Chapter Eight #2
He lifted her up and off him and set her down roughly on the other side of his bed.
She gave a startled squeak. There was moonlight shining through the window—the curtains were open—and he could see she was as completely naked as he had suspected.
Her pale skin shone, her long legs were stretched out, and her dark hair formed an inadequate cloak over breasts with rosy nipples.
She was beautiful, and he wasn’t sure why that surprised him.
Perhaps because when they first met he had seen only her fear and her need for his help, but looking at her now .
. . For the first time, Rory could see that his new wife was actually a prize.
He took a breath and then another, trying to calm himself and allow his aching and very hard cock to soften.
Was she doing this because she had discovered she was breeding after all, and she was trying to confuse the issue of the child’s father?
His cock soon softened at the thought of being taken advantage of in such a way.
It was all very well to offer to save Grace from her desperate situation, to offer her a safe haven, but he had expected her to be honest with him, and to respect his wishes in return.
“Why are you here?” he growled. “Answer me.”
She was huddled on top of the bed cover, eyes dark and frightened in her white face, as if she expected at any moment for him to strike out at her. Tumble her onto the floor and kick her out of his room. He could see her chest rising and falling on quick breaths, like a cornered animal.
Rory didn’t want her to look at him like that. He took another deep breath and leveled his voice into something less alarming. “I won’t hurt you, Grace. I just want to know why you are here in my bed.”
When she answered, her voice was soft with a defiant note. “We are wed. Why shouldn’t I come to your bed? It is usual for a husband and wife to consummate their union.”
Rory noticed she was twisting her hands together, the movement a telltale sign of her inner turmoil. “But that was not part of our bargain,” he reminded her sternly. “Why are you so keen for our union to be consummated?”
She took a breath, and it sounded shaky, and blurted, “My father says our marriage will not be legal until then. He says you could grow tired of me or find another woman you wanted to marry, and then you would send me away, or return me to him, and I must make sure that never happens. And the only way to be sure is to join with you.”
Rory wondered why he had not thought of this himself even while the knowledge that the earl was still telling his daughter what to do sent anger fizzing under his skin.
Doubts niggled at him again. Was she telling him the whole truth?
He had thought her just an unhappy girl, driven to desperation by circumstance, but perhaps he had seen only what he wanted to see. Perhaps he had underestimated her?
“You told me you were not with child,” he said coldly. “Is that the truth?”
She nodded violently, her hair all over the place. “It is the truth, I swear it is!”
“When did you last lay with Bolton Buckingham?”
She chewed her lip. “We were together two months ago, but he didn’t . . . that is, he never put his . . . inside me. I cannot be breeding.”
Rory thought about that. Then, his brows rose to his hairline as he realized the significance of her words. “You are still a virgin?”
She hesitated, and this time she spoke reluctantly, as if the memory was not one she wanted to share.
“Yes. In that way, I am. Bolton liked to tease me. To bring me to a point where I was begging him to finish and then laugh and turn away. He said he would know when the time had come, but it never did.”
Tears shone in her eyes. “I think he enjoyed controlling me, making me suffer. It—it pleased him when I begged him. I do not think of myself as a virgin, and my father certainly doesn’t, but I suppose I am.”
Rory was stunned by this revelation. It was so far from his own experiences and behaviors that it felt completely foreign to him.
Buckingham brought her to near completion time and time again, and then just stopped?
His stomach roiled at the thought. “But when you were discovered . . .? Were you not . . .?” he began, hoping he was wrong and Buckingham had taken her, because if not then her ruination was even more unfair.
“We were naked, in a bed, so how could I deny what they thought they saw? No one would have believed me. I thought Bolton would surely have to offer for me. I hoped he might have some feelings for me, although by then I knew he did not love me. But I told myself that guilt at my plight and the fact of him being a—a gentleman would make him step up and do the right thing. It was what I had wanted from the start, what I had—had planned.”
