The servant inclined his head and then turned and left.
Her mother, ever the consummate smiler and maker of peace entered deeper into the room. She sank into a curtsy. “My lord, what a beautiful day it is for a wedding.”
He cast a dubious glance out the window at the gray skies but said nothing on her mother’s polite pronouncement, for which Phoebe was grateful. Her mother dealt with enough unkindness. She’d not tolerate it from this man.
“Rutland,” her father said smoothing his palms over the front of his jacket. “A pleasure to see you this day.”
Her bridegroom flicked a bored gaze over her father. With the sneer on his lips and the loathing in his eyes, her soon to be husband looked upon the viscount as though he were sludge dragged in on his boot. For all that had passed between them, at least they could come together in this regard. Edmund didn’t return the greeting. Instead, shifting his attention to Phoebe, he spoke to the vicar. “It is time to begin.”
As her family sought out chairs arranged at the front of the room, Phoebe’s pulse pounded in her ears, deafening. She eyed her family seated in a neat row like geese in Hyde Park on a spring day and then cast a last, desperate glance at the door. What if she left? Surely, the marquess could not very well proceed to marry her sister, this day or any other day, not after he’d been jilted by the eldest sister.
Her gaze locked on his harsh, unrelenting stare one more time…and she knew—this was not a man who’d give a jot for Society’s opinion. If he wished to wed, her, Justina, or the queen herself, the woman’s fate would be sealed. With a slow, steadying breath, she walked the remaining distance over to Edmund and the vicar—ready to be married to the man who’d shattered her heart.
Edmund stared at a point beyond the vicar’s head as the man rambled on and on with the words of God and fidelity and love and trust. Words that his parents, all of Society, had proven were worth nothing more than the pages of that black book they were written upon.
“Edmund William Amery Deering, wilt thou have this Woman to thy wedded Wife, to live together after God’s ordinance in the holy estate of Matrimony? Wilt thou love her,” his stomach twisted. He loved no one. “comfort her,” what did an emotionally deadened man know of comforting anyone? “honour, and keep her in sickness and in health;” She would never fall sick. He’d not allow it. “and forsaking all others, keep thee only unto her, so long as ye both shall live?”
He paused to study this woman who would be his wife—his marchioness. Proud, silent, unmoving, she’d not cast another glance at him since she’d taken her place beside him in front the vicar. Fidelity, in a world where there was no honor, was a laughable clause put forth by the Church of England in an age-old vow. And yet, looking at the crown of her thick, auburn tresses and the smoky blue of her gaze…he’d not thought of bedding another and could not. Perhaps someday when he didn’t burn with this fierce need only for Phoebe. For now, she was all he wanted. Terror twisted in him.
“My lord?” the vicar prodded, giving him a pointed look.
“I will.”
The man nodded and then carried on with the same silly vows. There was the faintest pause before she pledged herself to him with that simple “I will”.
“Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?”
The viscount inclined his head. “I, her father.”
At the immediacy of that disloyal cur’s words, a blanket of rage fell over Edmund’s vision. How easily this man would turn Phoebe over to him—an unworthy, undeserving bastard. How easily it could have been another. A growl climbed up his throat and the vicar swallowed audibly. The book slid from his fingers and he and Edmund and Phoebe knelt to retrieve it simultaneously. From their positions upon their floor, their gazes locked. She searched his face and he knew she was looking for words of him, from him. And he wanted to be the man to give her those words she deserved and more.
But he was not that man. Edmund swiped the book and climbed to his feet. He held a hand out to Phoebe and then turned the small, black volume to the other man’s care.
The ceremony continued without further interruption and with a final statement from the vicar he’d managed to rustle up, Edmund was at last married. He looked at Phoebe, frozen, her expression wan. His lips twisted in a bitter smile. Married to a woman who would rather see him to the devil than call him husband, but then she was his. And that would have to be enough to satisfy this hungering to possess her in all ways.
