Why neither of them spoke, Alex did not know. Perhaps Bryceson was too busy concentrating on his task while she was too busy appreciating and noticing everything about him. She knew only that his topaz eyes were warm, kind, loving. Here stood the gentle boy who’d tended scraped knees, extracted slivers from small hands and dried a lifetime of silly tears. She saw that his shoulders were broader, his arms stronger, his huge hands callused, his sable hair prematurely silver-gilt.
His demeanor no longer bore the mark of a young god, perfect of feature and seeking admiration, but of a soldier home from war, wounded and scarred, though striking still, and virile. So potently male that Alex lost her breath just watching him. As opposed to his former chiseled perfection, Hawk’s face now bore a hard, flawed quality, which gave him an aura of jeopardy, a provocation that would draw women like moths to a flame.
He was definitely older, though she could not yet vouch for wiser, but after overhearing his amazing story earlier, she surmised that he could hardly have escaped some degree of wisdom. She did know that he must have survived a great deal more than he would ever willingly reveal. “Your father would be proud of you,” she said without thinking.
“If I had died fighting Boney, perhaps, but I expect that he would have considered any man mustered home, broken, as a failure.”
“But you were not mustered home because you were wounded. The war ended.”
“Gideon guarded Napoleon all the way to St. Helena, and Reed is still one of Wellington’s aides.”
When put that way, Alex knew he was right about his fanatical father, but what could she say?
She was embarrassed she had mentioned the man, but she was even more embarrassed when Bryceson slipped his hands up her leg to unhook her garters, and she shivered and squeaked, because she felt the lightning shock of his touch to her core.
He looked up and quirked a brow. “I am not going to ravish you, Alexandra.”
After a stunned, silent moment, she sighed with resignation. “I am sorry to hear that.”
Bryce reared back, and after a similar moment, he shook his head. “Stand,” he said, and she understood why his men obeyed him, as did she. He untied the laces on her half-petticoat, slid his hands down her hips to push it to the floor, and she stepped out. Her second was a full-petticoat and he helped her out of that with entirely too much experience, in the same way he loosened and removed her stays, expertly and efficiently.
At a knock on the outer door, he turned to leave her standing in her new lawn shift, and again like an empty-headed porcelain doll, Alex waited and hoped for more.
When Bryce returned, he slipped her white gossamer night rail over her head, down her arms then he helped her into her matching wrap. “You will surely catch your death without both,” he said, a hot, hard glint in his eyes. “Or worse.”
The tardy promise in those last two words—along with his piercing gaze—shivered her to her trembling knees.
When she was dressed in the night rail made for her trousseau, Bryce neither stepped back to admire her or his handiwork, nor did he comment further on the exquisite finery—a disappointment. He simply peeled back the bedcovers and urged her into its feather-filled warmth. Heart pounding, Alex did as her husband bid, moving toward the center, expecting him to undress and slip in beside her.
Instead, he pulled the covers up to her neck, sat beside her on the bed and waited, with a disapproving frown, as she freed her arms. Then he took possession of her hand. “I am afraid this has been a long, tiring, and shocking day for you,” he said. “And I am sorry for all of it. Reed told me what he said. I am especially sorry that you heard, but perhaps it is best you know. Get a good night’s sleep now, for we have another long day ahead of us tomorrow, though hopefully, a much less alarming one.”
“But what about you? Are you not going to sleep?”
“I am having the settee made up as we speak. I will be fine there for one night. I have slept on worse.”
Alex sat up and saw by his arrested gaze that the blankets had fallen away and exposed her breasts to his view. She did not cover herself and he did not look away, not for several pulsing beats. For the first time, she had her husband’s full and blatant male attention while she was conscious and could appreciate it, and she was glad.
When he did look away, she sighed. “Bryce, this is your bed. You are too tall for that short sofa. Come, sleep beside me.”
FIVE
HAWK CURSED HIS trembling hands as he tucked Alex back into his bed and admired the cloud of cinnamon waves forming a silken halo upon her pillow. Had any man ever needed such willpower as he was compelled to call upon at this tempting moment?
