The Stranger I Married

Chapter 16

As he left Bella behind, Rhys was so lost in thought he failed to look ahead. Turning the corner, he ran into a hastily moving body and had to reach out swiftly to prevent her fall.

“Lady Hammond! My apologies.”

“Lord Trenton,” she replied, straightening her skirts and touching a hand to her golden curls, which showed a faint trace of gray. When she looked up at him with a bright smile, he was startled, considering how he had very nearly run her over. “I apologize, as well. I was not minding my path in my haste to ensure my guests’ enjoyment.”

“Everyone is having a fine time of it.”

“I am so relieved! I must thank you for the attention you paid to Hammond’s niece this evening. The poor dear is so beleaguered by destitutes. I am certain discourse with a non-marital-minded man was refreshing. She was in as fine a mood as I have ever seen, which pleases me greatly. I appreciate your forbearance in speaking with her for such a length of time.”

He held back a grunt. The image of him as a benign figure who had no sincere interest in Abby irked him in a way he could not understand. He longed to retort and refute, to say she was unique and desirable for more than her purse. But why he wished to defend her so fiercely eluded him. Perhaps it was guilt.

“No thanks are necessary,” he assured her with practiced smoothness.

“Are you enjoying the scavenger hunt?”

“I was, yes. Now though, I will bow out and leave the rest of the guests to the glory.”

“Is anything amiss?” she asked, the concerned hostess.

“Not at all. I am simply very good at such pursuits, and it would not be very sporting of me to win tonight, when I have every intention of winning tomorrow.” He winked.

She laughed. “Very well. Good eventide to you, my lord. We shall see you over breakfast.”

They parted ways and Rhys took the shortest route to his rooms. Once he’d undressed, he dismissed his valet for the evening and settled before the fire with a decanter and glass. Shortly, he was in his cups and somewhat eased of his regret over Abby, at least until the door opened.

“Go away,” he muttered, making no effort to cover his legs, which were bared by the part in his robe.

“Rhys?”

Ah, his angel.

“Go away, Abby. I am not in any condition to receive you.”

“You look perfectly conditioned to me,” she said softly, coming over and circling the chair until she stood between him and the fire.

Divested of her underskirts for ease in undressing, he could see the outline of her lithe legs through her gown. He grew hard, a condition he was unable to hide, dressed as he was.

She cleared her throat, her gaze riveted.

Feeling the urge to shock her, Rhys yanked aside one edge of his robe and bared his upthrust cock. “Now that you have seen what you came here to see, you can go.”

Abby sat in the chair across from him, her back ramrod straight, her gaze curious and capped with a studious frown. She was so damned adorable, he had to look away.

“I did not come here to simply gaze at what I want and not have it,” she said primly. “A sillier concept I’ve never heard of.”

“I have something sillier for you,” he retorted gruffly, shifting his half empty glass to create prisms from the firelight. “You working so industriously toward an unwanted pregnancy.”

“Is that the impetus behind this mood you are having?”

“My ‘mood’ is called ‘guilt,’ Abigail, and since I’ve not felt that particular emotion before, I am not comfortable with it.”

She was silent for long moments. Long enough for him to drain his drink and refill it. “You regret what happened between us?”

He did not look at her. “Yes.”

A lie, for he could never regret the time he had spent with her, but it was best if she did not know that.

“I see,” she said softly. Then she stood and came toward him. She paused beside his chair. “I am sorry you regret it, Lord Trenton. Know that I never will.”

It was the wavering undercurrent in her voice that made him move lightning quick to capture her wrist. When he forced himself to look at her, he saw tears, which cut him so deeply he dropped the glass in his other hand, the thud of its impact drowned by the roaring of blood in his ears. The feel of her, just that slight, fragile piece of her, set off memories of touching other parts. Impossibly, he began to sweat.

She tried to pull herself free, but he held fast, rising to his feet, gripping the back of her neck roughly. “See how I hurt you? How I can do nothing but hurt you?”

“It was heaven,” she cried, swiping furiously at her tears. “The things you did…the way you felt…the way I felt!”

Abby struggled, but he maintained his grip. She glared at him through her weeping, her cheeks flushed, her lips red and parted. “I see my mother was correct. Affairs are physical release, nothing more. I suppose sex must feel this way for everyone. With anyone! Why else would so many indulge?”

“Cease!” he barked, his heart racing as he saw the path of her logic.

Her voice rose. “Why else would the experience mean so little to you? Stupid of me to think you and I are unique. I am so easily replaceable for similar intimacy. I conclude that any other man could provide a like orgasmic event for me!”

“Damn you. No other man.”

“To hell with you, my lord!” she cried, glorious with indignant fury. “I am no great beauty, but I am certain there are men who could make love to me without regret.”

