Chapter 20

Grace felt her stomach knot tight. Despite the look Philip was giving her, as if he’d like to do nothing more than tear the gown right off her, those words were something her mother would have uttered.

Fury shot through her as she swept around him.

“Yes, I am wearing this gown,” she said tartly. “Celia helped me with it.”

Celia had been most helpful that afternoon. They had taken one of Grace’s old dresses, and like with the wedding gown, they transformed it into something new.

“I have no intention of changing,” Grace said tartly, wondering if Celia had been wrong about the dress.

Celia’s words from that afternoon still rang in her mind.

“He could not possibly ignore you in a gown like this.”

“Changing? Why would you change?” Philip’s hand suddenly caught her elbow.

She swung back around to face him, stunned at the words.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Do you have more gowns like this?” he asked, his eyes no longer on her face but on her cleavage.

“I intend to,” she whispered. The way he was looking at her, drinking in the sight of her, made her feel more confident. Her stomach was no longer knotted tight but swirling excitedly.

“Good,” he said, his voice husky and deep. “Let’s go.” He released her and strode out of the house.

The sudden loss of touch left her heady. She raced after him, eagerly climbing down the front stoop and toward the carriage. The footman offered his hand to help her into the carriage, but Philip’s hand appeared in front of her, and Grace took that instead, climbing into the carriage.

He sat beside her as the carriage set off, jolting them from side to side. With the movement, their shoulders just brushed together.

It was a great distance from the touches they had shared the night before though Grace still trembled at that touch. She wanted more of it.

“So, how was your day?” she asked, turning to face him on the bench.

He frowned, but he didn’t look at her. Instead, he pulled out the pocket watch and checked the time. Her lips pursed together when she realized he was fussing silently about them potentially being all of five minutes late to the assembly.

“Where have you been all day?” she asked when he still didn’t say anything.

He looked at her, eyes narrowed, clearly startled at her questions.

“Your frequent silence is becoming something of a pain, Philip. Tell me, do you intend on not talking to me ever again? Just so I know and can prepare myself for living with a sullen mute.” Her sharp words actually made the side of his lips lift a little in humor. She raised her eyebrows, challenging him to say something.

“I will be no mute, but we have our rules, Grace, remember?” He eyed her warily.

Grace felt as if the carriage floor had opened up and swallowed her whole. With this one phrase, he was putting distance between them.

“We’re only spending this one month together. What would be the point in getting to know one another more than we already do?”

Grace blinked. With one question, he had quite expertly put up not just distance but a great wall. It was as if the Philip before her was not her husband anymore, not the man who had practically ravaged her the night before on the bed. No, he was Eleanor’s cold, distant, and proper brother again.

“How about for common courtesy’s sake?” she said smartly. “You could at least exchange pleasantries.”

“Very well, I had a good day. Did you?”

Seeing he wasn’t going to tell her anything about where he had been or what he had done, she turned away on the carriage bench.

Tabitha’s words entered her mind, and she considered that maybe her cousin was right. It was perfectly possible that Philip did indeed have a lover, someone he already knew before they married. He would simply be a man of discretion in any affair he had.

“It was fine,” she said woodenly. “I introduced myself to your staff as you were not there to do it for me. I found my own chamber, too.”

“Good.”

“I changed it.”

“What?” He jerked his head toward her.

“Mrs. Williamson said you wanted me to have the room on the opposite side of the house. As far from your own chamber as possible, I saw.” She shot him a glare, showing she had seen what he had done. “I prefer the view from the chamber in the center of the house, so I asked to swap. You do remember telling me it was my home too, don’t you? That I could change it as I liked?”

“I remember.” He looked away, staring out of the window.

Grace glowered at the back of his head, wondering if the thought of her being in a nearer chamber added to temptation at all or if it made no difference.

Their shoulders were no longer touching. In fact, there was a space so large between them now on the carriage bench that a rather large man with a rounded stomach could have fitted there, keeping them far apart.

Grace parted her lips. She was going to ask again where he had been that day, to try and discover something about her husband, but Philip plainly had no interest in talking to her. Either he was very interested in watching the people they passed in the street, or he was doing a very good job of feigning it.

Grace slunk back away from him, increasing the distance even further. Resting her elbow on the wall of the carriage, she placed her chin in the palm of her hand, well aware her slumped posture was different to his rigid one.

How wrong Celia was about Philip marrying me for anything more than the sake of his reputation.

She couldn’t wait to get to the assembly and leave all thoughts of Philip behind.

* * *

Philip had a tight hold on Grace’s hand as they entered the ballroom of the Almack’s Assembly Rooms.

“The Duke and Duchess of Berkley,” one of the staff announced their arrival.

Many pairs of eyes turned to look at the pair of them. Philip imagined many looked out of curiosity after their recent scandal, but he also saw many men’s gazes linger far longer than they should have done on Grace. There was brief hunger in those gazes. They were attracted to her in this gown, and they made little effort to hide such obvious looks.

Philip’s fingers tightened even more around Grace’s as he led her into the room.

“You have done your duty now,” Grace said under her breath as they crossed the room. Behind them, the next guests were already being announced. “Go and spend the evening as you like, and I shall do the same myself.”

She snatched her hand out of his grasp and walked away.

Philip felt empty as he stared after her.

This is what I want, right?

Yet his eyes traced where she went.

Nearby, he could see Xander and Dorian sharing a drink together. He could go to them, join in the conversation. He always got along well with Xander, and as much as it was paining him to admit it, he was even getting on better with Dorian these days, but he could not.

Instead, his eyes followed where Grace went.

