Earl of Every Sin

by Scott, Scarlett

  He thought of all he had seen, all he had done. The bloated corpses of dead soldiers, the screams of dying men. Death had become commonplace, but he was not as numb as he had imagined. He was beginning to realize that now.

  Something inside him froze. “Precisely what is it you want from me, madam?”

  “I want to feel as if you do not resent me,” she said.

  “I do not resent you.” That much was truth, for he did not.

  “I want to feel as if what I feel for you is returned, at least a modicum,” she pressed.

  “What is it you feel for me? Hmm? You do not even know me.”

  If she knew him, the real him, El Corazón Oscuro, she would flee. She would not be on his lap. She would not be holding his face in her hands with such indefinable gentleness. If she had seen the sins he had committed, if she had walked in his boots, she would run screaming, recognizing him for the soulless devil he was.

  But still, she did not go. Nor did she allow him to retreat. She remained where she was, a weight in his lap he liked far too much. Her thumbs traveled gently over the ridges of his cheekbones. Twin, silken caresses.

  “What would you do if I kissed you now?” she asked.

  Kiss you back.

  He was saved from folly by the carriage rocking to a halt.

  They had arrived at the coaching inn at last, and not a breath too soon.

  With more force of will than he had recently been able to evince, he clasped her wrists, loosening her hold upon him. Then he deposited her on the opposite bench.

  “We have arrived at the inn,” he told her. “Perhaps you wish for a respite whilst the horses are changed.”

  Without waiting for her response, he threw open the carriage door and leapt to the ground as if the fires of Hades were upon him.

  Perhaps, in a sense, they were.

  Chapter Fourteen

  She had pushed Alessandro too far.

  Catriona knew it when, after the first change of horses, he had chosen to sit on the box rather than share the carriage with her. Subsequent stops had maintained the same distance. And his imposition of space had not improved by the time they reached the inn where they would be staying for the evening.

  She had dined in a private room alone.

  She was now in the room where she would be staying for the evening, also alone.

  And her patience for him had reached an end.

  Although her lady’s maid had already arrived to help her prepare for the evening, Catriona had sent her away. She had harbored a suspicion her husband’s attempts to keep her at bay were not at an end. Their time alone in the carriage had left him shaken.

  It had left her hopeful. Hopeful she may be capable of scaling his walls. Of battering down his defenses. Or forcing him to let her in.

  Instead, he had withdrawn at once.

  She should have known.

  Catriona left the room, gathering her courage and her pride both, and made her way to the public rooms. Alessandro was seated, a tankard of ale before him, a pretty, young serving wench not far from his side. Catriona knew a pang of jealousy at the sight. Of course, he would have ladies fawning over him wherever he went. He was not just handsome but compelling in a way few men possessed.

  But she was his wife, even if he was determined to treat her as if she were nothing more than a duty, he had not been able to escape. She reached the table, giving the serving wench a pointed stare.

  “Husband,” she greeted brightly. “I have been awaiting you.”

  The girl took her cue to leave, fading into the background in a pretense of seeing to the needs of another customer. Catriona turned her attention to Alessandro. He exuded a different energy this evening. He was cagey and raw, his eyes heavy-lidded and dark as they assessed her.

  His sullen lips were drawn into a frown. “Cristo, what are you doing wandering about alone, Catriona? Do you not know any better? Something could have happened to you.”

  She seated herself even though he had not bothered to stand or invite her to join him. “Perhaps you should have concerned yourself with such matters before you abandoned me.”

  He clenched his jaw. “I did not abandon you.”

  “I have been alone since this morning,” she countered.

  “I wished for solitude,” he said, unrepentant.

  He could have his solitude when he returned to Spain.

  She stared him down, equally unmoved. “You ought not to have married me, in that case.”

  “Return to the chamber and get some rest.” His tone was curt, his brooding expression even more forbidding than it had been upon his initial sight of her. “Tomorrow is another long day of travel before we reach Marchmont.”

  “No.”

  She had allowed him to hide from her for long enough.

  “Lady Rayne.” His voice was low, a warning growl.

  She was not afraid of him. Rather, it seemed clear to her he was afraid of her, which was why he had devoted the day to avoiding her and wallowing in ale.

  “Lord Rayne,” she returned, unflinching. “Will you order me an ale, or shall I have to procure one myself?”

  His lip curled. “You are not sitting in a common room swilling ale.”

  “Not yet. If you will not oblige me, I will seek out your friend. Or perhaps an obliging fellow.”

  But when she made to stand, his hand closed over her wrist. “Stay.”

  Catriona sent him an inquiring glance. “Have you changed your mind, husband?”

  The urge to find her way beneath his façade, to rattle him, was strong.

  “If you are half as intelligent as I believe you to be, querida, you will return from whence you came,” he warned as firm in his resolve as she was in hers.

  “Ah, but I am foolish,” she dared to tell him, her tone conspiratorial, “for I married a man who is determined to leave me. You may say I traded one banishment for another, of a sort. Hardly the action of a wise woman. Nor was it wise to ruin myself and cause my exile in the first place. And it is most certainly vastly unwise to find my heart softening for a man who has told me in no uncertain terms he cannot feel the same.”