He regarded the siren for signs of the sprite who had, in turn, shadowed and vexed him through their growing up years. While he was grief-struck by the loss of that child, he was intrigued, no small bit, by the emergence of the woman. His first reaction was natural, his second, both unacceptable and a clear threat to his sanity.
As he rose, he bent to kiss her brow. “Sleep. I command you.” Then he stroked her cheek, snuffed her candle and left the bedchamber, shutting the door behind him.
In the sitting room, Hawk discarded his cane, his frockcoat, and untied his cravat before pouring himself a brandy with palsied hands. He made an awkward, confined pace about the room, twice or thrice, the better to tire to the point of exhaustion.
As he helped Alex from her clothing, he had ached for her corresponding ministrations, her cool fingers against his heated skin, as he had touched her, for her tenderness to be directed toward his comfort, her gaze toward his face, when all the while, she had been unable to bear the sight of him and looked away, instead.
Why had she said she was disappointed he would not ravish her? Was she teasing? Was she that angry with him?
Perhaps he was making a horrendous mistake in letting her go… Once upon a time, she had liked him enough to marry him. Perhaps she had even wanted him, then.
Perhaps she wanted him still.
Hawk damn near laughed. Perhaps delirium had once again set in…
Was she toying with him? Being facetious? She had, after all, liked Chesterfield enough to marry him, as well.
Hawk cursed. Here he was worried about her, trying to do what was best for her, while she was shaking the foundation of his conviction and undermining his altruistic intentions. Why could he not sense what she wanted?
Likely not him. Not anymore. No, he must give her that annulment as soon as may be, and free her from his abysmal self, though not so soon that Chesterfield might still be unattached when he did.
That part of his plan, he must alter.
When he had returned to England, weak, scarred, and furious at fate, he assured himself that his family was well. And when he was convinced they were, he delayed notifying them of his return. He could not ask them to endure the daily reminder of his failure—his scars, his very presence.
He had gone to the aid of his sister-in-law, Sabrina, and of Gideon St. Goddard—another rogue of the club—the husband he secured for her when he thought he was dying.
To get himself declared alive again, Hawk petitioned the House of Lords, and parliament in general, even the Prince Regent and a score of his advisers and friends, Tory and Whig alike. Some, Prinny would have at his side, were it not for the mad King’s sane moments, had more influence than perhaps was good for England.
Since Hawk’s father’s solicitor was unavailable, he sought another to notify Baxter Wakefield, his cousin and heir, that he lived. Hawk did it all, anything and everything he could, to avoid facing his family with his disagreeable self. By then, he had concluded that for Alexandra’s sake, he must release her from their marriage.
Then he heard that she was about to remarry.
That she loved someone else was all the more reason to let her go, though he could not allow her to commit bigamy. And so he had gone to stop her wedding.
Now, for the sake of his nieces, he must take up his responsibilities
as planned and proceed as if his marriage to Alex would continue. This would give Claudia and Beatrix a chance to get used to having him back. He would encourage them to depend more upon him and less upon Alex.
When the paperwork reinstating him as the Duke of Hawksworth bore fruit, and what was left of his wealth, title and estates reverted to him, he would move his family from Huntington Lodge, Alex’s family home, back to Hawksridge, his own estate. By then, his nieces would perhaps be dependent upon him again and less destroyed by Alexandra’s departure from the bosom of their family.
Also, by then, Chesterfield might have married another.
More than anything in this world, Hawk wanted to keep Alexandra for himself. Second to that, he would keep her for his family. But with no choice but to give her up, he must at least keep her safe in their marriage, until Judson Broderick, Viscount bloody Chesterfield was absolutely out of the running for her hand.
No matter her seeming indifference to his scars, Hawk would not sit back and let Alexandra’s apathy, in the face of his appearance, turn to valor, which would most assuredly fester into disgust, and destroy the entire family.
