The Duke's Indiscretion (10 page)

Colin drew the blankets over them. Then snug
gling into her, his face in her warm neck, his hand crossing over her corseted chest to cling to her lace-covered breast, he drifted off into a blissful, peaceful slumber.

C
arlotte sat in Colin's study, on the cushion-covered bench seat in front of her beloved pianoforte, staring at the keys through the thin veil of light streaming in from a street lamp outside. The room smelled faintly of tobacco, leather, and polished oak, distinctly masculine scents that irritated her because they spoke of him. She had to wonder if he put her pianoforte in his private study on purpose because he wanted her to be reminded of him every time she played.

It had to be nearly dawn, and yet she didn't feel a bit tired. She felt restless, unable to sleep after what he'd done to her this night. He hadn't stirred when she gingerly climbed out of his bed, and she prayed he'd stay that way for hours, dozing heavily, unaware of her absence. It shouldn't be too difficult for him, she decided, as he'd clearly exhausted himself with her willing body, a thought that once more sent a tremor of shame coursing through her.

She no longer wore the indecent, scratchy, tight-fitting…
costume
he'd purchased for her. She'd practically ripped it from her body the moment she left his sleeping side, replacing it with her beautiful, hand-stitched nightgown and robe she'd so carefully selected for comfort and enticement on her wedding night.

My wedding night.

She didn't know if she should laugh or cry at the absurdity of her current situation. Her head pounded, and she still felt the ache between her legs from a pain she had never anticipated. Why she thought a marital bedding would be a pleasant experience was beyond her imagination. Perhaps if love were involved in the union there would be a better…connection. She didn't know. He seemed to enjoy himself, but she never wanted to go through such intimacy with her new husband again. At this point she didn't even care about giving him an heir. She'd rather stay in England and perform than have to relive last night's embarrassment anytime soon.

Blinking quickly to hold back tears of frustration, she reached out and placed a finger on middle C, then C and E, then the chord C, E, G, letting the notes quietly resonate. Always had her music soothed her nerves, and she wished it wasn't the dead of night so she could actually play and sing to the rooftop.

“What are you doing in here?”

Startled at the unexpected interruption, she drew her hands from the keys and glanced over her shoulder, catching sight of him at the doorway, his figure in shadow. She swiftly turned back to the pianoforte,
folding her hands primly in her lap, breathing deeply because as angry as she was right now, as confused as she felt, the sight of him still managed to heat the blood in her veins and she'd be appalled if he noticed.

“Charlotte?” he asked again. “Why are you sitting in here in the middle of the night?”

She supposed she had to answer him. Closing her eyes, she leaned her head back a little. “I couldn't sleep,” she replied, her voice sounding hoarse and distant to her ears.

After a long moment of silence, she heard a creak of the floorboards and his footsteps on the scattered rugs, and then seconds later, he lit a lamp on his desk. She lifted her lashes again to a brightened room, though she kept her gaze focused on the keyboard until he strode to her side and she couldn't help but notice him.

He wore only his trousers, hands stuffed into the pockets, his marvelous chest naked for her view as if he had no shame at all. And as much as she wanted to slap herself for feeling a nervous heat permeate her cheeks, her only clear thought was how perfectly stunning he was to look at, his hair mussed, his sleepy eyes keenly fixed on her.

“I don't suppose you came down here to practice at half past four in the morning,” he said, leaning his hip on the edge of the keys, his tone colored with amusement.

She sat straighter on the bench and did her best to ignore his stare—and the warmth emanating from his muscled form. Reaching for a stack of music to her left, she began to sift through it. “As I said, your grace,
I couldn't sleep. Since I'm still new to your home, I couldn't think of any other place to go.”

He remained quiet for a moment or two, then after drawing a long breath and letting it out loudly, he sat on the bench beside her without any warning at all. She scooted over to give him room, realizing perfectly well that he wouldn't budge even if she begged him to leave. Her only hope was that he'd grow tired of boring, brittle conversation and return to his bed on his own.

“Play something,” he said.