He grunted as Phoebe’s brother slapped him on the back. “Splendid day, splendid day. Days ago I called you friend.” He stuck his hand out. “Now I’ll call you brother.”
Edmund choked on his swallow. He didn’t have brothers. Or friends. Or family. Hell, he didn’t even have a single person he could bring to scratch to stand beside him on his wedding day.
“And you shall call me sister.” The youngest skipped over with her hand outstretched. Oh, God this one would find herself ruined within days of her entry into Society in a handful of years if she was not carefully guarded.
Phoebe stepped between Justina and Edmund and glared at him. Her sister slowed to a halt and looked with confusion back and forth between Edmund and Phoebe. “Phoebe?”
“It isn’t polite to take a gentleman’s hand,” his wife bit out between clenched teeth.
He took in the tight, white lines formed at the corners of her mouth and then a slow dawning understanding registered. Yesterday, when she’d overheard his discourse with her father, she’d believed he would wed Justina to settle a debt between them. But there was more to it. By God, she believed he desired her sister—a mere child. At one time that weakness would have proven useful; a seed of truth to manipulate and weaken her. Now, he detested the idea that she believed he could ever want another who wasn’t her.
An awkward pall of silence descended over the room and an eager desire to be rid of the entire Barrett brood with their misguided, misplaced beliefs in him. “If you will excuse me,” he said coldly eying each of the Barretts staring at him with such an eclectic array of emotions he was nearly dizzy—adoring younger brother, fearful viscount, uneasy mother, confused younger sister, and irate Phoebe. Suddenly, these five people, six with the vicar, was five too many. “If you’ll excuse us,” he said stiffly.
“Excuse us?” her mother parroted back. “The wedding breakfast,” she blurted.
“There will be no wedding breakfast.” There was no need to fuel this family’s erroneous conclusion as to the man he was. No, the sooner they were gone from his townhouse and life, the sooner he could go back to reclaiming his solitary world—with now just Phoebe in it.
Mother and youngest daughter looked back and forth between each other as though in a desperate bid to make sense of his words. Andrew Barrett’s faltering smile conveyed his disappointment. The viscount’s fleshy jowls communicated relief. Only Phoebe’s newly cynical eyes hinted at a woman not at all surprised that the man she’d just wed hadn’t the decency to coordinate a celebratory feast with her family.
By their recriminating silence, he’d achieved the very goal he’d set out in through the avoidance of that meal. He never hated himself more than he did in that moment.
“Come along then,” the viscount ordered his family. When no one immediately moved, he gave his wife a sharp look that propelled her into movement. The woman dropped a curtsy and a murmur of polite felicitations and then started toward her husband.
“But I don’t understand.” Of course the unabashed Justina Barrett would voice the very words thought by all—including Edmund himself.
A soft smile so pure and still unsullied turned Phoebe’s lips as she looked on at her sister. That gentle tilt of her lips, as potent and powerful as it had been from their meeting on the Delenworth’s terrace, froze him. And with it went all logical thought. His wife crossed over to her sister and took her hands. “There is nothing to understand,” she said, while he stood there in silent torment over her masterful hold upon him. “The wedding brea
kfast is a mere formality and ours was a hastily thrown together affair. There was no time for those small details.”
“Just like your gown,” Justina Barrett complained.
Phoebe nodded. “Just like my gown.”
Just like her gown. And the breakfast. And the whole bloody day. One more mark upon his soul. What was a missing wedding breakfast and denying a woman her wedding trousseau and the lavish affair dreamed of by most? Guilt knifed at him. Why did this fault seem the most egregious of all the other sins against him?
“Oh, very well,” the younger Barrett sister said with a sigh. She gave Edmund a disappointed look and then made her way over to her parents. All but his wife and Andrew Barrett took their leave.
The younger man rocked on his heels, more hesitant than he’d proven in all their exchanges. Then, he walked over. He stuck his hand out again. “My congratulations.” He cleared his throat. “My sister is a good person. An honorable one.” In short, everything that Edmund was not.