She moved first to her friends. She met Eleanor, Violet, Celia, and Diana, who all hugged her in turn. The group conversed eagerly together, speaking so fast it was as if they hadn’t seen each other in weeks, let alone just a day.

Philip took a glass of punch offered nearby from a server and circled the room. He occasionally greeted people he knew but did not stop to linger in conversation, for his eyes kept returning to Grace.

At one point, she nearly dropped a champagne glass in her clutches, but Violet saved it for her. She smiled with her friends as she hadn’t done with Philip in their whole carriage ride here. Repeatedly, she adjusted the ribbon on her neck that hid that biting kiss he had given her.

Strangely, Philip felt a wish that it wasn’t hidden. Despite the fact he knew how improper it would be for a husband and wife’s intimacies to be so on display, he longed for Grace to embrace it, to not hide it at all.

Then another crossed toward the group.

The familiar face of the Marquess of Morton reached the group and started talking to Grace.

What the hell is going on?

Philip nearly broke the spindle off his punch glass.

He had heard long ago that the Marquess of Morton’s tendencies were more for men than women, yet increasingly recently, he was beginning to doubt this.

Had the Marquess of Morton not been caught alone outside with Grace? Had he not made a special effort to talk to her that night of the opera? Now, he was doing the same thing again!

Philip put down his punch glass on a nearby table, very aware that the bowl of the glass was somewhat at an angle to the spindle now. He crossed the room himself, making his way fast toward the group.

He caught Eleanor’s eye first. All semblance of laughter and smiles on her face faded. Through her spectacles, she looked at him with narrowed eyes, clear suspicion in her gaze.

As Philip reached the spot where Grace and the Marquess of Morton stood together, he halted, waiting silently for one of them to notice his arrival.

“You look quite beautiful this evening, Your Grace,” the Marquess said smoothly. He took Grace’s hand, about to kiss the back.

Philip’s eyebrows shot up in alarm.

Out of the corner of his eye, he was aware of Violet and Eleanor elbowing one another, both staring at his face though he didn’t care.

“My Grace.” The words erupted from Philip’s lips.

Violet and Eleanor were both staring at him openmouthed, glasses halfway to their lips at the words.

The Marquess of Morton had spun around fast in alarm, and Grace’s face was at last fully visible to Philip. The smile vanished from her face, and she looked at him with perfect hatred.

“What did you say?” she hissed.

“My Grace,” he happily said again for her to hear, capturing her hand with ease. He took the champagne glass out and passed it to Eleanor, who took it in a fumble, then he took a firmer hold of Grace’s hand and led her away. As he left, he was sure to glower once at the Marquess of Morton, who now looked to be trembling in his fine court shoes.

“What the hell are you doing?” Grace said angrily as Philip threaded her arm purposefully through his.

“Joining the dancers.”

“Are we? So kind of you to ask first,” she said with full irony. “What did you do that for? You know perfectly well the Marquess of Morton was not flirting with me. He was simply being kind.”

“You forget something, Grace.” Philip halted at the side of the floor, looking her straight in the eye as the last song ended. “Just because I know the man’s inclinations doesn’t mean I have to like seeing him touch you.”

Her lips parted. Before anymore could be said between them, he towed her onto the floor.

They took the places of the dancers leaving, joining with others. In the quiet, they were unable to keep talking. They had to wait for the music to start, when they bowed and curtsied together then he took her hand and led her into the first movements of the dance.

A slow and steady cotillion, the feeling dramatic — it was a strong and purposeful dance. With steady steps, they walked around one another, holding just one hand each.

“I am adding a new rule to our list,” he whispered to her as they released one another and walked the other way. This time, they did not hold hands.

“Another? Aren’t there enough stifling ones already?” she muttered, looking him in the eye with that defiant way he had seen so often in her.

“You must not let another man touch you,” he whispered in her ear as she turned to stand in front of him, facing him.

“I cannot believe you have suggested such a thing.”

“Why not?” He took her hand and turned her under his arm, repeatedly. She kept whipping her head around to look at him again. “You are my wife now, Grace.”

“And what of a casual hand touch? Or if a man was to help me in and out of a carriage? Are all things banned?”

“Completely.”

“You arrogant —”

Yet whatever else was in her list of insults was broken off as they were forced to step away from each other. They circled other dancers, joined hands with groups of four, and completed a whole circle here too. When they came back together, he took both of her hands and turned her around. The locking of their arms brought her face closer to his.

“This is exactly why I thought marriage was a bad idea, why I never wanted it in the first place.”

“What do you mean?” he asked as they walked around one another in a syncopated step, their locked arm position keeping them close.

“I detest being told what I can or can’t do in life. I’m a human being, Philip, not your lapdog.”

“I never said you were.”

“Yet you are acting like it,” she hissed. They parted, and she turned on the spot, coming back to face him. They went back to the beginning of the dance, circling one another and holding hands. “How would you feel if I instructed you that you were never allowed to touch another woman until death do us part? That you could not help an older woman trying to cross a street to keep her safe from carriages?”

“There’s a difference —”

“No, there is not!” she hissed, her cheeks red with fury. “It’s just as mad, just as absurd, for me to ask you not to even think of touching another woman again.”

He didn’t reply, for he could not, and she seemed to have reached the end of her tether.

Rather than taking his hand for the next figure of the dance, she stepped back. She broke line, surprising the other dancers around her, then turned and marched off the floor early.

Philip watched her go, well aware that he should have been furious at this sense of impropriety, but there was another feeling shouting this one down. It was much stronger and certainly overwhelming.

He stepped off the floor too, allowing the other dancers to fill the space as some watching on whispered and pointed in his direction.

“I do not think I could touch another woman now, My Duchess,” he whispered possessively.