“Let me assure you,” he bit out, “any other man who touches you will regret it immensely.”

“Oh.” As she blinked up at him, her free hand fluttered to her throat. “Oh my. Are you being possessive?”

“I am never possessive.”

“You threaten any man who might touch me. What do you call that?” She shivered. “Never mind. I love it, whatever you call it.”

“Abby,” he growled, furious at the tightening he felt in his gut. Would she forever drive him insane?

“That growl…” Her eyes widened, then softened. “Your roguish tendencies turn my insides to jelly, did you know that?”

“I did not growl!” Against his will, his arm drew into his body, pulling her with it.

“Yes, you did. What are you doing?” she gasped when he licked the very edge of her lips. “You intend to ravish me, do you not?”

His half-drunken brain was inundated with the warmth of her slender body, the soft scent of her, and the voice he loved. Her cries in orgasm were enough to make his cock weep with joy. It was leaking even now, he was so aroused, and she had done nothing to make him feel this way. It was simply her. Something indefinable about her.

“No,” he murmured in her ear. “I intend to fuck you.”

“Rhys!”

When he released her wrist and reached for her breast, he was not surprised to find her nipple hard against his palm. Those long, delicious nipples. He pulled her to the floor.

“What? Here?” Her shock would have made him laugh, if he weren’t concentrating so fiercely on yanking her skirts out of the way. “On the rug? What about the bed?”

“Next time.”

Finding her slick and hot, Rhys began to work his cock into her with a groan of surrender. Abby whimpered softly.

“Will you regret this, too?” she asked, squirming beneath him.

He knew she was sore, could feel how swollen her tissues were, but could not desist. Watching her as he forced her body to take him, he nearly drowned in those blue eyes with their golden flecks. “Never,” he vowed.

“You lied earlier.” Her smile was brilliant and watery with renewed tears. “I have never been so happy to have been lied to.”

He had never been so happy either.

Which was a torment worse than hell itself.

Unwilling to leave Isabel after her apparent upset the night before, Gerard found himself walking several feet behind her as the Hammond party left their horses with grooms and walked to a location prepared for an alfresco picnic. Dressed in flowered muslin with a large satin bow at the back and a wide-brimmed straw hat upon her upswept auburn tresses, his wife looked both elegant and young. The latter effect was enhanced by her sparkling eyes and wide smile.

That he was responsible for her look of contentment was astonishing to him. Prior to four years ago, he had never pleased anyone but himself, and he’d never in his life made a woman happy outside of sexual intercourse. He had no notion how he’d managed the deed. He knew only that he would continue to keep her so blissful if it killed him.

To wake to Isabel pressing kisses to his chest with laugher in her eyes was beyond heavenly. To feel her turn to him, snuggle with him, reach for him when she grew cold…It was a type of intimacy he hadn’t known existed, and he had found it with his wife, the most beautiful and wonderful woman in the world. He deserved it less than anyone, but he had it. And he would cherish it. Spilling his seed inside her had been a foolhardy lapse, one he would not repeat. He could not risk impregnating her.

Glancing aside, he studied Trenton and said, “You still look morose. The country air not working its wonders on you?”

“No,” Trenton grumbled, frowning. “My ailment cannot be cured by fresh air or anything else.”

“What kind of ailment is that?”

“The female kind.”

Laughing, Gerard said, “I hope to be slowly developing a cure for that myself. Unfortunately, I doubt it would help you if I do.”

“Once Isabel discovers a dalliance on your part,” Trenton warned ominously, “the saints above will not be able to cure you.”

Gerard came to an abrupt halt and waited for Trenton to face him. The rest of the party continued on until they were quite alone. “Is that what you told my wife last night? That I would stray?”

“No.” Trenton stepped closer. “I merely told her to be practical.”

“Isabel is one of the most pragmatic women I know.”

“Then you do not know her well.”

“Beg your pardon?”

Trenton smiled wryly and shook his head. “Isabel is a romantic, Grayson. She always has been.”

“Are we talking about my wife? The woman who discards men who become too attached to her?”

“Lovers and spouses are two very different things, would you not agree? She will become attached to you if you continue on your present course. And women can be positively demonic when their affections are rebuffed.”

“Attached to me?” Gerard asked softly as wonder filled him. If this morning’s playful affection was any indication of what Pel was like when attached, he wanted more of it. All of it. Today was the best day of his life. What if all of his days could be like this one? “I’ve no intention of rebuffing her. I want her, Trenton. I intend to keep her happy.”

“To the exclusion of all others? Nothing less will content her. For some unknown reason, she has odd delusions of love and fidelity in marriage. She certainly did not learn that in our family. From faery tales, perhaps, but not from a firm grounding in reality.”

