On a Long Ago Night (34 page)

He completely ignored her words as the look on his face

turned bold. "You might not have my name," he told her with

assured arrogance, running his hands slowly up the long length of

her waist. "But you will have my children. You will have no reason

to doubt that you are my wife."

A shiver went through her, half thrilled anticipation, half

hysterical terror. In an instant, every ounce of control she possessed

shattered. She turned and ran across the threshold of Lacey House.

"Go away!"

James sighed. He could hear the tears in her ragged voice

through the thick wood of the bedroom door.

Well, at least she had answered his knock this time. He

scratched his ear and shrugged at the worried-looking butler, a

large man named Huseby.

"Virginal bridal nerves," he offered to the concerned man.

A flash of skepticism played across the butler's face before he

said blandly, "Of course, my lord."

"I think we need to think of something else."

There were a great many family retainers named Huseby.

James had met several in the last hour, as they'd tried to persuade

the hysterical woman to come out of hiding. This Huseby was more

commonly known as Charles. Charles held a ring of keys he'd

secured from the housekeeper, Mrs. Huseby. They'd already

discovered that having a key to the door of Honoria's suite did no

good, as she'd barricaded herself inside. James could imagine the

stack of furniture shoved across the doorway. She was going to

hate herself for this loss of control once she came back to herself.

This could not be allowed to go on, for both their sakes. A

frontal assault had proved impossible; it was time for different

tactics. "I think we should go now," he said, drawing the butler

down the hall.

Honoria breathed a sigh of relief when several minutes

passed in silence after James and Charles's footsteps faded away.

She hadn't hidden in her room since she was thirteen, but she felt as

vulnerable and out of control now as she did then. She almost

smiled, recalling what a terror she'd been to her parents during her

gawky, stormy adolescence.

Honoria moved away from the door. She was tired from the

journey, her face was salt-stained and aching from too much

crying. All she wanted was to take off her traveling clothes and

climb into a hot bath. But calling for bath water would mean

having to open the door. She couldn't hide in here forever, but she

was not prepared to face James Marbury until she had regained her

usual composure. At the current rate, she estimated that would take

up to a year for her to fight her way back to her normal serene

control.

"Drat the man," she muttered as she unfastened her buttons

and hooks with inexpert fingers. Once she'd stripped down to her

underthings, she found a china wash basin in her dressing room and

dumped the water from a vase of fresh flowers into it to bathe her

face, hands, and neck. The water held the aroma of newly cut

greenery and pleased her strained senses more than any exotic

perfume.

"Ah, the simple life," she murmured ironically, and then

unpinned and shook out her curling red hair. She picked up a brush

and began stroking it through her hair as she walked back into her

bedroom.

Only to throw the brush in a whirling arc in automatic reflex

at James, who stood with his arms crossed in the middle of the

room.

He snatched it out of the air before it hit him. "Honoria! Be

good."

There she stood, with her hair undone, without a corset or

even a robe. She wore nothing but a thin white cotton chemise. He

stood there with his arms crossed, looking her up and down with a

slow, assessing stare. "It is nice to see you dressed for the

occasion," he said, grinning roguishly.

She resisted the urge to modestly cover her cleavage with her

hands. She knew that far more of her bosom would be showing if

she were wearing a ball gown. But she was not wearing a ball

gown, or even the armor of a corset. She was in her bedroom, and

from the way he looked at her, she might as well be naked. Under

present circumstances, what she was wearing and where she was

wearing it was shocking and scandalous. And dangerous.

"No need to blush," he said, taking a step closer. He gestured

around the bedroom, then looked back at her, eyes bright with

amusement and something that sent a hot rush of desire through her

veins. "You look lovely, by the way."

She ignored the compliment and reverted to basic annoyance.

She put her hands on her hips and demanded, "How did you get in

here?"

He pointed to the open balcony window. "Mr. Huseby—the

gardener, not the butler, was kind enough to loan me a ladder. You

look like you're feeling better now. Good." He began to undo his

cravat "Your skin has such a fine, healthy glow."

"My skin is none of your affair."

He tilted an eyebrow. "Isn't it?" His coat followed his cravat.

Honoria was appalled. "What do you think you are doing?"

"Taking my clothes off." His vest went next.

As he began unbuttoning his shirt, she ventured to ask,

"Why?"

"We have a great deal to discuss. Which 'why' are you

referring to at the moment?"

She hated that he sounded so confident, so amused, while she

feared she was turning into a raving madwoman. She looked

around her for means of defense, or escape. She had shoved the

heavy table across the door herself. If she ran for the barred

doorway, he could catch her long before she had time to move it

out of the way. Her gaze went to the balcony, where soft white

curtains fluttered in the breeze from the open doorway. Perhaps she

could—

"I shoved the ladder to the ground after I used it," James told

her, guessing her thoughts. "You're trapped here with me, Honoria.

Face it. It is
kismet
that brought us together, then and now."

"Nonsense," she responded. "Fate has nothing to do with it."

He moved forward. She took a step back, and stumbled on

the edge of a plush rug that had been turned up when she moved

the table, but James had her in his arms before she hit the floor.

