She had removed her cloak already, so she stood in the ballroom in her day gown, its brown wool shot through with gold. She put herself though her paces one position at a time and soon lost herself in the joy of motion, feeling her heart pump and her legs and arms respond as if there were an opponent present.
She felt the joy she found only on the fencing floor, on the archery range, or on horseback. Here she could be her true self, and it did not matter if that self would have been shunned by society at large, especially the London ton. There was freedom in motion and in the sweet feel of a blade slicing through thin air. She turned as if to parry a thrust that was not there, only to find her blade stopped in midair by her husband’s hand on her wrist.
“Caroline, did I not tell you that knife play is unacceptable in my house?”
She stepped back, freeing her hand as well as her blade. “You did indeed, my lord. But this is not knife play. This is fencing.”
“So I see.”
He held out one hand, and she reluctantly placed her new sword into it. He hefted the blade, testing its weight. “This is a decent sword. Where did you find the money for such a thing?”
“My pin money, if you must know, my lord. My needs are few. I have been saving for a blade since August.”
“Before you ever met me?”
“That’s so. I knew I would marry and get to London eventually.”
Anthony’s bark of laughter filled the room and made her smile. He did not keep her blade as she had feared he might, but turned it around so the hilt faced her. “This blade is not fine enough for you,” he said.
“It is blunted,” she answered. “And the weight is sound.”
He did not answer but watched as she wiped it down with a cloth and put it back in its wooden case.
“Will you take it from me?” she asked.
“No,” Anthony said. “If you prefer blunted blades to ribbons and bonnets, that is your prerogative.”
Caroline stared at him for a long moment. “You may be learning my ways, my lord. It is still too soon to tell, but you might become civilized yet.”
He laughed again, drawing her close so she could take in the scent of his skin. She rubbed her fingers on the black velvet of his coat, enjoying the softness of the cloth and the strength of his arm.
“I think I must learn more of your ways, for you seem to have no intention of learning mine.”
“Giving up so easily, my lord? I would not have thought it.”
“I concede nothing, Caroline. I intend only to humor you, so when I strike next, you will not expect it.”
Caroline raised herself on her toes so she might run her lips over the edge of his jaw. He crushed her to his chest, their banter forgotten, lowering his mouth to cover hers. She did not savor her triumph, for she was too busy savoring him.
***
Caroline was not certain if it was the cold of winter that drove him indoors to her side or simply something about the city that made her husband relax, but Caroline found for the first time in their marriage that she and Anthony could talk to each other.
One night, as they sat alone in her bedroom, she told him of her childhood in York, growing up with her father gone.
“Yorkshire is beautiful, but a lonely place when all the men are off to war. I had trouble sometimes remembering the sound of my father’s voice. I had a miniature of him, but it did not truly look like him. Papa was never still, for one thing. He taught me to ride before he went away.”
Anthony swirled the brandy in its glass, watching the play of the amber liquid. “It is like that with those we love. No matter how long we are apart, we carry them with us.”
“I wish I had carried a clearer image of him,” Caroline said.
“I felt the same way when I was off fighting and had to leave my sister behind. Anne was a beauty. I had a miniature painted of her too, but I lost it in the war.”
“I am so sorry. Did she die young?”
Anthony met her eyes, coming back from a far distance. He tried to smile but failed. “No. She lives still.”
“Why have I never met her? Where is she?”
Anthony swallowed hard. He did not speak for a long moment, so she went to him, taking his brandy from him, sitting on his lap so he could not look away from her. She pressed herself against him, offering the only comfort she knew.
In spite of the relative peace they had reached since coming to London, there was a gulf between them, a gulf she did not know how to bridge. He wanted her, and she him. Their mutual desire was a slender thread, but it was all she had. She offered her body to him silently, and for the first time in their marriage, he did not take her.
Instead, he drew her close, burying his face in the softness of her hair. There was no lust in his touch but a different kind of desperation. She thought for one horrible moment he might weep, but he did not. He drew back to look into her eyes, pushing her hair back from her forehead.
“Anne lives still, but she is a recluse. She had a shock and does not like to go out in company.”
“Will we see her for Christmas?” Caroline asked.
His voice was rough when he answered her. “No. She prefers to be alone.”
He did not say what had happened to Anne, and Caroline did not press him. Whatever had occurred, it was a tragedy that still touched his heart. She would not give up on his sister, though she let the subject alone. She would find a way to meet Anne after the New Year and see if she might bring Anthony and his sister back together in spite of whatever had driven them apart.
***
They spent Christmas day with Anthony’s only other living relative, Lady Lucy Westwood, who had spoken to Caroline so plainly in Yorkshire the day she and Anthony had become engaged. She arrived for dinner promptly at seven, the early hour set by Lady Westwood’s specifications. Dressed in gray bombazine, the gray silk turban on her head fastened with a diamond brooch, Lady Westwood had raised her quizzing glass and inspected Caroline’s arrangements down to the place settings in the dining room.
