The Chadwick Ring Page 14

  Ginevra glanced at her reflection in the swivel mirror on her dressing table: her image was framed like a Tudor headdress by the canopy of the pleated and draped four-poster behind her, and her cheeks colored as she thought of the nights she had spent there in her husband’s arms. She knew his body as well as her own now, his lean, hard muscles, the deep scar on his hip from his old war wound. She had not slept alone since he returned to Dowerwood for her, and even now that they had come at last to London, each morning she had wakened to find herself snuggled against him in the granite cradle of his embrace. Sometimes he simply held her; more often he touched her with a disarming tenderness that made it increasingly difficult for her to recall the driving passion he had shown her that first night. His caresses were always butterfly soft, controlled even when he was moaning his own pleasure into her bright hair; he treated her as though she were a piece of rare porcelain, and it was hard for her to believe that this was the same man whose body had breached hers so ruthlessly while in the throes of some urgent need she still could not begin to comprehend.

  She found herself longing for his touch. Her childhood had been singularly devoid of affection, and she responded hungrily to the cuddling, the gentle stroking—but his passion confused her.

  She wished she understood him, she wished she knew what it was he was seeking from her. Despite his kindness, their union seemed at best tenuous, held together only by the desire he felt for her, and she feared that soon even that frail bond would break. Already she was aware of a gulf between them. She had thought at first that he had taken her merely to brand her as his wife, his possession, but now whenever she lay passive under his touch she was aware that he watched her intently for something else, some reaction other than acquiescence—and when he did not find that unknown response, he would fling himself away from her while he still shuddered with his own satisfaction, his muffled groan tinged with disappointment. Ginevra would watch him helplessly. She longed to beg him to explain what he wanted, but she remained silent, unable to frame the words.

  She was failing him, as she had always known she must. He had had his pick of seductive, experienced women since before she was born, and there was no way she could hope to match their skill. Soon the novelty of their relationship would fade, and the marquess would abandon her entirely while he returned to those other women, perhaps even to that Madame de Villeneuve. She was sick with dread that soon his tenderness would change to impatience, then disdain, then indifference, and he would resume his old ways, leaving Ginevra, lonelier than ever, to cope with only the shell of a society marriage, a hollow life that would have to be. carried out among strangers, in a city she disliked intensely.

  One of her long curls snarled in the stiff bristles of the brush, and Ginevra yanked at it until the pain brought tears to her eyes. Since their arrival in London the signs of their impending breakup had become more distinct. That very morning she had awakened in his arms as usual, and she had nestled closer without opening her eyes, luxuriating in the feel of his hair-roughened skin rubbing intimately against hers. When she slowly lifted her lashes, she had found him staring closely at her with a dark intensity that made her nervous. She murmured, “Good morning, my lord,” and his blue gaze had narrowed into a scowl as he snapped, “For God’s sake, Ginevra, don’t call me ‘my lord’! My name is Richard, and I want you to use it. When you call me by my title, you sound like a servant. I almost expect you to leave my bed and creep furtively back to your quarters in the attic.” Ginevra, still half-asleep and stunned by the suddenness of his attack, could only gape at him, her face pale with shock. He took a deep, rasping breath and continued irritably, “And contrary to what you are probably thinking, I do not make a habit of seducing the housemaids. It has always seemed to me less than a noble act to take advantage of one’s dependents in that fashion. Every woman I have ever been with has had the right to say no.”

  Sickened by the images of all those other pliant female bodies that had curled invitingly around his, Ginevra retorted before she could stop herself, “Every woman but me!”

  His glare became glacial, and his hard mouth turned up in a smile that had no hint of humor in it. Suddenly apprehensive, Ginevra tried to move away from him, but his arms were a vise trapping her, and his long fingers caught in her burnished hair and pulled it so taut that her eyelids stretched. “As you say, madam wife,” he mocked mildly, too mildly, “every woman but you.” Slowly his face had lowered to hers, and with grinding, irresistible force his lips ravaged hers until she could taste her own blood, salty and metallic. She whimpered with pain. When he lifted his dark head to stare at her, she could see red flecks on his mouth. With a muttered curse he flung her away from him. He slid from beneath the blankets and stalked naked across the room to the communicating door of his own chamber, slamming it behind him so hard that the canopy on Ginevra’s bed swayed.

  She set down her hairbrush and regarded her reflection in the mirror. Her lower lip was still slightly swollen, giving her face a sensual cast she had never seen there before. She looked older. She looked ... kissed. She reached for one of the tiny cut-glass pots that adorned the dressing table, and she delicately rubbed a salve of refined and perfumed oil into her aching lip. After she closed the lid she returned the vial neatly to its place on the table, her fingers tracing the graceful G engraved on the silver cap. The marquess had given her the luxurious dresser set the night before they left Surrey for London, handing the fitted case to Ginevra with the dry, offhand comment, “By the way, don’t forget to tell Emma to pack this.” When Ginevra squealed her delight, he had shrugged as if the gift were only a casual one, of little import, yet she knew he must have ordered it for her weeks before, perhaps even prior to the wedding. Ginevra shook her head in bewilderment. How did one reconcile such a thoughtful and tender gesture with the anger that had driven him to hurt her deliberately that morning?