  There.

  She had revealed to him what she had only come to grasp herself in the hours alone, silent, in a carriage rocking toward an uncertain destination.

  “Verdad,” he said at last. “That is all truth. There is nothing more foolish than fancying I will ever feel anything for you beyond obligation and lust.”

  His words found their way beneath her armor, as sharp as spikes, digging into her tender flesh where she was most vulnerable. Obligation and lust, he said so dismissively, but she reminded herself of the way he had touched her this morning, what seemed a lifetime ago.

  She recalled the kisses he had placed over her body even though he had denied her lips. She remembered every moment of his tongue on her flesh. Of his fingers working their magic, his mouth on her breasts. Of him, deep inside her. The pleasure he had introduced her to had been the likes of which she had never imagined existed. No man who had merely been slaking his needs, bedding her to get an heir on her, would have gone to such lengths.

  He was struggling, fighting to keep his ties to the past and the encumbrance of all his guilt. But she had always been strong. She had needed to be, for her mother, for Monty, for herself. She could be strong for Alessandro. She could fight him back.

  What remained to be seen was whether or not she could win him.

  She leaned toward him, across the scarred table, as if she were about to impart a great secret. “Was I just an obligation this morning?”

  A muscle in his jaw ticked. “Catriona.”

  She was pushing him again, and she knew it. “It is a fair question, is it not?”

  Mouth tightening, he signaled for the wench who had been eying him in much the same manner a stray dog watches scraps of meat thrown into an alleyway. The woman returned, casting a dismissive gaze over Catriona before turning all her attention to Alessandro.

&
nbsp; “How may I help you, milord?” she asked.

  The suggestive tone in her voice was not unnoticed by Catriona.

  You may help me by finding the nearest chamber pot and emptying it over your head, she thought disagreeably.

  It was small of her, she knew. But it could not be helped.

  Her husband brought out the worst in her. Also, she hoped, the best.

  “Ale for my companion, if you please,” he said, his gaze still hot and hard upon Catriona.

  “Yes, milord.” The serving girl dipped into a curtsy that allowed a view straight down the front of her bodice.

  Catriona barely suppressed the fiery need to trip her.

  Fortunately, her husband’s eyes remained trained to her. Unfortunately, the warm, brown depths simmered with anger.

  She decided to prod him more. “You never did answer my question.”

  He took his time responding, lifting his glass to his lips for a lengthy draught. “Your question was impertinent.”

  “Or necessary,” she said.

  “Impudent,” he returned.

  “What manner of woman did you imagine you had wedded?” she asked. “I am the scapegrace sister of a scapegrace.”

  He drank more of his ale, his eyes never leaving hers. The way his tongue flicked over his upper lip when he had finished—a slow, torturous half-revolution—was not lost upon her. “I imagined I married the sort of lady who would not shamelessly sit in my lap. The sort of lady who was intelligent enough to understand the manner of union I offered her. A lady who would go to sleep rather than wandering through a public house. The sort of lady who would not wish to place her already tenuous reputation in jeopardy by once more acting in a manner most scandalous.”

  “And I imagined I married the sort of gentleman who was not afraid of kissing me on the mouth,” she retorted.

  Then instantly wished she could recall her hasty words when she saw the way his mien changed, growing grave and harsh where before he had been coolly engaging.

  “Oh, querida. I am not afraid of kissing you,” he said with deceptive softness. “It is merely a distinction I reserve for another.”

  His first wife.

  How crushing.

  Unsurprising, for he had never intimated he had tender feelings for her. Their every interaction thus far had centered on how very unfeeling he was. Which, as it happened, was a blatant lie, and she knew it.

  Even so, though she did her best to remain stoic, she could not deny the effect his words had upon her. They were akin to a dagger in the heart. For every forward step she thought she had taken with him, she found herself forced back three.

  She was saved from responding by the return of the serving wench.

  Catriona held her tongue until the girl had gone, throwing longing looks toward Alessandro and swaying her hips as she went. The dreadful female. She envisioned casting the entire content of her tankard in the other woman’s direction. Oh, how glorious it would be to soak her enemy in the bitter-scented brew which had been grudgingly placed before her.

  “I have always been honest with you,” Alessandro added before tipping back his head and quaffing more of his ale.

  The sudden craving for the scent of his skin hit her. Unwanted. Powerful. How she longed for this man, even more so after this morning. More so after their carriage ride. She felt more for him than she ever had another man, including Shrewsbury.

  “You have been honest with me in some regards,” she told him, though hardly all.

  Not that she would compare the two men. Alessandro and Shrewsbury were nothing alike. One had upended her world, the other had righted it. One had been a tiny spark on dry kindling. The other had been ravaging, unquenchable flames. One had made her feel safe, and the other made her feel shockingly vulnerable.

  But alive, so very alive.

  “I have been honest with you in all regards, querida,” he returned. “You merely do not wish to hear the bitter truth. La vida es fea, mi esposa. Life is ugly.”

  Catriona would prove him wrong. She was more convinced than ever that she could. That she must.

