Debt of Honor (16 page)

He felt at peace, almost happy. He had his home back and the money to reassure its future. He had a beautiful wife and a house resounding with life more than he had ever remembered. He could look forward to the future with a sated feeling of accomplishment.

Contentment filled his bones. A month ago, when he married
Stanville’s daughter
, he did not expect to feel this way. Like a lazy cat devoted to napping through the summer afternoon, he recrossed his ankles and stretched before opening his eyes.

Letitia was no longer drawing. She was sitting with her arms around her pulled-up knees, resting her chin on top of them.

“Are you finished?” he asked.

She turned her head toward him. “With the drawing? Yes.”

“Would you like to go somewhere else?”

“No, not yet. It is nice here.”

“Hmm,” he agreed. “It’s one of those rare moments when everything around seems so perfect that one cannot help but feel at peace with the whole world.”

Letitia smiled and rested her cheek on her knees.

“Are you happy, then?” she asked. “You achieved all you wanted.”

Not all. He had once wanted a family, his own real family. A loving wife and children of his own. That was one dream that belonged in the past.

“I am contented,” he said.

She nodded in reply.

What about you?
he wanted to ask, watching the clouding of her suddenly pensive profile. It struck him then that his contentment had to appear very selfish. He wanted to share it with her. More, he wanted her to be happy. Would that ever be possible?

“What about you?” he finally asked after a short silence.

“I am contented,” she said.

“Are you? I am glad of that.”

“You have been very kind to me. I did not expect that.”

“I will not apologize for marrying you,” he replied. “I would do it again if it were my best or only means of recovering Wycombe Oaks. But it was never my intention to see you suffer because of this, or for any other reason. I hope you know that.”

“I do,” she said.

He reached out and twined one golden lock around his fingers. It felt soft and silky. The need to sift through all of them with his fingers and watch the sunlight ignite them with myriad sparks spiraled with unexpected force. But she stiffened under his touch, her back tense with anxiety that seemed to vibrate through her skin to his fingertips.

Percy withdrew his hand and got up.

Letitia stood too.

“You know,” she said lightly, though the tension and anxiety he had felt a moment ago became audible, “it is one month today since we married.”

So she was aware of it too. He allowed himself a very cautious smile.

“Then perhaps we ought to celebrate such a remarkable occasion.”

“Oh.” This surprised her. “What do you have in mind?”

“Just this,” Percy murmured and reached for her.

Chapter Nineteen

Percy closed the distance between them and slid an arm around Letitia’s waist until the muslin of her dress crumpled against his waistcoat and her slender frame leaned into him. The fingers of his other hand dove into the sunny locks that had teased him all morning.

The surge of need swirled through him. He cupped Letitia’s head, gratified beyond measure by the same yearning and desire that had made it so damnably difficult
not
to kiss her a week ago. She was soft, warm and undeniably, deliciously female. The combination sent a powerful jolt to his groin. His arm tightened around her back of its own volition.

Taking a deep breath, Percy quelled the urgency to crush her mouth with the full force of his need. Instead, he touched her lips lightly, tentatively, almost asking for permission.

When she did not respond at first, the familiar feeling of inadequacy began to unclench its tentacles in his chest, until a slight shift in her stance stopped their progress.

Then Letitia did something unexpected. She pressed her lips back against his mouth, pursing them into a tiny O.

The realization struck him suddenly.

“No wonder you asked Darnley to break the engagement,” he said softly, looking into her disoriented and flushed face. “After weeks of being affianced to him, you still know nothing about kissing.”

She stiffened under his hands, and her gorgeous mouth pursed now into a question. “What is there to know?” Then she arched her eyebrows. “No one has found me deficient in that simple civility thus far.”

“No, I do not think they would,” he said softly. “But kissing a lover goes beyond simple civility, or at least one hopes very much that it should.”

As he spoke, he pulled her back to him. “Let me show you, Lettie,” he murmured. And this time he let go of caution.

He kissed her more boldly now, molding her lips to his when she began to yield. And as he did, her stiff stance softened, slowly becoming a surrender. Her lips parted, and she made a small guttural sound that, for all its softness, hit Percy like a blast of hot wind.

He plunged in, the dizziness and desire going to his head with the potency of a strong brandy. With a growl of satisfaction, he crushed her to his chest and explored her mouth.

Her hands, clenching his waistcoat, slid up to his shoulders and stopped there for a moment before reaching for his head and pulling him down, her fingers weaving through his hair with the urgency of a drowning person.

A moan shot from his throat, straight into her mouth.