Lady Westwood made polite conversation all evening as she very impolitely inspected every morsel of food and every servant who crossed her path. Anthony glowered, but Caroline pressed his hand, so he said nothing. She smiled at his elderly aunt, waiting for the moment when she would speak her mind. She was not disappointed.
At the end of the evening, as Lady Westwood stood in the front hall, waiting for her carriage to be brought around, she met Caroline’s eyes. “You have taken this one in hand. I was not sure you were the woman to do it, but I see now that you are.”
Anthony opened his mouth to protest, but Caroline laid her hand on his arm, and he stayed silent.
“Anthony is a good man,” she said. “I am fortunate.”
Lady Westwood harrumphed and turned her eagle gaze on her nephew. “See that you remain a model husband, Anthony. Keep her happy, young man, or you’ll answer to me.”
Anthony forced a smile. “As you say, Aunt.”
Lady Westwood laughed out loud at that answer and let Anthony escort her down the marble stairs of the town house and hand her into her carriage.
***
That night, in the shadows of their bed, Anthony asked, “Am I a model husband, Caroline?” He loomed over her, drawing out her pleasure. Caroline gasped beneath him, moaning his name and writhing, but he would not let her pleasure peak until she answered him.
“Yes, Anthony. Yes.”
He moved within her, and she shattered. He did not wait long for his own pleasure but went over that edge with her. They lay entangled on their bed and slept, her hand on his chest, his lips on her hair.
After Boxing Day, Anthony took Caroline to the most fashionable modiste who served the ton, Madame Delacroix. Caroline suspected the lady was not originally from France but from Cheapside, though she was too polite to say so.
Whatever her origins, Madame Delacroix was a master seamstress. Her designs in sprigged muslin for the daytime and damask and silk for th
e evening flattered Caroline’s figure, with their high waists and low-necked bodices.
For the first time in her life, Caroline was able to choose her own fabrics and styles, all a great deal more sedate than anything her mother would have preferred. She thought at first Anthony would try to control the very clothes she wore, but after he saw the shades of peach and cream she wanted for her day dresses, and robin’s-egg-blue and shell-pink gowns she desired for their evenings at home, he relinquished the field of her wardrobe to her without complaint.
The only design with which he insisted on being involved was the gown for her debut at court. During the Twelfth Night ball she would be presented to the Prince Regent, and Anthony had very specific ideas about how he wanted her to look. Caroline stared at the gown of soft, pearlescent white in the full-length looking glass of the modiste’s salon. When Caroline moved, the fabric shifted in color from opal to pink to gold to cream, depending on the way the gown caught the light. It was lovely but not something she would ever have chosen for herself.
“I fear you spent too many years on the Continent, my lord. You have too much of a care for women’s fashions.”
“I was too busy fighting to notice what women were wearing in France, Italy, and Belgium, Caroline.”
“Unless you were stripping their gowns off them,” she said.
Anthony did not laugh, but he did not contradict her either. She was suddenly miserable, surprised to find herself jealous of all those unknown women who had once lain beneath her husband as she now did every night.
Anthony seemed to notice a shadow cross her face, for he nodded to Madame Delacroix, who drew back but did not leave the room. He stepped close, his lips brushing Caroline’s temple, the heat of his breath moving the curls next to her cheek.
“I will take great pleasure in stripping this gown off you, when the time comes,” Anthony said. “I told you once before, there are no other women between us.”
She looked at her reflection, struggling to control the strange emotions that had risen in her breast. She found she could not answer Anthony so she spoke to the seamstress instead.
“Madame Delacroix, I have never worn a gown so fine in my life.”
She caught her husband’s gaze in the glass, and they shared a moment’s affinity. For once, they were thinking the same thing.
She knew he was thinking of the beautiful blue silk gown he had brought for her to wear on the day she married him.
“Well, only once,” Caroline said.
Anthony wrapped her in a protective embrace that was as tender as it was filled with desire. He held her close, and Caroline could see nothing but him. In that moment, she felt as if the rest of the world simply did not exist.
Caroline was transfixed by the dark fire in his eyes. He kissed her in front of the seamstress and her staff as if he cared nothing for propriety or fashion. It was not fashionable among the ton for a husband to desire his wife. In this, her husband was unique.
***
The night before the Prince Regent’s ball, Anthony took a private supper with Caroline in their bedroom. His wife had covered the room in roses and dahlias, all bought at great expense. White petals drifted across the blue damask bed linens, the snowy sheets peeking from beneath.
That night they did not speak much but sat close together at her marble-topped table, sharing one great armchair. They feasted on oysters and caviar, eaten with soft, warm bread from the ovens downstairs.
As they finished their meal, before Anthony’s thoughts turned inexorably to making love to his wife, he wondered idly if he should tell her of his mistress.
Anthony knew they would see Angelique at Carlton House the next night. He also knew the Countess of Devonshire would not simply retreat, leaving the field of war to her younger rival, even though her rival was his wife. Caroline would eventually hear of her existence, if not from Angelique’s own lips, then from someone else.