She could feel his eyes fairly caressing her face, which made her squirm inside, feel hot all over. But she didn't dare look at him directly. Instead, she vowed to keep her manner wearisome.

“I really don't want to wake the staff—”

“Oh, damn the staff,” he cut in, reaching up to brush her hair off her shoulder. “I want to hear you play. For me.”

She tried not to cringe from the intimate manner in which he spoke, from the way his fingers grazed her neck and made her skin tingle. “I think I'd rather go to bed now, sir,” she countered, attempting to stand.

He quickly grabbed her wrist to hold her down. “What's wrong, Charlotte? Why did you leave me?”

Tightening her jaw for strength, resolute in her bearing, she finally turned to glare at him. “Honestly?”

“Honestly,” he replied, tipping his head to the side a fraction in curiosity.

She couldn't stop her confession now. The wound had been opened. “I was a bit—no, I was
thoroughly
uncomfortable trying to fall asleep wearing a scratchy corset, sir.”

He blinked in surprise, eyeing her up and down as if noticing for the first time that she'd changed her attire. Then his gaze returned to her face as a slow, crooked smile spread across his mouth.

“I was hoping to bed you again, Charlotte,” he said mischievously, “but men tend to get…sleepy after such vigorous lovemaking. I wouldn't have slept for very long, though, before the feel of you next to me stirred me back to life.”

Her forehead creased as she shook her head in amazement. “Are you insane, sir? Or just an idiot?”

For moments he did nothing. Then very, very gradually, he drew away from her, releasing her wrist, his features hardening before her eyes.

“I beg your pardon?” he charged in a husky whisper.

She snickered caustically, unwilling to look away from the stony planes of his handsome face. “Firstly, what we did wasn't anywhere near the bed. Secondly, I'm quite sure there was no love involved since you could hardly contain yourself long enough to remember who you were with.”

Her bitterness, her forthright acknowledgment, absolutely stunned him—so much so he sucked in a breath through his teeth and jerked back as if scorched by her vehemence.

“Do not tell me you didn't enjoy yourself, madam,” he said, his tone grave. “I felt every inch of your luscious body respond to my touch.”

A fresh wave of heat suffused her cheeks again but she resisted the urge to avert her gaze from his
intimidating stare. Instead, quietly furious, she fisted her hands in her lap and leaned toward him to continue her tirade.

“Respond to your touch?” she seethed in a whisper. “You didn't
touch
me, sir, you used my body and humiliated me for your own lustful intentions. I was willing to give myself to you as your wife, but you made me wear an absurd costume and ridiculous shoes, then called me by my
stage
name while you yanked me down on top of you to take me
sitting
.” Tears filled her eyes and she decided not to fight them at this point. “You
hurt
me, sir, without considering my feelings or the fact that I had never been intimate with a man, and I still feel the pain from what amounted to nothing more than a callous…acquisition of your right. If that was lovemaking, I can only hope that you left me with your child tonight so that I will never have to be
touched
by you again.”

He gaped at her, speechless, his face growing deathly pale even in the dimness of lamplight. Unable to stand his company a moment longer, she stood abruptly and rounded the piano bench, backing away from him as she moved toward the door, her anger overflowing.

“You couldn't wait to have a lusty time with my body in the most selfish way imaginable, and yet you still haven't even asked me to call you Colin.”

That said, she turned on her heel and walked out of his study, chin high, back rigid, leaving him alone on her piano bench to wallow in his thoughts.

She could only pray he'd feel as miserable now as she did.

 

Colin reclined on the settee in his bedroom, one leg stretched out on the floor, the other hitched up over the armrest, a half-empty whisky bottle in his hand, which he dangled over the edge of the seat while he stared blankly at the ceiling. Dawn had broken at last, and yet he didn't feel like moving, like talking to anyone, like working, or even rising to bathe.