“No others,” Gerard said, distracted. He looked ahead, wishing he could see his wife from this vantage. As if she felt his silent demand for the sight of her, she appeared and waved, causing him to take an involuntary step toward her.

“You are champing at the bit,” Trenton observed.

“How should I win her heart?” Gerard asked. “With wine and roses? What do women consider romantic?”

Wildflowers picked as afterthoughts and off-the-top-of-his-head poems had lured Em, but his goals were different now, more important. He could not leave this to chance. Everything for Isabel had to be perfect.

“You are asking me?” Trenton’s eyes widened. “How the devil would I know? I’ve never in my life wanted a woman to fall in love with me. Damned inconvenient when they do.”

Gerard frowned. Pel would know and he longed to ask her, just as he had always turned to her for advice and her opinions. But in this instance, he was quite definitely on his own. “I will puzzle it out.”

“I am glad you appreciate her, Grayson. I often wondered what Pelham was looking for outside of wedlock when he had Isabel so smitten within it. He was a god to her in the beginning.”

“He was an idiot. I am no god to Pel. She is well aware of all my shortcomings. If she can see past them, it will be a miracle.” He began walking and Trenton fell into step beside him.

“I would think that to love a person in spite of their faults, rather than because you cannot see those faults, would be the deeper of the two attachments.”

Considering that thought a moment, Gerard broke out in a grin. Which faded as they rounded a large tree and he saw Hargreaves speaking with Isabel. She laughed at something said to her, and the earl’s returning look was both open and fond. They stood together with an obvious familiarity.

Inside him, something twisted and churned. His fists clenched. Then she saw him, and excused herself, moving toward him swiftly.

“What delayed you?” she asked, taking his arm with blatant ownership.

The writhing thing inside him quieted and he exhaled audibly. He wished he were alone with her, talking with her as they had last night when they’d returned to their rooms. Lying in bed with Pel curled to his side and their fingers linked over his chest, he had told her about Emily. Told her about what he had discovered about himself, and listened to her assurances and voice of reason.

“You are not a bad man,” she had said. “Merely one who was young and in need of adoration after living with a mother who could do nothing but chastise you.”

“You make it sound so simple.”

“You are complicated, Gerard, but that does not mean it is not something simple that goads you.”

“Such as?”

“Such as saying farewell to Emily.”

Puzzled, he asked, “How am I to do that?”

She rose to hover above him, her eyes glowing with the reflection of the firelight. “In your heart. In person. In any way at all.”

He shook his head.

“You should. Perhaps during a long walk. Or you could write her a letter.”

“Visit her grave?”

“Yes.” Her smile took his breath away. “Whatever you need to do to say good-bye and set aside your guilt.”

“Will you go with me?”

“If you wish me to, of course I will.”

In the space of an hour, she changed his self-loathing to self-awareness and acceptance. She made everything seem right, made every challenge bearable, made the completion of difficult tasks seem possible. He longed to provide the same for her, to be as valuable a partner to her as she was to him.

“And you?” he asked. “Will you allow me to help you make peace with Pelham?”

She lowered her cheek to his chest, her hair spilling over his shoulder and arm. “Anger at his memory has strengthened me for so long,” she said softly.

“Strengthened you, Pel? Or your barriers?”

Her sigh blew hot across his skin. “Why do you pry at me?”

“You said this was enough, but it isn’t. I want all of you. I am not inclined to share parts of you with any man-dead or living.”

Her breathing stilled until he almost shook her in alarm. Then she gasped and clung to him, her legs tightening around his, her hands clutching his shoulders. He embraced her just as fiercely in return.

“You can hurt me,” she whispered. “Do you understand that?”

“But I will not,” he vowed, his lips to her hair. “Eventually, you will come to believe that.”

After a time, they drifted into sleep, the deepest slumber Gerard had known in many years, because he was no longer trudging through his day waiting for it to end. He had something to look forward to upon waking.

“Isabel,” he said now, leading her a short distance away from the other guests. Ways to win her deeper affections sifted through his brain. “I should like very much to take you to my estate tomorrow.”

She glanced aside at him from beneath her hat, the jaunty angle revealing the curve of her lips and not much more. “Gerard, you may take me anywhere.”

The double entendre was not lost on him. It was a beautiful day, his marriage was on the mend, he had romance on his mind and in his heart. Nothing could steal his contentment. He was about to reply, his heart light at Pel’s teasing banter…

“Grayson.”

The crossly voiced intrusion could not have come at a worse time.

Heaving out a disappointed breath, he turned reluctantly to face his mother. “Yes?”

“You cannot continue to avoid the other guests. You must attend this afternoon’s treasure hunt.”

“Certainly.”

“And supper this evening.”

“Of course.”

