“Stay out of this, girl,” Winter muttered, not looking at her. “It doesn’t concern you.”
She laughed, but it was a harsh, cold sound. “You made it my concern when you involved me in your vendetta. We are here, uncle, because of your manipulations. You were so blinded by your own rage that you were willing to sacrifice anything to create even a tiny bit of pain in this man’s life. Even me.” She caught her breath and Matthew saw that she was struggling with tears. “So if you think he is a killer, then what does that make you, that you would hand over your own flesh and blood to him so that you could make him squirm?”
Her uncle shifted and he glanced at her at last. “I won’t let him hurt you.”
She shook her head. “The only one who has hurt me is you. Now this is my house. You made sure of it today when you marched me up the aisle to a man who did not deserve your machinations. And since it is my house, I have the right to tell you to get out.”
Winter flinched and turned on her. “Isabel—”
She pointed toward the dining room door. “You are not welcome here. Not if you are going to accuse my husband of such terrible things. Not if you are going to humiliate him in front of his friends and our family.”
“So you take his side,” Winter growled. He moved toward her, and Matthew rushed around the table at the idea that he might touch her. But he didn’t. He only leaned in. “I am your family. Angelica was. Where is your allegiance?”
She recoiled, but then she lifted her chin. In her face, Matthew saw her power and her strength. Something she normally kept quiet, but was there in all its glory in that charged, painful moment.
“If you were my family, you would have thought of me before you did what you did. And Angelica is dead.” Matthew and Winter flinched at the same time. “No one can bring her back, no matter how much you or Matthew wish you could. So I owe her nothing more than my grief that she did not get to live out her dreams. Now as I said, it is time for you to go. And until you are able to apologize and reflect on what you’ve done, you are not welcome here again.”
Winter stared at her, sputtering. Then he cast a deep glare in Matthew’s direction and stormed from the room. The chamber sat in stunned silence for a moment as Matthew gaped at Isabel. The fire had gone out of her now, replaced by regret. Pain. She had done this for him. In front of everyone he loved, she had taken a side and it was his.
“Brava!” Graham Everly, Duke of Northfield, suddenly called out as he rose to his feet, clapping his hands. Slowly, all his friends joined in the applause.
Isabel dropped her gaze from his as bright color filled her cheeks. Although they meant well, although he saw that her strenuous defense of him and censure of her uncle had softened more than a few hearts to her, it was clear she was uncomfortable with the accolades. He moved to her and caught her hand, squeezing it as he met her eyes and held them in a show of solidarity and gratitude.
“Enough, you lot,” he said, laughing to soften the mood. “This is not a play.”
It was Graham’s wife Adelaide who grinned at that. She had once walked the boards herself, in a very different life. “If it had been, it would have been lit very differently.” She stood and came around to embrace Isabel. “You were very brave. But I can see how tired you two must be after all the excitement of the past few days. I realize a wedding party would normally last a few more hours, but I suggest that we leave the bride and groom to themselves.”
She looked around the room with a pointed gaze. Matthew rolled his eyes. She had very little subtlety and yet he appreciated the gesture. In truth, he did want to be alone with Isabel now. His…wife. He shook his head at that reminder of what had transpired hours before.
“Well said, my love,” Graham said as he joined his wife. He shook Matthew’s hand, his bright blue eyes holding Matthew’s for a moment. Offering the support and friendship Matthew had always known from this group of friends. He appreciated it even more now than ever before.
The rest got up, shaking hands, kissing Isabel’s cheek. They all moved into the foyer to say their farewells. He noted that Isabel was quiet during it all. She smiled as she was acknowledged and accepted the friendliness that was offered to her, but she still held herself back. Cautious, as though she didn’t trust in this new world she found herself in. And why would she? One couldn’t expect change overnight. And there were still so many questions to be answered. By her, and perhaps by him.
At last it was only his mother who remained in the foyer as the carriages drove off into the night. She turned toward them with a soft smile. “You know, my marriage to your father was arranged,” she said. “And over time, we came to care deeply for each other. Love each other.” She blinked at the tears that always accompanied talk of the late duke. “So I wish with all my heart that despite this complicated beginning, you two will find happiness together.” She stepped up to Isabel and took both her hands. “Welcome to our family, my dear.”
She leaned in and bussed Isabel’s cheeks gently. When she backed away, Isabel smiled. “Thank you, Your Grace. I hope to one day prove that I belong here.”
His mother’s smile faltered a fraction, and she met Matthew’s eyes for a brief moment before she waved her farewells and went to her own carriage.
As she pulled away, Hicks closed the door and turned to them. “Is there anything else I can provide, Your Grace?” he asked.
Matthew looked at Isabel. Tonight he only wanted one thing, and it wasn’t anything the butler could provide. Only the woman who refused to look at him. “No. You and the rest of the staff should have a well-deserved night off. Her Grace and I will be fine.”
Hicks inclined his head and then glanced at Isabel. “Many felicitations, Your Grace. I hope you and His Grace will have many happy years together and that this home will be a comfortable one for you.”
“Thank you, Hicks,” she whispered.
