The Duke Takes a Bride (Entitled Book 2) (12 page)

I
mogen registered
the sounds of a door slamming and the thud of heavy footsteps.
Mrs. Nero,
she thought groggily. She flipped to her side, wriggling to find a more comfortable position. A hand snaked around her waist, pulling her against a warm, hard chest. She smiled sleepily.

“Genie?” The voice that called her name sounded confused. And young.

She surfaced to wakefulness reluctantly. She blinked and spied the blurry figure by the doorway. Even without her spectacles, she recognized the tall, willowy form immediately. Her heart slammed in her chest.

It was Maggie. Shit!

Imogen bolted upright on the bed like a resurrected cadaver in those horror B-movies. Her elbow poked Julian in the stomach. He grunted but went back to sleep. She clutched the duvet to her chest tightly, unintentionally revealing her bed partner’s smooth bare buttocks to his sister’s gaze. She saw Maggie’s brows slash together in a confused frown. She stepped back out of the doorway as if checking she had the right room. Julian chose that moment to squirm. The sunlight filtering through the crack in the heavy curtains was shining directly on his face. He moved to turn his face away, and the light bounced off his golden, storybook prince hair.

Imogen saw the moment Maggie’s uncomprehending stare turned to shock. Her mouth dropped open and her eyes dilated with horror. Her mouth worked but no sound came out.

“Maggie−”

But Maggie had already started backing away. The door banged shut violently. Julian lifted his head.

“What was that?” he mumbled, squinting from the early morning sun as he scanned the room. Seeing no one, he flopped back on the pillow.

“Your sister,” Imogen hissed, trying desperately to unravel herself from a tangle of limbs and bedcovers, “is here.”

“She always had great timing,” she heard him mutter grouchily. She was finally emerging from the linens, one foot already on the floor.

“Not so fast,” Julian’s hand shot out to wrap around her ankle, preventing her from making her escape. She crouched like a loaded spring, hopped on her free foot, and tried to shake off the hand manacled to her leg. In doing so, she inadvertently delivered a sharp kick to his nether regions.

“Fuck,” he groaned, abruptly dropping her ankle.

She stumbled but managed to remain upright. “Oh God, I’m so sorry.” She rushed to his side.

“I’m fine,” he said, taking deep, slow breaths. He looked a bit green.

“Are you sure?” She kicked her torn shirt under the bed to be dealt with later.

He nodded, not as green as a few seconds ago. “Before you go out of the room, we need to talk.”

Something in his tone warned Imogen she wouldn’t like what she was going to hear next. This was the morning-after talk that was supposed to have gone down two years before. “Er-can we do it later, preferably when your sister is not out there waiting?”

“This can’t wait.” Even sleep-roughened, his voice managed to be imperative. ”I should have discussed it with you last night − before things got out of hand.”

There had been more than hands involved. There were fingers, and lips, and tongue, and teeth…

“Look, last night was great, mind-blowing sex. It was the best I’ve ever had.” His brows knitted together. Imogen tried not to be distracted by the well-delineated anatomy that was splayed on her bed. “God knows I don’t have much to compare it with and I’m not an authority like you on the subject,” she studiously ignored his deepening frown, “but it was great.” She raised her fisted hands and did a small pom-pom cheer wave.

His face grew more ominous as Imogen blabbered. “I think I know what you’re trying to say, so I’m just going to make it easy for both of us. It will spare us the awkwardness, and I can get out of the room and be right in another awkward scene with your sister,” she finished in a rush.

He got out of bed, stalked to where she was midway to the door, and stood in front of her with his feet planted wide apart, arms across his chest in a confrontational stance. “What is it you think I’m going to say?”

“Before I answer your question,” she croaked, “could you please, please put on your clothes first?”

Julian just quirked a maddening brow.

“Fine,” she snapped. He smirked. She dashed to the side of the room, yanked open a drawer, and grabbed a shirt and yoga pants. He remained quiet, drumming his fingers on his arm with a long-suffering look. “Now I’m decent.”

Julian’s gaze dropped to her chest. “Barely,” he drawled.

Imogen followed his gaze. Her nipples were poking through her thin, ratty shirt. This time it was her turn to fold her arms across her breasts. For self-defense.

