Shamed that she would contemplate, much less experience, such wanton urges, Emily dropped her gaze from Michael’s mouth, her face growing warm as she suddenly remembered some of the other things she’d overheard her brothers boasting about doing with their mouths. Of course, they had been in their cups at the time … drunk, actually. Still—
Goodness! If British dukes were anything like her brothers, Michael would be kissing her all over. And touching her … in all sorts of secret, private places … but not until after he had removed her clothes … all of them. Her cheeks burned as the provocative scene played out in her mind. Of course, he would remove his own clothes as well, after which he would lie naked beside her in the bed. That particularly fascinating visualization heated her face to the point of scorching.
Having been raised in a household of men, the male body wasn’t exactly a mystery to her. Indeed, unlike most of her friends, who had had more conventional upbringings, she had known the differences between men’s and women’s bodies from a very early age. And though she would never have dared voice the disgraceful fact, she was scandalously intrigued by those differences.
She was just envisioning those diverting differences and wondering if British noblemen’s differences looked the same as other men’s, when Michael murmured, “Shall we retire now?”
Emily’s breath caught in her throat. Apparently she was about to find out. Unnerved by the prospect, she nodded once, taking care to keep what she was certain was her cranberry-colored face averted as she did so. Even if it turned out that her husband did look like other men, and she suspected that he would, she still wasn’t exactly sure what to do with his differences. Especially the one between his legs.
Her best friend, Judith, who had been married for two years when Emily had left Boston, had whispered to her that that particular difference made some rather startling changes when a man was near a naked woman; changes that men found uncomfortable and expected women to sooth by allowing them to thrust it into her private female place. Just how she was supposed to make it fit in there was something she had never quite understood.
Utterly disconcerted now, Emily allowed Michael to lead her from the revelry, forcing herself to smile as he murmured thanks to their well-wishers as he went. She had so much to learn. Hopefully her new husband would be more amenable to instructing her in wedding bed matters than he had been when she’d requested his guidance in learning her aristocratic duties.
By now they had left the merry crowd behind, and Michael had again lapsed into silence, seeming to lose himself in his thoughts as they strolled down the pleasant, yew-lined path that led to the abbey. Whatever those thoughts were, they must have been very dark indeed, for his expression was exceedingly grim.
Hmmm. Could it be that he found the notion of bedding a stranger as daunting as she did? Or was it something about her, personally, that he found so displeasing? She suffered a pang at that last. As much as she hated to admit it, she supposed that it was entirely possible that she wasn’t to his taste. After all, everyone had their own opinion as to what made a woman appealing, and just because the men in Boston had considered her so didn’t necessarily mean that Michael automatically shared their view.
Absurdly wounded by that very real possibility, Emily stole a peek at her husband, noting with another, rather bittersweet pang that she found him appealing to the extreme … even more so than she had yesterday, and she had liked what she’d seen then immensely.
The illogicality of her discovery gave her a start. Considering that he’d been less than charming to her all day, you would have thought that his appeal would have diminished, not increased. Frowning, she stole another glance. Hmmm. Perhaps the increase had something to do with his clothes. After all, everyone knew that men always looked doubly dashing in formal dress. Wondering if the doubly dashing factor was the culprit here, Emily surreptitiously studied the man beside her.
Though his dark blue tail coat wasn’t what she would call a perfect fit, it came closer to fitting his thin frame than the coat he had worn the previous day, as did his white and silver patterned waistcoat and dove gray trousers. True, the snugger fit did emphasis the alarming gauntness of his form, but it also displayed the perfection of his proportions, which remained spectacular despite his excessive leanness.
After pausing to admire the manly breadth of his shoulders, Emily shifted her gaze to his face. He was looking at her as well, his expression unreadable. For an instant their gazes locked, his glimmering jade one piercing her entranced dark one, then she abruptly looked away, shivering. There was something in his eyes, something disturbing yet compelling that sent a tingle down her spine—an odd, but pleasurable tingle that now terminated in a strangely delicious tickle low in her belly. She shivered again in response.
He snorted. “Never fear, dear wife. I excused us from the festivities because I was tired, not out of some uncontrollable urge to ravish you.”
Emily started at his words. “What?” she ejected, quickly glancing back at him. His face was hard and etched with bitterness. Taken aback by his sudden animosity, she frowned and stammered, “I—I don’t understand what you mean.”
“Of course you do,” he snapped. “Your feelings were quite transparent just now. You were looking at me and shivering, clearly dreading the moment when I claimed my husbandly rights.”
Stunned, she simply gaped at him, too floored by his outlandish allegation to do more. Then she began shaking her head over and over again in denial. “You are wrong, your grace. I was having no such thoughts. What ever makes you think I was?”
“What the hell am I supposed to think when you make it so damn obvious that you cannot bear the sight of me?” he retorted, grinding the words out from between his teeth. “Those times when you somehow do manage to spare me a glance, you instantly look away again, shivering as if you had just seen the devil.”
