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Authors: Katie MacAlister

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BOOK: Truth about Leo
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Leo was well aware that the bathwater, such as it was, was rapidly cooling, but he felt oddly loath to end this bizarre conversation. He wanted to keep Dagmar talking just to see what she'd say next. “Are you referring to sexual congress?”

“No, not particularly.” She looked thoughtful. “Although I suppose if you wanted to inform me about how to do it, I would be grateful. People don't talk to me about these things because I am a gentle and innocent maiden.”

“So you have mentioned.” He had absolutely no doubt that she was anything but a gentle maiden, although the forthright look in her pretty hazel eyes gave proof to her claim of innocence.

“I don't often have the opportunity to see gentlemen without their breeches.” There was a wistful note in her voice that had him wondering if her innocence was as great as he first thought. “Copenhagen is so cold in the winter, you see.”

There wasn't really much to say to that. Leo contemplated his course of action and decided to throw his trust in the legitimacy of the marriage lines that she'd dangled in front of him, and with a flick of his wrist, stood up, allowing the bedsheet to fall to his feet.

Dagmar's eyes widened. “I see,” she said after a few moments' silence, her gaze crawling over him in a way that had he not suffered a fever for ten days, not to mention a grievous injury to his arm and shoulder, he would have acknowledged in a wholly physical manner. As it was, he simply stood there and let her look her fill. “And that bit there…” She waved toward his groin. “Is it supposed to look like that?”

He looked down. “I've been ill.”

“Yes, but it's rather unsightly, don't you think?”

He squared his shoulders and looked down his nose at her. How dare she make disparaging comments about his penis? “It is quiescent at the moment, but I assure you that is simply the result of the fever. If you are worrying that I cannot perform my marital duties—not that I intend to perform them anytime soon because I have many questions, many questions indeed regarding this so-called marriage that has taken place—I can assure you that when needs must, it works quite well. Or so I've been given to understand from various ladies.”

“Hmm.” She gave his groin a doubtful look, then gestured toward the tub. “Well, I must admit that I don't see what all the fuss is about. If my sainted mother had shown me that years ago, we wouldn't have had that episode where she found me hiding in the stables.”

He stepped into the tub, glancing at her before sitting down in the tepid water. “What does a stable have to do with the male form?”

She smiled and handed him a small square of cambric. “We used to have a very handsome groom. His upper parts were exceptionally well formed. I felt that his lower half must match and wished to see for myself. Unfortunately, Mama found me before I could ascertain the truth for myself. Here is some soap. If you lean forward, I will wash your back. Try not to get your arm or shoulder wet.”

His body felt so weak, and he was so distracted by the mental image of a gentle and innocent princess hiding in a stable in an attempt to spy on a well-built groom, that he wasn't aware of her touch until some minutes had passed.

“Oh, goodness! You have a drawing on your back.”

“It's called a tattoo.”

“Why do you have a drawing of a”—there was a pause while she leaned forward to squint at the image—“a bird on your back?”

“It's a firebird, and it is the reason young men on their Grand Tour should not deliberately lose their companions in order to drink themselves blind in a tavern in the seedier part of Marseilles.”

“Oh.” She touched it with the cloth. “It's rather pretty. I have never seen someone with a drawing on their skin. What is a firebird?”

“A mythical creature, and before you ask, I have no recollection of asking for it, let alone the tattoo, so I'm unable to tell you why I chose that image.”

“Ah.”

Silence wrapped around them, a warm, steamy silence that seemed oddly charged. A warm tingling along his spine finally caught his attention, and it was at that point that he realized she had spent an inordinately long time soaping his back.

“Are you all right back there?” he inquired politely, trying to look over his shoulder without causing pain.

“Yes, fine. The salt water doesn't let the soap work too well.” Her fingers, warm and strong, slid along the flesh of his back, sending little chills of pleasure coursing through him. She made swirling motions, little patterns comprised of swoops and circles and long sweeps of her hands, that made him very aware that he was a man, and she was a woman, and one of them was naked.

“I believe…” He had to stop and clear his throat. “I believe my back is clean now.”

“Is it? I suppose that's so.” She wrung out another cambric square over his back and moved around to kneel next to him, eyeing his chest doubtfully. “I will wash your left side, but the ship's surgeon was most adamant that we keep your wound as dry as possible.”

He took up his cloth. “I have washed my left side already.”

“Very well. I shall do your lower half, so you won't have to bend…” She paused, staring with growing astonishment at the water. After a minute, she looked up at him, a question clearly evident in her face.

“Yes, it's supposed to do that,” he said without looking down at his lap. “That's how it functions.”

“Really?” She returned her attention to his groin. “That seems singularly impractical. How do you walk with that in your breeches?”

“Quite painfully when it's in this state. Luckily, I'm not often called upon to stroll about like this.”

