Duchess in Love

  “There’s no need to be triumphant about it,” he said, trying for an easy tone. “If you lost your nerve and decided not to marry your icebound marquess, I’d be happy to keep you on. No one could complain about the work you’ve done at Girton.”

  Her cheeks were flagged with crimson patches. “Oh really? Isn’t that nice? I can move from being the invisible wife who causes no trouble to being an invisible wife who causes no trouble, while continuing to do a great deal of work. How splendid for me. I shall give up a man who loves me and wants me to have his children, for a man who admires my letters and my management abilities.”

  “It was only a suggestion,” Cam said, feeling a wash of relief. It must have showed on his face.

  “I should like to know what you meant by modifications.” Her eyes were narrowed. When he didn’t answer, she gave him a sharp poke in the ribs. “Cam!”

  He had that amused, sleepy look about him that made her stomach tighten. “I was talking about bedding,” he replied, without even looking about to see whether anyone was listening. “If we stayed married, I think we should share a bed—at least when I’m in England, don’t you think?”

  “Even better!” she said shrilly, trying to ignore the little voice in her head that seemed to be—traitor!—welcoming the idea of sharing Cam’s bed. “I gather that I become an estate-managing wife who raises a family alone while her husband frolics in a foreign country.”

  “Ah, but we could have a good deal of pleasure before I left. And I would visit.” His whole face was wicked now. He wasn’t even touching her, and she felt as if he was caressing her. A glowing weakness lay low in the pit of her stomach.

  She opened her mouth to say something. But what?

  A cough sounded at her elbow. Marquess Bonnington gave Cam a scant bow. “The evening has deteriorated into an unpleasant display,” he said with glacial emphasis. “I propose that we adjourn to the library and practice our roles in Much Ado About Nothing. Lady Troubridge has just informed me that she has invited a large party to see the performance day after tomorrow.”

  Gina’s eyes widened. “She promised it would be a simple skit for the house party alone!”

  “Apparently she changed her mind.”

  Cam chuckled. “I hope she is not expecting us to match the thespian abilities of Lord and Lady Perwinkle.”

  “The less said about that disgraceful scene the better,” Sebastian commented.

  “Quite,” he replied.

  Gina had the horrible suspicion that Cam was laughing silently at her betrothed. “Come along, then. If we are to make fools of ourselves, we might as well practice our humiliation beforehand.”

  “There’s the spirit,” Cam said. He turned and scanned the room. “Where, oh where, is the beauteous Ophelia?”

  Sebastian frowned.

  “That’s from Hamlet,” Cam noted, adding painstakingly, “another Shakespeare play. I was referring to the more-than-beauteous Esme.”

  “The line reads Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?” Sebastian snapped, walking toward the library. He paused when they all reached the room. “Shall we begin with the first act?” A less dignified man might have been described as barking.

  “That would be us,” Cam said in a sunny tone. He caught Gina’s hand, but Sebastian was holding her arm. “If you would allow Beatrice and Benedick to sit down?”

  He drew Gina to the couch. Esme sat down opposite them, looking amused.

  “You had better take your gloves off,” Cam said, handing Gina a book. He frowned when he saw the myriad of tiny buttons extending to her elbows.

  She watched as his dark head bent over her wrist and he began nimbly pulling apart the small pearl buttons on the inside of her wrist. “I’m perfectly capable of reading with my gloves on.”

  Sebastian made an irritable gesture and sat down next to Esme. “When you are quite ready,” he said, with a biting edge to his voice.

  Cam drew off both gloves and tossed them aside without giving Sebastian a second glance. “There we are,” he said, in such an intimate tone that Gina felt as if she were transferred to the bedchamber.

  “Begin, then!” her betrothed snarled from the opposite couch.

  “What, my dear Lady Disdain! are you yet living?” Cam said, with so much amusement in his voice that Gina’s mouth curled upward, despite the fact that she was still annoyed with him.

  His eyes met hers, black and laughing, and her heart hiccupped.

