The Corrupt Comte (30 page)

She pushed the troubling thought from her mind. “Where will you g-go this time?” she asked her grandfather.

Amaury lifted narrow shoulders in a semblance of a shrug. “It does not matter.”

“It m-matters to me.”

“I cannot tell you, child.” He scowled. “And why do you care?”

The genuine confusion in his creaky voice almost broke her heart. “B-because I love you.” She sighed. Those three words just continued to spill from her these days, it seemed. “If you m-must leave, at least p-promise to write m-me, to let m-me know you’re all right.”

“
Non.
”

“Yes.”

He rocked back on his heels, eyes taking on a calculating gleam. “One letter per month.”

The weight on her chest lessened somewhat. “Absolutely not. Every d-day.”

He snorted. “Every other week.”

“Every other d-day.”

“Once per week.”

A smile curved her lips. “Agreed.”

His glare lacked heat as he threw up his hands. “Fine. One letter a week. And my cottage. And this house. Would you like the clothes off my back too?” As he wandered past Gaspard, who had watched the exchange with bemused interest, Amaury poked his arm. “You, boy. Come with me. I’ll show you this house that does not and will never belong to you.” Bending slowly, he picked up the fallen walking stick and shoved it into Gaspard’s hands.

She watched as the pair exited the parlor, the deed to the cottage clutched in one hand, and nodded when Gaspard peered over his shoulder at her in question.
Accept,
she reminded herself. She needed to accept.

But she feared acceptance would be a long time coming.

Chapter Seventeen

25 February 1820

There was a plain gold band on her finger, but all Gaspard could see were the packed trunk and valise sitting next to the bedchamber door. “What is this?”

Claudia’s dark eyes were bleak, weary. “I’m leaving. I t-told you I would, and I am.”

He remembered her saying as much on the night of their engagement ball, but he’d fixed that by submitting to her. She had wanted control, so he had ceded her his. Then she had said she loved him, and he had…he had…

He had lost his mind. The moment her
I love you
had left her lips, he had tripped over himself in his blazing need to possess her. He’d manipulated her back under his power and into his hands without a second thought, taking her with ruthless determination. The memory of it sent a shiver racing down his spine.

It had never been like that for him. A release was a release, and pleasure was pleasure, but Claudia had upended that by loving him. Her confession had spurred his greedy, domineering instincts, but it wasn’t until the intervening days between then and now that he recognized what else had changed within him.

He loved her.

And, by God, she could never know. It would only make the lie they were living now that much more painful—to love each other but constantly feign disinterest and distaste. To a woman who had spent her entire childhood unloved and come through it whole and hardy, being loved was what she longed for most. Loving her and then denying her the right to revel in that love was beyond cruel. He wouldn’t do that to her.

An unrequited love she could survive, he knew. Eventually, her feelings for him would diminish, fading until the façade they presented was her reality. As for Gaspard, he was an expert at lying, to the world, to his friends. Now he would add Claudia to that list.

The one person he refused to lie to was himself, and the thought of Claudia leaving him
on their wedding day
to lead separate lives drove a dagger through his heart, as surely as if she’d stolen his knife and plunged it heedlessly into his chest. “No.”

Panic chased across her pale features. “I have to leave, G-Gaspard. I
m-must
leave.”

“Why?” His shoulders ached with the effort of holding them stiff. “Why must you?”

“I won’t s-survive this,” she whispered, gaze trained on her wringing hands. “I c-can’t love you and…and live this way. It will d-destroy m-me.”

His jaw firmed. “You are stronger than that.”

“How would you know?” she snapped, sudden anger sizzling in her tone as her eyes lifted to lock with his. “How would you know if I’m s-s-strong enough to live with you, year after year for d-decades while s-society turns us into a j-joke, and while you wait to b-be found out for what you are?”

He didn’t like how she said
what you are
. As though he were something disgusting to be scraped from the bottom of her dainty shoe. “And what am I, Claudia?”

“A liar.”

Nausea snaked into his stomach, making him regret the many-course wedding breakfast they had enjoyed earlier at the home of her parents. “All men are liars, kitten.”

She shook her head. “I don’t c-care about all m-men, Gaspard. Only you.”

It didn’t matter that she didn’t mean it that way—his heart pounded a little faster to hear her forsake other men in favor of him. “You believe I will be discovered?”

“It’s only a m-matter of time.
Grandpére
s-s-said as m-much.”

“I am not your grandfather.” Amaury Pascale was a hard-hearted son of a bitch, and God only knew why the old man had gotten into the spying game all those years ago. Gaspard resented the comparison. His own reasons for becoming a spy had to have been at least somewhat noble…hadn’t they? Service to a country that had betrayed him at every opportunity—he couldn’t get more selfless than that.

Unaware of his inner turmoil, Claudia glared at him. “No, you’re worse.” Her hands fisted at her sides, the gleam of her wedding band catching his eye again. It glowed against her gown of amber silk trimmed with delicate pleats of sheer lace, the dress she’d worn at this morning’s simple but well-attended ceremony. Her hair remained shining and upswept, pearls studding her earlobes, the flush of her growing anger extending to those shell-pink ears and beautifully offsetting the pearls’ luster.

She was lovely, and she was his. His wife, his
comtesse
. A lump formed in his throat as he studied her. She belonged to him, inarguably and unalterably. No matter her protests, this staggering thing between them was their truth now. He couldn’t let her leave him. “How am I worse?” If she told him, perhaps he could change, in some small way—enough to keep her happy, but not enough to threaten the outward identity he needed to maintain, for both their sakes.