She gave it another doubtful look, then proceeded to wash his legs and feet, finally taking up a large linen for him to dry himself upon.

Ten minutes later, with his head swimming from the unaccustomed activity and his groin attempting to impress the princess with its apparent prowess, he was tucked into bed.

“Now, if you please, I should like the exact details of the circumstances of our marriage. I don't recall ever seeing you before.”

“That will have to wait until after you've had your broth.”

“I want to hear about it now.”

“I don't want to go into the explanation until later.”

Leo glared at her. “Madam, you seem to be under the delusion that you can naysay me. Please disabuse yourself of that notion immediately, and do as I ask.”

“Bossy, aren't you?” She had the nerve to look unimpressed by his dictates as she tidied up the room.

“If I am, it's because it comes with my position. When and where did we meet?”

“I didn't realize that majors were entitled to push innocent and gentle citizens around. In Denmark, officers treat ladies with respect.”

“I am entirely respectful to you.” He stopped, aware that the words were coming out in a growl. He cleared his throat again. “And I was referring to my title, not my military rank.”

“Your title?” She frowned as she gathered up the nightshirt, pausing as she was about to leave the cabin. “I thought your name was Leo Mortimer?”

“Mortimer is my family name, yes. I am the seventh Earl of March.”

“Oh, how nice! Frederick will be relieved to hear that.” She beamed at him.

He didn't want to allow the distraction, but he was unable to resist it. “Who's Frederick?”

“The crown prince. He's also a cousin and was, until we were married, responsible for me. But now I have you. Isn't it wonderful how things turned out? I'll go fetch your broth and have the men take away the bath.”

She left a smile behind as she bustled out.

Leo lay back on the pillows, feeling incredibly confused.

Without any memory, he'd been wounded.

And married.

And hauled onto a ship going…where?

It was all too much to take in. Perhaps he'd rest his eyes until the princess came back.

He slept for sixteen hours.

Five

We do not ogle Italian dancing masters, no matter how tightly their trousers fit or how muscular their derrieres are. Princesses are above such things, and if they aren't, they will soon find themselves with new dancing masters who don't fill out their trousers in quite such an exciting manner.

—Princess Christian of Sonderburg-Beck's Guide for Her Daughter's Illumination and Betterment

Dagmar started down a corridor, saw a familiar shadow loom up on the opposite wall, and turning quickly, sped back the way she'd come, racing up the steep wooden stairs to the deck. She paused for a moment, looking around wildly for a hiding spot, and had just chosen the fore of the ship when a hand closed around her arm.

“Princess Dagmar,” a male voice said rather breathily in her ear. “I find you at last.”

Dagmar's shoulders slumped. Caught!

“If I didn't know that there are few, if any, hiding spots on a ship this size, I would say you were avoiding me. But that can't be, can it?”

She murmured something inaudible and considered her options. Could she, if she twisted out of her captor's hold, outrun him to the captain's quarters, where she could make a plea for sanctuary?

“Not to mention the unlikely idea of a wife avoiding the company of her very own husband, a man who just two days ago she greeted with enthusiasm and appreciation. And no, you can't make it. I might be a little weak still, but if you run to the captain and demand he shelter you from me, as you did yesterday, I shall simply tell him to confine you to quarters.”

Dagmar spun around, frowning fiercely at her husband. “It was entirely unkind of you to tell him that I had a mental deficiency and was not responsible for my actions. Now he thinks I'm simple.”

Leo, who she absently noted was looking particularly well, regarded her with a steady gaze. The gaunt lines of his face brought on by the illness were softening as he fleshed out a little. His color had returned as well, although she couldn't help but notice that his right shoulder was held higher than the left, indicating he was still in pain. “You ran to him claiming I was beating you. If that's not the result of a deranged mind, I don't know what is.”

“You
were
beating me!”

He just looked at her.

She made an exasperated noise. “All right, you weren't actually touching me. But you yelled quite a bit, and you looked like you wanted to beat me.”

“If I did, it was only because you refuse to answer my quite reasonable questions. You might as well give it up, Dagmar. You've led me on a merry chase for the last two days, but the time is come for the truth.”

Her shoulders slumped some more. Even she had to admit that his request was a reasonable one. She'd avoided telling him the events of those last two days in Copenhagen simply because she'd come to realize that there was a very sharp mind behind that mild facade.

It didn't hurt that the facade was extremely charming and had taken to haunting her restless nights.

“Come. Let us sit in your cabin, where it's warm.”

“We can't. Julia is sleeping after her night's illness.”

“Ah. Is she suffering from
mal
de
mer
?”

“Still, yes. She's been sick the entire time we've been at sea, and at this point, I don't expect her to feel well again until we land. I managed to get a little brandy down her, so hopefully that and the sleep will keep her from succumbing to her horrible condition.”

