Dash it. This wouldn’t work, she could not read the numbers at the bottom of the window. Perhaps she should stand in the middle of the ladder.
She took a step down and froze as her dress pulled sharply against her throat and shoulders. Her skirts were caught beneath her boots. Just wonderful. She stepped up the ladder and freed the fabric. This time, as she descended, she kicked her skirts out wide. Still, her left foot managed to catch the hem of her riding habit.
This was silly.
She threw the measuring tape to the ground and grabbed as much fabric into her right hand as possible. Cool air rushed against her calves as she hoisted her skirts.
She took a precarious step down, but could go no further. Alas, it was not possible to descend a ladder without the use of two hands.
Footsteps sounded on the front porch.
“Oh good,” Cat called to the workman. “Can you please help…?”
Her voice trailed off as she felt a familiar shiver run up her spine. That was no workman watching her. It was her husband.
“My, my,” he drawled from the doorway.
Oh, buzzing and warmth and languid sunshine. It caught up to her regardless. Cat closed her eyes and felt the heat of his gaze on her back.
She could only imagine what he saw. Her lower legs were bare above her riding boots. And her drawers, should they be exposed, were frilled with lace at the bottom. Jamie had enjoyed extravagances like that, had bought her the most glorious undergarments the week after their wedding.
The sound of his footsteps drew nearer at a leisurely pace. She did not drop her skirts. She could not help it, she enjoyed his looking.
“I don’t know if I should admire you or call you to task.” His rough voice rubbed against her, sent gooseflesh skittering across her skin.
Strong hands wrapped around her waist and she opened her eyes. He was touching her. Framing her body with his long fingers. She was honey, shaped by a vessel. Fire, blazing within a ring of rocks. She was safe. Pouring out. Held together.
Jamie. Her Jamie.
“You can release the ladder now, Cat.”
But she didn’t let go. It was too long since she’d last been touched. Not the purposeful touch of her lady’s maid, or the quick buss on the cheek from a friend. But touched by a man. Touched so that the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as they were now.
He shifted his hands and spread his fingers wide, almost brushed the underside of her breasts. Her sharp inhale was loud in the silent room.
She opened her hand and let go, let herself fall back into him. Jamie slowly lowered her to the floor.
When he did not immediately release her, she stepped to the side. She did not want to give him this power over her. Not again. She dropped her skirts and squared her shoulders before she turned.
Attraction hummed between them, infinitely louder and hungrier than the honeybees. Jamie made no attempt to hide his arousal. His blue eyes were molten, his lids heavy. She struggled to hold his gaze before he let it slip down to her lips.
He was going to kiss her.
Cat stepped back and banged into the ladder. “Whatever are you doing in the village?”
His lips lifted into that dratted half smile. “Whatever are you doing, climbing a ladder?”
She slid to the side, needing more space from him. “Measuring for drapes. You?”
“Come to find you.” His eyes followed her escape. “You seem intent on avoiding me.”
Avoiding him? Cat opened her mouth to deny his accusation, but, in truth, she had been doing exactly that. Taking meals in her chamber, detouring around the rooms he seemed to frequent, and spending more and more time in the village.
It pleased her that he noticed this. She looked down and shook out her skirts so he would not see the flush heating her face.
“Why are you measuring for drapes?” Jamie collected her tape from the floor and handed it to her, then looked out onto the street. “And why is Abbey Lane overrun with workmen?”
His back was to her, so she allowed herself time to reply. She didn’t know how much she could trust Jamie with her plans for the village. Not that she thought he would object. Just…she didn’t want to be vulnerable to him. Not in the least.
“You have decided to renovate the village?” Shadows played beneath the hard angles of his face as he turned toward her.
“Yes.”
“Because it was…looking shabby?”
She drew back. “Do you think that would be my only concern?”
He glanced down at her legs. “You have always had an eye for pretty things.”
So he had seen the lace on her drawers.
Still, she was no longer the girl he knew her to be. It was true, in the past she might have worried about the cottages simply because they appeared disheveled. She would have renovated them to impress visitors approaching Forster Abbey. But that girl was gone. “You have been away a long time, Forster.”
His eyes searched her face. “It seems I have.”
Neither spoke for a wide stretch of time. At least not with words. Cat felt the subtle shift as her body reacquainted itself with his presence. As the skin knows the touch of sunshine, or the nose a familiar smell, so her form knew his. Blood, bones, muscle, even her heartbeat attuned to him. He was everywhere, within every part of her.
She did not like it.
“Where are the tenants?” His face was half light and half shadow as he stood before the window. “I thought the Thompsons inhabited this cottage.”
“They’ve moved to Nottingham.” How flattering that he could remember his tenants’ names, but not his simplest duty to his wife, such as a note to let her know he was still alive. “His sons needed employment.”
Jamie glanced at her from the corner of his eyes. Her skin prickled and her heart thumped. So dramatic, this reaction of her body to his body.
“I’d like to keep these cottages full with estate workers, as is tradition.”
Was he saying the families she had chosen were not welcome? For they did not include husbands and fathers. And she had a plan to employ the women and children outside of farming. “There simply isn’t enough work in the fields, not with the threshing machines.”