  “We can’t sit like sticks,” Cam remarked. “We’ll have to act this thing out, now that we are to have a proper audience.” He picked up her hand and kissed the palm. Sebastian made a growling noise.

  “Is it possible disdain should die while she hath such meet food to feed it as Signior Benedick?” Gina said, trying to ignore the tingling in her hand.

  Miracle of miracles, Esme had managed to engage her irate future husband in conversation. “Why are you deliberately antagonizing Sebastian?” Gina hissed.

  “Forgot the rest of your speech?” Cam replied with an irreverent smirk. “Prompters at the theater charge a penalty when actors haven’t learned their lines properly.” His eyes drifted in such a way that his idea of a penalty was readily obvious.

  “Thankfully, my memory is excellent,” Gina snapped. “Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come in her presence!”

  “Then is courtesy a turncoat,” Cam responded. “And by the way, I think I’ve done you a signal favor by drawing off that boarhound you call your future husband.”

  “Nonsense,” Gina said. “You are playing with his feelings the way you play with everything. Aren’t you ever serious, Cam?”

  “It is certain I am loved of all ladies, only you excepted.”

  Annoyance boiled in her chest. She snatched away her hand. Somehow he’d kept hold of it and was smoothing each finger in a way that made nerves tingle all the way up her arm. “I don’t believe you care about anything. You’re nothing more than a care-for-naught, as my old nurse would say.”

  Cam’s face lost a bit of its impudent seductive quality. “Truly, I love none,” he remarked.

  Gina’s jaw set. “That is just like you,” she hissed. “I insult you and your reply is a joke.”

  “It’s the line from the play,” he protested. “Benedick says that he doesn’t love anyone.”

  Gina scowled at her script. “A dear happiness to women: they would else have been troubled with a pernicious suitor.”

  “You needn’t sound so fervent.”

  “Why not? It’s true enough. You are Benedick, in the flesh. You love no one, except perhaps your Greek Venus.”

  “I do care for Marissa. She’s a passionate, loving woman.” Cam decided that he didn’t have to mention that Marissa’s passion was reserved for her husband.

  “How lovely,” Gina cooed. “I shall marry Sebastian”—she threw a reckless smile toward the other couch—“and you can return to your cozy domestic goddess.”

  Cam was happy to see that Bonnington was absorbed in a heated quarrel with Lady Rawlings. “I wouldn’t call her merely cozy,” he said, dismissing the memory of his echoing house in Greece. “Marissa is such a warm person that she seems to fill the house with laughter. So why don’t you continue with that line about your cold blood?”

  “I thank God and my cold blood,” Gina said between clenched teeth, “I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow than a man swear he loves me.”

  Cam gave a mock little bow of his head. “Said with true flair. Beatrice to the life. Hopefully that cold blood will sustain you during your marriage with yonder icy marquess.”

  “How dare you!” Gina gasped. They both involuntarily looked at the opposite couch, but Esme and Sebastian were paying no attention.

  “God keep your ladyship still in that mind,” Cam said. “So some gentleman or other shall ’scape a predestinate scratched face.”

  “Scratching could not make it worse, an ’twere such a face as yours were,” she taunted.

>   “Oh really?” Cam snapped back.

  “That’s not in the play.” Her green eyes were glowing with the pleasure of battle. He felt an unwilling surge of lust that rocked him from head to toe.

  Esme interrupted. “Lord Bonnington and I are going to take a brief turn in the garden. We will return in five minutes.”

  Cam gave them a tight nod.

  “Forgot your line?” Gina said, the moment the door closed.

  “I believe so.” His hands bit into her shoulders and he jerked her toward him.

  “Then I own the forfeit,” she said. Her tone was just a little uncertain as she watched his mouth descend on hers.

  Now he had her where he wanted her: on his lap, with her lips under his. She wiggled for a moment and then her body melted against him, slender perfection and creamy, delicate curves.

  “I determined the forfeit before we began.” His voice was a husky rumble.

  “Um-hmm,” she said.

  He deepened the kiss. His hands roamed greedily, molding sweet curves, tracing breasts hampered and constrained by tight silk and a corset.

