The Devil Is a Marquess (Rescued from Ruin Book 4) (16 page)

“Next time will be better, love. I promise.”

Her eyes flared. “Better? Husband, if this gets any better, I shall not last the week.”

Then, he collapsed fully upon her, eliciting an “ooph,” before he began shaking. Peals of rich, baritone laughter cracked and burst out of him. She smacked his shoulder lightly. And soon joined in.

*~*~*

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

“I favor visits of brief duration and guests of abundant wit. If I cannot have the latter, the former is doubly important.”
—The Dowager Marchioness of Wallingham to her companion, Humphrey, while formulating the guest list for a summer house party.

After limiting himself to a mere three sessions of lovemaking with Charlotte, Chatham had awakened in the morning feeling marginally sated and surprisingly refreshed considering he’d slept only four hours during the night. He’d gently lifted her leg from where it tangled around his calf and her palm from where it plastered over his right eye, laying a kiss upon her inner wrist before arising from the bed to stare down at her naked form.

She was freckled along her arms and shoulders and from her upper breasts to her neck and face. But the rest of her body—including those endless legs—was smooth and creamy. He loved the cinnamon spots. He loved the fiery hair. He loved the copper thatch between her thighs and the sweet strawberry nipples. He also loved her eyes, how they lit with a golden flame and burned emerald when she was aroused. How they gentled and softened and adored him after he brought her pleasure.

He loved her scent upon him, fresh and sweet and sensual. He did not want to wash it off.

Neither did he want to leave her. He wanted to turn her onto her belly and bury himself inside again. But he could not. She was bound to be sore.

Besides, obsession was a luxury. In a matter of months, she would leave him. He must remember that above all else.

So instead of rejoining her inside their warm, golden nest, he’d dressed and filled Charlotte’s flask with cooled tea, tucked the thing into his pocket, and ridden out to the southeast corner.

Now, as he stacked the final stone into place on his wall, he felt the burn of the afternoon sun upon his neck, the itch of sweat between his skin and his shirt. Yet nothing turned his thoughts away from … her.

He wondered how she was feeling, whether she would know that bathing herself with warm water would help the discomfort ease more quickly.

He wondered if her eyes would glow with pride and delight when he told her he had finished the wall.

He wondered how a man was expected to restrain himself when she was all he could bloody think about.

“Nearly done, I see.” Peter called from his turnip field. “Fine work for a nob.”

Chatham grinned and waved. “Only part remaining is to repair the gate along the hedgerow, and we’ll be well set for harvesting.”

Peter wandered closer to perch on the wall as Chatham brushed the dirt from the stones and resettled one for a better fit. “Shall we drink to it?” the farmer asked.

Smiling wider, Chatham nodded and retrieved Charlotte’s flask from the pocket of his coat, which was draped over the adjacent hedgerow. He lifted the metal container toward Peter and took a cooling swallow.

“Your spirits appear improved, if I may say. Had a good night, then?”

Chatham recorked the flask and slid it back into its home. Raising a brow at Peter, he replied, “The sun is shining and a wall is complete. Is that not enough?”

Peter gave a bark of laughter and then lifted his own flask to Chatham. “Nae. But that answers me question just as well.”

Chuckling, Chatham shook his head. He examined the wall to ensure none of the stones had come loose or settled awkwardly.

“Saw some of ’er ladyship’s guests ridin’ out in one of the west pastures this mornin’. One was a right giant. Didn’t know nobility came in that size.”

Abruptly, Chatham’s mood darkened. It was Tannenbrook. Had to be. Peter was right—the earl was unmistakable. And, he recalled, Lady Wallingham had a rather inexplicable fondness for the man. Why was he here, suddenly coming for a “visit”?

Tannenbrook and Charlotte were
friends,
or so she had claimed. She had been prepared to wed him, however, and that spoke of more. If the large-boned lord had not resisted her father’s coercion, she might belong to Tannenbrook at this very moment. Sleeping in his bed. Writhing beneath the giant’s monstrous body. Bearing his monstrous sons.

