivered, her eyes blazing. Not allowing the woman to retaliate, Leticia slipped her hand from Bainbridge’s tense arm and took a step forward.
In a lowered voice, she infused every bit of intimidation she could muster. “Go home, madam. It is over. This will not be a household set up like the Duke of Devonshire’s.”
A shocked gasp preceded Mrs. Rawlins reply, “I would never—”
“Of a certainty, you would. Your presence here is a statement of how you wish to go on.”
Mrs. Rawlins cast off her train and was so swallowed up in fury that she began to lift the crop she clenched.
Leticia softly laughed. “No, do not do something so excessively rash. It will only serve to overset Bainbridge. We all know about his temper.”
Chin up and nostrils flaring, Mrs. Rawlins whirled and snapped an order to the groom, who cupped his hands for her boot. She mounted without her usual grace, shoved her boot into the stirrup, jerked on the reins, and cantered away.
Behind her, Bainbridge cleared his throat. “That was somewhat severe.”
“When one encounters impudence and rudeness, one is expected to dispense a strong reprimand. She showed her true character by coming here to laud her control over you.”
“She never had control over me. I was referring to the way she abused her horse and your comment about my temper.”
Acutely aware of Carnall remaining discreetly on the staircase, she twitched her nose and looked away. “You do have a dreadful temper, but I live secure in the knowledge that you would never vent it on females or children. Now, where is the parson?”
She could see that he wanted to argue, but said, “I had him escorted by way of old South Gate. We’ll go through the house.” He took her wrist, flicked a gesture at Carnall, and towed her beside his swift stride. Focused on his purpose, he strode through corridors, his expression grim. “What did that comment about Devonshire mean?”
“It had to do with the present duke’s father, who kept his mistress in residence.”
Hurt muted his voice. “I would never do that to you, Leticia.”
“Of course you wouldn’t. It was a warning to keep her activities away from this house. I apologize if I have ruined your…friendship with her, but I cannot maintain a sense of self-worth if I allow myself to ignore her provocation. Mrs. Rawlins, whatever she is, or may become to you in future, will not rule this house.”
He shoved open a stout wooden door banded in iron strips. They entered a ancient circular room that smelled of acrid stone. Steps attached to one wall wound upward.
“The southwest solar,” he muttered, not slowing his pace.
She puffed for air, paying attention to where they headed while hurrying to keep up with his much longer legs. She heard Carnall’s swift tread behind them and sensed his delight. His keen focus on the center of her back created an itch and urge to cringe.
Bainbridge shoved open another heavy door, taking them into a chapel’s side entry. Mellow sunlight fell in slanted shafts from narrow windows. Dust floated in the sunbeams. Taffy stood on one side of the chancel prie-dieu, well away from a bewildered-looking clergyman. Bainbridge, being Bainbridge, did not make use of the kneeler.
Leticia gasped, chest heaving, when he pulled her to a halt in front of the priest. A rosebud fell from her hair and plopped on the stone floor. She swept up a fallen curl and tried to put it back in place with one hand.
Taffy swiftly fixed the escaped lock and stepped back as Bainbridge barked, “Vicar, have you seen the document and agree to its validity?”
“Yes, my lord. Isn’t this somewhat irregular. And rather hasty. Perhaps we—”
“You’ll say the words now and be on your way. Are we clear?”
Leticia thought she heard a cough behind her and realized that it was Carnall trying to cover laughter. Taffy stared forward and kept her lips sealed. Leticia sent Carnall a speaking glare over her shoulder that warned him to contain his humor. She squinted a threat at him. No laughing!
The vicar began the to babble words. Leticia bowed her head but got distracted by a curious distortion on one side of Bainbridge’s tight pantaloons. Bainbridge interrupted her inspection when he clasped her right wrist and put it over his own. The vicar wrapped a beautiful, scratchy sash around their wrists. More words came bubbling out of the vicar, until he stilled and looked wildly around the ancient chapel, as if for a route to escape.
Bainbridge snapped at the vicar, “Are you finished?”