For a long time he'd tried to think of something practical, household matters or work, things he needed to do for Sir Thomas, swallowing his expensive liquor with zeal and gazing at nothing in particular. It hadn't worked. He simply couldn't help but relive his night with his new wife, the crazy eroticism that had overtaken him, the way she'd responded to the striking desire between them, reacted to every stroke, every shared kiss and the touch of his lips on her skin. She
had
responded physically, he knew that as any man would, but it had never entered his mind that she hadn't enjoyed him, or the act itself. Somehow she'd fooled him…or he had been blind.

Now quite drunk, feeling pitifully wounded, even embarrassed, he let himself consider and reflect on every moment of their interlude together, how she'd returned his kisses with passion as her wetness coated his fingers, how she'd complied with his order to wear what had to be an uncomfortable outfit in every way, especially for a virgin. And he knew she was a virgin. Logically he'd known as much before his wedding to the Lady Charlotte Hughes, though the line between Charlotte and the exotic, sensual Lottie seemed to blur with him, a fact Charlotte threw back in his face when she accused him of calling her by her stage name.
While it was true that he'd wanted to bed his wife to make their union legal, he hadn't really considered the ramifications of doing so as if he were making love to the woman of his dreams. What he wanted more than anything was to take Lottie in a whirlwind of lust and passion, hot breaths and moans, to make her come over and over before she satisfied his raging sexual hunger. He'd wanted to be her greatest lover, and instead he'd hurt her because he'd been not her greatest, but her first.

Suddenly, through a wave of nausea, he heard the faintest musical notes drifting up to his bed chamber from his study below. She played magnificently, a minuet he only vaguely recalled.

Colin closed his eyes and raised the bottle to his mouth again, taking a long, full swallow, feeling the burn in his gut and strangely delighting in it.

Had he been stupid in imagining a full week in bed with her, the two of them laughing, touching, stroking, lying together in a pleasure-filled embrace? After last night she wanted nothing to do with him, and never in his life had he been brought to his knees by a vision so beautiful, then hit over the head with insult at his lovemaking abilities. He was Colin Ramsey, the noble Duke of Newark, admired by every female in the land, married to a well-respected lady of the peerage. He knew how to treat a woman, and Charlotte should have anticipated grand lovemaking by someone with his reputation, even, he realized, if society had exaggerated that reputation just a little. Yet she said he'd left her in pain, a thought that not only cut him to the core, but filled him with a certain, rare humiliation.

Now, lying flat on his back in his bedroom, still wearing his wedding trousers and a loosely opened shirt, he listened to her play to the beat of his pounding head. And the more she played, the more it annoyed him that his wife of less than twenty-four hours had brushed him aside after only one night and returned to
her
passion at the pianoforte. Ridiculous, and he'd be the fool of London if anyone learned how fully in charge of him she'd become in one day. He wasn't about to let her win this battle.

With resolve, he attempted to sit up on the settee, the room spinning suddenly at his effort. After allowing his rolling stomach to calm, he slowly stood, still clinging to his half-empty bottle.

What the hell. He swallowed deeply again, then wiped a palm down his face before walking unsteadily toward the hallway. He took two or three deep breaths to balance himself, then staggered down the stairs in bare feet, following the sound of the music until he reached the door of his study, cracked just enough for him to watch her and listen for a moment before he fully opened it.

She didn't hear him, wasn't aware of his intrusion, which gave him ample time to consider how he might begin a discussion. She'd plaited her long hair, twisting it up atop her head, and now wore a modest morning gown in light green, its wide skirts flowing over the piano bench, its puffed sleeves stroking her ear lobes with each fast movement of her nimble fingers.

Head splitting, he leaned his unsteady form against the door frame and crossed his arms over his
chest, his open whisky bottle clutched in one palm.

“Beautiful,” he said just loud enough for her to hear.

Startled, her fingers fairly flew off the keys and she whirled around to view him, her luscious mouth dropped open.

He offered her a crooked grin, but said nothing for a moment, enjoying her surprise.

Removing her spectacles, she looked him up and down, noting, he supposed, that he carried the bottle and still wore his clothes from the night before, though her eyes lingered on his chest, reassuring him that she certainly enjoyed his body, at least on a conventional level.

“I like it when you look at me,” he drawled very softly, his eyes narrowing as he focused on her face.