He tapped his fingers idly on the windowsill. “I am increasing the farming capacity of the estate and will soon be in a position to employ more men.”
Irritation pressed into her with insistent fists. If he had need for more homes, there were other empty cottages on the estate.
Indeed, Jamie acted as if he could come back after a five years’ absence and reclaim control of her world—her plans, her womb, her future. “How ambitious you are in your return, Lord Forster. So much plowing of new fields and increasing of crop yields.”
He slanted her a sharp look, his blue eyes intent on her.
I need an heir, Catherine.
Turning to face her, he leaned a shoulder against the window and took his time considering her. Considering the shape of her face, which she kept achingly impassive, then curve of her breast and waist where he had held her. He dragged his gaze back up to hers. “I’m a very ambitious man, Lady Forster.”
The sun beat through the window, but it did not rival the heat in her blood.
Desire. Its soft fingers threaded down her spine and ripened the flesh that would welcome his.
He shifted his weight onto one foot. They stood before the large window, visible to any villager or laborer who should look their way. She could not concern herself with their impression. Certainly it was well and clear what would be seen. There were bulls and mares in the field that considered each other thus.
It was not so rare a thing.
But neither was it without a subtle persuasion.
Jamie was already her husband. She knew the feel of him within her flesh, the pleasure he could give her. She knew what it was to gasp and tremble and ache and tumble over the precipice of desire together.
Lust was not an emotion that required forgivenes
s.
And lust did not keep a husband. Did not bind a father to his home.
She uprooted her feet and crossed the cottage, stopping only when she reached the door and the fresh air outside. She cast her husband as impartial a look as she could manage even as her limbs trembled and her blood screamed NOW.
“Do have a care, Forster. Untended fields have a predilection for thwarting a man’s designs.”
Chapter Four
THAT NIGHT, CAT EYED HER BED distastefully. It was a lovely contraption, covered in lavender silk shot through with silver. But it seemed torturous to consider another night spent tossing and turning within its confines.
She glared at the door connecting her room with Jamie’s. Twice now, she’d thought she heard his footsteps crossing toward the door. Twice now, she’d waited in trembling anticipation for…nothing.
A big, bewildering, disappointing nothing.
She would never be able to sleep.
Not after she had felt his hands on her earlier that day. Not after he’d almost kissed her. And certainly not after the naughty thoughts that had punctuated her evening.
Cat tightened her dressing robe. Really, she ought to just knock on the door herself. She and Jamie had much they needed to discuss. This business of him requiring an heir did not supersede the reason he had abandoned her in the first place.
They must settle this thing between them once and for all.
Cat marched across her room and rapped her knuckles on the door.
“Enter.” She couldn’t tell if Jamie sounded surprised. Could wood absorb such a thing?
She opened the door and stepped into her husband’s bedchamber.
Jamie was relaxed back on his bed dressed in nothing but loose trousers. Her gaze immediately landed on the tanned skin of his chest. Elegant, thick muscles rounded and corded across his shoulders and abdomen.
My goodness.
She couldn’t recall for a startling moment why she’d entered his room. Her eyes trailed downward, over his sculpted abdomen to the top of his trousers.
Jamie cleared his throat. “Good evening, Cat.”
She blinked, trying to clear the hard, lean sight of him from her mind. But she tumbled through memories. The hot silk of his skin. The tang of salt as she pressed her tongue to his muscle. The way he filled her, rode her, pleasured her.
Jamie’s chest expanded on a long inhalation. Cat’s body followed.
She dragged her gaze up all that hard beauty into his eyes. “What are you planning to do, Jamie?”
He lifted his brows. “Planning to do?”
“Are you going to visit my rooms?”
His mouth curved up at the edges. “I’d thought to give you some time. If you are ready now—”
She stepped back. “And what then? Will you stay here at Forster Abbey, or will you leave again?” She did not like the nervousness in her voice.
The bed creaked as he pushed himself up and onto to his feet. His trousers fell low across his abdomen, revealing curious dips and hollows. “This could not wait for morning?”
“No.” No, this could not wait for morning. She could not wait.
Jamie scrubbed his hand through his dark hair, leaving it standing on end. “The answer is yes, I plan to stay at Forster Abbey.”
Cat dipped her chin in a sharp nod. The creation of a child did not require love. It did not even require forgiveness. But a marriage did. And she did not want to bring an innocent baby into an unhappy family.
The ultimate question remained. Would he ever forgive her?
She looked up and met his eyes. Her palms began to sweat. “We need to talk about what happened.”
He scrubbed his hand through his hair again. “To what do you refer, exactly?”
“The affair. Or the non-affair, as it were. You do believe me, don’t you?”
“Yes, I believe you. I always did.”
Cat felt her shoulders drop. Thank God he understood. As well he should have. He had known for weeks that Simpson was trying to seduce Lady Allysandra, not her. Indeed, Simpson was a notorious rake known for his conquests of tall brunettes. Cat was neither tall nor a brunette. She took a few tentative steps toward Jamie. “It was terrible luck that I was discovered with Sim—”
“It was not an act of luck, Cat.” Jamie leaned one shoulder against his bedpost and crossed his arms.