Alexandra stared at the burgundy brocade bed canopy above her while the scent of the snuffed beeswax candle remained a lingering reminder of one man’s penchant—her husband’s—for walking away without looking back.
The bridegroom she had thought sacrificed to the wages of war, relinquished to the vaporous vagaries of perpetual rest, had been, quite impossibly, returned to her. A literal miracle, she had discovered upon hearing Reed Gilbride’s story. And yet, despite the wonder, Bryceson Wakefield had, once again, deserted her. He had left her alone in the center of his bed, steeped in hurt, shock and disappointment.
All the time he undressed her, she had anticipated undressing him the same way. She anticipated more kisses like the one they shared in the carriage. She expected the leisure and the right to kiss her husband whenever and wherever she chose. She ached to kiss the scars on his face, to press her lips to all his scars, to all of him, and she wanted the same intimate attention from him.
After nearly two years of marriage, she was long past due his husbandly ministrations. As his wife, she had fulfilled every single requirement, save one, the marriage bed, that lack not having been her choice. She deserved a marriage, signed, sealed, and consummated.
She wanted to go and shake him, scream, and rant but Alex bit her lip and tightened her fists, aware that she must conquer her tendency to be precipitate; else she would rush from the room with admonishment in mind and end up ravishing her husband as he slept.
’Twould not do to let him see how much she wanted and needed him. If she had learned one thing about the male of the species, young or old, it was that if a female’s attention was difficult to secure, then a male continued tenaciously in her wake, attempting to secure it, or her. By the same token, she had observed that while males could be encouraged by any sign of interest, however slight or fleeting, they soon lost enthusiasm for the chase, if the female appeared easy or eager to be caught.
Well Bryceson Wakefield, Duke of Hawksworth—her husband, by God—would not be losing interest in her any day soon; she would see to that. She was due a wedding night, Alex mused, and she would have one… despite her bridegroom’s detestable reason for marrying her.
When she had learned the truth of it, she had nearly expired, herself, of sorrow. ’Twas not said to her face, of course, but behind her back, by some of his friends, after Bryce had first left for the war.
She could have stepped away when she heard her name, of course, as she might have done downstairs when she heard Hawk’s, but she had not. That first time she eavesdropped, she learned that Bryce married her so she would care for his family while he went to war. One of his cronies said she would do anything for her husband’s pat on the head, “which is all poor old ‘Bry’ could bear to give her.” They said, “It was too bad he had not lived long enough ‘to bed the beauty’ she had become.”
To the devil with beauty. What did looks have to say to anything? ’Twas Hawk’s love she wanted, plain and simple.
Unlike the scores of women who had always flocked to the proud, handsome-as-sin Bryceson Wakefield, Alex had loved him despite his magnificence. All the while he had been trying to prove his worth to his father, and to himself, if he but knew it, Alex had loved the kind and gentle soul who dwelt inside the quintessential rogue.
Was she the only one who glimpsed that gentle man? Or had she been as blind to his faults as others were blinded by his beauty?
She wished she knew.
She was sorry, for Hawk’s sake, that his legendary good looks had been marred, but she hoped that without the outer trappings of perfection, he would discover and come to appreciate the good and gentle man he was.
That man, she yearned for—body, heart, and soul.
That man, she loved.
Though her concern over Chesterfield’s reaction to their cancelled nuptials, and her anger at her husband, went a long way toward dampening Alex’s inclination toward celebration, she still wanted, more than her next breath, to walk into the sitting room, slip into his embrace, and weep with unmitigated joy at his return.
But she could not, she thought, swallow her gathering tears. Not yet.
~ ~ ~
Hawk found himself standing outside a ruin of a manse, a dreamlike fog shrouding the night in ashen vapor, a ponderous regret cutting deep in his belly, for he bore the horrific sense that he had arrived too late.
At the sound of carriage wheels on cobbles, he turned to see Alexandra and Chesterfield driving away.
“No,” Hawk shouted. “No.” He could not allow them to live in sin together. Alex belonged to him, not to Chesterfield.