Matthew frowned. It was like she was shrinking. Since her confrontation with her uncle, she had grown quieter, hunched smaller. Like she was trying to disappear. And he didn’t want that. Not at all.
“Come,” he said, offering his arm. “Let me show you your chamber, Your Grace.”
To his surprise, she flinched at the title, but took his arm and let him lead her upstairs. He guided her to the door to his chamber and opened it, revealing the drawing room. He saw it through her eyes as she gazed around. It was a masculine space. He’d changed and updated it when he inherited, and now it was all him. He would have to allow her to change that, to bring some of herself into the world he’d lived in alone for so long.
“It’s lovely,” she said, stepping away from him into the room. “The mahogany furniture is exquisite.”
He smiled. “There’s more of it in my bedchamber, if you’d like to join me there.”
She turned, her eyes wide and her breath short. For a moment, it seemed like she was struggling to find words. Then she simply nodded.
He opened the door and motioned her in. When she passed him into the room, he caught a vanilla whiff of her hair and shuddered with desire. How he had resisted her since the last time they made love weeks ago, he could not say. Right now that felt like an exercise in impossible control.
Tonight he would not exert it any longer.
She moved around his chamber, her hands shaking as she looked at the miniatures on his table. He and Ewan, portraits his mother had done when they were boys. His mother. His father.
Then she turned and faced his bed. His big, comfortable bed that felt so bright and ready in the firelight. She reached out and touched the coverlet, dragging her fingers along the soft cotton fabric with a shiver.
“I am nervous,” she said at last.
He wrinkled his brow. “We have done this before, you know.”
“I know. But when we did, I wore a mask. And there weren’t so many questions between us. Just the desire, nothing more.”
He frowned. He wasn’t so sure she was right about
that. There had always been questions between them. And always more than desire, even though the truth of it was hard for him to accept.
He stepped forward. “Would it make it easier for you if we talked about some of those questions before we…proceed?”
She jerked her face up and met his eyes. The moment between them seemed to stretch for an eternity and then she nodded. “If you want to ask them, please do.”
He cleared his throat. A thousand things rushed up in his mind, a thousand facts and lies he wanted to sort out. But the one that fell from his lips surprised even him.
“Why did you come to the Donville Masquerade?”
Isabel blinked at the question. She’d thought he’d ask about her uncle or her cousin. Or talk to her about the uncouth outburst she had created at his table not twenty minutes before.
“That is what you want to know?” she asked. “We have talked about it before.”
“But as you said, when we did you wore a mask. I’m not asking Miss Swan. I’m asking Isabel now. I’m asking because I want to know about you.”
She let out a sigh. “Very well. Though it isn’t a very interesting story.”
He arched a brow. “How a gentlewoman ended up in a sex club in the underground? I think it is.”
She laughed despite the discomfort and uncertainty of the situation. Matthew had the unique power to do that, to bleed out some of the tension that always seemed to rise between them. And to make her comfortable when she ought not to be.
“My husband was very…old,” she began. “You know that, we’ve spoken of it before. My father wanted me to marry a man with means and position in our little Society, and Gregory had both. But he was not…gentle with me. Or caring. It was a flip of my nightgown and a few half-hearted grunts and that was all. Sometimes I got a flutter of something more, of some pleasure, but if I wanted that, I had to find it with my own hand. In secret.”
She watched as Matthew’s jaw set in anger. Not at her, she didn’t think. At her late husband. And why not? Matthew was a man who always tended to her pleasure before he thought of his own. In his mind, a man who only thought of himself was entirely ungentlemanly.
“You were alone, despite your marriage,” he said softly.
“Yes,” she said, her voice cracking with the painful truth of that statement. “And then he died. He’d been sick all along, but it was sudden. And I was free. Except not. Within a month or so, his heirs from his first marriage swept in and pushed me out. My uncle took me in.”
He stiffened. “For his own purposes?”
The question made her ponder that. Right now it was hard to recall if Fenton had always had his own goals in mind. But when she pushed past her pain, she could remember.
“Just as you are not what he thinks, he is not entirely what you believe,” she said gently. “He was very kind when I came to him. We could talk and spend time together. I tried to make him laugh, though I failed more often than I succeeded.”
She shook her head at the wave of sadness that overwhelmed her with those memories. Where had that man gone? Had his desire for revenge taken him entirely? Or was he still inside the shell of her uncle?
“You were happy there.” There was no censure in Matthew’s tone. She was glad for it. After all, he had every right to judge her uncle and her.
“I was, for a time. But the longer I stayed, the more he mentioned that one day I would marry again. That he would arrange for something. Something that would benefit me. Only I knew the kind of benefit he meant.”
“Financial. Positional,” Matthew said.
She nodded. “After months of a little freedom, I was slapped in the face by the prospect of another loveless, empty marriage. And I was terrified. I couldn’t sleep, I used to roam the halls, and that’s when—”
She cut herself off, for the next part of her story was the most scandalous of all. She’d never stated it out loud, not even to Sarah.
“Tell me,” he said, and he closed the distance between them. He reached out and took her hand, his warm fingers massaging her palm. Perhaps he meant it to be comforting, but it was not that. Arousing was a better word. As his thumb caressed her palm, she felt her body grow heavy and wet.
