Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Hours later, Amelia held a candle up to the hall outside her bedchambers at Riverside Court. Paintings of severe-looking gentlemen lined either side of the corridor. Glancing through the windows, she guessed the sun had set hours ago.
I should not have slept so long this afternoon, she chided herself inwardly. Now I am too restless to remain in the foreign, strange-smelling room that has been assigned to me.
Her candle cast shadows on the grand staircase as she made her way downstairs.
A flickering, warm light caught her attention on the second floor. She walked towards it, careful not to trip on the runner beneath her.
The housekeeper, Mrs. Smythe, had given her a brief tour upon arriving. She recalled a reading room nearby, where she could waste the hours until sunrise.
She paused in the doorway to the firelit room and peered inside. A smoldering fire crackled in the hearth. Had the servants forgotten to bank it before retiring? Entering, Amelia crossed to the fireplace and set her candle down on the mantle.
“It’s a good thing I could not sleep,” she murmured to herself.
“A good thing for whom?” she heard behind her.
Gasping, Amelia spun around. She squinted against the darkness, her heart pounding in her ears.
Nicholas stared at her, his thumb holding a clothbound book open in his lap.
A tall candle stood vigil on the table beside him.
He had removed his jacket and vest, one leg crossed over the other, his dark hair pushed away from his face in a way she liked.
“I had no designs of— I did not know that you were…” Amelia stopped herself, stumbling over her words. “I am so sorry for disturbing you. I could not sleep.”
“That does not surprise me.” He returned to his book, licking his thumb to turn the page. “You did not come down for dinner. Could not be stirred, so I was told.”
“It was a taxing morning.”
“Hm,” Nicholas hummed, then looked up. “Taxing?”
“Busy,” Amelia corrected. She rubbed her eyes and stepped toward him. “What are you doing here?”
Nicholas looked down at his book again and arched a brow.
“Reading,” he sighed. “Attempting to read.”
He closed his book, preserving the page with his thumb, and gently dragged the chair next to him closer with his booted foot.
“You may sit with me, if you do so silently. You were particularly gregarious in the carriage ride earlier today.”
Pressing her lips together, Amelia crossed the room toward him.
She became fiercely aware of her state of undress.
A thin cotton chemise clung to her body beneath her silk dressing gown.
Each step caused the floorboards to squeak beneath her, and she hastened over to the chair he had offered her, fingers fluttering over the leather back as she inspected the nearby shelves of books.
“Is this your private reading room?” she asked, examining the collection. Barely legible titles glinted in the candlelight. “It is lovely.”
“Not private, but preferred.” The sound of a page turning. “It was once a schoolroom for Samuel and me. But my late father had it repurposed once we fled Oxfordshire for London. There is a larger library downstairs.”
“I know. Mrs. Smythe showed it to me earlier. Uncle Benjamin never had so many rooms for books, though he enjoyed reading.”
“And the libraries at Bright Corner?”
Amelia started. “How do you know about Bright Corner?”
Nicholas smiled, eyes fixed on the pages of his book. “It was mentioned to me that Bright Corner was where you spent your childhood.”
“Yes, well…” Amelia thought briefly of her family’s abandoned manor. Freddy, when he returned from France, had promised to renovate the house into somewhere they both could live. Though that seemed unnecessary now. “That much is true. But it has been empty for some time.”
“You would not wish to return there?” Nicholas asked after a moment of silence. He closed his book again, invested in her answer.
She guessed why.
“I do not own Bright Corner.”
“No. Your brother owns it, then?”
Another surprise. “Yes. But he is not in England, and we do not know when he shall return.” When Nicholas remained silent, she continued. “He left for France two years ago on a personal errand.”
“A personal errand?” His voice was tinged with sarcasm. “A much mysterious young man.”
“That is rich coming from you,” Amelia whispered beneath her breath. “I believe you shall like Freddy, if the two of you chance to meet. Though by the time he returns to England, you and I will likely have parted ways.”
“In which case, he shall not like me at all.”
“No,” Amelia agreed, though it pained her to think of the future. “Likely not.”
Moving to the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, Amelia scanned the contents of the reading room until she came upon A Father’s Legacy to His Daughters, which she had read under her governess, though she could not remember a thing about the book in great detail.
Careful not to make too much noise, she sat in the chair beside Nicholas. To her surprise, he was watching her and not being subtle about it.
“What is it?” she asked.
“I was merely considering the next few weeks,” he murmured, leaning over to pour her a glass of water from the carafe beside him. She glimpsed the cover of his own book: something by John Locke. “How we should… behave with one another while this marriage lasts.”
One another, Amelia repeated in her mind. Why did that necessary grouping of man and wife make her body tingle in trepidation? Perhaps it was the impermanence of their arrangement. Not knowing when exactly he would tire of her and call for the annulment.
Not knowing how she would feel when it happened.
“Already we have received a plague of invites to events both here and in London. Word has traveled fast of our marriage.”
“How pleased you must be,” she said, her tone bitter.
He ignored her. “It would be in our interest to be seen frequently in public. And before you send another scathing remark my way, no—I do not expect you to behave like a madwoman while we are around others. Your presence alone is satisfactory. And should we enjoy ourselves for these next few weeks, so be it.”
“What do you have in mind?”
Nicholas shrugged. “I shall allow you to select from the invites. Though naturally, nothing in London.”
Amelia grew quiet at the reference to London—his earlier mention of a lover ringing in her ears. Nicholas extended her the glass of water.
