Mad About the Earl (27 page)

“No, Griffin! It is you who are a fool. It is true what they say of you. You
are
a brute and a beast, and I hate you!”

Her voice cracking on the last words, Jacks fled the music room.

*   *   *

The music room fell silent with Jacqueline’s departure, but the atmosphere still throbbed with the emotions that had played out there.

“Tell me about Mr. Maddox,” invited Rosamund.

Griffin huffed a sigh. “There is no way Jacks will be permitted to marry him. Lord deVere, her guardian, has a list of possible suitors to choose from, and I can tell you it was hard work getting him to agree to that. If he had his way, he’d marry her off to Lord Malby.”

Rosamund gasped. “Malby! That old lecher?”

“Aye, that’s the one. Friend of my grandfather’s. There was a longstanding arrangement.”

This was all very troubling. Rosamund had observed Jacks and Maddox as they squabbled amiably over the dancing, trading quips and friendly insults. While Jacqueline displayed none of the self-conscious fluttering girls ordinarily engaged in when they fancied themselves in the throes of a grand
amour,
it seemed to Rosamund that the girl might very well love Maddox but simply didn’t know it yet.

And there was a distinct look in
his
eyes.…

“But if they are in love,” she said, “you ought not to separate them. It would be cruel.”

He snorted. “Love? Jacks isn’t in love. She’s not at all missish, you know.”

“That is abundantly clear,” said Rosamund with a roll of her eyes. “I have had less success with her than I had hoped. But then the truth is I haven’t tried very hard.” She sighed. “I like her so very well just as she is.”

She paused, then licked her lips, a frown furrowing her brow. “I think Maddox does, too. In fact, I believe that whatever her feelings might be,
he
is in love with
her
.”

“Well, he can forget about marrying her,” said Griffin.

“Is his birth not respectable?” Rosamund asked.

“Oh, it’s more than respectable. Junior branch of a very old family, the Maddoxes.”

“But not grand enough for the sister of an earl, I take it?” said Rosamund.

Why did the arrangements in place for Jacqueline make her at once so uneasy and … and angry, too? It was no different from her own situation. In fact, far more generous, because Jacqueline would have her pick amongst a number of eligible suitors.

Was it because
she
was in love that she wanted the same for everyone else around her?

“Jacqueline would be happy with Maddox, Griffin, I am sure of it.”

“No! Can’t you see how impossible it is?” He dragged a hand through his hair.

“Frankly, I can’t. If you would only stand up to deVere—”

“It’s not deVere,” he said loudly. “
I
do not want her to marry Maddox!”

“But why?” said Rosamund. “You said yourself he is of good family and he clearly doesn’t need her fortune. And she would be near us, Griffin. Don’t you think that would be a wonderful thing for us all?”

“No, I don’t! I want her as far away from here as possible.”

She gasped. “So Jacqueline was right. You did send her to Bath to be rid of her.”

“Damned right I did.”

“And now you want to ruin her life by marrying her to one man when she is more than half in love with another! And he wholly in love with her! It is too cruel, Griffin.”

He laughed. “Cruel, is it? Was it cruel of them to marry you to me?”

Her anger arrested, she said, “That was entirely different.”

I loved you from the first, you thickheaded beast!

“Was it really?” purred Griffin, showing his teeth. He looked like a well-groomed bear now that Dearlove had taken him in hand, but the wildness was still caged inside that well-dressed form.

He said, “From the moment of your birth, you were taught to believe you had no other choice but to marry the man chosen for you. Even at eighteen, when any other girl might dream of a handsome prince to sweep her away,
you
accepted your duty to marry an ogre without a qualm. Vastly unpleasant though the thought must have been.”

“If I had taken you in dislike, the duke would not have forced me to marry you,” said Rosamund, striving for calm. She hated the groundless self-loathing that made him talk this way. She’d hoped to put a stop to that by lavishing physical affection upon him. It appeared she’d failed.

He used his forefinger to tip up her chin so she looked him in the eye. “But Montford would never have let you have your handsome soldier, would he?” Griffin said softly, his voice sounding like the crunch of gravel underfoot. “There’s no need to deny it. Your high color betrays you, my dear.”

She’d flushed with wrath, not guilt, but he clearly chose to interpret her blushes in the harshest light. “You are offensive, sir.” She jerked her head away from his hand.

He raised his eyebrows in cool skepticism, but his gray eyes sparked with anger and his big body tensed as if he’d spring. “The truth is so often offensive, don’t you find?”

“You have no idea of the
truth,
” snapped Rosamund. “You make it up as you go along. There is no cause for you to be jealous, my lord. I am sure I have never given you one.”

“I’m not jealous!”

“Yes! You
are
jealous or you wouldn’t be so angry for so little cause. I would never willingly do anything to injure you, or hurt you. Captain Lauderdale is nothing to me. I don’t care if I never see him again. Does that satisfy you?”

His gaze dropped to the locket that hung about her neck, the one she so often wore. She realized she’d been fingering it again.

“I remember that locket,” he said. “You had it on when we first met. You wear it always.” He took a deep, ragged breath. “Show me what is inside.”

She froze. It was
his
face in the locket, but she’d rather die than admit she carried him with her like some foolish, love-struck chit. She might tell him one day, but he didn’t deserve such a confidence now. Not when he accused her of deceit.

“No,” she said. “I am not going to show you.”

The blaze of ire that crossed his face made her take a hurried step back.

He wouldn’t hurt her. She knew he wouldn’t. But her blood heated and pounded through her veins. She couldn’t let him see.