Letitia made another guttural sound, and her tongue, so far passively accepting his exploration, moved to join his. Her hips suddenly moved against his.

A wave of white heat swept through him.

“Lettie,” Percy groaned into her mouth and somehow managed to take a step back.

She opened her eyes. The degree of his torture only increased at the sight of her unfocused gaze and heightened complexion.

Then she blinked a few times.

“What did you say?” she asked, expelling a shaky breath.

“Your name,” he mumbled, unable to tear his gaze away from her wet, swollen lips.

“No. Before.”

Something about her lack of experience? Whatever it was, it seemed to matter little now that he was burning alive and could hardly constrain himself from taking this accidental celebration to an entirely different level.

“It doesn’t apply any longer,” he said softly, wanting to kiss her entire face before finishing with that gorgeous mouth again.

“Oh,” she murmured, making it sound like a question she was mulling over.

Percy allowed himself a tiny smile. “You’re not sure? Then let us try again.”

And his mouth swooped down to hers once more.

The only thing Letitia was sure of was that she was not sure of anything at all. If that activity they had just engaged in and that now roared through her veins like a wildfire was the true way to kiss a man, then Percy had been absolutely right. She had known perfectly nothing about kissing. She had never before experienced anything remotely as explosive as the past few minutes in his embrace. Her lips pulsed with life. Her insides burned with restlessness and need.

And unlike the attempts of Sir Walter Hasting, groper extraordinaire, there was nothing unpleasant about this experience. On the contrary. She already wanted to be back in Percy’s arms, against his hard, strong frame, to feel the muscles rippling under the soft cambric of his shirt, to sift her fingers through his silky hair and to inhale the faint trace of sandalwood while he devoured her mouth.

Would that be his habit—kiss her once a month on the date of their nuptials? It already seemed vastly insufficient. So when he pulled her anew against those quivering muscles, Letitia applied herself eagerly to practicing her new knowledge.

Circling his waist, she let her hands travel up his back, over more hard, flexing muscles. Just touching them ignited her belly to the point of a powerful contraction. She pressed her whole self against Percy and reversed the game, pushing her tongue into his mouth and plastering her hips against his rock-hard thighs, and another jamming hardness, a gratifying confirmation of his desire.

Emboldened, she pressed harder. There was again that low moan rumbling through Percy’s chest. His hand, splayed on her back, moved down and stilled her movement. A whimper escaped her.

Suddenly, Percy drew his head back.

Letitia snapped her eyes open, dismayed at this hasty withdrawal and a little fearful that perhaps she had gone too far. Had she?

Percy’s gaze burned into hers, but his features were contorted with…pain? He let go of her derriere and stepped back almost hurriedly.

“Well, we did get past the simple civility,” he murmured and, removing the fingers tangled in her hair, drew his thumb across her cheek and lips before dropping his hand.

A small gesture, but the heat of his touch traveled all the way to her toes. Her lips throbbed, maybe because they seemed larger and more sensitive than just minutes ago. She tried, very inconspicuously, to feel them with the tip of her tongue.

Percy’s gaze darkened.

“I haven’t forgotten what I told you on our wedding day.” His words came out abruptly. “This…does not change anything between us.”

Letitia jerked a step back, astonishment and disappointment squeezing her heart. She was reeling from an earth-shattering experience, but to him it was just a…
this
?

“It is reassuring to know
this
has been such an insignificant interruption in your day’s schedule,” she snapped. “Very well, I shall not spare
this
interlude a second thought, I assure you. At least the horses had plenty of rest. If you hurry, we may still make it back for an early dinner.”

Percy’s expression became even more contorted. “This is not what… Think what you will,” he growled, sounding irritated. “You are safe from me, as I promised you before. Unless”—he paused and his gaze burned into hers—“you want to release me from that promise.”

Without waiting for a reply, he turned and picked up the knapsack laying on the blanket, then started ahead of her toward the remnants of the gate, the dirt and stones crunching under his boots.

Letitia snatched her bonnet from the blanket and followed him up the path. No, Percy didn’t look like a man who wanted to be released from any promise. Judging from his hurried and almost-awkward gait, he couldn’t get away from her quickly enough, as if she’d scorched him or done something equally unpleasant.

It was rude to leave her behind, but if he stayed there a moment longer, he might do something that would belie his words. He’d moved as soon as he was reasonably sure he could walk.

When he half teased her into the kiss, he had acted on a desire that, despite his better judgment and the stern warnings he had been issuing to himself, refused to be ignored any longer. Letitia had given him a perfect opening, but what followed surpassed his every expectation. How did it happen that the woman whom only a month ago he had planned to send away forever now filled his thoughts during the day and his dreams at night? And that kiss, at first a little awkward and definitely unschooled, broke the remaining constraints. No, they didn’t have to have a white marriage.