“Last night was great. I’ll never forget it. Thanks.” His eyes narrowed, so she hastened to add, “So much. Er-I mean, thanks for a spectacular, sexual experience.” The words were quite a mouthful, but then his mouth had been everywhere too. She squeezed her legs together.

It was a seemingly endless few seconds before he spoke. “It won’t be your
last
spectacular, sexual experience, Imogen,” he said smoothly, “if you agree to become my wife.”

Wife?

She was hearing things. She had heard too much sex did that. “Your what?”

“I’m asking you to marry me.”

Imogen tried to make her mouth work. Finally it did. “You want to marry me?” She dug a thumb onto her chest. “Me?”

Julian made a show of glancing around the room. “No one else is around, so I guess that means you.”

“Are you out of your mind?” Imogen burst out hysterically, like one of those women in Maggie’s Spanish telenovelas. “Is this some kind of a joke?”

“I’m not joking.” True enough. Julian wasn’t smiling, nor laughing. In fact, he looked dead-serious.

Imogen stumbled her way to an accent chair by the window, sinking into it with legs like jelly. “Wh-why?”she stammered.

He began pacing the length of the room, raking a hand through his hair. Imogen just observed him, stunned. She was immune to the sight of his magnificent physique for the first time. What caught her attention was how unsure he looked, a far cry from his usual self-possessed manner.

He paused, then swung to face her. “It’s time.”

“Time for what?”

“To produce brats.” He scanned the room, stooped by the foot of the bed, and retrieved his trousers. “I need to marry. Have an heir. I’ve delayed long enough. If I wait longer, I might not live to see the brat when he goes to university.” He pulled on his pants with impatient movements.

To produce his brats. How…romantic. Served her right for asking when she could have just leapt at the opportunity and said yes so fast his head would’ve spun.

“Maggie can’t inherit. The title and estate will go to Gray if I don’t have a son.” His lips twisted to show how much of a disaster it would be if that happened. “Idiotic, anachronistic laws,” he muttered in disgust.

The only reason Imogen was getting a proposal from Julian was because of a feudal rule that managed to survive despite present-day gender equality. How it
warmed
her foolish, stupid heart that an antiquated custom was now working to her advantage – she was to become a brood mare to the Duke of Blackmoore.

She strangled her disappointment. “You can have your pick of accomplished, beautiful women to be the mother of your children, like Princess Alexandria. Why me?”

He stopped short and impaled her with his laser beam gaze. “How long have you known about the betrothal?”

There was no use prevaricating. “A long time ago. It wasn’t Maggie,” she quickly added when Julian started glowering. “It was Gray.” His brother had gleefully imparted the information with a cruel sneer.
Julian is going to marry Princess Lexie, not some porky, four-eyed nobody like you.

He swore softly. “So that night…?” His eyes held a question.

“I knew that you were engaged, but just for that night I pretended you weren’t,” she admitted truthfully. “The alcohol made it easy.” The lie helped her save face.

Julian’s eyes darkened, the ring of black around the irises more visible. “You aren’t easy to forget, Imogen.”

“After that disastrous hook-up? I wouldn’t forget me either,” she derided.

“It wasn’t all disastrous.” He searched her face. “I wasn’t completely honest that night.”

She frowned.

“I was such a hypocrite.” He reached down, tilted her chin, and ran a thumb across her bottom lip. “Virgin or not, I wouldn’t have stopped.” Imogen’s lips parted, and his thumb slipped inside. She sucked on it and saw his eyes flare with heat. “I would have slowed down but make no mistake, I wouldn’t have stopped.”

His thumb slipped out. He grasped her shoulders, yanked her up, and swooped down for a devastating kiss. “I never stopped wanting you, Genie,” he said raggedly a few bone-melting minutes later.

H
a
. So it just wasn’t the jetlag,
her sex-addled brain scoffed
.
But wanting wasn’t the same as loving. “You can’t just ask someone you ‘want’ to marry you, Julian.” What was she doing trying to convince him otherwise?

“Why not?” His brow lifted arrogantly.

She refused to say the L-word. “It’s just not done.”

“You mean I have to wrap my proposal up in hearts and flowers?”