The terrorized man squeaked, dropping his missive as he jumped back. “Yes, my lord!”
The sash got unwound and flipped at the vicar. Taking her hand, Bainbridge snarled over his shoulder, “Escort him to the manse, Carnall, then come back and stay for dinner.”
As she was being hauled back the way they had come, Leticia called over her shoulder, “Taffy, lay dinner in the breakfast room.”
They sailed through the chapel door, heading back through a newer portion of the house. “Bainbridge, where are you taking me?”
“Up the servants’ stairs.”
Seeing steps ahead, she used her free hand to grab up the front of the gown and clutch yards of tulle into her waist. Since it was late morning, Rosellyn was tidying the bedchamber as they entered. She leaped backward with a yelp when Bainbridge halted in the center of the room.
“Out,” was all he said. Loudly.
Rosellyn scooted by and slammed the door. Gasping and almost dizzy for air, Leticia didn’t quite hear what Bainbridge said until he repeated it.
“How do you get out of that rig?”
Around gasps for air, she reached back and groped underneath the train. “You shouldn’t have scared off Rosellyn.”
He growled when a feeble tap on the door interrupted his advance. He turned and jerked open the door. A footman cringed, stepped back.
“My lord, you have visitors.”
“Tell them we’re not at home.” When the footman didn’t move, Bainbridge demanded, “Why are you still here?”
From the passageway, the footman peered around Bainbridge. “My lady, your relatives are waiting.”
A terrible calm filled the room when Bainbridge stilled. Leticia had seen him angry a number of times but never this suppressed, rippling menace. She didn’t want to start off the legal portion of her marriage with her husband being forced to leave the country for murder.
She flew around Bainbridge and through the door, moving quickly down the hallway. “You’ve kept them in the introductory hall?”
The footman ran to get ahead of her. “Yes, milady. My lord has given precise instruction that they should not be welcomed, and therefore, I didn’t take them to a receiving room.”
Hearing and feeling Bainbridge’s stalking tread behind her, she said, “Your impression is accurate. When we get there, keep everyone away. Take the footmen with you when you leave. I suppose it’s useless asking you to not relay what is about to happen to everyone in the servants’ hall.”
“Oh, quite useless, my lady. You must know how your cousins are esteemed in the district. One is parsimonious and the other high-nosed. And they have slighted you, my lady. That must not be tolerated.”
“As I feared.”
She increased her pace, and the footman dashed ahead to stay in the lead. Behind her, Bainbridge growled.
Chapter 17
Leticia shoved aside frustration. Her mind whirled with ideas of how to save her dimwit cousins. As Bainbridge followed, she sensed his rage intensifying with every step. No man would wish to be interrupted during a pre-coital moment, and Bainbridge wasn’t a man to be thwarted. He acted as contented as a sleeping bear until rudely wakened. She had to get to her cousins before he did. He was in no mood to let them get away without venting some of his aggravation. She could scarcely believe the arrogance of showing their faces at Stokebrook without advanced notice or an invitation. It had to have been Joseph’s insufferable overconfidence and inf
lated sense of privilege that forced Henry to attend him in the madness about to erupt.
She got to the base of the entry hall steps before Bainbridge captured her wrist. Holding her in place, he glared across the hall and muttered, “You’ll stay here while I deal with them.”
His grip on her wrist had been firm, but his hesitation gave her the impression he worried that he’d hurt her. A fingertip tenderly caressed before he released her and headed across the room.
Joseph stood with supreme self-assurance in his preferred pose, bearing weight on one elegantly shod foot, while he propped a gloved hand on the head of a Malacca cane. He oozed an air of satisfied buoyancy, utterly pleased with himself.
Henry stood behind him close to the wall, cowering under a fan of mace. The varied types and sizes of axes gleamed since Taffy’s arrival. Cleaned, the armor and mounted weaponry on display now had an ominous cast.
A fearsome truth pierced her concern for the cousins. Prior to this, she’d merely accepted the weapons as decorations, mementos of a warring family’s proud history. At this moment, she fully comprehended their purpose. The array of spiked mace affixed to the walls had actually splattered some poor soldier’s head into mush. The pikes and spears had stabbed and gutted.