  She shook her head, disturbed by his succinct view of the world, for it was not so clear and concise, nor so dark and bleak as he would have it. “Life is night and day. It is summer and winter, warmth and ice, blossoming flowers and frozen ground. Life is spring and fall, new beginnings, and withered deaths. It is pain and pleasure. But you are wrong to think it ugly, Alessandro. The disparities of life are where its beauty hides.”

  He said nothing, and she could not be certain if it was for the best or for the worst that he maintained his silence. She felt, all at once, as if she had said too much. Revealed too much. And yet, she also felt as if she had not said enough.

  Catriona busied herself by taking a tentative sip of her ale. Bitterness coated her tongue. Why had she imagined it would be sweet and delicious, like an elixir of the gods?

  In truth, the stuff was awful. It required all the self-control she possessed to keep from spitting it out.

  “You do not enjoy your ale, querida?” her husband asked, and for the first time that evening—nay, for the first time that day—there was laughter in his voice.

  She liked the laughter, even if it was at her expense, for she reasoned he was a man who deserved levity. Who had earned it. Who did not exercise it nearly enough.

  She also liked her pride. Too much, in fact. Which was why she raised her own tankard to her lips for another sip. This time, she held her breath as she swallowed the swill down.

  Catriona settled the drinking vessel upon the battered table with a thud. Some of it sloshed over the brim. “I do not just enjoy it. I adore it.”

  “Indeed?”

  Was it her imagination, or had her husband’s lips twitched?

  “I can see why it is called the nectar of the gods,” she lied.

  He raised an inky brow. “Has it ever been called that? I confess, I do not recall.”

  Perhaps it had not.

  “Oh, yes,” she insisted. “It has.”

  She held her breath and took another sip. Then another. The taste on her tongue when she exhaled was worse than dreadful. It was despicable.

  “Ambrosía,” he said.

  Catriona took two more healthy draughts. “Precisely.” The urge to belch clamored up her throat, and she pressed the back of her hand over her mouth.

  How ungainly.

  She could not expel air in such fashion before her husband. Not before anyone. She swallowed the belch and promptly let out a hiccup in its stead.

  Drat it all.

  “Ah, I understand now.” He drained the remnants of his tankard and gestured for the wench. “Another,” he told the awful woman when she reappeared. He flicked a glance toward Catriona, a glint entering his gaze. “Rather, two more, if you please. My companion and I are thirsty.”

  Catriona hiccupped.

  She pressed three fingers over her lips, staying future, unladylike interruptions from barreling forth. The awful woman cast a disapproving look over her before turning back to Alessandro.

  “Are ye certain, milord?” she asked. “Yer lady friend seems to have had plenty already.”

  Catriona threw back her head and drained the awful, bitter dregs of her tankard. The good thing about such an action was that it served to kill her hiccups. The bad thing about it was that as the fermented beverage swirled through her stomach, she felt as if she were on the verge of casting up her accounts.

  But she would do everything in her power to keep from showing her weaknesses, both to the man seated across from her and the hovering woman. She slammed the tankard down. “I do thank you for your concern, but I am well and quite ready for another.”

  *

  For the second night in a row, Alessandro had gotten his bride inebriated. He kept his arm around her waist, all the better to steady her, as they made their way to the chamber they would be sharing for the night. She clung to him as unabashedly as an ivy vine.

  Th
e first night had been unintentional.

  The second night? Utterly deliberate.

  He was not ashamed of his admittedly underhanded tactics, either. Nor was he sober either. He had just managed to drown himself in enough ale to dim the ferocious hunger threatening to consume him whenever he was in the presence of his wife.

  His wife, whom he had been doing his damnedest to avoid since she had settled herself upon his lap and shaken him to his very core.

  He wanted her too much. He liked her too much.

  Everything was all wrong, and he needed some time to sort through the disastrous thicket his mind had become. But not tonight. Tonight, he merely needed quiet. And sleep. And no temptations.

  Catriona hiccupped. “Forgive me, husband. I do think perhaps I should not have had the second tankard.”

  Maldición. Her hiccup, like her giggle, was adorable. As was the way she called him husband. He did not like it. He liked it far too much.

  He needed to get her into bed so she could go to sleep and leave him in peace. They reached their lodgings for the night at just the right moment.

  “Or the third,” he told her wryly as they crossed the threshold together.

  She stumbled over her hem and nearly fell. Another hiccup punctuated her awkward movements. Alessandro swept her in his arms. He kicked the door closed behind them, then cast a glance about the chamber, in search of her lady’s maid.

  His wife’s face was upturned, laughter flirting with her lips and the flashing blue of her eyes. “Was it three? Why did you not advise me better, husband?”

  Because I wanted you too silly to present a danger to me.

  But he would not say that. “Where is your woman?”

  “Sadler?” She smiled up at him and waved a flippant hand. “I dismissed her hours ago.”

  He stalked across the chamber, aware he was left with two options: either go in search of the domestic or play lady’s maid to his wife. Whilst getting Catriona with child was his primary aim, he had already determined it would be in his best interest to maintain the distance between them for the night. Some slumber ought to grant him the clarity he needed.