Читать книгу Only Marriage Will Do - Jenna Jaxon - Страница 15

Juliet struggled to hide her smile, satisfaction welling within. They’d been going on as if they were a true married couple. Pray God it was an omen.

Amiable gasped.

Juliet peered up at him.

He had gone rigid. His eyes bulged.

Had a clod of cold mud fallen down his back? She followed the path of his gaze and her heart thumped wildly. Her hand hovered a bare touch away from his mud-soaked breeches. Her mouth went dry and her knees wobbled.

How in the world had she come to stand in front of a half-naked man, alone in his room, ready to strip off his breeches? Her hand actually rested lightly on the flap of the garment, next to a row of buttons. Did she dare continue?

Amiable stepped backward, taking the decision out of her hands. He breathed as though he’d run a mile.

“I beg your pardon, my lady.” He looked away and hastily stuffed his shirt back into his breeches. Little drops of mud flew everywhere. “I do not know what came over me. Please forgive my impertinence. I had no right to treat you thus.”

“What do you mean, Amiable?” She struggled to remain calm, even though her heart grew panicked as he withdrew from her. “You have treated me only with honor.”

“I acted as if you were my wife.” He turned to face her, straightening his back as he did, and widened the distance between them. “You are not, Juliet. Neither you nor I must forget that again. This masquerade is for the public only. In private you are still Lady Juliet Ferrers and I am Captain Dawson.”

His words smote her heart though they were nothing but the truth. They were not married and perhaps never would be. It would have been so easy for him to have thoroughly compromised her just then. He must know her willingness. Know also the consequences a gentleman faced if he acted so dishonorably. It seemed he had no desire to have her as his wife.

Anger and humiliation shot to the surface. “As you say, Captain Dawson.” She tried to keep the hurt out of her voice but didn’t think she’d succeeded. Damn him. Well, he’d seen the last of her for the evening. She whirled toward the door.

“You shouldn’t leave, Juliet,” he said softly. “We are supposed to be a married couple. People will think it odd if you spend too much time with your maid.”

She rounded on him, so furious she could barely see. “Should I instead stay and help you bathe? Do you wish to compromise me, Captain?” No answer. Wretch. “And for your information, I am well aware how married people act when in public. To their eyes, I have seen to the comfort of my husband and am now going to see to my maid, who is most likely upset by the events in the yard. She may be frightened she will be blamed for the mishap and dismissed. I need to reassure her that as long as I employ her she will not come to grief under your hand.”

Her parting shot delivered, she left, shutting the door with as much force as she thought acceptable without actually slamming it. She walked down the dimly lit corridor to the room designated for Glynis, shaking more with every step. After dinner, she would have to slip back down here to spend the night with her servant. She entered the chamber to find her maid washing off all traces of the adventure. Would that she could do so as well.

She waved Glynis to continue her ablutions and surveyed the small room with a disgruntled eye. It irked her to no end that he would end up in the most comfortable accommodations while she and Glynis would have to make do with a small table and chair, a washstand, and one narrow bed.

Fuming, she stalked over to the window. Worse and worse. Their room faced the front of the inn. As if to confirm her fears, a mail coach pulled in, horses snorting, harness jingling, coachmen loudly calling for the grooms and exhorting the passengers to hurry into the inn for their dinners. A noisier situation could not be imagined. She probably needn’t worry about the narrowness of the bed—she doubted she would get any sleep even if it had been three times the size. In the yard, grooms led the new team to the traces. One of the big gray horses plodded straight through the spot where the outline of Amiable’s body still lay clearly delineated in the mud.

Would have served him right if he’d have still been there and had to scramble out of the way. She was glad she had rubbed the mud from his boots with his ruined coat. If only she could remove the ache from her heart with equal thoroughness.

* * * *

“Hell and damnation.” Amiable cursed under his breath as the door banged shut behind Juliet. He had made as big a mess with her as with his filthy clothes. Drops of the clingy mud spattered the floor around him. Every movement seemed to dislodge more blobs. He shed his shirt and breeches, hoping the latter could be saved, doffed his drawers, and finally stepped into the steaming tub.

He groaned in contentment as the delicious heat relaxed his tense muscles. All except for the one that still stood stiff and painful from his groin. “The General” would probably not relax for quite some time. He lay back in the bath, eyes closed, and tried to will his flesh into submission.

After five minutes, he’d only succeeded in making it worse. Images of Juliet with her hand working to unbutton his breeches would not abate. Fantasies of her loosing his heated flesh and stroking him until he burst filled his head. Her scent of jasmine lingered in the room, taunting him with her presence until he ached hot and hard for her. Unless he acted the cad and went to seek another companion for the night, only one course remained available to him. He grasped his throbbing flesh and moments later shuddered his release. He sagged against the back of the tub. The ache had gone, but the relief remained hollow.

How had he managed to get himself into such a mess? All his thoughts concentrated on Juliet and the longing she created within him. Amazing that he could feel a tender regard for a woman so soon after his hopes were raised about Katarina. Had he not loved her as deeply as he believed? Or was this feeling for Juliet only lust? If so, then why hadn’t he just succumbed to that lovely temptation and let her strip him naked and plunge himself into her sweet, hot depths? She had seemed willing enough.

He moved restlessly in the water, searching for a comfortable position. His protective nature had asserted itself once more—this time to protect her against him. He could no more take her virtue than he could kill her. This lovely woman had become too dear, too sweet for him to dally with and leave a ruined woman, even if his conscience would allow it.

