Once Upon a Tower

  To his horror, her eyes filled with tears. “I don’t know. I forgot to ask.” Then her brows drew together. “You were the first one, you know.”

  He cupped her face in his hands and gave her a kiss, because he simply couldn’t not do that. “I know,” he whispered. “I know.” Consummating their marriage was one of the most profound moments of his life. Though it would have been better if it hadn’t hurt her so much.

  She popped her bottom lip out in such an enchantingly sensual fashion that he had to kiss her again. They lost track of the road map for a while, but then he got back to the point.

  “I don’t know,” she confessed.

  A slow grin shaped on his lips. “Experimentation,” he murmured, “is one of my favorite pastimes. And I already know some things about you.”

  “You do?”

  He nodded. “You like this.” He rubbed both thumbs across her nipples. She gasped. “Don’t you?”

  She didn’t seem to want to answer as long as he kept doing that, so he stilled his hands and said, “Edie.”

  “Yes,” she said, her voice coming in a little pant. “I like that.” He bent down and . . . aye, she liked that, too. She pretty much liked everything, it turned out, except when he licked her under her chin. And she actually started scolding him when he licked her armpit.

  “I love it,” he said thickly. “You smell so good, like essence of Edie, my favorite scent in the world.”

  “Ugh!” she cried, pulling away. “Stop that!”

  But an experiment needs to be thorough, so he just kept licking and kissing and nibbling his way down her stomach. Then he pushed her legs apart, giving one throbbing second to the memory of her legs straddling her cello before lowering his mouth onto her plump, tender flesh.

  He’d kissed her here before. But he’d done it to make sure she was ready for him. The road map wasn’t about him.

  It was about her.

  Every time Edie felt that little pulse of embarrassment that threatened to make her think too much, she let the champagne drag her back into a floating place. What Gowan was doing felt so good that her breath came sobbing from her chest. And then he pushed her knees back, which made her so vulnerable and oh God, he could see everything, but he didn’t seem . . .

  He was growling, deep in his throat, and when she took a quick glance, she could see that his private part was still standing up. So he desired her, even though he was doing that. For the first time, it made her feel empty, as if she needed him to fill her up. So she pulled at his shoulders, but he wouldn’t pay any attention to her.

  And all the time a feeling was building in her legs until she was moving them restlessly as if a fever was coming over her. Gowan ran a hand over her stomach, farther down . . . put one broad finger into her.

  She shrieked and arched her back. It wasn’t enough, so she sobbed and begged him, but then he slipped in another finger and did something with his tongue and her hands fell away from his shoulders altogether.

  A moment later a flash of heat rolled her down and under, as if she’d been caught in a tidal wave: utterly engulfing, magical, terrifying, all at the same time. She heard herself crying out, her voice guttural and hoarse, and even that frightened her, a little.

  But there was no avoiding it, no stopping it. The feeling swept up from her toes and dragged her in a storm of sweet pain that her body welcomed. When she broke free, she was panting, her face was wet with tears.

  Gowan’s fingers slipped from her, and she began shaking again. She wanted more than that. Without thinking, she sat up and reached for him. There was a song in her veins and she wanted to give him the same.

  She caught sight of his face.

  Thirty-two

  “What?” she whispered, realizing that her fingers were trembling as if lightning had forked through her. She withdrew her hand. “Did I do something wrong?”

  His face was dark. The silvery feeling drained from her body as quickly as it had come.

  “You came,” he said, his voice clipped.

  Edie drew her knees to the side and managed to sit up. “Ah . . . yes?” It seemed such a paltry word for what had just happened. She could feel pulses in parts of her body where she had never felt them before.

  His jaw tightened. “Was it your first time?”

  Edie froze, realizing her mistake. The champagne . . . the pleasure . . . it had made her recklessly abandoned. She nodded.

  First disbelief, then fury, ripped across this face. His words came as hard as hammer blows. “Then what happened when you supposedly came the other”—he paused—“three times?”