  With a sigh she tugged on the bell rope to summon Emma to help her dress. Today the marquess was going to present her to his mother at last, and she wanted to look especially well. She had no time to waste questioning why her husband was moody and unpredictable. Such fluctuations of temper seemed part of the male condition. Certainly Sir Charles had been equally capricious, and young Bysshe showed the signs as well. Ginevra’s eyes narrowed. There was nothing she could do about her husband or father except learn to cope—but it was high time she confronted the boy.

  Bysshe’s grumbled “Come in” was barely audible. Ginevra opened the door to his sitting room and found him by the window, hands shoved deep in his pockets as he stared sullenly down at the street. He was fully dressed, except for his coat, and his clothes bore the unmistakable stamp of his father’s tailor. Ginevra was struck again by how tall he had grown. His lanky body retained its adolescent thinness, but he was very nearly a man; only his face, still youthfully round, reminded her of her childhood playmate. She noticed that he had shaved his few whiskers, and someone, perhaps the invaluable Hobbs, had carefully trimmed his straight sandy hair. The one remaining sign of his recent illness was the sickly pallor lingering around the ear that had been bandaged.

  Ginevra said lightly, “Good morning, Bysshe—or perhaps I should say good afternoon. I’m not yet accustomed to city hours, I fear. I thought I’d see how you are faring. I’m delighted you’re looking so well.”

  The boy turned away from the window, and his brown eyes surveyed her comprehensively. When his glance reached her mouth, his expression hardened. He nodded coldly. Ginevra bristled and said, “I think it’s time you and I had a talk.”

  With a sweeping gesture he motioned her to a seat. “As you wish, my lady.”

  She sank into the chair, more hurt by his rudeness than she cared to admit. “That’s exactly the sort of thing we need to discuss,” she noted, making a pretense of adjusting her skirt. “I want you to explain why you are being so ... so stiff with me. At first I thought it was your illness, but you’ve recovered now, and still you treat me like a leper. You
wouldn’t even ride in the carriage with your father and me when we journeyed from the country.”

  Bysshe shrugged. “The doctor wanted me to stay with him, in case I became overtired.”

  Ginevra looked steadily at him. “I don’t think that’s it at all. The pair of you could have ridden very comfortably with us, yet you chose not to. You have been deliberately avoiding me, and I don’t understand why. What have I done?”

  He scowled down at her, his young face troubled. “You truly don’t understand, do you? You have no idea at all what it does to me to think of you as my ... my stepmother.”

  Ginevra shook her head impatiently. “Don’t be silly, Bysshe. No one is asking you to think of me as your stepmother. I’m Ginnie, your old friend, just as I’ve always been.”

  He glared at her, and his color heightened. Suddenly he exploded, “Yes, but now you’re also his wife!”

  Ginevra shrank back against the soft cushions, shocked by the force of his outburst. She thought she could hear the glass shade vibrate on the gas fixture. “For God’s sake, lower your voice before someone hears you.”

  She could see the effort it took for him to restrain himself. His flush ebbed, and his hollow chest rose jerkily with each harsh breath. He sank to his knees before her chair, catching her arm in a bruising grip as he demanded, “How could you, Ginnie? How could you give yourself to him? How could you let him...?”

  Ginevra patted his linen sleeve in the same sort of gesture she might have used to comfort a toddler. “It doesn’t matter now,” she said gently, “it’s done. My father ... your father ... Dowerwood: you know they’ve always wanted the properties joined, and after Tom died, it was the only way.”

  “The hell it was!” Bysshe gritted. “You could have married me!” His hands slid up to her shoulders, and he shook her as he begged for understanding. “Why didn’t you tell them you wanted to marry me, Ginnie? I’d be a good husband. Don’t you know I love you? I told you.”

  “You were out of your head when you said that.”

  “I’m perfectly sane now, and I want you to listen to me. I’ve always loved you. I used to be jealous of Tom, because you were destined for him. You were as beautiful as an angel, and even when we were little I used to dream about you. I used to imagine that I was the viscount, and you were going to be mine.” His fingers tightened on her thin shoulders, and his face moved closer to hers. “At Dowerwood when the pain finally stopped and my mind was working clearly again, I thought at first that I had imagined everything, that this crazy nightmare of you marrying him was just something that had come to me while I was delirious. When I found out it was true, I got sick all over again. Late at night I’d lie there in bed, and when he would look in on me, I’d pretend to be asleep. Then in the dark I’d watch the light from his candle shining in a big crooked rectangle on my wall after he left the room. I could see it clearly as he crossed the corridor to your room, and when it finally narrowed and disappeared, I would know that he had shut the door, that he was alone in there with you.” Ginevra stared at him, mesmerized by the feverish glow in his brown eyes. He was so close that she could feel his warm, moist breath stroking her face as he whispered, “Sometimes it seemed to me that I could hear the bed creak...”

