Chapter 15
Warning bells went off.
Big ones.
Thunderous ones.
Not the lightly lilting sort, but the grave, ominous toll of the seventeen-ton chiming bell at St. Paul’s Cathedral.
For he recognized his wife’s tone; it was one that bordered on peeved and pain and usually preceded the moment he ended it with a paramour—and just in time.
The rub of it was, a chap couldn’t just go about cutting one’s wife off. At least, not completely. At that, when one’s wife was still one’s bride. And even more so, when one was aching to get himself inside the lady’s tight channel.
Stepping with great care, he used his tongue and teeth to make tender love to her neck.
“You are my only little raven,” he said silkily, knowing what she wanted to hear. It was what all women wanted to believe—they were the only one. Let her have this for tonight.
That way, they could both get what they wanted from one another.
“Do you assign different animals befitting the lady’s appearance or temperament?”
He didn’t know whether to laugh or groan. “Do you truly want to talk about my relationship with other women on our wedding night, Daria?” he asked impatiently. “Do you want to know what I call my lovers?”
Her deadly serious, pale features didn’t waver. “Yes.”
A sigh pulled from his chest. Ceding the battle and not the war, he stepped away from his wife.
“I don’t know, Daria.” Discomfited, he headed for the Hepplewhite cellarette and reached for the Bristol blue brandy decanter. “I haven’t thought about the bloody endearment.”
As his fingers touched the stopper, his gaze caught upon Daria’s reflection in the mirror.
“Is that what it is?” she asked softly.
He stared perplexedly.
“An endearment?”
Argyll blanched.
His wife, this night, all of it was too much. All he wanted to do was to seat himself between his bride’s supple legs, and instead she wanted to speak about his past seductions.
He hastily tugged the metal ring and uncorked the bottle. “If you’re looking for affection and warmth from me as a husband, Daria, you are destined for disappointment.” He splashed several fingerfuls into his snifter.
“I’m not looking for affection, Gregory,” she said so simply he actually believed her—or he at least believed she’d convinced herself.
Argyll finished his pour. The way he saw it there were only one of two ways this conversation with his bewitching bride ended: either with the quixotic miss thoroughly and properly bedded and wedded and his lust for her sated.
Or, Argyll shut out of her chambers, with an erection that wouldn’t cease.
Argyll carefully plugged the bottle and set it upon the marble top.
Prepared to win the battle to bed her, he faced his expressionless bride. “My dear.”
Daria tipped her head, displaying the long, graceful length of her neck. A green-blue vein stood out as a stark invitation. That slightly curving line begged for his lips and teeth.
Taking in a slow breath through his nose, Argyll took a drink. “You want to know how I’ve referred to my past lovers, do you not? My dear is one way.” He gave the contents of his glass a little swirl. “Darling. My pet.”
“Is that all?’
He quirked a brow. “Would you like to spend our wedding night creating a fresh set of terms for my future lovers?” he asked cruelly.
Daria flinched; her gaze slid away from his.
So much for a rake’s charm. Wryly shaking his head, he took another sip.
“I believe it would be wise to discuss the terms to our arrangement, Gregory.”
Argyll instantly regretted his swallow. He choked once around it.
When he managed to breathe, he narrowed his eyes. “Oh?”
Daria nodded.
In addition to sarcasm and rhetorical questions, his wife also failed to properly detect menace.
“I do not believe it wise for us to make love.”
Here was a first.
The first woman in the course of Argyll’s entire rakish existence—at that, the lady he was married to—who’d rejected him. He would roar with laughter. If he wasn’t fit to be tied with desire and fast-climbing fury.
It was on the damned bloody tip of his tongue to say they needn’t bother with love; that just a well-enjoyed consummation would do.
“And what brought you to that conclusion, wife?”
She searched worried eyes over his face. “I’ve angered you.”
“Do I look happy?” he snapped.
“No, that is why I remarked—”
“Never mind.” Closing his eyes, Argyll pinched the bridge of his nose.
“I know a man with your reputation will have your pride pricked.” His thoughtful wife came over and patted him on the back.
“I’m less concerned with your smoothing my wounded pride, madam, and more intent on the why of it.”
Argyll was rather proud of his calm given the volatile storm brewing under his skin.
“Oh.”
“Oh, as in it did not occur to you, I might wonder at that?”