  “What’s this?” he whispered, tracing a whalebone curve. “I thought you forswore all corsets.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  He stood, pulling her to her feet.

  Gina’s knees were weak. Before she knew what was happening, he was towing her out of the room.

  “Where are we going?” she cried.

  He didn’t even pause. “Your bedchamber.”

  “What?” She put all her weight in her heels.

  He turned around. “We’re going to your bedchamber, Gina.” He tipped up her chin, and what he saw there made him shudder. “Now.”

  Still she held back. “We can’t, unless—” Her cheeks were wild rose and her voice faltered. “I must bring virginity to my marriage bed, Cam.”

  He felt as if she had dashed him with cold water. His voice was flat. “You really do think I’m an irresponsible lout. A—what did you call it?—a care-for-naught.”

  She felt the way his body stiffened as if his skin were her own. “No! That isn’t the case. I trust you. I know you wouldn’t do—that.”

  He waited, mouth grim.

  “I don’t trust myself.”

  The words faltered from her lips, and she turned a deeper shade of rose. He thought about it. Her hair was swept high on her head, and diamonds shone on her ears. She looked precisely like a young, regal Queen Elizabeth. Except that Cam knew he could turn this queen into his with a touch of his lip.

  As he said nothing, her shoulders grew perceptibly stiffer. She turned with a swish of skirts. “Shall we return to the play, sir? Your next line is, Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.” She sat down and picked up her book as if it were the most fascinating document she’d ever seen.

  Camden Serrard, the Duke of Girton, never acted out of pure instinct. Since hopping out the window of his father’s house with literally tuppence in his pocket, he had survived by using his wits, acting not by instinct but by logic, combined with a strong wish for self-preservation.

  Until that moment. He found himself, Lord knows why, on his knees before a young and imperious queen.

  He reached out, cupped her face in his hands, and crushed her mouth under his. Large hands cradled her face as if she were the most delicate piece of statuary ever made.

  She sighed into his mouth, an erotic little squeak, and strained against him. He let his hand run across her bodice, feather light over smooth cloth, cupped the curve of her breast, and ran his thumb over silk.

  “Oh, Cam,” she gasped.

  His eyes glinted with satisfaction. His other hand danced enticement, teased and caressed.

  She cried out, unable to keep the sound inside. He kissed her again so that he could taste her gasps in his mouth. His hands went their sinful way until she was boneless, gasping against his mouth, squirming for satisfaction she couldn’t have, given the restraints of silk, taffeta and one corset.

  Until a noise outside the door reminded an erring duke and duchess that they were not, in fact, in the duchess’s bedchamber.

  Gina pulled back and stared at her husband. When he touched her, her breath turned to silken fire in her breast. When he kissed her, she became shameless. Everything about him, from his black eyes to his callused hands, made her pulse with desire. I will never feel this for anyone else, she thought. The knowledge was very clear in her heart.

  Cam smiled at her easily, and tucked the frill about her neck into order. He looked unmoved, as if they’d spent their time reading Shakespeare.

  I mustn’t do this again, Gina thought, out of the new knowledge in her heart. I must not touch this man again: he is not mine, and will never be mine. That way lies only heartbreak.

  The remainder of the evening passed in a blur. They ran through the play three times, with her betrothed acting as a taskmaster. By the second time they were reasonably proficient, and she was drooping with fatigue.

  In the last run-through, Beatrice snapped at her Benedick with passionate emphasis. Benedick, conscious of growing frustration every time he looked at his delectable wife, snapped back with such intensity that even Marquess Bonnington watched and wondered.

  24

  The Second Council of War

  “I don’t think you’ve destroyed everything,” Esme said, judiciously choosing a grape before she popped it in her mouth. “But you certainly have made your life difficult.”

  Carola shuddered. “I don’t see how you can eat at a time like this.” Her voice had an edge of hysteria. “You must come up with a plan to save my marriage!”

  Esme raised an eyebrow. “The number of grapes I consume has no effect on my sympathy, I assure you.”