Emily continued shaking her head, unable to believe what she was hearing. “That is ridiculous! All of it!”
“Is it?”
“Of course it is. I can assure you that I have no trouble whatsoever looking at you.”
“Oh?” He halted abruptly in his steps. A muscle flickering angrily at his tense jaw, he folded his arms over his chest and harshly inquired, “If what you claim is indeed true, then how do you explain your response to me when we were introduced? If I remember correctly, and I assure you that I have an impeccable memory, you could barely look at me. When you did, you appeared ready to burst into tears.”
“Your grace—” she began, wanting to explain.
He silenced her with a brusque hand motion. “Then there was the way you shivered at the sight of me just now. And do not try to tell me that your shiver was a figment of my imagination. Unlike yourself, who believes in witches, and curses, and God only knows what other sort of drivel, I have no imagination whatsoever.”
Drivel! Of all the rude, pompous, insolent. …! Incensed by his sneering disparagement of her beliefs, she hurled back, “Apparently you have more imagination than you know to so preposterously misinterpret my actions.”
“Indeed? Pray do tell.” He tipped his head to the side and regarded her with an infuriating air of superiority.
She prickled beneath his stare. Really! These British nobles had to be the most insufferable beings on the face of the earth. Deciding that she had suffered quite enough from this particular noble, Emily braced her hands on her hips and heatedly replied, “For your information, I was on the verge of tears yesterday because I thought you were dying. I was saddened by the terrible tragedy of someone so very young meeting an untimely end. Surely you can understand why I would feel so?”
He shrugged. “Of course. I am not completely lacking in feeling.”
He could have fooled her. Eyeing him in a way that she hoped conveyed her skepticism, she continued, “As for my shivering just now, you are correct in that I was thinking about the m
arriage bed. However”—she added a punch of emphasis to the word “however”—“contrary to what you believe, I didn’t shiver out of dread, rather, out of apprehension. Even you, with your professed lack of imagination, should be able to perceive how distressing a prospect it is for a girl to be bedded by a stranger.”
“I can, though I must confess to being perplexed as to why you didn’t consider that prospect and properly come to terms with it before agreeing to marry me. And do not try to tell me that a chit with your talent for fancy failed to imagine what lay beyond the altar.”
“I never said that I didn’t imagine it, or that I hadn’t come to terms with my marital duties,” Emily shot back, her palms itching to slap the sneer from his face. “I did and I have. Unfortunately, simply imagining something and coming to terms with it doesn’t always erase all of one’s reservations toward it.”
“Oh?” His dark eyebrows arched in sardonic query. “And would you care to tell me exactly what you imagined that has incited such dire reservations?”
“I would not. I will, however, tell you something that I did fail to imagine and that is now inciting the direst of all reservations. And that is the fact that I have married a hopelessly disagreeable man.” She added a sniff for good measure. A sniff? Oh, my! She was beginning to sound like her grandmother.
He chuckled darkly. “There was hardly any need for you to imagine something about which our grandmothers were so forthcoming. Indeed, I cannot recall anyone mincing words in describing my condition. And if a man described as an invalid plagued with fits isn’t hopelessly disagreeable, then, pray tell, who is?”
“A man conceited enough to believe that a woman’s every action is in some way influenced by him, that’s who,” she rebutted.
“Ah, but I didn’t say that I influenced your every action, just the ones I stated,” he replied in an infuriatingly reasonable tone. “And you admitted that I was correct.”
“Yes, I did. And it is only fair now that you admit that my responses to the stated situations were perfectly justified,” she countered defensively.
He shrugged one shoulder. “Were they?”
Her eyes narrowed at his condescending reply. “I suppose you think that you would have been better able to hide your feelings, had you been in my position?”
“I did do better, damn it,” he snarled, savagely rounding on her. “Do not forget that I was in your same position, that I, too, was faced with marrying a stranger. The very fact that you never suspected how much I despised being forced into this marriage more than proves the superiority of my control.”
“Forced?” Emily gasped, her shock at his words staggering her mind. She had naturally assumed that he had wished the match. Indeed, she’d been under the distinct impression that he had sought it. That he had been forced into the marriage was an entirely new, and devastating, concept.
“Yes, forced,” he spat back. “Regardless of what you might have been told, I had absolutely no desire to marry you, or anyone else. Unfortunately, my meddlesome grandmother took it into her head that I needed a wife, and since she saw an arranged marriage to you as her only hope of satisfying that ambition, she threatened me with some rather unpleasant consequences should I refuse to cooperate.”
“I—I had no idea,” Emily murmured, her emotions spinning in a sickening maelstrom of chaos.
While she understood and even sympathized with his bitter resentment, a part of her couldn’t help feeling hurt and betrayed. For though she had neither expected nor wished to find love in this match, she had assumed that she would at least be wanted. It was that assumption, and that assumption alone, that had given her the courage to utter the marriage vows. Now that that assumption had been shattered, she felt a crushing sense of hopelessness and loss. Given her husband’s fierce animosity toward her and their marriage, there was little chance that he would wish to consummate their union. That meant that there would most probably be no children.
