Chapter 12

CHAPTER 12

“Dear God,” Keith muttered under his breath as he moved toward the drinks table, looking through the decanters of port and sweet wine as he searched for a good whisky.

The poetry evening Lady Arundel had arranged seemed to be pleasing many in the room, but Keith certainly wasn’t one of them. As far as he was concerned, all of this poetry was nonsense. It was a way to try and put the world into meter and rhyme, forcing something that couldn’t be reasoned into something structured.

Aye, life is never that simple.

His main distraction wasn’t helping matters. He could still feel the thrill coursing through his veins from what he and Celia had done that afternoon.

The way her back arched off the bed, her red hair spread across the pillows, was more intoxicating than any whisky he’d ever had in his life. The feel of her, the way her body had tightened with the pleasure was everything to him.

Those thrills had been even greater with the way she had opened herself to his perhaps more intense ways of lovemaking. She hadn’t objected when he’d pinned her hands above her head. She had even hissed with pleasure when he had spanked her in that most thrilling of ways.

Deep down in his gut, something tightened with the longing to have her again.

I cannot. Wake up, ye fool.

He turned his back on the table, frustrated to have not found a whisky to distract him.

It seemed he was not the only one uninterested in the poetry recital. Xander and the Duke of Berkley appeared at his side, both reaching for drinks.

“Isn’t there a better way to spend an evening?” the Duke of Berkley asked with a sigh.

“Violet is fond of her writing,” Xander said with a smile. “But this poetry is testing even her patience.” He nodded toward his wife, who had a rather forced smile on her face. “Endless poetry… it’s too much for anyone.”

“Especially this sort of poetry,” Keith agreed, wincing along with the two men beside him as a lady started reciting from a poetry book, talking about great love and how it was like finding out one had wings, making one soar to the heavens.

“I rather think the writers have never been in love,” the Duke of Berkley said with a sigh. “Anything good to drink here?”

“No whisky,” Keith grunted.

“Try this instead.” Xander poured a burnished brown liquid. “You like whisky, so you might like this.”

“Brandy? I’ve had that before.”

“Perhaps not one like this.” Xander waited as Keith took a sip.

It was strong like whisky. Perhaps not quite as smooth and strong, but certainly more pleasant than the ridiculously sweet wines on offer.

“It’s Armagnac,” Xander explained. “It suits a stronger palate.”

“Thank ye.” Keith smiled and took another sip.

As the two men returned to their seats, he stayed where he was, still unwilling to join the others. He took a sip of his Armagnac and stared at the ceiling, thinking of Celia, who was still confined to her bed.

Could I join her there? Could I sneak away?

He couldn’t forget the look of shock on her face as he pulled away. Perhaps there had even been a flash of pain there.

It wasn’t about ye, Celia.

He adjusted his shirt, thinking of the scars on his back. They had been put there long ago, and he was not willing to talk about the way they had gotten there with anyone. Not even with Celia, whom he had told quite a bit during their chess game.

“Your Grace,” a timid voice called to him.

He jerked his head around in surprise to see Lady Alicia approaching him. She curtsied, rather bashfully, hiding her face.

I suppose it’s an act. Many men would like that look.

Keith could even see the way she snuck glances at him, all coy. He preferred the bolder look.

“Are you enjoying the poetry evening?” she asked, moving to his side to pour herself a drink.

“Well enough,” he lied, knowing it would not do to say that his mind was elsewhere.

Aye, it’s upstairs, with Celia.

A strong memory flashed through his mind—Celia arching her back, moaning, her hair falling back. The way she had responded to his every touch was a delicious memory. He nearly downed his drink and marched back to her chamber.

Damn the scars on my back. Surely their discovery is worth a night with Celia?

“Your Grace?”

“I’m sorry?” Keith realized he had quite ignored Lady Alicia as she spoke to him. “My apologies. I was distracted by the… poem.” He gestured rather unenthusiastically to the lady that was now reciting.

It was a Shakespeare sonnet. At least this one was a little better than some of the others.

“And what did you make of the last poem, Your Grace? It was beautiful, wasn’t it? So serene and peaceful in its description of love.”

“Yes, peaceful,” Keith said, trying to sound much more interested than he was.

Is love a peaceful thing?

In his dubiousness, he took a rather large gulp of the Armagnac.

“Stars, hide your fires,” the young lady who was reciting began. “Let not light see my black and deep desires.” She hesitated, then continued, but those words struck Keith most particularly.

It was true that he was trying to keep his greatest desire hidden. He couldn’t quite bear the thought of anyone knowing what he and Celia had done. It wasn’t so much his reputation he was concerned about as the fact that what they had shared was theirs, and that’s how he wished it to remain. It was their secret and no other’s.

“You are fond of poetry?” Keith attempted more conversation with Lady Alicia. After all, if Lady Alicia was in need of a husband, and he was in need of a wife with a dowry, then Celia could be right—perhaps Lady Alicia was a serious contender.

“I was fond of the last one.” She smiled sweetly. “I rather like the idea of a peaceful love. It makes for a happy marriage, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, I suppose so.” He looked away.

Or a boring one.

He remembered the fire when Celia had kissed him the night before out on the terrace, then he recalled the way he had carried her out of the lake. There had been nothing peaceful in their interactions thus far, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“You seem distracted, Your Grace.” Lady Alicia looked away.

Keith felt a surge of guilt. Here was a lady who was vying for his attention. She could be exactly what he had said he was searching for, but meanwhile, he could not stop thinking of the lady he had practically made his lover.

Be practical, you fool. You want a marriage without passion and excitement. You want to not need one another.

An unpleasant memory flashed through his mind.