  “The fact remains that Carola is right. We need a plan of action,” Gina pointed out.

  “I am very sorry to say this,” Helene added, “but Lady Troubridge informed me that Lord Perwinkle is leaving at first light tomorrow.”

  There was a wail from Carola’s side of the table, and Gina automatically handed her a handkerchief.

  The four women were sharing a meal in Carola’s chamber, since she had once again refused to descend for luncheon.

  “I believe the time has come for strong measures,” Esme said, eating a grape.

  Carola lowered the handkerchief just enough to blink despairingly at her. “I truly don’t wish to marry Neville.”

  “More to the point, he shares your feelings,” Gina noted.

  Carola scowled. “He’ll marry me if I tell him to. And I may have to, if…if Tuppy decides to divorce me!” She burst into tears again.

  Gina looked at the handkerchief Carola held to her face and decided it had two or three more bouts of tears left to it.

  “I believe that a bed trick is necessary,” Esme said. “Very appropriate, given that we’re performing Shakespeare tomorrow. His plays are full of bed tricks.”

  Helene looked pained. “What on earth is a bed trick?”

  “A bed trick is the substitution of one person for another,” Gina explained. “The obvious problem would seem that, to the best of my knowledge, Tuppy has not invited anyone to share his bed. For whom will Carola substitute?”

  “That’s the tricky bit,” Esme admitted.

  “Impossible,” Carola sniffed damply. “He doesn’t want to sleep with me.”

  “One of us will have to seduce him, making an assignation for a later hour. Then Carola will be waiting—”

  “And Tuppy will leave in disgust,” Carola interjected.

  “No, he won’t,” Esme said. “Because it will be dark. Don’t you know anything about bed tricks?”

  Carola shook her head. “It sounds like just the sort of activity my mama deplores.”

  “I believe it’s the only solution. Tuppy has reason to believe that you dislike his performance in bed, and you have made it clear that you wish to end the marriage. You must convince Tuppy that you wish to be in his bed—nay, that you are willing to embar
rass yourself to be there.”

  “The question is, who is going to make the assignation?” Esme looked brightly at her two best friends. “Gina? Helene?”

  “You,” they answered in chorus.

  She grinned. “As it happens, I’ve made an appointment with my husband for tomorrow night. Tonight is my last night in the solitary comfort of my bed, given that Miles’s girth is likely to have me sleeping on the floor.”

  “I cannot believe we are engaged in this disreputable conversation,” Helene said, very pink in the face. “However, I assure you that I cannot make an assignation. I haven’t the faintest idea how to go about it.”

  “I disagree,” Esme remarked. “You simply haven’t had the impulse yet.”

  Six eyes turned to Gina, who was eating a tart and clearly considered herself merely a spectator.

  “Oh no!” she said, startled, putting down her tart. “I couldn’t possibly!”

  “Why not?” Esme said. “Apparently Tuppy likes you already, given your knowledge of trout.”

  “I can’t! I’m already—”

  “Already what?”

  “I won’t allow it,” Carola broke in. “Tuppy likes Gina far too much. In fact, I don’t like this plan at all, Esme. I don’t want to watch someone flirting with my husband. You are all more beautiful than I am, and tall in the bargain. I won’t have it!”

  Three tall women looked at her affectionately. Her halo of golden curls was gleaming in the sunlight, and she looked as adorable as a new-hatched chick. “You’re a fool,” Esme said affectionately. “But if you don’t want Tuppy seduced, so be it.”

  “Why not just put Carola into Tuppy’s bed late at night?” Gina asked. “He won’t expect her, and it will be a lovely surprise. That is, if you really think Carola has to take such a drastic measure.”

  “I do,” Esme replied. “Tuppy has been humiliated before a large part of the ton. He’s a man, with a man’s dislike for embarrassment. If I were Tuppy, I wouldn’t go within a yard of my wife, no matter how besotted I was. Because he is besotted with you, darling,” she said, turning to Carola.

  “He can’t be that besotted, given that you think he would invite any one of you to join his bed.”