  Her mind was spinning from the champagne, and the only solution she could come up with was to pull the sheet over her head. Instead she drew it up so her breasts were covered. “I just thought—I can explain.”

  “Do that.” He folded his arms. “Explain to me why you’ve been pretending that I pleased you.”

  The problem was that she couldn’t quite remember what her reasoning had been, but she hadn’t known him then. Not the way she did now, after spending hours and days confined in a cramped carriage, listening to him patiently dealing with problem after problem. “I didn’t mean it that way,” she said, finally.

  “You didn’t mean it that way? How else could you explain what you did, other than to say that you lied to me in the moment when I thought we were closest? When I thought—” He broke off.

  “It hurt,” she said, stumbling into an explanation. But she couldn’t put the words together. She tucked the sheet tighter around her breasts, feeling tears press at the back of her throat. “This time was different.”

  “This time you were drunk.” His voice was utterly even. “God, Edie, of all things I wouldn’t have thought you were a liar.”

  “I’m not!”

  “I knew something was wrong. No wonder I damn well felt as if I didn’t own you.”

  Her breath caught at this, and she recovered some presence of mind. “You do not own me,” she said, feeling her own temper spark. “What we do in bed has no bearing on the fact that I am my own person.”

  “So I’m facing a lifetime of asking my wife whether she really liked it or whether she was just acting—being as she’s her own person.”

  “That’s cruel.” It went against Edie’s nature to argue. She wasn’t good at fighting back. Instead, she resorted to the method by which she’d learned to negotiate her father’s and Layla’s fraught union. “If you would just be reasonable—”

  Gowan actually growled at her, lunging from the bed and walking away to the darkest part of the room to stand with his back to her, clearly fighting to control his rage. “I hate it when you use that tone of voice with me.”

  “What voice?”

  “That sugary, peacemaking tone. You’re condescending, and if there’s anyone in this room who should be condescended to, it’s you.” He swung about. “You lied to me, and I hate liars.”

  “I was just—I was a virgin!”

  “So?”

  “I panicked!” she cried. “It hurt, and you just kept going on, and I didn’t know how to make you stop.”

  His head snapped back, and he made a sound as if he’d been slugged in the gut. “Now you’re telling me that I forced myself on you?”

  “No!” But she was so rattled by his snarl that the right words didn’t come. Her eyes fell under his glare. “I just couldn’t . . . I kept thinking about what you expected, and that I couldn’t be what you wanted in a wife. I was failing,” she said, saying it because it had to be said. “You were trying so hard, and I tried, too, I swear I did. I didn’t want you to think—”

  “I was trying so hard, like some rutting animal?” His eyes blazed at her. “You thought I’d prefer to be deceived than told the truth, no matter how difficult it was? What you’re saying is that when I failed you in bed, you didn’t think I could shoulder the truth.” His jaw flexed again. “Bloody hell, Edie. How could you think that of me?”

  “It wasn’t like th
at,” she cried.

  He bent over and pulled on his breeches, not bothering with his smalls.

  “Where are you going?” she asked, hating that her voice was shaky. She couldn’t let him go like this. She slid from the bed.

  “For a walk.”

  She stepped forward, but tripped on the sheet, stumbled, and nearly fell.

  “Careful,” Gowan said, his tone cutting. “My father took to sitting on a three-legged stool because it was a shorter distance to the floor once the whisky went to his head.”

  Edie took a breath and tucked the sheet securely around her breasts. Any pleasurable effect of the champagne had evaporated. “Couldn’t we talk about this? I’m truly sorry.”

  “What would we talk about?” Gowan buttoned his placket, not meeting her gaze. “I was under the impression that I was making love to you. That you were with me, in a moment I thought was . . . But, obviously, I had my head up my arse. You were shamming, and I was fool enough to believe you. Fool enough to think that there was something special about the moment.”