Daria chewed at her finger. “This is about your need for an heir?”
“No, this is about me wanting to fuck you,” he said bluntly.
A fiery red spilled across her cheeks. Her lips parted.
“Oh?” he supplied for her.
She nodded. “I’m not accustomed to that manner of coarse language.” Her color deepened.
Damn if she didn’t look lovely with that color in her face, and how much more bloody entrancing were it to be from Argyll thrusting between her trim thighs.
Argyll set his glass down on the mantel and wandered nearer his wife. “I’ve answered you, wife. Your turn now.”
Having this conversation after he’d reveled in her body, only to be left rock hard, didn’t bode well—for either of them. But have it they would.
He crossed his arms at his chest. “One does not change the terms of a contract after they’ve been set and agreed upon, madam.”
Daria bit the corner of her finger. “Given the day’s…events, our arrangement merits new considerations.”
It was too much.
“There is no current situation, madam,” he shouted. Argyll tossed his arms high. “And what bloody ‘events’. The only one I recall was marriage.” One he was fast beginning to regret.
Amidst his storm, Daria remained the picture of calm.
Closing his eyes, Argyll dragged in several slow breaths. “What precisely is the situation you speak?” he repeated.
“I do not want you coming to my bed after you’ve spent the day in some woman’s arms, Gregory.” Daria shook her head. “I will not do it.”
He stared. Wait.
What?
This is what she believed?
Why shouldn’t she? You evaded her all day.
And when she visited his office, he’d been in a state of dishabille, stinking of brandy, wearing marks on his neck.
On top of that, DuMond warned him.
“Do you have nothing to say?” Daria asked haltingly.
Which did she seek? A promise he’d not been in the arms of any woman but her today? An assurance of his fidelity?
He’d give her neither.
“There is also—”
He forced a bitter laugh. “There is more?”
Daria’s cheeks pinkened, that same dusty hue of her nipples he’d played with moments ago.
God rot her for this.
“I believe it might be best we not have children.”
He laughed outright. “At this rate, that is the last worry you and I shall ever have.”
“I’m going to die,” she said softly.
Argyll snatched the ends of his hair and yanked. “This again?” He cursed a lengthy stream of profanities.
His bride remained unmoved.
Had he bloody imagined how she’d come alive in his arms? Twice?
“And I had not considered until—”
“I was off tupping some whore,” he jibed.
Daria jerked like he’d struck her.
Argyll curled his hands into sharp fists. By God, I will not be made to feel bad. Not for this.
Daria stretched a hand out. “If we have children, they will be sad if I’m gone and there is no—”
“Enough,” he said quietly.
“No one to share their lives with and the only way—”
“I said enough, Daria,” he said quietly, with a calm he did not feel inside.
This time, she complied.
“You are attempting to punish me for, as you see it, being unfaithful?” He almost choked on the word.
The bloody fucking irony.
Her lips formed a small frown. “I am not vindictive, Gregory. I am your wife.”
“No,” he said, folding his arms at his chest; his muscles popping with tension. “You are my bride. We are nothing in the eyes of the law and church…until I bed you.”
Her face crumpled. “I have hurt you.”
“I cannot be hurt,” he said frostily, and factually.
She stretched a palm towards him. “Then, why are you—”
“You’re all-knowing. You see the future. You claim to know my thoughts. Figure it out yourself.” Letting out a fresh wave of curses, he stomped over to his Cellier and grabbed a bottle.
“I never said I am all-knowing, Gregory.” When he swung back, he found her eyes drowning in sorrow.
A lance struck between his ribs. Again, she’d allow him to feel guilty? He steeled himself against the sensation.
“I don’t want to hear anything you’ve previously said in the past. You are no different than every other woman, my dear.”
He’d lied. And by the way Daria’s nails frantically scrabbled with the sides of her thumbs, he’d done a bang-up job of it, too.
“Everything from your mouth has been a lie.” Letting loose a cold laugh, he gathered his bottle and lifted it her way. “While you have gotten everything you wanted.” He brought his hands together in an awkward clap. “Congratulations, Duchess.”
Had she flinched. Had her shoulders dropped or tears welled in her eyes, he couldn’t have felt worse than the stillness of her pale features.