To save her, he’d had to hurt her. Her infatuation with him seemed to run deep. In love with the idea of him being a “knight in shining armor,” she did not see the very real danger he presented. Knights had needs as well. His rebuff just now might have stung her pride, but it had been for the best. If only he could continue to keep her at arm’s length until the end of the journey. At least seven more days on the road. Not an easy task now that he regarded her as more than a friend.

Much more than a friend, to be brutally honest. He admired her courage, her decisiveness, her determination to get what she wanted. He loved a spirited woman, the quality that had drawn him to Katarina. Juliet’s outspokenness did not rival Kat’s, but neither could she be called mealy-mouthed. Yet she seemed a perpetual “damsel in distress,” which had an appeal all its own. Not to mention her beauty into the bargain.

He sat up and reached for the soap and a cloth, determined to erase the vestiges of his adventure in the mud from his body and the pleasures of Juliet from his mind. He would not take advantage of her vulnerability to get her into his bed, with or without benefit of marriage. She might believe herself in love with him, but that would certainly change when he left her at her brother’s estate. Out of sight, out of mind. A few days after he left she would count her escape fortunate. If they were to marry, there could be no escape for her when she realized she had tied herself not to a chivalrous knight from the Round Table, but to a flesh and blood man with real faults.

No need to deny his desire for Juliet, but he had lusted after others before. Such a shallow passion hardly provided a good reason for marrying. His parent’s loving union had made him long for a similar married life. Unfortunately, the only woman he had ever proposed to had turned him down. He could assuage that fresh hurt with the devotion Juliet offered, although he doubted his heart had been touched again so soon after being rebuffed. Juliet would be only a substitute for the love he had lost.

He continued to remove the soap and dirt from his body, washed and rinsed his hair, and at last stood up, cool water sluicing down him. He stepped from the tub, reached for a piece of toweling to dry himself, and set out to dress for dinner. Perhaps over dinner they could come to some sort of agreement about their behavior during the remainder of the trip.

Just over a quarter hour later dinner arrived. Juliet did not. He waited ten minutes, his mouth watering while the chicken and vegetables became increasingly lukewarm. Finally, he tossed his napkin down on the table and went in search of his “wife.”

He knocked on Glynis’s door and the maid answered, her face a puckered frown.

“Is Lady Juliet ready? Our dinner is getting cold.” He tried to keep a pleasant tone, although the insolent look on the girl’s face made it difficult.

“My lady says to tell you she is not hungry and will not be dining this evening.” Her frosty glare dared him to object.

“I will be the judge of that.” Amiable shoved his way past her, much as he had done with the servant at Dunham House yesterday morning. He strode over to the still figure in a chair placed before the cold fireplace. She did not acknowledge his presence by word or movement, though she must know he stood right beside her, towering over her. She would have to be dead to miss him.

“I have been waiting for you, Juliet. Our dinner has grown cold.” He tried very hard to keep his tone light. This wasn’t her fault.

“As Glynis has just informed you, I am not hungry, Captain Dawson. You have my leave to begin without me.”

Her flat, emotionless tone made him wince. Another battle to be fought.

“As you reminded me a short time ago, I am not your wife, Captain. You need not pretend solicitude toward a casual acquaintance.” She stared determinedly into the dead fireplace.

“I believe we passed casual acquaintance status approximately half an hour ago, my dear.” He smiled at the memory of her shocked expression. “Please come and dine with me, Juliet. We must keep up the fiction of husband and wife, you know.”

“I suppose in the wide world there has been a wife who has not been hungry at dinner time and has refused to dine with her husband,” she said, still staring at the cold ashes. “Although, if such an occurrence has not actually happened before in the history of mankind, then I suppose I shall be the first.”

“Juliet.” He hunkered down beside her chair and looked into her face. The flickering light of the room’s one lamp cast her more in shadow, but he read the hurt pride and anger on her face well enough. “I am sorry if my words earlier offended you, my lady.” Perhaps it would help the situation if they reverted to the distance of formal address. “But they were true. We are not wed and I cannot in honor act as though we are. I am here as your protector, not your debaucher.”

“It seemed so right, so natural.” Her voice died away and her head dropped to stare at her lap.

“Nevertheless, it was wrong.” Damnation. He cursed himself roundly for ever starting that little scene in their room. “I suppose we acted our parts as in a play, and the roles became real to both of us. But as much as we may become absorbed in a play on the stage, it is only a play after all. Once you have had time to reflect on it, I believe you would not want that particular role in truth.”

She sat still, hands clasped in her lap.

Amiable stood, his heart sinking. “I will summon a kitchen maid to come warm our dinner for us. I will then go back to the parlor where dinner is laid. I would like very much to have the honor of your company, my lady. I look forward to seeing you soon.”

He left the room, passing the disapproving Glynis on his way out. After giving his orders to the kitchen, he returned to the chamber and, though he had not yet eaten, poured a shot of brandy, tossing it down his throat in a single gulp. Some days one could do absolutely nothing right.

At a loss for what to do, he wandered the room, gazed at the two mediocre watercolors on the parlor wall then thumbed through a volume on horticulture until dinner returned to the table, piping hot. Again, he sat down and waited, then consulted his pocket watch. Five slow minutes later, he shook out his napkin and picked up his fork. He would not let good food go to waste even though he now had little appetite. Doggedly, he plowed through his plate, the hot food tasting like sand.

The door opened.

He stopped chewing and held his breath as Juliet seated herself across the table from him.