by Jilian Rouge
Gasping at the thought, she broke away abruptly from their impassioned kiss and stared at him with dismay. Sensing the sudden change in Georgie, Rafe asked with concern, “What is it? Did I do something to scare you? You need never be afraid of me, you know that, don’t you?”
“That isn’t it at all,” Georgie negated. “You had said that you hadn’t heard from your father in months. So, you know none of the latest news then.” She stated it, not as a question, but as fact with a touch of dread.
“That’s a rather odd thing to be thinking while I’m kissing you,” Rafe said wryly. “Which means I haven’t been doing a good job of turning you witless.”
He tried to pull her closer, but she wriggled free to step back and look at him squarely. “Listen to me, Rafe. Has your father’s solicitor contacted you since then?”
Shaking his head, confusion writ on his handsome features, he asked, “What does that have to do with what is between us?” Again, he moved in to wrap his arms around her waist and gather her close.
In frustration, Georgie burst out, “Will you stop that? I’m trying hard to tell you something of importance and all you can think of is seducing me!”
He barked, “Well, what else is there? I’m only trying to show you how much I want a future with you, and you’re clearly needing to be convinced that I am sincere.”
She returned, “This is about your future!” Then, in a visible effort to calm herself, she blew out a slow exhale before quietly saying, “You have to know that your father and brother had been in an accident.” She paused to take in his reaction and watched as the look in his eyes turned from languorous seduction to stunned shock.
“Are they all right? What had happened?” he asked, panic mounting in his voice.
Georgie hated that she had to tell him and was reluctant to bring him inevitable pain at her next words. “Their carriage overturned at the narrow pass. You know which one. Neither your father nor Lionel survived the fall.”
Silence settled heavily between them, and Georgie felt it weigh heavily upon her as she struggled to tell him the next part. After what seemed like eons of heartbeats later, Georgie quietly stated, “As your father’s last surviving family member, you are the new Duke of Lyonscar.”
5
Rafe stumbled back, his vision blurring with tears. Georgie reached for him then, whether to lend comfort or to keep him from landing on his ass, he didn’t know, but he couldn’t handle being touched just then. Not yet. He couldn’t breathe from the pain of such utter loss—oh, and the overwhelming guilt! He felt cold and numb at once, unable to do more than focus on one thought, on repeat: they’re gone, they’re gone, they’re gone.
Georgie’s heart went out to him, helpless to do no more than stand back and watch Rafe struggle with the heartbreaking news. “If it’s any consolation, they died instantly; they hadn’t suffered,” she explained morosely. “I had your father buried next to your mother and Lionel on her other side.”
He saw her then through the veil of his tears and asked, “You were there?”
She knew what he was asking without having to clarify. “Yes, there was no one else to make the arrangements. While I may be a Griffiths by marriage to you, I did love your father as well as my own. Lionel, too.”
Nodding absently, Rafe replied in a far-off voice, “Good. I’m glad. I’m glad they had you to oversee the details.” Shaking himself to rights, Rafe looked at her once more, and Georgie could see evidence of the pirate captain beneath the veneer of a gentleman. His emotions were now hidden away, so unlike the younger version of Rafe who had acted on his emotions on impulse. The iron control he now seemed to possess gave her a glimpse of the man he had become: the passionate barbarian so accustomed to ruling his domain, including his own emotions. And it thrilled her to no end.
Ignoring the sudden curl of desire pooling in her belly, Georgie further explained, “It was only natural. Since you left, I had moved back to Lyonscar Castle, mostly out of duty to your poor father. He was heartbroken, you know, when you didn’t return that first year. He needed my help to run Lyonscar—a woman’s touch, he said, was sorely needed there. I think he had hoped that my presence there would have brought you back sooner.”
A mild look of surprise crossed Rafe’s features. “I hadn’t known you moved back to Lyonscar. He nor Lionel made mention of that fact in any of their letters.”
Georgie said with a wry smile, “That doesn’t surprise me, given the history of your father’s machinations into our lives. He did say that you would return when you were ready, and not a moment sooner.”
“A polite way of saying I was stubborn, you mean,” he said with a small chuckle. A ghost of a smile dusted his lips, sadness still tinging the corners of his mouth. Georgie’s heart went out to him as he bravely poked fun at himself. He continued, “Like I had said, Father and Lionel knew I was coming home, but I had one last mission before I came home for good. Otherwise, I would have come sooner, but I came too late.”
Regret weighed on him heavily as he added, “I’m sorry I didn’t send word to you directly. And I’m sorry that you were left with the responsibilities of the estate. My responsibilities, as it turns out.”
“No need to apologize. Neither of us were ready to reconcile five years ago, and I have to say that I quite enjoyed running your father’s household. If the king would allow women to be dukes, I would be the first one to sign on,” she said with a small, proud smile.