With a frustrated sigh, Claudia started for the door, but he stood in her path, and hell if he was going to move for her. He scowled when she first stepped to the right, then veered left, blocking her escape. “How am I worse, wife?”

She flinched at the title, and his heart sank. “You’re worse b-because you actually m-married me. You didn’t let m-me go.” Her eyes gleamed with unshed tears as she stared up at him. “I th-think…I think I always b-believed you would let m-me go.”

His entire body went cold.

A lone tear slipped down her cheek, and her nose turned red as she sniffled. “I told m-myself to accept this. Us. But it’s not s-s-something I c-can just
accept
, Gaspard.” The tears fell faster, each one a brutal punch to his gut. “Now I have s-somewhere to go, away from the
t-ton
. The c-cottage in Hampshire.”

“You cannot go to Hampshire.”

“Why not?”

Because I love you.
“You are my wife, Claudia.
Ma femme.
” His mind raced. A stall, a tactic—he needed one, immediately. “Perhaps you could wait more than a day before leaving your new husband.”

That had her pausing. “This looks b-bad?”

He shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest. “If you care about appearances.” At the moment, he didn’t care one bit…but even he had to admit that her precipitous departure to the countryside the day of their wedding was the perfect cover.

If she left today, society would tell the tale so fast and so furiously it would spread to the Continent in mere days, with no one surprised to discover that the molly
comte
couldn’t keep his wife. They might even assume he had sent her away, having seized control of her monetary assets and having no further need for a woman. Her leaving was the best possible option they had if they hoped to keep him far from an assassin’s blade, so it was a shame that he cared more about this woman than he did staying alive.

For a man who could have died several times over in the course of his short life, by another’s hand or his own, this was a stunning epiphany.

“Fine,” she mumbled, wiping away her tears with haughty defiance. “I’ll st-stay. B-but only for a few d-days.”

Relief poured through him. “Good.” His relief quickly turned to frustration. He’d bought time, a handful of days—a week if he were lucky—but she still intended to leave him, giving up on their marriage before it had a chance to grow. He may not be able to tell her he loved her, but he wanted this to work, in whatever manner it could.

Because in the end, he hadn’t married her for her money. He’d wed her for her husky, too-English voice and her coquettish French features. He’d wed her for the body that made his pulse pound and his breath catch. He’d wed her for that clever mind and the equally appealing facetious humor that she so rarely let off its leash. He’d wed her because she made him feel like a god when they came together, and because she made him feel like a feral beast when they were apart.

He had wed Claudia Pascale because he lived in a world where he could trust no one, yet he’d decided to trust her—not because she had no one with whom to share his secrets, but because he knew, deep down, with the instincts he both fought and embraced on a daily basis, that she was worthy of his trust.

Claudia was a good woman, and he loved her. He could spend the remainder of his life striving to deserve such a woman and fail her, miserably. Or…he could be the only man he knew how to be, and hope that was enough to convince her to stay.

That was the man she had married, after all.

He glanced around the large bedchamber decorated in shades of cream and ivory. The room and its attached chambers made up the countess’s suite in the new London townhouse with which Amaury had gifted his granddaughter. It wasn’t an extravagant residence, but it certainly befitted a couple of their rank, a couple with access to one of the greatest merchant fortunes in England.

The bedchamber bore evidence of Claudia’s tastefulness, similar to the small room in her parents’ home. There were dashes of bold color hiding in plain view, subtle accents against a neutral palette of backgrounds. A glass vase of sea green sat on the mantel above the marble-fronted hearth, a velvet throw in royal blue draped across the foot of the tidily made bed.

That bed captured his attention and held it, frustration mounting with every passing moment. “You say you will stay for a few days.”

She eyed him warily, nodding.

“How do I make you stay longer?” When she didn’t answer, he gestured to the valise and trunk by the door. “What convinces you to empty your bags and stay?”

She backed away slowly, and he followed, footsteps measured and even. “I d-don’t—”

“Tell me,
chaton
. What must I do to keep you with me?” Anger simmered as he unknotted his cravat and stripped off his dark brown coat. The lace cuffs buttoned to his shirtsleeves came next, followed by the embroidered bronze silk waistcoat, but instead of removing his shirt, he simply rolled back the sleeves and planted his hands on his hips.

“What are you d-doing?” Her fingers intertwined over her midsection, knuckles white.

What he knew how to do—command, dominate and seduce. This was the man she knowingly married, so this was the man he’d give her. And, if Gaspard were honest, it was the man he
wanted
to be with her. “You are my wife. I am your husband. It is our wedding night.”

She touched her ring, twisted it. “And you want m-me?” He watched her swallow. “You want t-to…”

“
Oui.
” He smiled, perversely enjoying her discomfiture. “Do you not?”

“I wanted to leave you.”

His temper spiked. “
Oui
, but that is not happening this day. So what to do to pass the time?” He stalked forward again, herding her backward until her legs hit the large bed. Their bed. “I have a suggestion.”

Her hands fluttered at the low neckline of her wedding gown. “You do?”

His cock thickened as a barrage of potential scenarios flashed through his mind. Kneeling before him, on her back, on all fours. He would need to do it all if she intended to soon deny him by running away to Hampshire. “We christen this bed with my cock buried deep in your sweet cunt.” He paused. “And you come for me, as you always do.”

She blushed, and the fingertips at her neckline began to trace the lace edging far less casually than before. She was
teasing
him, and he wanted to growl. From reticent to ready as he tempted her with sex, though he admired her attempt at subtlety.

Finally, she said, “I have questions.” Her chin rose in an expression he immediately recognized.

So this was what she wanted, and what would keep her with him—for now. A price he was more than willing to pay. “I will answer every one.”

“No m-more s-s-secrets?”