Chapter Twenty-Seven
“ALEXANDER,” GIULIANA PURRED UPON HIS ARRIVAL AT HER DOOR, “you’re back.”
“Do you practice that voice or is it natural?” he asked, unsure why this was his first question.
But then it made her laugh one of her throaty laughs and he was glad to have said it.
The sound dampened the anger he’d been desperately trying to hold on to.
He collapsed into a chair, back yet again because of his troubles with Harriet.
“It’s more or less effortless now,” she answered, ringing a bell and asking for a bottle of champagne. “But that’s not what you came here to discuss.”
“Champagne?”
“We’re toasting to the end of my service.” She grinned at him.
“The end … of … what? You’re leaving?”
“Aren’t you letting me go?” she asked, without a hint of confusion. Her questions were always posed in a way that made the other person certain they had misunderstood.
“No. One would think you were looking forward to the end of our arrangement with how often you bring it up.”
“Oh dear, it seems I’ve once again overestimated the male intellect.
Regardless, champagne is good for you every now and then, and I like to err on the side of now.
” As if Giuliana commanded the world—and Alexander wasn’t sure she didn’t—a footman arrived then with the bottle and poured them each a glass.
“I’m certainly not going to let you go now. She’s … Harriet … she left.” Alexander decided Giuliana was correct about the champagne. He drained his glass and refilled it immediately.
“So, would you like me to tell you what an idiot you’re being now, or shall we wait until we’re done fucking and you’re even more tormented?”
“I’m not—You’re quite brazen, aren’t you?”
“I’m positive it’s why you chose me.” She winked at him and took a delicate sip of champagne, acting as if she were somehow three steps ahead of him.
She likely was. Any feeling Alexander had of understanding women had vanished right about the time he’d entered the Dunleys’ library.
“You’re … you’re being …”
“Brilliant? Correct? Wise?”
“Exasperating.”
Giuliana nodded at his champagne glass. “Drink up and then tell me what you did,” she said with an irritated sigh, as if Alexander were the one not performing his usual role in this scene.
“Why do you presume it was me?”
“I never take a man’s side if I can help it.”
“She sold her wedding ring, took the money, and moved to her father’s house.
I suppose that’s all the use she had for me.
Better that she left now, before we formed an attachment or something.
It wasn’t a true marriage anyway, so it’s no bother really.
A little irksome that my father was correct about her being a fortune hunter, though. ”
At Giuliana’s harsh, narrowed gaze, Alexander shifted in his seat and amended his answer: “Fine. Fine! I may have gotten her removed from the dictionary project that she’d been working on, which she’d made me promise she could continue after we married.
She also insinuated I’ve been visiting other women, which I have not.
” Giuliana sent another shriveling look his way.
“Not in the way she’s imagining! I haven’t been with anyone since she … since we … since her.”
“Hmmm” was all Giuliana said, pinching her lips together.
“Oh god, just say what you want to say, don’t make me beg for it.”
“Oh, but you begging is one of my most favorite sights.”
“Giuliana,” he growled, and something within him seared with pain. It was the tone he usually used with Harriet. She was the one whose name he wanted to say like that, whom he wanted driving him mad.
“All right, I’ll tell you what I think.”
“Your generosity does you credit.”
“I don’t think anyone with half a brain could meet Lady Alexander and assume she’s a fortune hunter; I don’t even think you believe that.
Though anyone willing to wed and bed you deserves some coin tossed their way.
You’re a dolt for getting her removed from her project, not that I have any idea what that is, but one can assume you were doltish.
Furthermore, regardless of your actions, the fact of the matter is that you asked to be allowed to still meet with other women, did you not?
” The question was apparently rhetorical, as she didn’t pause for him to answer.
“Most importantly, I think you’d have to have less than half a brain not to realize you’re madly in love with the woman. ”
“I am not!” Alexander roared, so used to denying the fact to himself that it didn’t even occur to him to answer otherwise. Of course, it also didn’t occur to him to examine why he’d had to deny the fact to himself so often.