“And the ride scheduled for tomorrow.”

“My apologies, madam, but I cannot oblige you there,” he said smoothly, finding her overbearing tendencies lacking their usual irritating effect. Even his mother could not ruin his day. “I have the time reserved for Lady Grayson.”

“Have you no shame?” the dowager snapped.

“Scarcely any, no. I thought you knew that.”

Isabel bit off a laugh and looked away quickly. He somehow managed to keep his face impassive.

“What is so important that you would abandon your hosts again?”

“We travel to Waverly Court tomorrow.”

“Oh.” His mother frowned at him a moment, an expression so common to her countenance that lines permanently etched its passing. “I should like to go. I’ve not been there in many years.”

Gerard was silent a moment, remembering suddenly that his parents had spent some time in residence there. “You are welcome to join us.”

The smile she bestowed on him startled, the transformation of her features was so unnerving. But it disappeared as quickly as it came. “Now come join the rest of the party, Grayson, and behave yourself as is appropriate to your station.”

Watching his mother walk away, he shook his head. “I hope you can disregard her gloom.”

“I can with you at my side,” Isabel replied offhand, as if she were not saying something that completely rocked him to the core.

He took a brief moment to catch his bearings, and then allowed his grin to break free.

No doubt about it. Nothing could ruin his day.

“Lady Hammond would have to pair us together,” Rhys muttered, moving rapidly up the wooded path.

“The thought of hunting treasure with you made me giddy,” she teased. “I am dreadfully sorry if you do not feel the same about being with me.”

The side glance he shot at her was so hot, her skin felt burned. “No. I would not call what I feel ‘giddy.’”

The dead leaves along the trail crunched beneath every heavy step of his hessians. Dressed in dark green, he was stunningly handsome. Once again, she marveled that such a bold, masculine creature would find anything arousing about her, but it was clear the marquess did. And was very upset by that fact.

“If I had any say in the matter,” he grumbled, “I would pull you into that clearing over there and lick you from head to toe.”

Staring straight ahead, Abby had no idea what a woman was supposed to say in reply to such a statement. So she looked at the paper in her unsteady grip and said, “We need a smooth stone. There is a river around the bend up there.”

“That dress you are wearing is distracting.”

“Distracting?” It was one of her most flattering, a soft pink muslin with burgundy satin ribbon edging the low-cut bodice. She had selected it just for him, even though she hadn’t the bosom to make it truly fetching.

“I know with a quick tug, your nipples will pop free and I can suck on them.”

Her empty hand sheltered her racing heart. “Oh my. You are being very naughty.”

He snorted. “Not as naughty as I would like to be. Pinning you to a tree and lifting your skirts would do nicely.”

“Lifting my-” She stumbled to a halt as every cell in her body responded to the picture his words evoked. “It is the middle of the day.”

Rhys, lost in his own thoughts, took several steps forward before realizing she remained behind. He turned to face her, his rich hair glinting in the filtered light of the overhead canopy. “Are your nipples different in the sunlight? Is your scent altered? Your skin less soft? Your cunt less tight and wet?”

She shook her head rapidly, unable to speak.

His gaze bore intensely into hers. “I have to depart in the morning, Abby. I cannot remain here and debauch you further. That I am trusted to be alone with you is like trusting the wolf to guard the lamb. It’s perverse.”

Try as she might to keep her mother’s advice firmly in her mind, she could not do it. Her heart ached. She could only hope her exterior did not betray her.

“I understand,” she said tonelessly, all her previous enjoyment in the day gone.

Why did this man appeal to her so deeply?

She had lain in her bed after leaving him and pondered that question for hours. In the end, she decided it was a combination of many things, some external, like his attractiveness and charm. And others internal, like his tendency to find new joy in her discoveries about how men and women related with one another. With him, she did not feel gauche. She was desirable, witty, and wise. Rhys thought it was “wonderful” that she enjoyed puzzling out scientific equations. He had even kissed the ink stains on her fingers as if they were a thing of beauty.

He was known for his ennui and jaded views, but Rhys was only dormant, not dead. She longed to be the catalyst that revived him, but she knew his sense of duty to his title would never allow her to be.

It would be best if he left.

“It would be best if you left.”

He stared at her for a long moment, unmoving, so when he lunged at her and grabbed her roughly, she was caught completely unawares. His hands in her hair, he kissed her with unrestrained passion, his thrusting tongue stealing her breath and her wits.

“You make me forget myself,” he said harshly against her bruised lips. “To see you dismiss me so summarily drives me insane.”

“Something has obviously driven you insane,” snapped a familiar female voice.

Rhys groaned. “Bloody hell.”

“Leave it to you, Trenton,” drawled Lord Grayson, “to ruin my day.”