He quickly silenced the small voice insisting this was a very bad idea and he would pay dearly for such a decision, sooner or later. She had kissed him with such abandon that for that one moment, at least, all his scruples had vanished in a puff of smoke. Surely, this was not a woman who wanted to stay safe from him.

Now,
that
thought was too foolish by half. Once he started down that path… Foolish indeed.

The question lodged itself firmly in Letitia’s head.
Did
she want to release Percy from his promise?

She knew the answer all too well, of course. Especially in light of her newly gained knowledge about how to kiss a man. How to kiss Sir Percival Hanbury in particular. A man who possessed magic in his hands and mouth, and who didn’t have a mistress.

“What troubles you, my dove?” Josepha glanced from the needlework in her lap. “Has your excursion today not been productive enough?”

If Josepha only knew! At least she had her drawings to show for the morning’s exertions.

“We accomplished a great deal,” Letitia offered. The sheets laid out in front of her on the orangery bench did not belie that statement. At this rate, she was going to use more paper than any printing shop in London. Luckily, her lips seemed to have returned to their normal size at last.

But, of course, all the years she and Josepha had spent together meant that not much got past her companion. Or, more accurately, nothing
important
got past Josepha unnoticed. Now Josie’s careful gaze measured Letitia’s face with an expectation of the confidence they always shared.

“Did you? A great deal,” Josepha muttered loud enough for Letitia to hear her. “I wondered. Since your return from Wycombe Oaks this afternoon, you seem to be present in body but not in mind.”

“Hmm.”

“Hmm indeed,” Josepha agreed. “You care to tell me what happened?”

“How do you know anything happened?” Letitia bristled. As always, Josepha had read her mood like an open book.

“You’ve been very absentminded all evening. I’d hoped you would tell me without asking. Does it have anything to do with Sir Percival?” She raised an eyebrow in question before returning her attention to the needlepoint.

“He kissed me, Josie.”

Josepha’s hand pulling the needle froze in midair, and a wide grin replaced the concentration on her face.

“Well, at last,” she said with audible relief. “The way he’s been looking at you, I was beginning to wonder whether he’d ever make a decision.”

“What decision, Josie? We merely acknowledged the passage of the first month of our marriage.”

“Indeed. And you still keep that door between your rooms locked?”

“Miss Josepha Fourier, this is a marriage of convenience. You know how it came about. We agreed to keep it that way.”

“Don’t count on it too much. There’s one need every husband has that only a wife can satisfy.”

“There you are wrong, Josie. Any woman can satisfy his needs, I’m sure. Although, I must admit, it has been a pleasant surprise to know he’s nothing like my father. I couldn’t pretend ignorance the way Mama did.”

“And what did I tell you the very first day? However, I am not wrong now. Maybe other women could satisfy his lust, had he been inclined to live that way. No, I’m talking about children. Besides, your husband is in love with you.”

Letitia spun on her heel, sending a few of her drawings floating to the floor.

“In love with me?” The question came out on a squeak. “Don’t you see something you wish to see, rather than what is, Josie? Children, yes, I can agree with you about that, but Percy in love with me? No, no, you are truly mistaken. Maybe he likes me well enough, but what about his first wife?”

“Ah, so that is why he kissed you,” Josepha scoffed as she pulled on the thread. “Because he’s pining after the woman who never had a kind word for him. Where did you get
that
idea?”

“Why, he told— Wait, who told you about Sarah?”

“One hears things.” Josepha smiled. “Your predecessor was not a great favorite with anyone in this house except the previous housekeeper and her own maid. No one likes capricious mistresses.”

“True, but the same capriciousness may not have extended to Sir Percival.”

Percy, in love with
her
? The idea filled Letitia with warm, tingling joy. She had been careful to avoid thinking about such an eventuality, although it had been impossible to suppress the hope budding in her heart. Yet, judging by the taciturn stiffness of Percy’s demeanor all the way back from Wycombe Oaks this afternoon, letting it grow might cost her dearly.

Letitia picked up the drawings from the floor and rearranged them again on the bench. The dusk was slowly covering the orangery with a mantle of deeper darkness, even with several candles alight on her bench and by Josepha’s chair. Percy had practically thrown her out of the library this evening, using as an excuse the need to write letters that had to go out in the morning.

“Whatever happened in the past”—Josepha’s words cut into her thoughts—“is best left right there. You must look forward, my dove.”