  He gave a short laugh. “That’s the real travesty. Every time you moaned through your supposed pleasure, I prided myself that we were perfect together. I kept thinking that even though you yourself told me in a letter that you had very little interest in the ‘pursuits of the flesh,’ I was proving you wrong.”

  “I shouldn’t have pretended,” Edie said, her hands wringing together. She feared the bleak look in his eyes even more than she had feared his rage. “But I didn’t know you very well yet, and I found what happened in bed embarrassing.”

  “Well, now we know each other. And how in the hell am I ever supposed to trust you now?” He grabbed one of his boots. “You’re at your most honest when you’re drunk!” The words burst with rage.

  Edie tried to form an answer, but nothing came. Her stomach was churning, and she had a sudden panicked thought that she would throw up at his feet.

  “I had hoped to marry a woman who would love and care for Susannah,” he went on. “I didn’t question my decision, even after you told me in the same letter that you had no maternal inclinations.”

  He slammed one foot down into his boot with a thump that rang through the room like a gunshot. “You warned me, and I ignored it. I have no one to blame but myself for the fact my sister will grow up in bloody England.”

  That hurt so badly that Edie couldn’t even speak. A hoarse sound burst from her chest. “I wanted to be her mother; I did, I did.”

  The flash of disbelief in his eyes was almost more painful than his rage. Then he turned aside, looking for his second boot.

  “I would have loved her,” Edie said, her voice wavering. “But Layla was there, and . . .” Tears spilled down her cheeks.

  He shrugged. “I took one look at you and lost all capacity for rational thought. I marched in to your father and bought you with no more thought than if I was purchasing a horse.”

  Gowan slammed into his other boot. “Then I failed in bed—not to mention the fact that I was such an ass that I didn’t even know all those oohs and aahs were mere lines, performed by my wife, the actress.” She saw him shudder. “Did I tell you why I didn’t sleep with a woman until marriage?”

  The question was so savagely asked that tears spilled down Edie’s cheeks.

  “I had this quixotic idea that honor demanded honesty between myself and my wife. Honesty. And the moment I met you, I decided that you were that person. Hell, I even fell in love with you—”

  She made a sound, and he looked up. “Go ahead and call me a damned fool, because I am. I fell in love with you and decided you were a perfect woman, evidence to the contrary.”

  “And now you don’t think I’m perfect for you?” Edie’s voice cracked.

  “What you are perfect for is playing the cello. In truth, the only thing you really give a damn about is that instrument. Your father as good as told me that, but I ignored him as well. You’re married to the cello, not me, and I’m married to a woman who had to get drunk in order to enjoy intimacy.”

  “It’s not true,” she whispered. “I—I did like it at first. You know I did. And I married you.” She searched his face, looking for that spark of warmth that was always there when he looked at her. The way he watched her, the way he reached out to touch her. She had always felt he wanted her . . . yes, that he loved her.

  It was gone.

  “You said you love me,” she cried, hating the sound of her own voice, the way she was pleading with him. “That can’t just disappear.”

  “I love the woman I created in my own mind,” he snapped. “The woman who had a fever so high she couldn’t even hear me, but I didn’t notice it. You told me yourself that you didn’t want to be a mother, but I blithely thought you’d change your nature for me. I was as drunk as my father on a bottle of whisky, but it was on a product of my own imagination.”

  “Don’t,” Edie cried, sobs rising in her throat. “Please don’t say these things.”

  “I’m simply acknowledging the truth.” He looked suddenly exhausted, the skin drawn tight over his cheekbones. “It’s as much my fault as yours; I forced our wedding before we had time to truly know each other, and now we both have to live with the consequences. Most importantly, I fell short in the most profound way a man can.”

  He pulled on his shirt. “I need to rearrange my view of the world. A matter of priorities. I can—it will all be fine.” He enunciated the words with savage precision.

  “Gowan!” She put raw emotion into her cry.

  He walked to the door, leaving her standing in the middle of the room. “Drama doesn’t suit you.” His voice hardened. “My father warned me, you know. He said that there are two kinds of women: the ones who give and take pleasure, and the wives, who lie in bed like pancakes.”