  He regarded her hungrily. “Oh Ginnie,” he murmured. His arms slid roughly around her and he lowered his mouth to hers in an awkward kiss. Stunned, Ginevra remained immobile as his trembling lips moved wetly over hers. He took her passivity for encouragement, and one hand groped for her breast.

  Tentative, shaking fingers, so different from her husband’s gentle but firm caress, pulled at the low neckline of her dress, and Ginevra shuddered with revulsion. She pushed her palms against Bysshe’s chest and shoved as hard as she could. Caught off-balance, he tumbled backward, sprawling in an undignified heap at her feet. She leaped up from the chair, her face livid with anger as she readjusted her bodice. “How dare you!” she raged, stamping her small foot, glaring at him indignantly as he picked himself up from the floor. “How dare you treat me that way! Whether you like it or not, Bysshe Glover, I am a married woman, and you dishonor me when you speak as if I were some ... some Cyprian!”

  Bysshe recoiled, his head jerking back as if she’d slapped him. “Ginnie!” he gasped. “How can you even think I’d ever insult you? I love you. I thought you ... I wanted you to ... I had to tell you ... Dear God, Ginnie, it’s his touch that dishonors you. The man’s twice your age and he has a French mistress!”

  Ginevra spun away from him and flung herself out of the room, sickness welling up in her throat. She fled along the carpeted hallway, brushing past a startled footman, not halting until she was out of sight of Bysshe’s door. She stumbled to a standstill in front of a flower-laden console table at the head of the staircase, and she leaned heavily against it, shaking, uncertain her legs would support her. She peered closely at her unnatural pallor, her face so bleached that by contrast her gold lashes seemed almost dark against her white cheeks. She could feel her heart pounding erratically, and she crossed her arms over her chest as if to protect herself from the outrageous knowledge that she had heretofore avoided: Bysshe loved her. This was not some fantasy brought on by his fever; her husband’s son was in love with her. The boy whom she still regarded as a childhood friend had grown to a man who wanted from her something much more profound than mere affection. Oh, Lord, the idea was disgusting ... deplorable ... incestuous—and she did not know how to cope with it.

  It wasn’t fair, she thought with resentful irony, remembering how she had opposed this marriage because of her previous engagement to Tom. She had just been coming to terms with the situation, no matter how bleak those terms seemed, and now this! Someone ought to have known what would happen. Her father and Lord Chadwick were both men of the world: even in their haste to arrange the match they ought to have had enough insight to foresee that Bysshe could not be so casually dismissed as they pretended. But they had ignored him, and now it was left to Ginevra to find a way out of this labyrinth of jealousy and desire. God help everyone if the marquess ever suspected...

  “Ginevra?”

  She spun around, her eyes stretched and startled, just in time to see Chadwick mount the stairs by twos. When he reached the top, he caught her in his arms and demanded, “My dear, what’s wrong? Are you unwell?”

  Not daring to look up, she shook her head fiercely. She wondered if Bysshe’s kiss had somehow branded her, as that of her husband had done earlier, and she could feel guilty color painting her cheeks. She stared resolutely at the mirror polish of his boots and murmured huskily, “No, my ... no, Richard, I’m quite fit, I assure you.”

  One long finger curled under her chin and tilted her head upright while his blue eyes studied her hectic features. She lowered her silky lashes in an effort to hide her expression from his discerning gaze. He frowned. “You seem feverish.”

  She shook her head. “I’m not ill. I’m just a ... a little apprehensive about the prospect of meeting your mother, that’s all.”

  The hard line of his mouth softened. “Of course you are. Meeting one’s in-laws for the first time is enough to make anyone nervous. But believe me, you have nothing to fear. My mother can be formidable, but I know she will love you.” A teasing light danced in his eyes. “She has always had an affinity for small, helpless creatures.”

  “Richard!” Ginevra squawked indignantly. “You make me sound like a puppy.”

  He smiled indulgently and pulled her closer, his hands moving over her soft hair. “No, not a puppy—a kitten. A tawny Persian kitten with tiger eyes, one that purrs sometimes when I stroke it, and other times hisses and lashes out at me with its sharp little claws.” He paused. “I’m sorry I was rough with you this morning,” he said. “God knows I don’t mean to fly up in the boughs that way, but you have no conception of how it makes me feel when you ... when you...” His deep voice faded as his arms tightened about her.

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said quietly. She relaxed
against him, closing her eyes as she nuzzled her face into the intricate folds of his cravat. The fresh smell of crisply starched linen filled her nostrils, not quite masking the deeper, more elusive scent of tobacco, imperial water, and warm brown skin that Ginevra identified with her husband. She sighed, her earlier alarm abating. In the safety of his arms she had the tantalizing feeling that she was on the verge of some momentous discovery, some grand revelation that could change her life. She clung to him, waiting.

  Just as Chadwick’s mouth lowered to Ginevra’s, he suddenly noticed Bysshe standing frozen in the corridor, staring at them. His fingers clamped down convulsively, digging into Ginevra’s delicate skin. He nodded curtly and said, “Good morning, my boy. You’re looking well.”