Surrender Becomes Her (19 page)

Quietly, Marcus, Isabel, and Seward left the room. In the hallway, Marcus said to Seward, “Why don’t you join the others downstairs for some refreshments? Mrs. Sherbrook and I will stay in the sitting room, and if there is any change,
we will ring for you immediately. And if you wouldn’t mind, please ask Deering to send up a tray for Mrs. Sherbrook and myself. We’ll leave the selection to him.” He glanced at Isabel’s wan face. “But some hot tea would certainly be in order.”

Seward hesitated and Marcus said, “Lord Manning is resting comfortably now and there is nothing that you can do but fret him. He will either recover or die. His fate is out of your hands.”

The physician took a deep breath, nodded curtly, and disappeared down the stairs.

Marcus guided Isabel into the pleasant sitting room that adjoined Lord Manning’s bedroom and, after seating her on a dark blue damask sofa and telling her what he planned to do, he walked back into the bedroom to speak to Edmund. Lord Manning had already fallen asleep, but Edmund looked up when Marcus approached.

Smiling at the boy, he said, “Your mother and I will be in the sitting room. I shall leave the door ajar and, should you have need of us, just call out.”

Edmund smiled shyly and nodded.

Returning to the sitting room, Marcus took a seat in a high-backed chair covered in blue and gold striped velvet to the side of where Isabel sat like a little wraith. Her bright red hair glowed like a flame in the candlelight and the skirts of her amber gown spread out against the dark blue material of the sofa made a pleasing contrast. The strain of the evening was evident in the purple shadows under her eyes, the unnatural paleness of her skin, and the tightly held curve of her mouth—not to mention the unconscious twisting of her hands in her lap. Certainly, no one looking at her, he thought ruefully, would ever take her for a woman just married. At least, not happily married, he amended.

Reaching across, he laid his big warm hand over her cold smaller ones. Her fingers immediately clutched for him and her eyes lost that distant stare as they met his.

“It has been an eventful evening, has it not?” he said quietly.

She gave a small choke of laughter. “You could say that.” Her gaze dropped to their entwined fingers. “How do we go on from here?” she asked unhappily. “Th-th-there hasn’t been any time to discuss any plans before we m-m-married.” She swallowed. “I know we are married, but I—” Her voice closed off and a flush stained her cheeks.

Having a good idea where she was going, he smiled and raised her chin until she was forced to meet his eyes. “Isabel, I am not about to demand my conjugal rights tonight,” he said softly, “if that is what worries you. You may tell Deering to prepare a bedchamber for me, and for the next few days at least, you may pretend that I am merely a guest. When my mother returns home, I shall have her see to it that a trunk is packed for me and delivered here by one of the servants.” He flashed her a whimsical look. “I will not deny that this is not the way I envisioned my wedding night, but there is more at stake here than our enjoyment of the marriage bed. I do not intend to disrupt Lord Manning’s household any more than necessary, and that includes removing you and Edmund to Sherbrook Hall or forcing myself into your bedroom. We are married. God willing we will have a long life together. There will be time enough for us in the future.”

Her face glowed and she leaned forward saying earnestly, “Oh, Marcus! Thank you! You are being most understanding.” She turned to look at the opened doorway that led to Lord Manning’s bedroom. “I-I-I am afraid that at present I can think of nothing but…” Her voice was suspended by tears.

“He’s dear to me, too,” he said somberly. His expression bleak, he added, “If he dies, the next few weeks will be painful and neither one of us needs to be worried about the changes our marriage brings.” He took a deep breath. “Once this is behind us we can concentrate on our changed circumstances.”

Relief almost made Isabel giddy and the cold iron claw that had been lodged in her belly since she realized what the baron was about vanished. Sinking back into the softness of the sofa, she looked at Marcus, thinking that he looked attractively roguish with his black hair tumbling across the broad forehead and his cravat slightly askew. The bottle-green jacket was not of the first stare nor were the breeches and boots in their usual pristine condition and they added to the roguish air. She smiled to herself. None of them probably looked their best. Her lashes lowered hiding her eyes and covertly she studied him, this man who was now her husband. He was dearly familiar and tonight with his tired, rumpled elegance he drew her as he had at no other time. She knew an urge to caress that wide brow, to soothe the lines of weariness and strain she saw on his dark face, to wipe away the unhappy cast to his fine mouth. The image of that mouth hard against her breast sent a stab of needy desire streaking through her and she gasped in dismay. How could she think of such a thing with Lord Manning dying in the next room?