She stopped her approach, rooted by his frustrated tone and the hard expression on his face. He was still angry, even these five years later.
Tight lines bracketed his mouth. “You went out onto the balcony willingly and on purpose.”
Yes, to warn her friend, stubborn man. “She was engaged to a duke.”
“She was a bloody fool.” And so were you. He did not say the words, but they hung in the air regardless.
“Everything happened so quickly.” What a nightmare that evening had been. Cat had never intended for people to believe she was the one having the affair. “I was just trying to protect Ally. She would have been absolutely ruined.”
“And what about me, dear wife?” Jamie’s voice was quiet and barely stirred the air in the room. “Were you so worried what others would think of me?”
Truthfully, she hadn’t been thinking of him. She’d been thinking of her exciting friendship with a soon-to-be-duchess. She’d been thinking of flirtations and intrigues and the entertainment of her first London Season. Not her new husband. She looked down at the floor.
He sighed. “Are we really going to argue about this now? I am ready for bed.”
“I hadn’t thought to argue.” Tightness banded her chest. “I thought perhaps if we talked about it…”
She had hoped that he might come to forgive her. That they might press on into the future together.
It was a silly hope, she knew this. She had known this for years. She straightened her shoulders against the sadness that wanted to curl inward. She would move on without him. She already had.
“You must understand that your actions had simple consequences.” His blue eyes were fierce on her, unrelenting. “I could not stay in London and be thought a cuckold.”
“Could not or would not?”
“I was angry with you. I’d warned you against your friendship with Lady Allysandra. You would not listen to me.”
“You lectured me. As you always did.” The old impatience colored her voice. Even as Jamie had courted her those many years ago, even as they had flirted and played and fallen in love, he had treated her like a younger neighbor. She’d been the innocent girl in need of guidance, and he the worldly man who would provide it.
His shook his head, as if denying her memories. “I allowed you to be free with your actions, Cat. You wanted a Season and I humored you. I watched you dance and flirt with other men, even after we were wed.”
Her breath caught in her throat. Shame, anger, embarrassment, she could not tell what she felt. Did not care to examine it. She inhaled sharply. “You talk as if I was loose—”
“I just wanted you for myself! Good Lord, Cat, I waited for two years to marry you. I know it was not your doing, with your father putting off your first Season, then your aunt falling ill. But I waited, and—” He looked down at his hand, flexed and unflexed his fingers in a tight fist. When he looked up again, his eyes were sad. “Honestly, Cat, I gave you everything. I don’t know what more you could want from me.”
“I am sorry, Jamie. I am a thousand times sorry for my actions that night. But I cannot undo the past.” She could not look at him, her handsome, half-dressed husband. The man she had won and lost. She scanned the room and her gaze landed upon the new objects on his bookshelf. Some kind of mask and an odd statue. “You have been all over the world while I’ve been here, atoning for my mistake. Still, it is not enough.”
He said nothing.
“I cannot continue like this, Jamie.” Her words sounded hollow, empty. Fitting, for that was how she felt.
“What are you saying?”
Cat adjusted the
sash on her dressing robe. Pulled herself together. She would once and for all close the door on this man who had broken her heart. “I’m saying I cannot give you an heir, not with such animosity between us. In fact, I think we should apply for an annulment.”
“WHAT?” JAMIE STIFFENED. Certainly he’d misheard.
“I think we should apply for an annulment,” his wife repeated. “You would be free to marry and beget your heir with someone else.”
She was mad. Madness dressed in provocative green silk.
“We cannot get an annulment, Cat. I am not impotent. You are not a virgin.” The words tasted like ash in his mouth.
“I might as well be.” She had fire to her now. She dropped her arms and lifted her chin. “I’ve hardly experienced the marital bed. And that was years ago.”
“They would have to examine me.” Jamie tried to loosen his jaw. “I would have to prove that I cannot raise my victory flag.”
She arched an impertinent brow. “That shouldn’t be hard.”
“Oh, it gets hard, all right. You, of all people, should know.”
“Should I?”
“You talk as if you’ve forgotten.”
“What was there to forget? A few nights, that was all.”
He launched two steps toward her. “I don’t believe you.”
She straightened at his approach, all haughty pride. “Don’t believe what? That you could be so easy to forget?”
He closed the rest of the distance between them, his blood a fire of anger and desire. And possession. He would never give her up. “You are my wife.”
“Barely. I am not the same woman you once knew. And you are not the same man.”
“I am not so different, Cat.” He was shockingly the same, in fact. His travels had changed him around the edges, but the core of him had solidified. Like he had stepped completely into his own skin.
“I do not know, Forster. I find I do not know you at all.” Her eyes trailed over his chest, then flicked away. There was desire in her gaze. She could not hide it.
“You’ve known me practically my entire life.”
She wouldn’t look at him. He took her shoulders and turned her around so she faced the large mirror on his bedroom wall. He swept her hair to the side and stood close behind her. She was lightness to his darkness. Delicacy to his heft and bone. She was perfect.
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