"If not fate, then what?" he asked.

He was very close to her. Very large and strong, very

masculine, with his white shirt undone to reveal the dark vee of

hair on his muscular chest, and the rippling hardness of his

stomach. She had to catch her breath before she answered. "Bad

luck, that's what I call it."

His golden eyes narrowed. His face was very close to hers, so

close that her spectacles were quite unnecessary. He reached up

and took them off, placing them gently on the top of a nearby chest

of drawers. This forced her to concentrate exclusively on him

rather than any other distraction the room might offer. Not that she

could do anything else, anyway. She could not help but look at his

beautiful, sensual mouth as a slight smile quirked up the edges of

his lips.

"You're afraid of feeling any emotion, aren't you? That's what

this is all about. Why?"

"Emotions take me out of myself, make me forget who I am,"

she answered. "I will never let that happen again."

"Who told you that?"

"It was you who taught me." She wasn't sure when he began

touching her. She should have been, as he was drawing slow,

caressing circles with one finger on her throat, dipping inexorably

lower with each widening sweep. It set her tingling with arousal.

No, it accentuated and heightened the arousal even the merest

thought of him always brought her.

"Emotions don't take you out of yourself," he told her,

sounding so very certain and seductive. "They reveal who you

really are."

"Thoughtless. Reckless. Irresponsible, then." She could

barely speak for the rising heat that threatened to engulf her.

Anticipation and longing curled inside her; a needy ache only he

could satisfy. She didn't want it satisfied. She tried to pull away

from him, only to discover that she couldn't move at all.

"Passionate," was his answer. "It isn't a sin to make love." He

smiled, lighting up the world, and her. "Especially with your

husband."

She couldn't even think, anymore. She hated that all she

wanted to do was make love to this magnificent, glorious,

overwhelming male, who was in her bedroom, who was her

husband.

"Husband," she managed to gasp. "No." She shook her head.

"We can—should—we
will
have the marriage annulled."

He picked her up again—he was making quite a habit of it.

Throwing his head back, he laughed as he took her to the bed.

"Annulled?" He chuckled, and she felt the sound deep in his chest.

"I don't think so."

Honoria wanted to tell him to stop when he set her down on

the soft feather mattress and stretched out beside her. She put a

hand up, but found herself stroking his cheek rather than pushing

him away. The skin beneath her fingertips was rough, and the

abrasiveness sent little ripples of sensation through the pads of her

fingers.

"You need a shave," she said. What a needless, silly thing to

say. "I miss your beard," she added. "It made you look like the

devil."

"I am the devil. Your devil."

"I know." The words flowed out of her, slow and heavy. And

why did her limbs feel so deliriously heavy as well, full of a slow,

growing heat? Everything tingled. And her breasts—she didn't

want to think about the languid heaviness, or the tightly puckered

tenderness of the swelling peaks.

His mouth descended, not to hers, but to cover one of those

nipples that stood out so prominently beneath the delicate fabric of

her chemise.

She gasped, her spine arching off the bed at the intensity that

flowed from the spot where his lips covered her, suckling and

teasing with his tongue. She should be fighting this. Why wasn't

she fighting this?

"More?" he asked, raising his head just a little. He didn't give

her time to answer before he took her other breast in his mouth.

This time, though, he slipped the material down, freeing her breasts

completely from their confinement.

She did not want any part of her to be free. If she lay very

still and closed her eyes, she wouldn't feel anything. He could have

his way and then go away; she didn't have to be emotionally

involved with this.

She tried, but she soon found herself grinding her teeth with

the frustration of trying to ignore the delicious flickers of sensation

that rushed like wildfire through her. She'd bunched fistfuls of

bedcovers in her hands, and her heels were drumming against the

mattress. Uninvolved? How could she possibly remain uninvolved

when he made her feel—

"Get off me!" she demanded, bringing a fist up to bang it

against his upper arm. "Please, Diego!"

"James," he said. "Please what?"

He moved a little. She bolted into a sitting position. "Please

don't sound so insufferably smug. It's only a name," she added. She

leaned forward, squinting to get a better look at him as he rose from

the bed. "What are you doing?"

"Taking off my shoes and trousers."

"Oh." Her spine stiffened in shock. She waved a hand wildly

at him. "No. Wait! Don't do that!"

"I'm afraid I have to," he replied, with a solemnity that

covered a great deal of amusement.

What did the man find to laugh about in a situation like this?

Her, probably. She crossed her arms beneath her breasts, barely

noticing that she was half naked in her annoyance. "I see no reason

why you have to take off your shoes and trousers."

"The maid who changes the linen—I'm sure her name is

Huseby—would. We may get the sheets tangled today, my wife,

but the garden muck I got on my shoes from using the ladder isn't

likely to come out as easily as—"

"I have no intention of discussing soiled sheets," she

interrupted hastily.

"Move over," James responded, and shoved her toward the

center of the mattress, hip to hip as he got back into bed. "They're a

fact of life, Mrs. Marbury; nothing to be ashamed of. But there's no

need to have mud in your bed."

"You seem to be in my bed at the moment."

He put an arm around her. "And here I intend to stay." He