“What is it, my dear?” Marcus asked, hearing that soft sound.

To her great relief, there was a tap at the door and, at Marcus’s command, Deering walked into the room carrying a large silver tray. His face was composed, but the quick glance he sent toward the open doorway leading to Lord Manning’s bedchamber revealed where his thoughts lay. Placing the tray on a mahogany table at one end of the sofa where Isabel sat, he bowed and said gruffly, “Cook has been busy since Lord Manning was first stricken. You will find warm cross buns, apple fritters, some ginger biscuits, as well as slices of rare sirloin, rashers of bacon, coddled eggs, and tea and coffee.”

Marcus smiled at him. “Please send her my compliments. My wife”—and only Marcus knew what pleasure it gave him to say those words—“may enjoy the biscuits and tea, but the sirloin and eggs are precisely what I need right now.”

A slight smile flitted across Deering’s face. “Indeed, that is precisely what Cook said, when I protested.” His eyes slid again to the open doorway and his voice lowered. “Is there any change?”

Marcus shook his head. “None for the worst, at least. He is resting peacefully with his grandson at his side.”

Unable to think of a reason to remain, Deering bowed and reluctantly left the room.

While Isabel picked at her crisp, spicy biscuit and sipped tea, Marcus helped himself to a large plate of rare sirloin, coddled eggs, some warm buns, and two apple fritters. It had been a long time since he had last eaten. For several minutes there was a companionable silence as Isabel nibbled her biscuit and stared blindly into space and Marcus concentrated on the food on his plate.

His plate empty, and feeling somewhat revived, he rose to his feet and said to Isabel, “I’ll be right back. I’m going to see how milord is doing and if Edmund would like one of the apple fritters while they are still warm.”

Quietly entering the room, he discovered Edmund and Lord Manning sound asleep. Edmund lay curled next to his grandfather and Lord Manning’s arm rested around the boy’s shoulder. Marcus’s heart ached as he stared at the pair of them. Losing the baron would be hard on all of them, but Edmund would suffer the most. Poor little bantling. So young to have lost first his father, now his grandfather. Remembering his anguish when his own father died, Marcus vowed that he would do his best for the boy and try his damnedest to fill the old baron’s shoes.

As if aware of Marcus’s presence, Lord Manning’s eyelids fluttered and he awoke. His gaze met Marcus’s and he gave another of those painfully crooked smiles. “Are you angry at the way I galloped you to the altar?”

Marcus shook his head, a faint gleam of laughter in his gray eyes. “Indeed, I thank you for it. Isabel was being coy about
setting a date and you cleverly settled that matter for us.” His gaze sharpened. “And that was your plan, was it not?”

The old man carefully removed his arm from Edmund and admitted, “She appeared to be happy about the engagement, but she is an independent little devil and I feared that once I died, she’d find a way to cry off. There are valuable lands and a large fortune at stake and they will be Edmund’s when I am gone, but until he reaches his majority, Isabel and the boy need protecting and a man’s hand on the reins.”

“Don’t let Isabel hear you say that,” Marcus teased, even as he assessed the old man’s state. Except for the obvious paralysis on the left side, he looked remarkably well. His color was good, his eyes clear, and he was speaking, if with difficulty, coherently—an encouraging sign.

Lord Manning chuckled. “I know. I have no doubt that she is more than capable of running the estate and overseeing the Manning fortune, but she would be fighting against convention and she and the boy would be vulnerable to those less scrupulous individuals who might think to prey upon them. As her husband, you will protect them.”

“I would have in any case,” Marcus said quietly.

Lord Manning closed his eyes, exhaustion once again sweeping over him. “I know,” he said in a low, slurring tone. “I know, but this way is better and I can die knowing that they are safe.”

Marcus touched the old man’s hand where it lay limply on the side of the bed and Manning’s eyes opened. Marcus flashed him a twisted smile. “Think about living, my lord, and less about dying.”

The old man smiled faintly and fell asleep once more.

