* * *
“I lay on the battlefield, buried beneath what was left of Hughey and the horse I borrowed, for seventeen hours,” Griffin said softly when he and Alyssa lay on the chaise in the quiet aftermath of their lovemaking.
She knew he had been bayoneted twice, in the left leg and through the right shoulder, but she hadn’t known how long the horror lasted or that he had been left for dead, left to rot unless a burial detail was dispatched to retrieve him. And as he lay in the darkness, unable to move, Griffin had suffered the fate of every casualty left to die on the battlefield.
“I was plundered by three different armies: the French, a group of German Hussars, and our Spanish and Portuguese allies. And when the armies had finished with me, the native villagers plundered the battlefield. My clothing and boots were stolen first and then my sword.” He met her gaze. His admission surprised him. But it felt good to talk to her. “My Saint George medallion saved my life. There was a dent in it where a ball hit it. I saw it when the French soldier who bayoneted me ripped it from around my neck. My gold watch was taken with my waistcoat. I was stripped naked and about to have a precious part of my anatomy removed by a group of old women as a keepsake and my throat cut when Eastman found me.”
He didn’t tell her the worst of it, but Alyssa knew. She knew in her heart that what he didn’t tell her was far worse than what he did. And she knew from the nature of his wounds and from his nightmares that Griffin had suffered far more than he could relate. She understood the horrors and the indignities he had endured. She also understood that she would have to help him come to terms with them.
Alyssa scored her hand through his body hair. Lower and lower until she was able to wrap her fingers around him.
Griffin froze.
He stopped kissing her. He stopped everything.
She caressed him, using the motion he had taught her in the coach on their wedding day, but Griffin shook his head. “No.”
Alyssa widened her eyes in surprise at his answer.
“No.” He placed his hand over hers and stopped her motion.
“But, Griffin…”
He removed his hand from over hers, then stared down at her fingers. “No,” he told her. “Please…”
Suddenly, the words he had spoken the first night he’d awakened her with his feverish nightmares made perfect sense. Touch that portion of my anatomy again, madam, and I’ll kill you.
Alyssa gently released him, then looked up and into his blue eyes.
Griffin captured her face in his hands, plowed his fingers through her hair, and kissed her with a fierce passion, kissed her as if it had been much too long between kisses. And he kept on kissing her.
Alyssa kissed him back, and when she’d done kissing his mouth, she slid down his body and kissed him where she’d just held him.
He didn’t pull away, and Alyssa, emboldened by his response, took him into her mouth and made love to him in an entirely new way.
She lavished love and attention on him until he exploded in blissful satisfaction.
He shuddered in her arms, and Alyssa held him as his deep breathing told her he had finally found refuge in sleep.
Closing her eyes, Alyssa slept cradled on the chaise longue beside him.
Chapter Thirty-two
“Retreat is often the better part of valor.”
—Griffin, Duke of Avon, journal entry, 18 July 1811
Barely a Bride Page 59