“I don’t doubt it, firecracker. You always had a head for management. When we were younger, I always believed that you would make an excellent general for the King’s army. I still do,” he said matter-of-factly. Sighing, he continued, “I am grateful that my wife, my duchess, was capable of seeing to the estate’s needs with natural aplomb. It would be a grave error on my part if I were to allow you to slip through my grasp a second time.”
Georgie’s eyes widened. She could not deny that desire still simmered hotly between them, but a marriage between them was an entirely separate beast altogether. While she could forgive him the hurt he had caused her years ago, she could not willingly forget, not when heartache was the inevitable outcome if she remained bound to him.
Inwardly anxious but schooling her features with carefully maintained poise, she firmly stated, “If there is one thing I’ve learned about myself and your absence, it is that we don’t belong together. What we had was brief in its intensity, but we can’t expect to revisit those days with the same alacrity. I am no longer angry at you for what happened between us, but I no longer want to be married to you.”
“Why?”
“Please understand that while I’m happy that you are home, I don’t think we were meant for each other. If we were, we would not have made such a muck of things between us. We wouldn’t have hurt each other as we did.”
“Is there someone else?”
“Even if there wasn’t, I still think we should dissolve our marriage. You had me believing you were dead. If you had stayed away two more years, you would have been pronounced dead with no one else to carry on the Lyonscar title.”
Desperation had Rafe’s pulse quicken, his mind racing to adjust his strategy in a matter of seconds. He had to be careful of his next words, lest he lose her a second time. He carefully said, “I prefer to live the rest of my life at Lyonscar Castle with you in it. I came back to start anew with you, and I’m willing to show you for the rest of my days that I will never again be dishonest with you. Five long years away from you only served to show me how empty and cold life could be. Do you understand how much I need you?”
Georgie dragged a breath into her lungs and said with dignity, “I can’t be with you the way you want me to. I’ve changed just as much as you have. We’re different people, Rafe.”
“Is there anything I can do that can convince you that we do suit well together?” he asked, anguish tinging his voice. “I did enter our marriage loving you, and I believe you loved me then, too. Our bedplay was so much more than o
ur bodies coming together; it was above anything I’ve ever experienced. It had been like our souls, the very essence of our respective selves, were connected.”
Georgie had no other experience to compare it to back then. So, he claimed to have felt just as strongly as she had, but she attributed her response had simply been elicited by a master seducer. She had no way of knowing how sincere he was, not when he lied during their marriage vows, about his true intentions for marrying her. Although she could openly acknowledge to herself that she did love him, she feared that wasn’t enough to settle into a lifetime with him. For her, enjoyable marital congress wasn’t enough; she required complete and utter honesty in a husband.
Rafe was determined to change her mind, even if it took him the rest of his life. But he would do it subtly, molding himself into the kind of man she thought she wanted. He knew her, despite her claim that she had changed; he knew that she was only denying him to safeguard her own bruised heart. He aimed to prove to her that he was a changed man, ready to do anything to mend the huge rift between them.
Before he could continue convincing her, she claimed, “That may have been true five years ago, but I think I am better suited for someone of the same temperament as me. I also think your next wife should be someone who would be a better duchess for you than me. I just can’t stay married to you, Rafe. As difficult as it is, I rather think the courts would grant us a divorce.”
“Divorce?!” he roared. Quieting himself lest they be overheard and discovered alone, he growled, “Is there someone waiting in the wings to take my place?”
“As it so happens, no. There isn’t anyone. And I hadn’t been unfaithful to you either,” she said while guiltily thinking of Nicholas. “But your ducal duties include that of acquiring an heir. And while I would like children someday, I find that I’m quite happy to be on my own, and thus, I won’t be helpful to you in that sphere.”
Reading into what she hadn’t said, Rafe only heard that she had been left alone with no one in the past five years, another sin to be laid at his door. He refuted, “I don’t want any other duchess but you, Georgina. My children will have you as their mother. If it isn’t you, then there will be no heirs for me.”
Other than her parents, Rafe was the only one who used her full name when he was serious. The last time he called her that, he had been inside her, perched above her and in the throes of his own climax. Georgie lamely protested, “You can’t do that! It can’t be borne that you would be the last of your line. Your father wouldn’t stand for it, and neither would I! I won’t allow it!”
“Then stay married to me!”
“I can’t do that either! It would tear me apart to know devastation a second time when you decide to leave me. I barely made it from the brink the last time, and I doubt I would survive if it were to happen again.”
Fiercely, he exclaimed, “I swear to you that I would not let that happen, Georgina. You were mine since we were children, the day I had asked Nicholas Belhaven to look after you before I left for Eton. Even then, I thought he would make you happy, and I couldn’t let go of the discomfort that came from thinking of you with him.”
“You did not! You never thought of me that way or gave me any inclination of such thoughts.”