In a flash, he was a child again, peering around the staircase in his father’s castle. He saw his mother, her cheeks streaked with tears as she ran away from her husband. She sprinted like a mad woman, trying with one hand to pull her torn gown back into place. A shout sounded behind her.

On the stairs, his mother nearly ran into him. Elizabeth halted, clapping her hand over her mouth when she saw him there.

“He cannot discover us here,” she had whispered to Keith, taking his hand. “Come, let us be quick. You know what he is like when he is in such a temper.”

“Elizabeth! I need ye here! Come back at once!”

Yet, she didn’t listen to her husband. She took Keith’s hand and ran with him up the stairs. Keith kept glancing back, fearing that his father would soon be upon them.

He always insisted on needing Elizabeth. In particular, he needed Elizabeth to be at his beck and call.

I need a wife who will not need me. A wife who will be indifferent, as I shall be to her.

“Ahem.” Keith cleared his throat and put down his Armagnac, giving Lady Alicia his full attention. “Tell me more about yerself, My Lady. We have been in the same house for some days now, and I do not believe we know much about each other.”

“I am not that interesting, Your Grace.” She pinkened.

“Nonsense. Everyone has a story to tell. So, tell me yers.” He gestured for her to speak.

Her smile didn’t have the vivacity that Celia’s smile had.

Celia rose from the bed. For a change, the world didn’t spin needlessly. Everything was as it should be, and she even had some energy.

“I’m tired of being in this chamber.” She turned and reached for a gown the lady’s maid had left out for her, just in case.

As she pulled a fresh chemise over her body, she stilled, thinking of the way the cloth felt on her skin.

It was nothing like the feel of the Duke of Hardbridge’s hands on her. That feeling had been something else entirely.

“Oh, you did not describe pleasure with the right words,” Celia sighed, pausing as she sat down on the edge of the bed.

Miriam and the painter had described pleasure as something rather easy to take or leave, to savor when you wanted it and discard when you didn’t.

That most certainly hadn’t been her experience that afternoon. Pleasure had been something she was unable to resist. When the Duke had kissed her, she became a woman undone. She had pulled him down into the bed just as much as he had climbed into it.

The memory of those grey eyes as his fingers slid into her for the first time made her shiver with delight.

I need to see him.

Trying not to think about whether she was being weak or bold by wanting to see him, she finished dressing.

She dressed with particular care, pinning her hair up without calling for a maid, for she wanted to do it all herself. Dressed in her favorite Pomona green gown, she left the chamber and hurried downstairs. She clung to the banister rather tightly, a little dizzy.

As she reached the drawing room, she found the door open, and she heard words being recited from inside the room.

She moved closer and gazed upon Violet, who was now reciting a poem, much to the amusement of her husband, who seemed to be doing his best not to laugh.

From the mischievous smile on Violet’s lips, Celia rather wondered if her sister had chosen the overly sweet and exaggerated poem on purpose, just to see her husband snort and hold back his laughter.

Celia took a step forward, her head turning back and forth as she searched out the familiar figure of the Duke of Hardbridge.

There he is.

Her stomach did somersaults at the sight of him. He stood by a drinks table, talking to someone, wearing his usual shirt and waistcoat without a tailcoat. He had opted not for a cravat, but one of those thinner and much more informal ties. The way he adjusted the tie at his throat as he talked reminded her of how she had clung to that same tie that afternoon, pulling him toward her.

Then she saw him smile. It was a gentle smile, rather soft, the kind that he had never given her.

Celia took another small step forward, trying to get a better look at who he was talking to. Then she came into view.

Lady Alicia, dressed in a fashionable pastel blue gown, was something to behold. She was delicately pretty—the kind of prettiness Celia would never be able to achieve—with her golden blonde hair pinned at the back of her head. As she said something demurely, her chin downturned, the Duke of Hardbridge smiled again.

Celia couldn’t take another step into the room.

There was something so alarming about seeing him talking with Lady Alice, wearing that smile, that she couldn’t move a muscle.

Why is he so set on marrying a woman he has little care for?

Even in her room that day, he had said it didn’t matter who he married.

She jerked her head away, embarrassment raging through her as her eyes landed on the others in the room. She saw Violet and Xander sneaking mischievous glances at one another. Eleanor and Grace were sitting close to their husbands, and Diana was sitting so near to her husband that she was in danger of falling in his lap. For a man who did not often show his emotions, Aaron raised Diana’s hand to his lips and kissed it ever so gently.

Envy, like the Loch Ness monster, rose deep within Celia’s gut. She tried to push it down, but she could not. Her friends had matches of affection, of passion too, but that was not Celia’s future.

She took a step back, retreating beyond the threshold of the room before anyone could notice she was there.

She had never wanted to marry. She had made that decision long ago. Why should it matter now if the Duke of Hardbridge took a bride who wasn’t her? Why should she even care, even if she had compromised herself for him?

The pleasures of that afternoon seemed a long time ago now, as if she was looking at them down a long tunnel.

“It doesn’t matter,” she whispered to herself.

She turned on her heel, casting just one glance back at the Duke of Hardbridge and Lady Alicia. Lady Alicia laughed at something he said.

“Well, at least that’s another successful match I’ve made. I’ll have quite the reputation as a matchmaker for some time,” Celia muttered, trying to keep the huff of frustration out of her voice as she moved back to the staircase and climbed upstairs.

By the time she had reached the landing, she had pulled all the pins out of her hair and let the locks fall down her shoulders.

A wild idea came to her mind. If she and the Duke of Hardbridge had met another way, a way in which she had not been so bold as to swim naked in a lake, he might have considered her a match.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she muttered as she marched into her chamber. “He’s just a handsome duke. I’ve met those before, and they certainly do not change my life.”