His Temporary Duchess (Dukes Ever After #5)

Chapter 26

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

E leanor sat by Sebastian’s bed, a cloth in her hands. His skin appeared waxy, dotted with sweat, and she bathed his forehead.

“You fool,” she whispered, and when he didn’t react, she clasped her hands in her lap again. The physician had arrived and left; there was nothing she could do now but wait for his fever to break.

She prayed it would.

After everything they had been through, fate would be too cruel if it stole him from her now—just when she had gained him.

He stirred, and she looked back over him, examining him closely. His long, dark hair clung to his damp neck, and his eyes moved from below bruised eyelids. Although he had not been conscious since that moment in the street, it didn’t seem as though his rest was proving especially restful.

“Please,” she murmured, taking his hand and threading her fingers through his. “Come back to me. I already reconciled myself to losing you once—I can’t lose you again. I can’t. Please, my darling. Come back and tell me you love me. Come back and tell me you hate me. Just come back to me.”

In the hearth, the fire crackled, and she stared into his silent, waxy visage, clapping a hand over her face and doing her best not to give way into panic.

The door opened and Abigail pushed through. Olivia had offered to stay with them too, providing assistance where she could, but Eleanor had decided against it. Instead, she had tasked Luke with traveling to the manor for details, then relaying them back to Olivia.

At least that way, she could promote one match, even if it was not her own.

“How are you feeling, Your Grace?”

“I…” Eleanor blinked. How long had she been sitting in this chair? “I’m fine.”

“I brought you dinner. I think you should eat something, Your Grace.”

Eating was the very last thing on Eleanor’s mind, but she pinched her inner wrist. If Sebastian were well, he would tell her to eat. In fact, he would order to do so in that commanding tone of his, and she would have no choice but to obey, because she never did have a choice when it came to Sebastian.

“Thank you,” she said, accepting the tray and forcing a few ashy mouthfuls down. “Thank you. You’ve been very good to me.”

“Of course. All the staff are hoping that His Grace pulls through. For both your sakes.” With a sad smile and a curtsy, Abigail left the room, and Eleanor stared at Sebastian’s slumbering form until she finally succumbed to sleep.

Sebastian’s dreams had been tangled, dark, and angry. Yet whenever he thought he might sink under the weight of them, he was always brought back to himself by a soft voice saying his name, or a cool hand on his brow.

When he finally did push through the darkness of his mind and open his eyes, he found himself in a new kind of darkness. Embers from a fire glowed in the corner of the room, tinting the world around him in shades of red. The shape of the room was familiar, and it took him a moment to understand that he was looking at his bedchamber back at the manor.

Eleanor!

His last waking memory had been of her. She hadn’t gone—he had found her. He sat in a panic, and a languid hand pressed at his shoulder.

“ Sebastian ?” his wife uttered, her voice so full of hope and disbelief that his heart fair broke from the sound of it. “Don’t move! Save your strength. Stay still. Stay quiet.” She eased him back into the bed. “Are you truly awake?” She struck a match and light flared, revealing her familiar face, eyes shadowed by exhaustion and grief.

He wished he could wipe the expression away. He struggled against her restraining hand. He couldn’t be still and quiet until he told her all the things he needed to. A strange panic rose in him. He’d wasted too many minutes already; he couldn’t waste a single one more.

“Eleanor,” he said hoarsely.

“Shh, shh. It’s all right.”

“No, it’s not.” He took her hand and squeezed it in both of his, wishing he could do more. But although he was awake, and he knew that for certain, his head ached and his limbs felt like water. He could not have put strength into them even if he wanted to.

Still, he had strength enough for this.

“I love you,” he told her. “I have loved you for far longer than I had ever dared admit to myself, because of my fear that you would leave me. I admit that at the beginning, I thought my life would be easier without you in it, but I was wrong, and it has been quite some time since I realized that. My life is incomplete without you by my side as my wife, with everything that entails. There is no one else. Not for me. I love you too dearly for that, far more than I ever loved Lydia, whatever you may think.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “You always wanted her.”

“No. No . I thought I did when I was young and foolish and knew no better.”