He thought of the dagger Caroline had once carried in her reticule. He was glad he had made her give up her weapons. If he had not, she might have drawn a blade in the Prince Regent’s presence as soon as his mistress provoked her.
Perversely, though he had forbidden her to touch a knife again, the thought of a blade in his wife’s hand made him harden with desire. Though he knew he should tell Caroline the full truth, he did not want to break the truce between them.
The memory of his mistress faded until there was no one in the world in that moment but Caroline. He looked at his wife, wrapped in the sable he had given her for Christmas. She had taken to wearing it and nothing else when they were alone in her room.
Caroline leaned back against him with a sated sigh, drawing the fur close about her. The fine china plate they shared sat clean before her, and Anthony held up the serving ladle, offering her more braised beef, a spark of laughter in his eyes.
“Will you have more, my lady?”
“Two servings of each dish are enough for one night, I thank you,” she said, unabashed. She had been eating more lately, but her newfound roundness only served to stoke his lust for her. His wife let her sable slip off one shoulder.
“My lady, you are not decent.”
“Nor do I mean to be, until morning,” she said.
Caroline took the serving ladle from his hand and laid it back on its tray. He watched her, the hunger rising in his eyes as she let her fur slip down a second shoulder. He could see her body in the candlelight then, her breasts glowing peaks, her rosy nipples beckoning.
“Wife, you might catch your death of cold, even this close to the fire.”
Caroline straddled him, the large chair they sat in cradling them both as she wrapped her fur around them. “I can think of no better way to die. Can you, my lord?”
Her fingers moved beneath the sable, hunting him, and it was not long before she found what she sought.
Caroline’s deft fingers unfastened his trousers until they were loose enough to push aside. He was ready for her, and when her hand brushed him, Anthony took an involuntary breath. Caroline smiled like a cat that had just found the cream.
He did not move but let her lead, keeping his hands still on the arms of his chair.
“Well, my lord, it seems I have found something of interest here.”
Anthony’s breath came short as she raised herself a little higher, her hand still on him. He did not know how she managed it, but she freed his manhood all on her own while they were both covered in her fur mantle.
The fire touched her golden hair with sparks of light. Her flushed face leaned close to his as she kissed him, running her tongue along his lips. His wife raised herself once more and guided him home.
Anthony clutched her hips but did not move. He let her set the pace, keeping his control, but only barely, as she rose and fell over him. She let the mantle slip, and her breasts were revealed to him in the light of the candles they had dined by, the soft, round peaks raised in the chill of the evening air, her soft hair coming down over them, one curl covering her heart.
He moaned as she moved on him, the sight and smell and feel of her all coming together at once to break like a wave against the wall of his self-control. He faltered but did not fail.
Caroline dropped the sable altogether and rode him as she would her horse, rising and falling with her own breath, quickening the pace as she would for a gallop. Her tight flesh combined with the motion of her body threatened to bring his release too quickly. Still he held firm and watched her rise and fall over him again and again. She had no thought for his pleasure now, but only for her own as she rode after it, hunting it down.
Anthony did not move until she gasped and fell against him, sated. He laid her down on the carpet next to the fireplace, knowing he did not have the strength to make it to their curtained bed.
He was on her then and in her, thrusting blindly time and again, finally letting himself go, letting the hounds of his lust slip their leash and take her down, and him with her. She gasped in pleasure for a second ti
me beneath him. He lay still, his passion spent, his heart and hers thundering in his ears.
“My lord, it is better when you do it.”
“When I do what?”
He could barely form the words, much less hear her answer.
“I like it best with you on top.”
Anthony laughed and kissed her. Her lips tasted of honey, of bread and butter, of oysters and wine. He drew back and looked down at her, where the laughter still lingered in her eyes, even after his kisses.
“We will have to remedy that, my lady. But in a while. I am an old man and must conserve my resources.”
Caroline laughed at him, rolling with him until she was on top of him, her hair spilling over them like a gossamer curtain. “By all means, Husband, take care of yourself. For there will be more for you to do tonight.”
“Vixen,” he said, his breath still catching in his throat.
Caroline laughed again and pressed against him so his manhood rose against her thigh, unable to help itself. “You see, my lord. You are not as old as you think.”
Anthony laughed as he rolled her beneath him. This time he stayed on top. He carried her once more up and over the barrier between reason and pleasure. He followed her over that barrier himself again before they finally slept.
As they lay together on her bed in the firelight, Caroline heavy with sleep beside him, Anthony felt a shadow fall over him, a chill that had nothing to do with the cold of winter. He suddenly remembered his mistress would not be the only one in attendance at the Prince Regent’s ball. Viscount Carlyle would be there, as well. And as always, Victor would be hunting for ways to bring him down.
Anthony drew Caroline close, pressing a kiss to her temple. She did not wake but burrowed closer to him under the covers. He thought of Carlyle, of the damage he inflicted on everything he touched. It was a long time before Anthony slept. He held his wife against him, as if she might somehow slip away.
How to Tame a Willful Wife Page 17