Hawk mounted his horse—miracle of miracles, he could do so without pain—and he chased the carriage for hours, it seemed, catching up only when the vehicle stopped at a lavish estate in the heart of the mist.
“Alex,” Hawk called. “Alex, I am here. No need to do this. Come, love. Come home with me.”
But she continued walking away, as Chesterfield stepped forward to block his path and keep him from following. “You gave her up,” the knave said. “Your marriage was annulled, at your behest, and now Alexandra is my wife. Mine.”
The blackguard laughed. He laughed until Alex called to him from an upper window, in that white diaphanous gown, her nutmeg hair flowing free and barely covering her sweet, lush breasts.
Alex, calling Chesterfield to her bed.
As if clamped in irons Hawksworth stood and struggled, unable to escape his invisible fetters, while Chesterfield entered the stately structure on his way to—
“No!” Despite his struggle, Hawk could not free himself from immobility. Neither could he reach Alex.
Soon it would be too late. “No!”
As if doom had risen from the depths of hell, his father began to laugh.
Alex awoke to a mournful cry and bolted from the bed. Bryceson was sitting up, trembling, elbows on knees, scrubbing his face with the flat of his hands, his shirt and trousers, even his bedding, drenched with perspiration.
She knelt before him and tried to take his icy hands to warm them between her own, but he grasped hers, instead, and brought them to his brow, as if none but her touch could soothe him.
“Bryce, what is wrong? Are you in pain? What can I do for you?”
“It was only a dream,” he said. “A bloody nightmare, like a fretful three-year-old.”
“Of the war?” she asked. “Was it terrible?”
He relinquished her hands. “Light a candle, will you?”
Alex did as he requested, then she poured him a brandy. “Was it terrible?” she asked again, handing him the glass of dark amber liquid.
He sipped it and laid his head against the back of the sofa. “Horrid.”
“Would you like to tell me about it?”
His sigh was heavy. “There was a huge, hulking dragon…” He paused and opened his
eyes to regard her. “I believe it was purple. And scaly.”
Alex sat back on her heels. “You rat, you are toying with me.”
Hawk sat forward and fingered the hair coiled on her shoulder. “Toying with you, am I? If that were true, then I would be satisfied.”
Alex frowned. “What are you talki—”
“Your hair finally grew past your waist,” he said, extending the coil its full length. “You waited all your life for this.”
“You made fun of me, because I made you measure it.”
“Daily,” he added. “But I teased you more for your impatience, because it never grew fast enough. Nothing ever happened fast enough for you. You were so certain that one day your husband would adore your hair long and flowing past your waist.”
Alex regarded her hands, splayed on her knees, reluctant to discover what said husband really thought.
An ember snapped in the hearth.
“You were right,” Hawk said, thrumming her nerves and speeding her heart. “Go back to bed, Lexy. You will take a chill. Did you bring nothing warmer for sleeping?”
Lexy. No one else had ever called her that. Hawk’s tone had gone from gruff to teasing and she dared to regard him. “I understood,” she said, “that a bride wore less… rather than more, to sleep during the honey-month, though I have no firsthand knowledge, you understand.”
“A pity, that,” he said, as if he meant it. “Did Chesterfield realize he was taking a virgin widow to wife?”
Alex bristled and felt cornered once again, as if a misstatement now might carry a price she could not fathom. “We thought you dead for more than a year, Bryce. What makes you so certain that I remain untouched?”
Hawk’s jaw set; the fire in his eyes leapt, and under her hand, the pulse at his wrist trebled. “Are you saying—” He shook his head. “I dreamed…” After a long moment of expectation, he nodded and said nothing more.
Alex rose and went to open his portmanteau, regarding its contents, rather than her husband, as she answered. “I am saying, in all fairness to me, what I did after you died is not your concern—especially given the length of time between the event and your return.” She extracted a fresh shirt and went to offer her hand. “Come, sleep in the bed. You cannot stay here. The covers are soaked.”
Scandalous Brides Page 4