A wave of nausea escalated her worry. Her foolish cousins might have disturbed a resting giant. How does an undersized, overweight female in fluffy tulle stop a descendant of marauding Vikings and Norman invaders?
Bainbridge stalked across the vast room. The thuds of his boot heels on flagstones rang a forbidding knell. His right hand was fisted, his left relaxed. Something about his left hand worried her more than the clenched right. He’d told her to stay, but she readied to move. The last thing she wanted was to have her husband mangle two, entirely deserving idiots on her wedding day. It wouldn’t bother her husband’s conscience for a moment but would scar hers for a long time to come.
Joseph nodded a polite bow. “Lord Bainbridge, sorry to intrude, but we’ve come to fetch our cousin home.”
Bainbridge halted. From the other side of the room, she sensed the rage pouring off him, like smoke from a smoldering fire, embers readying to ignite. Cloaked in the assurance of his consequence, blockheaded Joseph acted oblivious. Smarter Henry shrank back and quickly looked away, telling Leticia that Bainbridge had put on his threatening mask. She’d witnessed smarter men back away from that in a hurry, but Joseph had only his goal in mind. Her fortune was his ticket to an easy life, and he wasn’t about to give up on that juicy bone. She wished she were close enough to slap his face for his blind greed. Anxious, she took an incautious step.
It was a bad move. Joseph noticed, took it as encouragement, and adopted a solicitous, man-to-man manner.
“You must be aware of the awkwardness of her present situation. We are sensible of your generosity and efforts to shelter her. Brother Henry has explained that your family has enjoyed a close connection with ours, nonetheless, there is distressing gossip of an elopement, and she’s been in residence without a companion for days. As her rightful guardians, we must take steps to rectify and salvage her reputation.”
Bainbridge said nothing. Leticia hovered, ready to fly across the room. Joseph’s confidence began to slip. His expression became pinched and impatient. He glared at her, as if she should do as he bid or take steps to alleviate the stalemate.
Then he made the mistake of issuing her a command with a sneer and an edge of mockery, “Come along, girl. This is where your disobedience ends.”
Viper swift, Bainbridge’s hand shot out and seized Joseph’s neckcloth, crushing the meticulous arrangement. Henry shrieked when Bainbridge slammed Joseph’s back into the wall. Leticia lifted her skirts and dashed across the room, scooting around his side to stand where Bainbridge could see her.
Joseph, stunned and gasping, rolled his eyes upward, where Bainbridge’s left hand rested on an ax handle.
Struggling against the grip at his throat, Joseph choked out, “Are you mad? Release me!”
Bainbridge stepped forward so that his chest pressed into Joseph’s. “You will leave and never show yourself here again.”
Joseph gargled, “My cousin—”
“No, she’s my wife. If you want to dispute that, my solution is simple.” He yanked the ax from the wall.
Henry cried out, babbling and blubbering. Bainbridge ignored him and held the ax handle in a loose grip that was more of a threat than if he held it upright.
Carefully, gently, Leticia said, “Bainbridge, a word please.”
Putting his nose on Joseph’s, Bainbridge said, “Understand this, Caudill. Relative or not, you will never see her again.”
When Joseph opened his mouth to speak, Bainbridge whispered into his face, “Not a word. It’s been far too long since Stokebrook kept the peasantry in line with a spiked head at the gate.”
Henry scuttled to the doors the stoic-faced footmen held wide. Bainbridge propped the ax against the wall, grabbed Joseph by an arm and the seat of his pantaloons. He carried him to the doorway and pitched him out onto the gravel, where Henry scrambled into a carriage. The team startled and began to move as the driver hauled up the reins.
Bainbridge slammed the door shut and took her hand. “Come. We have unfinished business.”
She gathered up yards of tulle in one hand. “You really weren’t going to use that ax, were you?”
“Not sure. Might have. Wanted to.”