She took it, nausea rising within her.
But her hands trembled, met clumsily with his, and the glass slipped from her grasp onto her night clothes, then tumbled onto the carpet below with a soft thud.
Amelia rose in shock, the front of her dressing gown soaked through with water. Lifting out of her seat, she felt Nicholas move at the same time, reaching for the book she had chosen, which was now ruined.
“It is all right,” he assured her emphatically, taking the now-dripping book and setting it down. “The glass did not break either.”
“No, but… Oh, this is awful. That poor book!”
Not thinking, she grabbed the book from him. She removed her wet dressing gown, hating the feeling of the soaked fabric against her skin where it clung to her stomach. Stepping away from the chair, she used her sleeve to dry the book. It was no use. The pages were already waterlogged.
Fighting a sob, she looked at Nicholas, who had leaned over to collect the glass.
He froze on the way up, his eyes widening at her.
Her breath came out as a shudder as she stared vainly down at the book. She set it down and clutched her arms around herself in shame, then moved quickly to the door, leaving her dressing gown where she had abandoned it.
“Wait, Amelia!” Nicholas said, putting down the glass and following her.
She paused on command, turning in the doorway, her arms still wrapped tightly around herself. The night air felt colder by the second, and she blushed as her nipples hardened beneath her chemise.
“It is only a book,” he pressed softly. “Do not flee me.”
“I ruined it. I am so sorry! I will try to find you another—”
“Stop.”
Amelia blinked, mustering her courage before looking up at him.
They both knew this was not just about the book. The life he had left behind in London hung over them like a dark cloud.
“These secrets I keep for your benefit,” he whispered, edging closer to her. “But should you wish to know—”
“Who was she?” Amelia asked.
“The wife of the lord who sought to duel me as a result,” Nicholas admitted in one breath.
Amelia started at his pained expression.
A rake like him could not feel remorse like that.
He sighed, then said, “But it was not… She was miserable in her marriage. That is no excuse, I know. But that is why I could not agree to the duel under any circumstances.”
“Do you love her still?”
Nicholas laughed breathlessly. His brow furrowed.
“Love?” he asked. “It was not love, Amelia.”
She hated that she liked hearing that. She should not have cared.
“Then, what?” she asked.
His lips parted softly, and she stared at them.
His eyes searched the dark space behind them as he constructed his answer, his body glowing in the firelight.
She waited desperately for his response, eyes trailing down his neck to his chest, a hunger for more than answers growing inside her until she felt she could burst.
Dark thoughts crossed her mind—a desire to press her wet body into his and feel his warmth, to press her lips against his skin and taste him.
“Surely you must know…” he purred, looking down at her. “You are innocent, but not stupid, Amelia.”
Warmth bloomed between her legs at the sound of his voice, low and tempting.
She stood, motionless, as he reached his hand toward her shoulder, his thumb pulling back the fabric of her chemise to expose her collarbone.
The feeling of his fingers on her skin made her moan quietly, and she blushed at the sound.
His thumb continued its journey downward—her arms falling limp to admit him—as he stroked her hardened nipple over the fabric of her nightclothes.
“You know,” he murmured seductively. “And so, you must understand why I am the way I am.”
“Perhaps…” she whispered, unsure of anything anymore, only wanting him closer. She stepped toward him and seized her courage. “I told you earlier I wanted to learn more—”
“You do not know what you are asking when you say that.”
“But what if I do?”
“Is that true? It cannot be.”
She answered him with resolved silence—and she did not move away.
His head tilted, his eyes growing heavy with what she perceived to be desire, fire flickering in his irises…
Was that desire for her, she wondered, or simply for her exposed and aroused female form?
He pinched her nipple softly as if to reply, taking her by surprise. She felt that warm, pulsing space between her legs become wet with the evidence of her longing.
His hand was moving then in pursuit of more. He cupped the side of her neck, thumbing the space beneath her ear, before he lowered his mouth to hers with an immediacy that made her gasp in shock and satisfaction.
His lips were warm and hungry over hers.
He pulled her against him desperately, positioning his leg between her thighs. The pressure was delicious, and she instinctively drove her wet core against his leg, mouth opening to admit a moan as he held her against him harder.
She could feel something—new and hard and yearning—pressing against her stomach. He had transformed under her touch, his body responding to hers, his searching, hot mouth lavishing her neck as he ground himself into her, pressing her against the wall behind them.
“This is what you are asking for,” he purred into her ear, reaching down between their entangled bodies to grab her hand and press it against his arousal over the fabric of his trousers. “But you will not make me break…”
His voice trailed off as she stroked him, his head tilting back in pleasure, and a soft groan escaped him. A new sensation coursed through her—the recognition of her own power over him.
With clumsy fingers, he sought her working hand and drew it away from him, shaking his head softly with fragile resolve. He drew her fingers into his mouth, licked the tips, driving her senseless, then clutched them tight in his fist, sighing viciously as he took a step back.
“I can’t—” he whispered, raking a hand over his mouth, refusing to meet her eye. “Amelia, I can’t. You deserve more than this.”
On fire, desperate for more, she tried reaching for his hands again.
But Nicholas had made up his mind.
“Forgive me,” he said as he turned from her.
His body, which had moments ago been so close to hers, disappeared like a shadow through the door. Amelia looked down at her trembling body beneath her nightgown.
Not ashamed, not defeated.
But confident that she would get what she wanted from this marriage—even if it were a fleeting flicker in the pyre that was her life.