“You planned it?” Rory asked and knew he sounded judgmental. “You wanted to trap him into marriage?”
She shook her head miserably. “Not like that. I thought he loved me . . . liked me at least, and I was sure we could be happy. And marrying him would take me away from my father and give me a safe place to bring my sisters. I would have made him a good wife,” she added, looking him in the eye, as if daring him to argue.
“But instead he ran away and left you to face the scandal on your own,” Rory said quietly.
He contemplated her revelations while she stayed quiet beside him, apart from her uneven breathing.
Was she crying, or trying not to? He couldn’t blame her—it was even worse than he had first thought.
Grace was ruined because she had been discovered with her lover, and no one would believe she was still a virgin.
Not that it would have mattered anyway. The mere fact of her being with a man in such a situation meant her reputation was in tatters, and after that the earl couldn’t wait to be rid of her.
Probably her ruination had been just the opportunity he had been waiting for so he could cast her off and concentrate on the two daughters he had sired.
Grace shivered, and realizing she was cold, Rory made an impatient sound and reached to pull the covers over her.
He found her nakedness distracting. She flinched when he moved, but he ignored her as he drew the quilt up and over her naked body and, while she stared at him wide-eyed like one of Callum’s injured forest creatures, he tucked her in.
And then he leaned over her and looked down into her face as she stared back.
“Now, listen to me,” he said sternly. “I am not going to abandon you or—or toss you aside, no matter what Ormsby says. I have given you my word and I mean to keep it. I will protect you, but we will lead separate lives. You will go your way and I will go mine. That was the bargain we agreed on, and that is what we will do.”
She shook her head and tears filled her dark eyes.
She gave a half sob. “You say that now, but you will fall in love with someone else and then you will want me gone. And then I will be worse than ruined and my father will never let me see my sisters again.” Her voice rose on the last word and she pulled the quilt over her head.
Rory felt a ridiculous desire to laugh. “I promise you I willna fall in love. I am no’ the type to fall in love. Everyone knows that.”
Her voice was muffled. “You might say that now but love has a way of creeping up and—and pouncing.”
“Oh, for God’s sake . . .” He pulled down the coverings, causing her to gasp, and then rested his hands on either side of her head, pinning her there. He leaned in close, and for a moment all he could think was how luscious her lips were and how much he wanted to kiss them.
He cleared his throat and told himself sternly to behave.
“’Tis very late, Grace, and we are both tired, and you are being overly dramatic.
Let’s wait until tomorrow. We can talk about your future then, and what I can do to help you make it what you want it to be.
I didna marry you lightly. I want to see you are safe and happy in your new life. ”
“Then why not consummate our marriage?” she asked him sulkily, pouting those tempting lips.
“Then I will know you truly mean what you say, and that you cannot rid yourself of me on a—a whim.” She shot him a glance from beneath her long dark lashes, and he remembered he was naked too.
“I can tell you want to lie with me,” she said slyly.
“And sometimes I ache with the need to have a man inside me.”
Rory wasn’t sure whether to kiss her or shout at her.
He felt both infuriated and frustrated. He was trying to do the right thing!
He was trying to be a good man, and she was goading him into being the exact opposite.
Did she really trust him so little? But he supposed she had little reason to trust any man.
And then there was the tempting thought that she was aching for him . . .
“I will not discuss this tonight,” he said through gritted teeth. “If you will not leave my bed then I must.”
But Grace shook her head and, with a sob, began to fumble with the covers he had just tucked around her. She slid out from the bed, and he saw her body in the moonlight as she hurried to the door, the soft curves of her breasts and hips, the peach of her bottom, and then she was gone.
He sat and stared after her, feeling confused and very aroused, and yet stubborn in his determination to stand by his word.
Rory had given her all that it was in his power to give her to keep her safe, and he refused to give her more.
Because that would mean . . . He wasn’t sure what it might mean, only that he suspected that once he made her his wife in truth, nothing would ever be the same again.