But goddamn it. He had an erection that wouldn’t quit and the only woman who’d satisfy his hunger was this infuriating, stubborn, compelling minx who thought he’d been bedding another, when she was the only damned—
“I do not want to be your duchess, Gregory,” she whispered. “I want—”
“It would have been helpful, madam, if you’d arrived at such a conclusion before you circumvented my marriage to the woman I actually wanted as my bride.”
“You to call me Daria,” she finished softly; clashing violently with his interruption.
Her words hung forlorn and hopeful.
His fell like the weight of a battering hammer. His chest grew tightened. He wanted to recall the words. And he couldn’t say for what reason, other than…one.
Guilt.
He had lived a life without regret. Until now. The sensation drew tighter.
Of a certainty, he did not like this whole feeling business.
Argyll set his bottle on the floor. “That was an unkind cut.” That was as close as he could get himself to an apology.
“No, it wasn’t, Gregory. That was you being truthful.” Daria lifted her shoulders in a shrug that could only be described as…sad.
His hands wavered at his side. He made them into fists.
Of all the emotions she didn’t show: happiness, excitement. The ones he didn’t rouse her to: desire, longing. It was this? It should be a hellishly disarming sadness that crept through her unflinching composure.
His heart knocked dull against his ribcage.
Oh, what delight the Devil must be finding in all this.
I need to get out of here now.
Away from her.
Away from the heinous feelings she roused.
But before he went, by God, he’d say his piece. “Do not speak to me now about our heartbroken children.” Precocious babes with eyes as vast as their mother’s, and the same spirit that would turn all of England upside down.
Daria’s eyes that were now stricken and unblinking on him.
Argyll stumbled, briefly forgetting himself.
He took in a breath and forced his thoughts to right.
“You yourself proposed terms for…for…” The day she is no longer here.
A sharp burning hit his chest. He measured his breathing once more.
“Their future, should some fantastical curse come true.” Argyll unfurled his fingers from the tight curl they’d formed.
His attention narrowed to her. “Be honest, Daria. Your reneging isn’t about saving any child born to us from cruelty when you’re gone.”
“I didn’t say you were cruel.” Her voice caught.
Argyll scoffed. “What did you mean to imply when you insisted your family be allowed to raise the child?”
She drew back. “I meant you’d be carrying on with your life and your…your pursuits.”
“Fucking women?”
If his tongue-tied wife went any redder, she would surely catch fire. “I do not like that word.”
Argyll forced out a sardonic laugh. “That makes two of us, Your Grace, for I have not particularly enjoyed the words issuing from your mouth either.”
He needed to go.
Now.
He didn’t trust he wouldn’t say things that would cut her even deeper.
“Be honest about one bloody thing in all of this, Daria.” His eyes hardened. “This isn’t about me. This isn’t about our unborn children. This is about you protecting your heart—.”
She was shaking her head.
“From me.” He ignored her lie. “I allowed you to persuade us both that you possessed the fortitude for this, and when you discovered, after one damned day—” He took a swift step toward her.
Paling, Daria scrambled to the opposite side of the bed.
Argyll halted.
She thought he would hurt her?
A sick, sullen anger coiled in his chest.
Argyll stared at her. “Tonight, I would have made dreams you didn’t even know you possessed come true, Daria. I would have made your body weep with a pleasure that rendered what passed between us in the carriage this morning a bloody hand kiss.”
He did not trust himself nearer her. Not when he wanted to strip his infuriating wife bare, lay her open beneath him, and drive himself into the only home he wanted in this moment.
His jaw grated, pain lancing up his temple.
He turned for the door.
No—damn it. That was not all. Because, Hell take him, she needed to hear it.
He swung back to his ashen bride. “Do you know the bloody irony of this?” he hissed, stalking back to her.
“There was no other woman tonight. Because you are the only one I hungered for.” He caught her by the arms and drew her close; his fingers trembled with the force of his restraint.
“I hunger for you, Daria,” he rasped. “I want you as I have never wanted another.”
Her rosebud lips parted, a soft, breathless sound escaping her. “Oh.”
A manic laugh tore from him. “The fact that I want to bury myself to the hilt inside you—and only you—earns me that look?”
He released her abruptly.
“You made a mistake in asking me to marry you, Daria. You were never strong enough—never hard enough—to weather life as my wife.”
His gaze raked over her, unflinching.
“We are both well and truly stuck.”