He eyed it a moment and then took the offering.
“Take care of my sister,” the young man finished.
“Indeed,” he drawled, infusing as much bored nonchalance into those words, all the while panic churned through him. It was far easier having wed a woman whose body he craved and whose presence he wanted when he’d not stopped to think on what she meant to him. He let go of Andrew Barrett’s hand swiftly and then clenched and unclenched his fingers into a fist. The other man turned to his sister and then, much like the boy he was, wrapped his arms about her and held tight. She returned that innocent embrace and patted him on the back.
She looked around her brother’s shoulder. “I will be all right,” she spoke quietly, those words reached over to Edmund, spoken just as much for his benefit as Andrew Barrett’s. The lady had learned the skill of lying at his hands. He should be proud of that one gift he’d given her. So why did agony rip through his chest?
As though embarrassed by his show of emotion, the young man quickly released her. With flushed cheeks, he beat a hasty retreat.
And just like that, Edmund and Phoebe were alone, married—until death did part them.
The room filled with the harsh drawn breaths of his bride; the first indication she’d given of her unease. She ticked her chin up a notch and glared at him. “Now what?”
Edmund quietly pressed the door closed, leaned against the wood panel, and folded his arms at his chest. He smiled slowly. She might despise him, but he would give her more pleasure than she’d ever known possible. “And now, the wedding night, Phoebe.”
Chapter 18
Phoebe widened her eyes and stared unblinkingly at the terrifying dark, tawny stranger she’d bound herself to. “The wedding night,” she repeated blankly. On the heel of that came rushing forth charges made by Honoria, who’d been so very skeptical of his intentions from the moment of their first meeting. Honoria’s concerns had proven right in this. What if she’d also be proven correct about the whole tying ladies up business? In Lord Essex’s gardens, he’d sought to seduce Phoebe’s mind and body. Now, there were no longer pretenses for him to keep up. “With you?” Of course with him, you goose.
“With me,” he spoke on a smooth, dangerous whisper. His feral grin widened and he shoved away from the door, stalking over to her. “Certainly not another.” He stopped before her, so she was forced to either crane her head back to meet his gaze or retreat.
Overwhelmed by the sheer masculinity of his broad, powerful frame, Phoebe made to edge around him. He propped his hip on the arm of the sofa and effectively killed her retreat. She wet her lips. Not in any part of his offer, nay threat, that forced her into this marriage did she ever believe theirs would be a union in name only. Most especially not after their passionate joining under the stars. “But it is not n-night.” She’d naively expected the wedding night, would come…well, at night.
He brushed his knuckles along her cheek and involuntarily, her lashes fluttered. Warmth shot through her at his touch and she detested her body’s weakness to him, despite his betrayal and the lies between them. “No, it is not.” He lowered his mouth to hers.
A startled squeak escaped her and she ducked down and scooted past him. “I…” She searched her mind for some plausible reason to delay the consummation of their vows. This intimate act would bind them in ways far deeper than mere words alone and even more than their tryst in Lord Essex’s—this represented the consummation of their marital vows. It would be a tangible linking of two beings that bound them forever in ways that moved beyond any sexual joining.
Edmund moved toward her with the lethal, predatory grace of a sleek panther. She knocked against a side table and the delicate mahogany piece tipped and swayed. Phoebe shot her hands out to steady the table and then rooted her feet to the floor. She’d not be cowed by him or unnerved by this nonsensical hold he had upon her. She would however delay…this. He was not the man in Lord Essex’s gardens. And she was no longer the innocent miss who’d come to him trusting with stars in her eyes, desperate for his kisses and more.
“Surely not now. There is…” She searched the room. “Breakfast,” she blurted. The ceremonial meal he’d not even deigned to have her family attend. Not that she necessarily wanted her family here on this sham of a union.
He paused. “Breakfast.”