“It would be nice.” Her flippancy hid the ache in her heart.

“Imogen,” he exhaled heavily, “some people get married for other reasons. Valid reasons other than-” he faltered, “the usual one.”

Her heart sank. To hell with those other reasons for getting married. She just wanted the usual one – the one Julian wasn’t marrying her for.

Julian forged on, his expression becoming more resolute. “I won’t insult your intelligence by lying and saying I’m in love with you.” His words railroaded her fragile hope that Julian felt something deeper for her. “Love.” He bit out the word with mild distaste. “I don’t trust that word. It’s thrown about carelessly, used destructively, manipulatively.” He spoke without inflection, but his eyes gave him away. They were flat and hard. He turned away from her, gazing at something through the window. “A woman told me once she loved me. I believed her. In fact, I asked her to marry me.” He laughed darkly. “She took off immediately when she learned I was going to be stripped of my title and estate if we got married.”

Imogen remained quiet, afraid Julian would clam up if she said anything.

“My mother, she told her children she loved them every time she put them to bed at night.” He glanced at her, and in his eyes Imogen saw something so bleak it was all she could do to stop herself from wrapping her arms around him. He looked back to the window, his shoulders taut. “Her love for her children didn’t stop her from killing herself, though.” He gazed unseeingly at the view outside for some time, then he snapped out of his reverie. His eyes sought hers and started to kindle with banked heat.

“The word
want
, on the other hand, I understand.” His voice became low, seductive. Imogen shivered, not in fear, but in need. “I know I want a woman who can make me laugh. I want a woman who took care of her sick father, who held several jobs just to make ends meet. I want a woman who is kind enough to take care of an ugly fish.”

“Hey, watch it,” she warned, her eyes stinging with tears. Could she settle for less when her heart wanted his? “Clark will grow into his looks. Just you wait and see.”

Julian’s lips quirked. “I want a woman who shares my passion for art, who understands my obligation to my title and my legacy and most of all, I want a woman who looks hot as hell in a ratty shirt.”

It would be so easy to say yes. “I don’t have the monopoly on those qualities, Julian. Surely there are others you’ve met who fit the bill.”

“If there are, I haven’t met them yet.” He sighed and ran a hand through his already-tousled hair. “Hell! I was supposed to ask you to marry me first, but you seduced me with your big brown eyes and your soft lips and I got distracted.”

“You were?” Her traitorous heart made a small bunny hop. It wanted to make a kangaroo leap, but she reined it in.
One brownie point for the duke.

He nodded, bemused. “You’re not my type, at all.” When she flinched, he added quickly, “In a good way.”

“There’s a good way?”

“I gravitate towards women who are not,” he paused to look for the word, “maternal.”

Okay. Cancel that brownie point.

“You’re different.” Then as if only just realizing it, he asked: “You’re not seeing anyone are you?”

“You think I’d be sleeping with you if I was seeing anyone?” she bristled.

“No, of course you wouldn’t,” he said in a rather odd tone.

“Are you?”

“Am I what?”

“Seeing someone?”

“You think I’d ask you to marry me if I was involved with someone else?” he shot back.

“So you’re not?”

He didn’t bother to answer. He just glowered at her.

“So to recap,” she quickly changed the topic, “what you’re after is a marriage of convenience?” She sounded like she was a heroine in one of those historical romances. A marriage of convenience indeed!

“It’s a partnership, Imogen. You will be my wife and we’ll make babies. Raise a family. In return, you will not want for anything.”

Except your heart.

“You will be free to choose to stay at home or pursue a career. It’s entirely your decision.”

“Wh- what if we get married and we find the partnership doesn’t work out?” Why was she even asking him this? Of course she wouldn’t marry someone whose idea of marriage sounded so businesslike.

“It will work out,” he said assuredly. “There has been no divorce in the Walkden family since the first duke.”

“They were all probably arranged marriages.”

“Most probably, but see how they worked out. No such nonsense as being in love to get married. Half of the couples getting married in a year in the UK end up divorcing anyway.”

“But what if you fall in love with someone?” The thought filled her with dread.

“I won’t,” Julian said with certainty.

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because I don’t want to, and I won’t.” His words were implacable, and Imogen shivered.