“But the way you danced with her—”

“I only danced with her because you danced with Luke.” At the confusion filling her eyes, he brought her fingers to his lips. “I know now you meant nothing by it, but I could not bear standing by and watching you dance with him. That was an error of mine, but it meant nothing. I only ever wanted to discourage her from her pursuit—it meant nothing to her, either. She wanted me then because I had moved out of her reach.” He had come to that conclusion long ago. She’d had plenty of time to find him and seek him out since she had ended things. The fact she had only ever tried after his marriage proved to him it was a selfish pursuit, and her affections meant nothing.

She didn’t truly want to be his mistress. That would be disastrous to her reputation, and she had yet to marry. All she had wanted to prove was that she still had power over him.

Unfortunately for her, he had already fallen in love with Eleanor.

Tears spilled down Eleanor’s cheeks. “I thought you didn’t care for me in that way,” she whispered. “I thought I’d failed.”

“I was afraid once. But I am not afraid anymore.” He squeezed her fingers in his. “Can you forgive me?”

“Forgive you ?”

“Yes.”

“Of course. There’s no question if you—” She swallowed. “If you really mean that you love me , then what is there to forgive?”

“So much. I don’t deserve you.” He pulled her closer, then hesitated. “Can you call me a bath?”

She gave a little gurgle of laughter and came to lie beside him, tucking herself against his sweat-soaked body. “I don’t mind.”

“You should.” He winced as he adjusted, but with Eleanor against him, he felt as though he could finally rest in a way he had been unable to do until then.

“When you’re well, we can consider that.”

“I feel better now.” He turned and found her face closer than anticipated. Her eyelashes brushed his cheek as she lowered her gaze to his mouth.

“When you’re better,” she promised in a whisper. “Until then, my darling, sleep.”

His heart felt lighter than it had in years. Finally freed from his certainty that everyone he came to care for would leave him, the tension in his heart left him. Terrible things happened, that was true, but he had done his fair share of alienating the people who had been close to him. Lydia had been subject to all his insecurities, and they had become too much for her—she had been too young to handle his trauma.

Eleanor was not. And in return, he would open his heart to her once and for all.

It took a further four days for Sebastian to fully recover. Eleanor spent the majority of the time by his side, but when he slept—as he did often—she made plans for his recovery.

First was the flowers. She went into the garden and picked armfuls of roses and other blooms to place in vases on every surface. Then she continued ordering the curtains and draperies of various rooms to be replaced.

He had chosen her. Whenever she thought about it, her heart swelled as though it might burst free from her chest. He had chosen her and she would not take that lightly. And so, she made the decision to turn his house into their home.

A place where they could learn to live as one. As husband and wife for the rest of their days.

On the fourth day, she rose early and transformed the breakfast room, intending to return to his bedchamber later and escort him down herself. But upon hearing the brush of footsteps, she spun to find her husband in the doorway to the room, his eyes on the floral display behind her. She had gone as far as draping vines around the unlit candelabra.

“Oh,” she said stupidly. “You’re awake.”

“I was feeling a lot better this morning, and I missed you.” He advanced into the room, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “It seems as though you have been busy.”

“I wanted to surprise you.”

“Consider me surprised.”

“Do you dislike it?” She looked into his face, and he brought his hand to her chin, thumb brushing her skin gently. “I hoped you might come to like it.”

“I like it a lot,” he said, still looking down at her.

“I wanted this to be our house, one that we both love.”

His mouth twitched. He had changed in the days since she had discovered him half-dead as he searched for her. And perhaps she had changed too—the part of her so desperate to flee had withered and died as she had stared into his frozen face. There could be no leaving now, not when he had proven himself so desperate to keep her.

And he, in turn, had shown himself to be slower to temper, more open with his smiles and his affection. The last barrier between them, one she had not known existed before then, had fallen away.

Yet for all that, she found a new somberness in him. A new appreciation for the world around him.

“This is your home as much as mine— more , even,” he said. “I’ve had well over a decade to make it mine as much as I could want. Now you have a blank canvas. Draw on it as you would wish. I want you to be happy here, and truthfully, I’m attached to nothing here but you.”

“I should have known I’d married a flirt.”

His smile widened into something so bright, her breath caught. “Did you not know by the way we first met?”

“You swore then you had no aspirations in my direction.”

“Why, when I first arrived there, I did not. You intrigued me.” The thumb brushing her chin moved to her lip. “As you still do to this day.”

Scrunch chose that moment to burst from her pocket, running up to her shoulder. Sebastian reared back, and Eleanor laughed.