He swallowed and gritted his teeth, trying to stop the visions that arose. Of her. With Tannenbrook. Laughing and stroking the man’s brick-like jaw with her freckled hands the way she did with Chatham.

A hot wind from the direction of the sea cooled the sweat on his skin but did nothing to ease his unreasoning hatred for the very notion of Tannenbrook. He’d met the man a handful of times and found him tolerable. Solid, intelligent, loyal. But now, he loathed him. The rough-hewn features. The gargantuan height, which likely appealed to Charlotte, as she would feel average by comparison.

“Somethin’ I said, eh?”

Chatham wrestled with his unaccustomed temper, wondering at the loss of control. “This house party of Lady Wallingham’s—is there any indication of how long it is intended to go on?”

“Haven’t heard. ’Er ladyship’s gatherings tend to last ’til she tires of ’em. Three weeks at most, I’d wager.”

He wanted to see Charlotte. Needed to speak with her and ask if she knew that Tannenbrook was only a neighbor away. Whether she planned to see him.

Or perhaps he would simply carry her to their bed and keep her thoroughly occupied for the three weeks Tannenbrook would be in proximity. That seemed like the best idea he’d had all day.

Plucking his coat from the hedge, Chatham bid farewell to Peter and started for Chatwick Hall, where his wife awaited.
His
wife. He liked the sound of that.

*~*~*

“Here we have the staircase,” Charlotte pointed out the obvious. “It was entirely reconstructed. I had thought to preserve much of the original. Unfortunately, between the rot and the damage, most of it was unsalvageable.” She cleared her throat and laced her fingers together. “The wood is new. Walnut.”

Standing beside her, a quiet, hulking presence with his massive hands clasped behind his back, Lord Tannenbrook nodded politely, as he had done for the past hour during their tour of Chatwick Hall. “Excellent craftsmanship.”

“The gentleman who made the banister has been a carpenter for more than forty years. We negotiated a most agreeable … agreement.”

Tannenbrook’s lips quirked. “Agreeable, eh?”

“Apologies. I am distracted.”

“When you described the dining room as the place where one dines, I confess such a conclusion occurred to me.”

She sighed and turned to her friend, who had arrived for a visit from Grimsgate Castle. “James, do you suppose … I mean, do you think it is possible, perhaps even advisable, to reassess one’s prior goals?”

His heavy brow crinkled.

“I only mean that perhaps what one supposes one wants at a certain stage in one’s life is no longer, at a certain interval and after certain events, relevant. Or, perhaps another outcome is preferable, even though one—”

“Charlotte. Have you been speaking with Vi—er, Miss Darling?”

She blinked. “Recently?”

He raised a brow.

“Yes, of course you meant recently. No. Why do you ask?”

His great chest heaved a sigh as though he were trying to gather his patience. Most unlike Tannenbrook, in her estimation. Above all things, the man was patient. “She is fond of this topic.” The muttered response was surprisingly resentful.

“Oh. Well, I was simply posing a rhetorical question.” She waved a hand dismissively. “Never mind.”

They stood in silence for several minutes, admiring the staircase.

Tannenbrook sighed again then rubbed his jaw with one large hand. “If circumstances have altered such that an aim no longer serves a logical purpose, then yes, one’s plans may change. However, you should be quite certain of your reasoning, and not swayed by fleeting temptations.”

Releasing a sigh to match his, Charlotte replied, “My thoughts precisely. Why should one remain beholden to a dream that no longer serves?”

“That is not precisely—”

“And, yet, what has really changed? And is the change permanent, or simply a passing fancy? And who can guess whether a man’s
feelings
are engaged when he refuses to remain in the same room with you other than to lift your sk—”

“Charlotte—er, perhaps you could show me the new stables. Or the garden.”

She came to stand in front of him, craning her neck in a way that was rare for her, to view his blunt, craggy features. “It could have been us, you know. You and I.”

Green eyes gentled and crinkled. “I would have driven you mad within weeks.”

