Chapter Twenty-Three #2
“He’s in Chelmsford. The air’s supposed to be better there for his lungs. I don’t see him as often as I should.”
“Why not?” Harriet expected him to offer up something about how busy he was with his business affairs or to bristle at the question.
Instead, he grew quiet for a bit, before speaking again in a near-whisper. “I … I have his life.”
Harriet waited again, but her trick didn’t work this time. “What do you mean by that?”
Alexander groaned, and she could tell her luck had run out.
“Let’s talk about something else!” he ordered, wending his arms around her waist. He spoke softly into her ear.
“I’ve seduced my way into a gorgeous woman’s bed in the middle of the day.
How often does that happen to a man?” Alexander brushed the hair off her neck and began once again licking and then nipping at the delicate flesh there.
As diversions went, this was quite effective in its simplicity, though Harriet wondered if it was always how he avoided unpleasant conversations.
Her worry disappeared quickly as she felt his cock harden and press into her back.
“To you? I imagine quite frequently,” she teased, joining him in the abandonment of heavier topics.
“Too true,” he said, pulling back from her, as if he were finished.
“Alexander!”
“Although Lord strike me down if I ever fail to take advantage of such circumstances.” He returned his attentions to her, for the second—or perhaps third?—time that day. Would she ever get tired of this? Would he?
Alexander woke that night with a start, alone in his own bed. He hadn’t known how to ask Harriet to join him only to sleep—or why he wanted her to so desperately. He’d been with her all day, all afternoon, and well into the evening and still he felt almost desperate for her company.
All the better, though, that she hadn’t been next to him for the nightmare he’d had, his first in years.
They started when John was sent away to Eton and then got worse when he was sent away himself to a lesser school three years later.
The other boys took a break from teasing him about his parentage to tease him for missing his mother; he refrained from correcting them that it was John he missed.
Perhaps telling Harriet about his brother had shaken something loose in him.
He itched to have a groom ready his horse, to flee to John, to see him and apologize for his absence and tell him about Harriet.
He wanted to ask his older brother what he should do and why it felt like there was something to do, when he’d so carefully arranged from the beginning for this to be a marriage in name only.
He and Harriet both knew the rules, and they were—for the most part—following them.
If one was incredibly strict about what counted as consummation.
Why then, when she’d sat in his lap, had he felt as if he needed to confess something to her? As if he was pushing a terrible, fetid secret down in his chest that might spill forth at any moment?
He wanted to ask his brother what was happening to him. Why was he planning surprises for his bluestocking wife, why did he no longer think of other women, why did the thought of Harriet’s smiles drive him to distraction and the thought of kippers make him laugh?
Alexander could imagine how John would answer.
He’d be silent at first, deep in thought, and then he’d walk over to a specific book in his expansive library, open to a dog-eared page, and point to a verse, which to John encapsulated everything about the scenario.
Alexander never felt he fully comprehended John’s poems, even with great effort.
But there was a certain comfort in the assurance that someone out there had felt this way before.
At least, he assumed that’s what John’s aim was in sharing them.
But riding an hour outside of London at midnight to wake a sick man was foolish for all kinds of reasons.
And for what? To brag to the man that he was living the life meant for him?
To tell him that he had everything John could possibly hope for—and would never get—and that still he was mucking it up anyway?
That he had a lovely wife, whose company he enjoyed above anyone else’s, who wanted simply to be friends?
And it was entirely his fault. Because he didn’t intend to be a real husband. He couldn’t.
It was not as if he could actually love her one day. Could he? No. Certainly not for the rest of his life. He hadn’t ever loved someone. Not like that. Even for a short amount of time.
Harriet had not expressed any desire for theirs to be a love match, he reminded himself.
He was the one following her around like a lovesick fool, forcing her to move into his home, setting books aside for her, hanging on her every word, telling her about his mother, wanting her in his bed to sleep next to.
Oh, bloody hell.
He had feelings for her.
Which was incredibly inconvenient. Thank God above he hadn’t gone to John. John would have seen right through him before Alexander even crossed the threshold.
What was he meant to do?
Alexander knew only three ways to rid oneself of unwanted feelings. It was too late for fencing, and he was intelligent enough to know that fucking another woman would simply complicate the matter. Which left him with one choice: White’s.
Brandy-soaking his emotions was not going as well as he’d hoped.
He was on his second glass and the knot of panic in his chest hadn’t eased.
How was he going to keep this truth from Harriet for the rest of their lives?
How was he to ensure his affliction didn’t worsen?
Had she offered again for him to have her, he would have taken her, and then surely he’d be done for.
He realized there was going to be no satiation.
The idea of having her once and being inoculated was delusional.
What if he told her? He could say … What could he say? And what would she say in return? “You poor idiot,” probably. If she were wise, she’d leave him now. She’d surely stop asking for help with her quim and suggesting friendship and giving him kisses on his cheek.
Hell. Hell. Hell.
Alexander was so engrossed in his line of thought that he hardly noticed a footman walking toward him, his brother John trailing close behind. He’d never seen John at White’s. He hadn’t seen John in London in years.
“Just the man I was trying to avoid!” Alexander let out, lifting his glass in a sardonic cheer.
“You’ve done exceedingly well at it so far,” John volleyed back.
“You aren’t supposed to be here.”
“I paid my dues like all the other dissipated silk-stockings tarrying about.”
“You pay dues here?”
“As of tonight,” John explained off-handedly. He reached down and took the half-full glass of brandy Alexander had been sipping and handed it to the footman, then waved the man off without ordering anything.
“I meant you ought not to be in town. Not good for the lungs.”
“Much harsher on the mind, I’ve found,” John quipped, looking around the club with undisguised revulsion.