“Oh, certainly. It’s quite often a man who isn’t in love visits his mistress for the first time after his wedding to ask her how to help his wife come.
Even more often he stops seeing his mistress altogether, even though he’s arranged otherwise with his wife.
This sort of thing is always happening.”
“Your sarcasm is not appreciated.”
“Your obtuseness isn’t either.”
“It doesn’t signify. Even if I did love her—which I don’t”—Alexander could hear the lack of conviction in his own voice—“she’s gone, and I have still ruined her dictionary.
And even if she did forgive me and return, and we went back to how things were before, I’m sure to break her heart when I end up wanting someone else. ”
“Do you want someone else? Have you wanted anyone else?”
“No! That’s not the point!” Then, realizing whom he was with, he added, “I don’t mean to offend.”
“Alexander, I’ve been here tupping Richard and taking hours-long baths in a house you bought for me, wearing only jewels you gifted me.
I shed nary a tear. But let me ask you this: What if you do someday want the company of another woman?
Are you not strong enough to turn that down?
If not for the sanctity of marriage, then for the sake of Harriet? ”
Alexander felt suddenly, embarrassedly, like crying, and he couldn’t say why. He waited for the lump in his throat to disappear and then he decided, perhaps influenced by the champagne or the friendship, to say what he really wanted to say: “What if I make a mess of it?”
Giuliana laughed, which was both comforting and insulting in equal measure. “Oh, Alexander, of course you will! You already have!”
Alexander thought about that for a moment, scrubbed his hand down his face, and let out a simple “Fuck.”
“Perhaps you might try actually demonstrating to your wife that you’re in love with her?”
“Again, I am not.”
“Yes, you’ve thoroughly convinced me,” she deadpanned.
“Regardless, she is not.”
“Did she tell you that?” Giuliana volleyed, sarcastically.
“No,” Alexander gritted out. On the one hand, the visit was proving quite painful; on the other, Alexander was certain he deserved to feel wretched, and he did no matter where he was or what company he kept, so he didn’t think leaving was in order.
He tried to win out and stay silent longer, hoping Giuliana would find another avenue of conversation. He gave in instead; truthfully, some sick part of him liked talking about Harriet, even if it was about why she didn’t love him.
“I’m not sure what she’d”—Alexander cleared his throat and then continued—“love about me. I won’t give her children, I took away her dictionary, she thinks I’m trying to seduce her sister apparently. On top of that, I’m a bastard.”
“Alexander, I refuse to sit here and catalog things she might love about you. You don’t pay me nearly enough for that.
However, might I suggest that people fall in love not for reasons, but because that’s simply what we do?
We fall in love with improbable people at inconvenient times.
Although falling for one’s spouse is rather quaint of you two.
” Giuliana paused then, and after a thoughtful moment continued.
“All right, I said I wouldn’t do it, but, Alexander, you do happen to be quite handsome and rich and skillful at swiving.
And pretending you’re unaware of those truths is dashed annoying of you. ”
“Is that enough, you think?” Alexander asked, pathetically.
“God, no.”
Alexander threw his hands in the air. “So, what do I offer her? Other than my money and my cock?”
“Let’s not disregard such things outright.”
Alexander almost smiled at that.
“She said you were my friend.” Giuliana tilted her head in confusion at the non sequitur. “Harriet,” he tried again, feeling a little shy. “She insisted that you were my friend. And, well, she was right. Thank you.”
Giuliana scooted closer to him and nudged him with her shoulder.
“That’s not going to make me list any more of your good attributes,” she said, her tone not at all matching her teasing words.
He could hear the emotion in her voice. She leaned up and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
“You’re a rather good friend to have, Alexander.
And not just because you’re a duke’s legal son.
As your friend, I must tell you that you’re being a horse’s arse and that you simply must fix things with this woman.
If only so that you aren’t such insufferable company. ”
“Yes, you’ve said as much. But how?”
“Oh, I don’t know, give her everything she’s ever wanted and then beg on your knees for forgiveness? That would work for me.”
“I don’t know what she wants.”
“Think hard.”