As she hurried up steps and down passages, she wondered if her cousin fully understood how close he’d come to dismemberment. She must write to Cousin Henry tomorrow and ask him to make it clear to his brother what another trespass on Stokebrook land without an invitation would mean. By the time she’d composed the letter in her head, they arrived back at the bedchamber. His haste tickled a comic chord in her head, while her body thrilled at his eagerness.
The first thing out of his mouth after he shut the door was, “Tell me how to get you out of that dress.”
Chapter 18
When he stepped behind her, she found enough wits to say, “Under the train, there’s lacing.”
He flipped the train over her shoulder and fumbled against the center of her back, no doubt making knots of the tapes. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him grab a small knife from the table. She felt the tug of the knife as the blade sawed through the lacing. He drew the gown off her shoulders and pushed it to the floor. Then he discovered the tightly drawn corset.
While sawing through the strings, he muttered, “No wonder you nearly fainted. You’re cinched into this thing like a sausage.”
She inhaled a deep, blessed breath when the binding fell away. It wasn’t until her shift joined the gown around her ankles that she connected with the reality of her lack of clothing. She’d been dressed and undressed every day of her life but never in the presence of a man.
Her heart began to pound. She darted a glance at the open window. Voices of outdoor workers floated in with the breeze. She stood still, wearing nothing but the bright light of day, and savored the brush of the wind over her bare skin. Her mouth opened in another kind of gasp when she felt his touch glide down her spine.
“Promise me, Cia, that you won’t wear that thing again. Your pretty skin is marked from it.”
He didn’t allow her to answer and stepped around her to present his back. “Get me out of this blasted jacket.”
“You’ll have to squat a bit.”
After he did, she slid trembling fingers beneath the coat collar and peeled the material from his back and arms. He unfastened his vest as he turned around, took the jacket from her hand, and flung it over the table. He stilled when he saw her shivering in the humid heat.
She desperately wanted to cover herself but didn’t. Digging her fingernails into her palms, she gritted her teeth to stop the whine of embarrassment rising up her throat. There was nothing she could do to hide her blush and lowered her gaze. Again, she noticed the odd deformity pressing against the kerseymere, more pronounced tha
n before. Comprehension scorched her skin when she realized the cause. Perhaps she didn’t have to be beautiful to keep her husband at home.
Her gaze flew up to his face. He wasn’t embarrassed about his condition. His attention was fixed on her chest, surveying her with predatory intent. She blinked and smiled. He liked what he saw and proved it when he lifted her from the pile of her clothes and carried her to the bed. He stripped off her stockings and shoes, then froze, statue-still, when she placed her palm on his shoulder.
She said in a breathy voice she didn’t recognize, “The rest of your clothes are not too tight to remove.”
Under her hand, she felt a change. A fine quivering began. She swallowed as the understanding came. He’d initially thought she meant to stop him. The muscled ridge of his shoulder felt like stone when she tried to squeeze an encouraging caress. He reared up, tearing off vest and shirt. She’d scooted back to observe, but the instant his shirt and vest were thrown aside, he seized her ankle, and pulled her forward, lifting her up against his chest. She heard a soft groan against her ear.
Air left her lungs when his fingers pressed against her back. The hairs on his chest tickled, while the feel of his bared skin against her own seared. She matched the wildness of his kiss, rubbing against him when his hands lowered to clasp and knead her bottom. When he tore his mouth from hers, she felt bereft, awash with unsatisfied wanting. He put a knee on the bed and laid her back against the pillows. She clutched the coverlet under her bare bottom to stop her hands from covering herself as his gaze traveled over her nudity.
In the husky, stranger’s voice, she said, “You’re still wearing clothes.”
Kneeling next to her, his eyes never leaving her body, he whispered, “Later. You’re not ready for that.”
She considered that a silly thing to say when she trembled with a terrifying eagerness. She could scarcely breathe for the wanting of what was to come. He seemed too interested in looking and not doing. That was unacceptable.
Forcing confidence into her voice, she said, “Looking isn’t going to give me an heir.”