Leaving Edmund and Lord Manning, Marcus turned and walked toward the sitting room. He met Isabel at the doorway.

“Is he all right?” she asked anxiously. “You have been gone so long, that I feared…”

Taking her by the arm, he escorted her back into the sitting room. “Calm yourself. They are both fine. Lord Manning awoke and I spoke a few minutes with him. That is what delayed me.”

“He spoke with you? What did he say?”

“Merely that he was happy to see us married.”

She smiled uncertainly. “And you? Are you happy?”

Marcus pulled her into his arms. Staring down into her face, he said softly, “Our engagement may have come about by accident, but if you believe anything, believe that there is nothing that I wanted more than to marry you.”

Her eyes searched his and something in his gaze, in his face, made her heart race. Was it possible, she thought wildly, that her most private, most cherished dream had come true? Did Marcus love her? Or was it mere affection for a one-time ward that she saw in his eyes? Despair swept through her. If he had married her still thinking of her as his irritating ward and out of a sense of duty, she might as well throw herself into the lake and drown. But if…if he had married her seeing her finally as the woman she was, seeing her as a woman who would love him with all her heart until the day she died…Hope flared in her. Oh, if that was what she saw in his eyes, then she was the happiest of women.

She knew that dark face and those cool gray eyes almost as well as her own; they had long haunted her dreams, but she could not determine if she was seeing reality or what she wanted to see. It seemed incredible that he could love her, and inwardly, she winced. She had certainly done nothing to make herself appealing to him and yet remembering those moments in his arms…Warmth suffused her and she felt a delicious tingle deep within. He had wanted her. Wanted her as a man does a woman, wanted her as she had longed for him to do since she had been seventeen years old.

A flush stained her cheeks and her gaze dropped. Playing with a button on the front of his jacket, she muttered, “Very prettily said.”

He bent his head and nibbled at her ear. “Dear, sweet wife, I have many pretty things I will say to you soon.”

She tilted her head and teased, “And no scolding?”

His eyes glittered and he pulled her closer. “No, no scolding. I have other methods of chastising an unrepentant little termagant like you.” His lips caught hers, and desire for her never far from him, exploded into being. His mouth hardened and he kissed her thoroughly, making no effort to hide his sudden, rampant arousal. Feeling as if he would split his breeches, Marcus fought for control, but like a caged animal sensing freedom, his body had other ideas and he crushed her next to him, kissing her with an escalating urgency.

Isabel, as helpless as he, returned his kiss with fervor, delighting in the feel of that tall, hard body pressed so tightly against hers, delighting in the drugging sensation of his lips and tongue taking her mouth. Her nipples hard and aching, her lower body aflame, her arms closed around his neck and she pushed herself even closer to him.

They kissed passionately, the depth of their hunger for each other growing with every passing second. Rational thought clouded by the most basic needs pulsing through him, Marcus sought her skirts and lifted them, growling softly when his seeking fingers found the soft, naked flesh beneath. He cupped her buttocks, positioning her against the swollen rod between his legs and rocked against her, but it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.

Tearing his mouth from hers, he glanced around for a place to lay her down and it was only when his gaze took in their surroundings that his thoughts became lucid. Christ! He was in Manning’s sitting room and he was preparing to make love to Isabel on the baron’s sofa!

Struggling to regain control, he determinedly set Isabel from him. It was difficult. Her face was sweetly flushed, the beautiful golden-brown eyes were drowsy with desire, and her soft mouth was far too appealing for his peace of mind.
But the knowledge that Manning lay possibly dying in the other room acted as a douse of cold water.

Isabel blinked and Marcus knew the exact moment that reality came crashing back to her. She gasped and spun around to look at the opened doorway. Her face horrified, she looked back at him. “Dear heaven! How could I forget, even for a moment…”

Marcus grimaced. “We are both not ourselves tonight.”

She gave a half-hysterical laugh. “Indeed. That is an understatement.” Fighting to regain her composure, she shook out her skirts, her face flaming as a thrill shot through her remembering Marcus’s big, warm hands moving across her buttocks. Her spine ramrod straight, she forced herself to sit down again on the sofa and deliberately took a sip of her tea. It was cold, but drinking it gave her something to do.