“That only shows how little you truly know me. I was not the innocent childhood friend you thought me. When you began growing breasts, Ernest and I had come to blows when he had caught me ogling them. You didn’t know, but I would sneak to the pond where I knew you went swimming just to catch a glimpse.”
“Why, you little sneak!” she accused with a small laugh. Rafe was relieved to distract her in some small way with his confession; anything to bring her mind away from thoughts of divorce. The very thought discomfited him, and he resolved to keep her mindful of the good, happy things from their shared past. It was his hope that these memories would supply the necessary ammunition needed to win her over.
Possessive pirate that he was, he looked down at her lovely breasts, recalling the times he had admired them and noting the changes time had wrought. They were fuller now, more womanly; their tops exposed by the low neckline of her evening gown. Lust hit him hard as he remembered how he had lovingly revered them with his hands, his mouth.
He had been caught staring when Georgie dryly said, “Keep your eyes above my chin at least, Rafe.”
“But I’ve always loved your breasts. You must know how enticing they look now that your body has ripened into that of an alluring woman. How did you keep the men at bay with the way you look now?”
“I’m not exactly beating them off with a stick,” she replied sardonically. “There are no hordes of them after me, if that’s what you’re implying.”
“Well, there should be as my wife is a beautiful woman. You are simply incomparable, firecracker.”
“Stop your nonsense!” Georgie hissed in indignation. “You cannot just charm me, and—and treat our marriage as something you can discard then retrieve it whenever you so wish!” She paused to inhale a shuddering breath to calm herself before continuing her tirade. Putting out a hand to ward him off, tears welled in her eyes as she pleaded, “Please, Rafe. I have no intention of renewing our marriage vows. You needn’t waste your energies on winning me back when your title will allow you to find a new duchess fairly quickly. Just please. Let me go.”
Rafe stared down at her as he said in a low, rough voice, “I am your husband, Georgina, as was witnessed by both God and man. Don’t you remember the last thing that was said by the priest at our wedding?”
Georgie stayed silent as he reminded her, “What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.” In a thundering tone befitting a pirate captain, he declared, “And I’ll be damned if I’ll let the courts grant us a divorce! I will not let it come to that!”
Before she could utter a protest, Rafe dropped a hard kiss upon her mouth and just as quickly, let her go to stalk back into the house. Georgie touched her fingers to her lips as she watched him leave, the heated imprint of his lips still lingering there. She felt dizzy and weak, her knees threatening to crumple out from underneath her. How was she going to continue on with a normal life with Rafe around?
…
Stomping off in a high temper, Rafe fought the urge to turn back around to where he had left his wife on the terrace. As a pirate lord who was used to his word being law, Georgie’s stubborn will irked him mightily. But at the same time, her defiance against him had him thoroughly intrigued, as well as aroused. None of his mistresses had ever dared to defy his wishes for fear of being turned out, but he had forgotten how his Georgie had always known her own mind. And God help anyone who got in her way when it came to what she wanted.
But he was in a rage to take what rightfully belonged to him, and Georgie was lawfully his. Just as Lyonscar was now his.
With his father and Lionel gone, he still couldn’t believe it. In his mind’s eye, he could still see his father regal and straight-backed, clapping him on the shoulder the day of his wedding day. And Lionel, stoic but smiling as he had spoken his wedding vows. He had been surrounded by the men of his family on the most important day of his life, believing he still had a lifetime ahead to witness them both turn old and gray. It didn’t seem right that he had been left behind to fill a role that was better suited for his father, then later, for his older brother.
Fortunately for him, it seemed that Georgie had cared for Lyonscar in his absence, with his father’s guidance, and presumably, later, without. As soon as he could take his leave of his friend, he planned to ride to Lyonscar, a two-day journey from Anthropshire, finally ready to come home. That his homecoming would be without his father or Lionel to welcome him at its gates saddened him to no end.
There was no longer a need to stay here at Ravenscroft, not when he had already dispatched the necessary information to Alex about their common business rival earlier in the evening. Warning his friend of the possible trouble that Dendridge could cause their latest venture was what he had come
here for.
However, he had not told the whole truth about his real reason for coming back home. Yet again another sin to lay at his feet, another thing he has kept hidden from Georgie. For the service he had down for his king and country as a privateer, a pardon was to be issued directly from the king to keep him from the hangman’s noose. And since he also had saved the life of a peer, the Earl of Merrick, while on the high seas, he had been awarded assistance in hunting down information about the man who had sold him into slavery.
From what little details he knew about his captor, the British Navy had been able to draw an uncanny likeness of the man with the crescent scar on his right cheek. The Navy had tasked him with one final mission before he retired his days at sea for good in exchange for a duchy. He had been commissioned to aid in the location and capture of the crescent-scarred slaver and bring him to trial for illegal slave trading. It had been no easy feat in the past year as the man was as slippery as an eel, making good his escape only seconds before.