He advanced on her and she retreated, her hand laid protectively over the locket.

Griffin’s scowl deepened, if that were possible. “As your husband, I command you to show that thing to me.”

She licked her lips. “No. It is not a keepsake from Lauderdale—of that, you may rest assured.”

“Then why don’t you want me to see it?”

“It’s private,” she said, halting as her back finally pressed against the wall. She lifted her chin. “I demand that you respect my wishes, Griffin. No true gentleman would do otherwise.”

At her last words, his ferocity intensified. He lunged and made a grab for both her and the necklace. His arm lashed around her waist. His hand came up to grip the locket and tug.

She gave a shrill cry as the chain broke and the locket came away in his big hand.

“You brute!” She wished she knew a worse name to call him, for she’d never been so furious in her life as she was now. So angry, in fact, that she thought she might explode with it.

Before Griffin could step back and open the locket, she brought up her open hand and dealt him a ringing slap on the face.

The locket dropped to the floor with a dull thud. Griffin didn’t even look to see where it went. Instead, he yanked her to him and kissed her, open-mouthed and hard.

She fought him at first, pummeling at his shoulders with her fists and stomping on his foot. But her fists made less impression on him than the beat of butterflies’ wings might have done, and her feet were clad only in flimsy slippers. Still kissing her, he caught her flailing hands in his and pinned them to the wall on either side of her head.

Raising his head, he looked deep into her eyes for wordless seconds. In those moments, she saw all the pain he tried to hide. She saw hunger there, too, and hopeless longing. It was the expression of a starving man peering through a window at a feast he knew he could never eat.

Understanding hit her. Tenderness flooded her, tangling with her fury and hurt. They were all bound together inside her, like a living thing straining for expression. With an anguished little cry, Rosamund kissed him, fervently, sweetly, savagely.

Despite her understanding, anger still rode close to the surface. She gave it free rein and sank her teeth into his lower lip.

He groaned, a sound expressive of the deepest carnal pleasure that resonated down to her bones.

Like the flip of a coin, her ambivalence switched to pure, raging desire. She licked the injured lip, then tangled her tongue with his, gave back everything he dealt her. He still held her hands captive, and the feeling of being trapped, subject to the will of this big, strong man seemed to heighten her need.

The roughness of his jaw abraded her cheek as he trailed kisses away from her mouth and down her throat. Without warning, he bit her in the place where her neck met her shoulder. Spasms of the most exquisite mix of pleasure and pain scintillated down her body. She felt the place between her legs heat and moisten. Shamelessly, she rubbed herself against him.

He fumbled with his breeches, then lifted her so that her back was flat against the wall and they were at eye level. In one shocking, deep thrust, he was inside her, sheathed to the hilt, staring with those fierce, storm-cloud eyes into hers.

“Oh, God,” she moaned.

He gripped her thighs and she wrapped her legs around him as he withdrew and surged up, into her, filling her, stretching her, stroking those intimate parts of her that he knew brought her the greatest pleasure.

They’d made love many times, but
this,
this was urgent and lusty and violent and raw. Their mutual anger had ignited a passion that caught them both up in its flames.

She sensed when the first flush of his ire faded. His lovemaking grew slower and more deliberate. He moved only the smallest amount, pulsing higher inside her, touching deep inside her, over and over again.

Ah, this was torture of the best and worst kind.

“Harder,” she whispered in his ear, and he gasped and shook his head.

He didn’t want to hurt her, but she knew what she wanted and it was him, all him, going harder and higher inside her. Experimentally, she licked his earlobe, then scraped it with her teeth.

He sucked in a breath and lost control, pounding up into her until she climaxed in a glorious conflagration of heat and light. She kissed him wantonly, communicating all her raw, elemental passion to him. In moments, his body arched and stiffened. With a primal cry of triumph and release, his body erupted into hers.

*   *   *

With an inward oath, Griffin relaxed his hold on Rosamund and slowly set her on her feet. While he adjusted his breeches, she slid down the wall a little way, watching him with glazed eyes, parted, bruised lips, and cheeks that were now flushed with neither guilt nor anger, but passion.

What the Hell had he been thinking, flying into a rage over Lauderdale? He knew she’d parted from the captain without a backward glance. If she had private longings for the man, she could hardly help that, could she? The marriage of the Earl and Countess of Tregarth had not been a love match. He had no right to demand her heart as well as her fidelity. And if she didn’t act upon whatever feelings she might harbor for the captain, Griffin had no cause for complaint.

And yet, such reasoning seemed more than a little specious. While his mind knew he had no cause for such rage, pure reason could not cure him of this insanity. His was a damnably possessive nature. He wanted her—
needed
her—to think only of him.

All right, he was jealous! He admitted it. But that was his problem, not hers. He must keep telling himself that. Love had never been a part of their bargain. He couldn’t command her to wrench Lauderdale out of her heart.

“I’m sorry,” he said gruffly. “I don’t know what came over me.”

The hazy look vanished, and she glared at him. “If you dare apologize for taking me like that—”

“Oh, no, not for
that,
” he said. “In fact, I fully intend to pick more fights with you so we can do
that
all over again.” His gaze warmed as he looked at her. “Or some variation of it.”

Her color heightened even further. Those bluer-than-blue eyes burned with desire. And with curiosity.

“You want to know what else I might do if roused to a temper?” he murmured. He tapped his chin with his finger, running his gaze over her in a leisurely fashion. “Hmm, let me think.”

He paused as if to ponder the question, as if he hadn’t already imagined every conceivable permutation of lovemaking in his many fantasies about her.