Even so, a twinge of regret pulled somewhere inside that their marriage should begin in this cold, lonely way. Why should it matter how little he cared about their wedding? After all she’d not truly given a single thought about this special day. And yet, he’d been so very insistent upon having her for his wife. She cleared her throat. “Breakfast. A slight repast to begin one’s day.” Then their marriage had begun the day more than anything. Still, there was something a good deal less terrifying in eggs and cold breakfast meats than in lying with this man whose expert touch had robbed her of her senses and awakened yearnings she’d never known a person could feel. Phoebe folded her hands together in front of her. He continued to eye her through thick, curled lashes no man had a right to, and then with a veiled look, spun and started for the door.
He was leaving? Where was the sense of victory at his rapid departure? Why should she want to spend a moment with the heartless fiend who’d forced her into marriage…and who would have just as easily taken Justina to wife? Edmund strode over to the bell pull and tugged once.
He was not leaving, then.
No, he turned around and started back in her direction.
Her belly fluttered with nervousness. “What are you doing?”
A knock sounded at the door and she gave silent thanks for the momentary interruption. “Enter,” he called out.
The door opened and a servant stepped inside. The young maid dropped a curtsy and cast a curious gaze momentarily in her mistress’ direction before then turning her attention to her employer. “My lord?”
“A tray of breakfast,” he put in coolly. A meaningless gesture from a man who did for none. This simple request was nothing more than a chore. A useless bother. “For my wife.” For his wife.
The woman gave a quick nod and then backed out of the room.
He respected her so little he’d not even introduce her to his staff. Then he turned back to her and her body burned at the powerfully hot stare he trained upon her. And the matter of his staff and her breakfast and their wedding really was quite secondary to the wedding night business. For this stranger was a man who liked his ladies bound. Not the man who’d laid her down gently amidst the roses and made gentle love to her. She gulped.
Edmund took another step toward her and she held her palms up. “Stop.”
Surprisingly, he did.
In an attempt to right her racing heart, Phoebe drew in a breath between her lips, filling her lungs and released it slowly. He winged an expectant black eyebrow upward. “I will not let you tie me up.”
Edmund stilled.
“I-I am c-certain those are merely rumors,” she stammered in a bid to fill the quiet. P
hoebe cast a glance about, searching the room for those whispered about ropes, and then swiftly returned her attention to his implacable face. “I do not see. Ropes, that is.” She bit her cheek at that silliness. Of course he’d keep those wicked cords in his chambers. “But I’ve…heard the rumors and I will not let you tie me up.”
The ghost of a smile tugged at his lips, softening him in ways that were mere illusory in nature. There was nothing gentle about him. “They are not rumors.” Except his silken whisper. That was smooth and washed over her like a hot sun on a midsummer’s day. And then she registered his words.
Involuntarily, her eyes flew wide, but she was saved from responding as he pulled the door open and allowed the servant entry with a silver tray. Breakfast. She swallowed hard. As though she could entertain thoughts of food with that shocking admission. The maid averted her gaze and then quickly rushed out, pulling the door closed behind her.
Edmund turned the lock and they two were alone—again.
Suddenly, this effort he made of going through the world terrifying all—men, women, children—and her, grated on her already frayed nerves. She settled her hands on her hips and glared at him. “I will not be afraid of your lies.”
“It is not a lie—”
“Or your angry whispers and hard stares and surly disposition. I—” It is not a lie. As in Honoria had, in fact, been correct and Edmund, the Marquess of Rutland, did, in fact, tie up women. “Oh.” In light of all the treachery he’d practiced upon her, should she truly be surprised by that admission? And yet, disappointment stabbed at her. Her arms trembled and she swiftly lowered them back to her side, lest he see the effect his words had on her and take some unnatural delight in disapproval.
So lost in her thoughts, she failed to notice his approach. She stiffened as he ran the pad of his thumb over her lower lip. “Those women wanted it.” The flesh quivered at his caress. He brushed his lips over hers once. “And you will, too.”
A Heart of a Duke Collection: Volume 1-A Regency Bundle Page 160