For several seconds Emily remained wretchedly silent, grieving as she buried her dreams of children and the joy they would have brought to her life. Then fury born of sorrow swept through her, and she began to rage against the injustice of her lot. Irrationally placing the sum of that injustice on Michael’s shoulders, she lashed out, “You bastard! How dare you use me in such an unconscionable manner!”
His eyebrows rose a fraction. “Such language. I suppose it is considered acceptable in America for women to call their husbands bastards?”
She shot him a withering glance. “It is if the husband in question merits the title, which I assure you you do.”
Instead of being insulted, as she had fervently hoped he would be, the hateful man chuckled. “In light of how many women have assigned me that very designation, I suppose I do indeed merit it.” Another chuckle. “How comically ironic. Those women called me a bastard for refusing to wed them, and you call me one because I wed you. It seems as if I am damned if I do, and damned if I don’t.”
“Indeed it does—doubly so when you consider the consequences of marrying me as you did. Were you anywhere near as clever as you fancy yourself to be, you would have had the sense to marry one of your adoring throng and been done with it.”
“Meaning?” he prompted, looking genuinely intrigued.
Goodness! Was that another sniff that had escaped her? “Meaning that you would have been better served by marrying a woman who knew what a bastard you are and thus understood what a despicable husband she was getting. Had you done so, you wouldn’t now be saddled with a disappointed wife.”
His eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly at her words.
“Come, come now, dear wife. Can you truly claim to be disappointed? Let us not forget that this was an arranged marriage between strangers. Surely even you, with your rampant imagination and nonsensical fancies, didn’t honestly expect to find bliss in such a match?”
“Bliss? No. I already explained about the curse and how it is impossible that I love you,” she snapped. “I had, however, expected to be wanted and welcomed as your wife. To be utterly honest, I thought you were marrying me to bear your heirs.”
His eyes narrowed a fraction more. “And where, pray tell, did you get such a notion?”
“From your aristocratic peers. From what I ascertained from their conversation in London, the only reason a nobleman marries is to secure his family line. And since I desire children,” she shrugged, “such an arrangement seemed agreeable enough.”
His eyes were little more than slits now. “Am I to understand that you married me out of a wish to bear children? And that you were willing to wed any man, even a total stranger, to achieve your end?”
Emily winced. When spoken out loud, her motive did sound rather … unsavory. Still, was it really any more contemptible than his reason for marrying her? Deciding the answer to be no, she nodded, defiantly refusing to deny his disgraceful charge.
“I see.” He contemplated her in silence for several beats, his jade eyes opaque and unreadable, then his mouth pulled into a sour grin and he said, “How very droll. It seems that you used me as well. Unfortunately, we used each other at cross-purposes, a misadventure in which, I am sorry to say, you have come out the loser.”
“Oh?” she intoned, her hands balling as she was overcome with another, stronger urge to slap him. He really was a bastard.
He nodded. “While I have succeeded in my purpose, which was to satisfy my grandmother’s demand that I marry you, the chances of you succeeding in yours are marginal, at best. In case you are ignorant of the fact, it takes more than marriage vows to get a woman with child.”
“I know perfectly well how babies are made,” she returned, haughtily. It wasn’t a complete lie. She knew, she just didn’t understand the mechanics of the act.
“Then you know that a couple must copulate in order to produce a child, an act which takes a great deal of stamina on the man’s part.” H
e leaned forward then and impaled her with his vengeful gaze. “In case it escaped your notice, my dear, I happen to be an invalid.”
Her jaw dropped at the meaning behind his words. “Are you saying that you are incapable of fathering a child?” she expelled on a gasp.
A strange shadow passed over his face, one that disappeared in the next instant when he straightened up again, chuckling harshly. “I am saying that doing so would require far more of my meager supply of strength than I wish to expend on you.”
Emily recoiled as if slapped, her pulse thundering and her breath huffing out in rapid, shallow puffs as she sputtered her blistering anger at his insult. Once, twice, three times her mouth wrenched open before she finally managed to snarl, “You really are a bastard.”
He shrugged, clearly unperturbed. “So we have established.”
“And I hate you,” she added, throwing the words as if they were stones.
Another shrug. “Good. If you hate me, you’ll be inclined to leave me alone.”
“Oh, I will leave you alone, all right,” she spat, her eyes filling with scalding tears. “I shall stay out of your way so completely that you will wonder whether or not I am still about. I just hope that—that—” Her voice became strangled then, choked by virulent emotion. Trembling with mute fury, she spared him one last contemptuous glare, then lifted her skirts and fled down the path toward the sanctuary of her chamber. As she ran, tears of pain and impotent rage spilled down her cheeks.
What should have been a day filled with promise and joy had turned out to be the beginning of a lifetime of emptiness and broken dreams.
Bewitched Page 9