“Are you still afraid of him?”

“I am not afraid .” Even so, he regarded the rodent with a mix of trepidation and affection. “Would you mind putting him to one side?”

“Why?”

“Why do you think?” A smile creased his face. “So I can kiss you.”

She had to laugh, and she scooped Scrunch into her hand. Fortunately, she had somewhere to put him now.

“Come with me,” she said, taking Sebastian’s hand and leading him back up to her bedchamber where the wooden cage Sebastian had ordered to be made stood ready. Carefully, she deposited her pet through the door fashioned for him, then closed it properly.

Then she spun back to her husband.

“Well?” she asked archly. “Were you not about to kiss me?”

“Indeed I was,” he chuckled, sliding a hand around to the back of her neck. He brought his mouth down on hers.

His kiss was soft and gentle, tender, saying everything he had already put into words. He loved her—she knew that, understood it in her heart, but he reminded her through her body as he parted her lips with his.

“Beautiful,” he murmured, kissing the corner of her mouth, then her cheekbone, then her eyelids, her brows. “I am the luckiest man to have ever walked this earth.”

“I love you,” she whispered, her breath leaving her lungs.

“I love you. More than I could ever have imagined loving anyone.” His fingers pressed into the small of her back, bowing her body into his. They had not been intimate since the night of that awful ball, and even then, there had been something mechanical about it. As though they were following familiar paths without thought or emotion.

Now, she felt the way he bared his heart to her.

She ached for him.

And predictably, her body turned to liquid in anticipation of how he could make her feel.

“Eleanor,” he said against her lips. “I hunger for you. Will you let me?”

“Let you what?”

He leaned back so she could see the glint in his eyes. “Why, darling wife. Have breakfast, of course.”

She trembled with desire as she nodded, and he picked her up—his recent illness had not diminished his strength, it seemed—placing her on the bed.

“Let me worship you,” he said, dropping to his knees before her, his eyes dark and just as hungry as he had said. I hunger for you .

“I burn for you,” she said, the words finding their way to her lips.

He glanced at her, expression soft despite the hard edge of his desire. His hands slid under her skirts, pushing them up to her waist. His eyes glowed with anticipation and his fingers skirted the edge of her slick core. She shivered at the flash of pleasure, there and gone.

“I want you to sound your pleasure,” he told her, that command she loved so much in his voice. “Don’t hold back for me, Eleanor. Can you do that?”

So different from when he had asked her to be quiet. There was no hiding what they were doing now—no hint of shame as he brought his mouth to her inner thigh. She let her head hang back, bracing herself on her hands as he peppered soft kisses across her inner thighs, his fingers teasing her until she writhed on the table.

“My feast,” he murmured, flicking his gaze to her, a wicked gleam in his eyes she recognized. Then he brought his head between her legs and feasted on her like a man starved, licking and sucking, using his finger to press inside her. There was little to no resistance.

To think she had been prepared to leave this behind for the remainder of her days.

Remembering his command, she didn’t bite her lip to keep her gasps and moans contained. With every sound that burst from her, he moved with added urgency.

When eventually she fell apart, his name was on her tongue. He held her through the waves of pleasure, drinking in her nectar as she trembled, her arms almost not enough to hold her up.

“Sebastian,” she said when he seemed to make as though he would continue there. “Sebastian, please. I need you.”

He rose, leaning over her, his erection hot and hard against her thigh as he kissed her, letting her taste the musk of her desire on his mouth. “I could do that forever,” he said huskily. “I love the way you sound.”

“Sebastian,” she whispered.

“I love you. I want you to feel how much.”

“I do.” She cupped his cheek with her palm, looking into his eyes. “You show me every day.”

“I haven’t. But I will.”

“You have,” she shook her head. “You made a cage for Scrunch. You see me, even when I feel like I want to hide. You let me into your house, and you have embraced me even when it terrified you to. You came after me, Sebastian. No one else has ever gone to such lengths for me.” Her heart swelled with such love, she thought she might split apart from it. “I will never forget.”

“I will endeavor to deserve you.”

“You already do. That’s what loving is.” She placed a hand against her heart. “As long as you hold me here, you deserve my love.” She smiled at his expression of wonder. “Take me now. Show me your love. And let me show you.”

His lips curved. “I already showed you with my mouth.”

“Show me again,” she whispered.