Smiling, she asked, “Why do you think so?”

“You value conversation.”

She laughed. “My father made it sound as though you would have preferred death to marrying me.”

His face went hard as stone. “I didn’t like what your father intended for you and told him so. Forcefully.”

She patted his arm. “Well, happily, it has not been as bad as I’d feared, so you needn’t worry.” That flagrant understatement nearly made her blush, so she quickly changed the subject. “Come, let me show you the garden. Then you should see the new water house. It is to be set over a spring with piping to the kitchen. Chatham designed it himself. He is really quite clever.”

“Is he treating you well, then?”

She considered his granite features, the blunt nose and square jaw, the serious gaze and perennial frown. “Yes. We have become friends, after a fashion.”

He looked skeptical, but did not pursue it, simply nodding. “Good.”

When they entered the garden, the bright sun made her eyes sting. She had forgotten her bonnet again. Honestly, every time Chatham entered her mind, everything else flew out as though there were room for him alone inside her thoughts.

Tannenbrook cleared his throat. “So, you haven’t spoken yet with Miss Darling.”

She noticed a weed sprouting in her bed of mint and stooped to pluck it out. “No. I did receive her letter after she arrived at Grimsgate, and I anticipate she will visit soon.”

“Perhaps you can persuade her of her folly.”

Standing and tossing the weed on the path, Charlotte placed her hands on her hips and shielded her eyes to see him better. His expression was oddly tormented.

“What folly, James?”

“She is determined to pursue me. It is ridiculous.”

Her brows arched in surprise—not that Viola was pursuing James, but that it was affecting him enough to ask Charlotte’s help. “I don’t know if ‘ridiculous’ is the word I would choose—”

“Entirely fitting. She is half my size. I could break her with one hand. Aside from that, she is a creature of the ton. When her feather-plumed mind is not singularly focused on frivolities, it is trained upon me. Incomprehensible.”

Her amusement growing, Charlotte suppressed a grin. “Why do you not simply ignore her? Surely—”

With a glower, James rumbled, “One does not ignore Viola Darling.”

She smiled. “Yes, she is quite fetching, I agree. Extraordinary, really.”

“That is not what I—”

“My dear cousin, Andrew, was positively
consumed
with calf-love for her. He talked of little else during the season.” Eyes wide, voice lowered, she pressed her hands together and mimicked Andrew’s prattle. “‘Miss Darling is an exquisite jewel,’ he said. ‘Miss Darling is a treasure more glorious than the queen’s crown. Miss Darling is more beauteous than England’s most breathtaking sunrise.’ On and on he rhapsodized.” She rolled her eyes. “Honestly, I considered stuffing my ears full of wool on numerous occasions.”

James fell silent, glaring at her.

“And he was hardly alone in such infatuation. I daresay the entirety of the beau monde took up penning poetry in her honor.” She wrinkled her nose. “What a lot of rot. They know so little of her, and yet gentlemen swarm ’round her like bees upon a honey pot, eager for one sip of her nectar.”

His visage clouded and roiled, turning thunderous. He looked away, his jaw granite.

Clearly, he did not like what she was saying. But she had a point to make, and he would listen. Viola was her friend, too. “They know nothing of her kindness or her determination, her generosity or her humor. They do not care. She could be the veriest harridan, and they see only her beauty. Never her heart or her mind, both of which are quite lovely in their own right, by the by.”

“Why bother telling me what I already know?”

Slowly, she approached him, noting how his gargantuan shoulders stiffened, how his hands curled into fists. He was one of the few men she’d ever met who made her feel average. “Because I am not certain you do.”

“The way men look at her is no mystery. How they fawn and gape and …” His jaw clenched, the muscles flexing visibly. “She is a spectacle.”

“She is much more than that, James, don’t you see? Your error is the same as all those other gentlemen. You are mistaking the wrapping for the gift.”

Torment returned to his eyes. “I do not belong in her world, and she does not belong in mine. She is simply too spoiled and stubborn to acknowledge it.”