  Tears were streaming down Edie’s face, blurring her vision.

  Gowan had opened the bedroom door, but then, at the last moment, he suddenly wheeled and lunged back into the room. She jerked aside as he snatched up a book that lay on a side table. The earlier rage had reappeared on his face . . . and not just rage. He looked like a warrior king betrayed by his own men. Like Caesar, when his friend Brutus raised the dagger to his chest.

  “What’s the matter?” she asked, fear washing her body.

  He turned to her slowly. “I’m not the only one who knows that I failed you in bed, am I?”

  Edie felt the blood drain from her face, as a wave of guilt flooded over her.

  “You told Lady Gilchrist. In fact, you wrote her a letter describing my shortcomings, didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t reveal any details,” Edie said in a choked whisper.

  The next word out of his mouth was flatly blasphemous. Then: “How could you do that? You told someone about what was happening in our bed?” He wasn’t even bellowing, but this was worse than shouting. There was a desolate acceptance of betrayal in his voice that cut her to the heart.

  A sob rose up in her. “I didn’t mean it that way!” She ran forward and threw her arms around his neck. “Layla is like my mother. Please . . .”

  Gowan removed her hands and stepped back. “You told the woman who will raise my own sister that I hurt you in bed. You told the wife of one of the governors of the Bank of England that you had to feign pleasure . . . because I couldn’t take the truth.” He bared his teeth, and his final sentence came out in a growl. “Damn you—you took my manhood and made me a laughingstock!”

  Edie was shaking with uncontrollable, violent sobs. “Gowan, no,” she implored. “Layla will never mention it.”

  “Layla already has.” His face was savage, but his voice had gone icily calm. “Your stepmother did me the kindness of lending me a book of poems about copulation. I thought it was odd. Now I see that she was giving me lessons on how to bed my wife.”

  Edie’s legs gave way, and she went down on her knees before him, her shoulders shaking, hair falling over her face. “Please don’t do this to us,” she choked out. “I lov
e you. And I’m sorry.”

  “As am I,” Gowan stated.

  Then he walked out the door.

  Thirty-three

  It was a long time before Edie stopped weeping. She wept for her marriage, and she wept because she had hurt someone who loved her. He had loved her. Gowan had fallen in love with her, and she hadn’t even known it.

  When the tears finally stopped coming, she felt so sick that she got to her feet and staggered into the water closet, where all the champagne that had gone into her came back up.

  She returned, still shaky but with a clearer head, and sat down on the bed to think. She wasn’t crying merely because she had hurt Gowan; she was crying because she was in love with him. She’d fallen in love with him—probably between one mile post and the next, while watching him solve problems, while watching him endure an endless description of roast chicken because it made Bindle happy, while watching him listen to music, the music he’d been taught was a waste of time. Even so, he respected her love for the cello, and had changed the itinerary of their journey, and . . .

  And loved her.

  The next morning, she woke feeling empty, like a shell whose inhabitant had died long ago. Gowan was right: she was useless as a woman and as a wife. She had to drink to have an orgasm. That could lead to a life as an inebriate. Like taking laudanum to get that lovely floating feeling Layla described.

  She refused to be that woman.

  And he was right about Susannah, too. The child had taken one look at her and turned away. Stupidly, it wasn’t until Layla had stepped in that Edie knew she wanted to be Susannah’s mother. But, of course, the little girl would be happier with Layla. Her stepmother had known exactly what to do. Susannah didn’t push her away; instead, Layla picked her up into her arms. It was petty to weep over the fact that the two of them loved each other.

  The truth was that she wasn’t any good at the things that made a woman a woman. Not only did she lack maternal instincts, but she didn’t seem to have the right instincts when it came to intimacy, either. She didn’t really know what she did wrong in bed. He had a disgusted look on his face when she opened her eyes. It made her wince even to think of it.