She swallowed. “I was up in the middle of the night and I decided to find a book in my uncle’s library. When I opened the door, I-I saw them.”
His eyes widened as her meaning became clear. “Who?”
“A maid and a footman. They were…they were doing all the things that people do at the Donville Masquerade. It was animal and powerful and passionate.” She shook her head. “I had never thought it could be like that. But I couldn’t stop thinking of it. Fantasizing about it in the dark of my room. I crept down every night, looking for them. Watching them if I caught them. I knew it was wrong, but I just couldn’t stop.”
His pupils dilated. She knew that look. What she told him made him want her. And that gave her a little bravery in this sea of inappropriate confession.
“The last night I saw them together, he said something about the Donville Masquerade. And then my uncle fired the maid and I never saw them together again. I asked around and ultimately found out exactly what the masquerade was. Intrigued, I snuck out and went. It was shocking to me, of course. But it fueled even more drive to go, to see, to explore that passion that I’d never felt and believed I never would feel. Until…until you.”
He lifted a hand to touch her face, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw. It was electric pleasure. It was anticipation of oh, so much more to come. And she was ready. Ready for this, even if it was all they would ever share. It was better than nothing. Wasn’t it?
It had to be.
“You deserved that pleasure you sought,” he murmured. “And I’m glad I was there to give it to you.”
She shook her head. “It’s a funny thing, isn’t it? That of all the hundreds of people who flow through that place, you and I found each other?”
Chapter Seventeen
Matthew’s jaw tightened, and for a moment Isabel thought she’d said something wrong. His reaction was so physical and so strong. She opened her mouth to ask him about it, to apologize for going too far.
But before she could, he dropped his lips to hers and her thoughts and fears faded away. At least for now, she could surrender, give herself completely and know that this man—this marvelous, giving man—would tend to her every need. And she to his.
He glided his hands across her cheeks as he tilted her head for better access. His fingers slid through her locks, bringing pins raining down on the floor around them. Her hair fell around her shoulders and his hands, and he drew back to stare at her.
“You’ve never had your hair down with me,” he said, touching the locks like they were something magical.
She laughed. “I suppose not. It’s just hair.”
“No, it’s silk and satin,” he said, lifting a piece to his nose and inhaling deeply. “It’s midnight and magic. It’s vanilla heaven.”
She blinked at those words, passionate and sweet. Her dark hair had always seemed too plain to her. But he spoke of it like it was something incredible, so it suddenly felt that way.
She lifted her hands and tugged at his jacket, and he smiled. “Is waxing poetic about your hair is the path to your surrender, Your Grace?” he asked with a grin. “I’ll file that piece of information away.”
“Silly man,” she whispered as she fumbled with the buttons on his waistcoat. “Touching me, saying my name, even looking at me the right way is the path to my surrender. It seems I’m always on the edge of it when I’m with you.”
“Good,” he growled, suddenly possessive and dark in tone. She liked that. Liked hearing him find his way to animal desire, away from the sweet goodness that normally made itself known.
He suddenly turned her and yanked her back against him. His mouth came down to her neck, and he sucked there as his hand glided to her stomach, holding her flush to him as he gr
ound his hard cock against her backside. She let out a moan at the aggressive touch and pushed back, meeting him eagerly.
“I have been waiting for this,” he whispered against her skin, the words sinking into her flesh and working their way through her bloodstream.
She nodded, wordless and breathless, and gasped when he pulled at the gown, popping the buttons free and scattering a few to join her hairpins on the floor.
“I’ll buy you a new one,” he promised as he parted the gown. “You’re wearing a chemise?”
She laughed at the deep disappointment in his tone. “Today I’m Isabel, remember?” she said. “Only the swan goes bare beneath her gowns.”
“Perhaps Isabel could take a page from the swan’s book from time to time,” he said, pushing the dress forward to droop around her waist. He slipped a finger beneath her chemise strap and inched it down her arm. “For me.”
“For you?” She gasped as his mouth followed the trail of the strap. “Yes, Your Grace.”
He murmured a moan against her skin and then turned her to face him. He locked his gaze with hers and dragged her chemise away. She was bare from the waist up, and heat flooded her cheeks. It was a funny thing, for he was right that he’d seen her like this before. He’d been far more intimate with her body.
But the mask had offered protection. Anonymity. A barrier. Tonight there were none, and as he stared she turned her eyes away.
He tucked a finger beneath her chin and turned her face back. “Don’t. Don’t hide from me.”
She swallowed hard and nodded, watching him as he watched her. His gray gaze swept over her body, drinking her in, his pupils dilating and his hands lifting to touch her bare skin at last.
He cupped both breasts, sweeping his thumbs over her already hard nipples. She threw her head back in pleasure and he leaned down to suck one peak into his mouth. He worked her tender flesh, stroking and laving, then sucking until she was gasping and groaning his name over and over.
He repeated the same action against her opposite breast, all the while inching her gown and chemise the rest of the way down her body until she was naked but for her sheer stockings.
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