The wind buffeted them as Leo stood watching her. Without warning, he reached out and brushed back a strand of her loose hair, his thumb gently stroking her cheek. “You have not had a very good time of it lately, have you? The captain says you seldom left me while I raged with the fever, and now you are in attendance of your companion.”

“She's my friend. I can't leave her any more than I could have abandoned you.” Dagmar suddenly shivered, the thin wool of her coat not doing much to keep out the wind and spray. Luckily, she'd turned out to be quite a sailor, moving with the ship in such a way that she didn't much notice its rolling.

“Then it will have to be my cabin. No balking, now. I am recovered, have bathed and eaten, so there is no reason you can't tell me what happened in Copenhagen.”

He took her hand, his fingers warm around hers despite the chill of the North Sea, and led her back down the stairs to the cabins.

“You still don't have any memory of the time before your fever broke?” My, but he smelled nice. It must have been the soap he used—he smelled warm and masculine, and there was a slight pine scent that pleased her.

“Not of events immediate to that time, no.”

Oh, who was she fooling? He pleased her in many more ways than just his scented soap. Dagmar didn't want to face the fact that she was having more and more thoughts about just how sleek his flesh had felt under her hands while she bathed him, but there came a point where one couldn't ignore the fact that one was having extremely erotic thoughts, and that time was now.

“I remember quite well what I was doing before I went to Denmark, but it's my time there that seems to have gone missing.”

She eyed him, wondering what it would be like to be married to him—really married to him, not just in name. She had a vague idea of what went on in a marital bed but clearly needed more information to fuel those erotic thoughts that kept pestering her at night—or correct them, since she wasn't sure if she was having feasible erotic thoughts.

“The surgeon said I have suffered a saber slash, but even that I don't remember.”

How long would it take him to recover from his wounds? He seemed hearty enough, other than holding his shoulder oddly. Would he need his shoulder in order to fulfill those bedroom duties that she thought about so much in the long, dark hours of the night? If only she knew just what those duties consisted of, she might have a better sense of how close he was to achieving them. If only she knew how he was really feeling. If only she had someone to ask.

“And I certainly don't remember meeting and marrying you, despite the fact that I must have been enough in possession of my wits to speak during the wedding ceremony.”

She sighed as she sat down on the edge of his bunk. There, right before her, sitting on a three-legged wooden stool was just such a person. Dearest Papa had always said that the only foolish question was the one that remained unasked. Therefore, she would take her courage in hand and simply ask. “Do you want to bed me?”

Leo, who was in the act of removing a heavy wool coat, paused and gave her a wild-eyed look. “Right now, you mean?”

“No, of course not.” She thought for a moment. “Unless you feel able to, that is. Do you?”

He stared openmouthed at her for a few seconds, then tossed the coat onto the bed alongside her, wincing as he did so. “I…I…I don't think I've ever…”

“You've never bedded a woman?” She frowned. “Now, that surprises me. My sainted mother said men were forever trying to bed women, which was why I must never have one in my bedchamber unless he was a king or my husband. But if you haven't…I fear we may be in some trouble, since I haven't bedded a man before either.”

“Of course I've bedded a woman.” He sat up straight and looked incensed, waving his good arm in a grand gesture. “I've bedded dozens of women. Hundreds. Why a king?”

“Why what? Oh, blackmail, of course.” She smiled. “There's nothing like a bedchamber scandal to tighten the screws on a man, is there?”

The look he gave her was one of mingled appreciation and horror. “You're quite the bloodthirsty little thing, aren't you?”

“Not particularly. The Danish court is fraught with bedchamber intrigue, however, and Mama felt I should understand how best to use it to my advantage should someone attempt to bed me without being my lawful husband. Do you want to?”

“We're back to that, are we?”

“You didn't answer my question,” she pointed out.

“That I didn't. I was hoping you'd forget it.” Leo took a deep breath and, with both hands on his knees, said, “Despite what your sainted mother told you, not every man wants to take every woman he sees to his bed.”

“Oh.” Disappointment filled her. He didn't want to bed her. She had a horrible feeling she knew why too. “It's my bosom, isn't it? I told Julia that it was getting bigger, but she didn't believe me.”

Leo's gaze was locked on her bulging bodice.

“Er…they're getting bigger?”

“It's the sea air.” She regarded her chest mournfully. “I don't suppose binding my breasts would help?”

“Most decidedly not. In fact, I forbid you even thinking about it.”

“I think there's something you should know about me,” Dagmar announced.

“I'm sure there are any number of things I should know, about you and our marriage, and since we're on that subject, I'd like a few answers—”

“I don't take well to being forbidden things,” she said calmly. “I never have. Dearest Papa said I got that from my mother, but I believe it's because I had to put up with Frederick bossing me around while Papa was ill. Frederick was forever forbidding me things.”

Leo just blinked his eyelashes over those interesting eyes and looked at her as if she were a boiled pig's head.

“If it's not my bosom—which I hope will shrink back to normal once it's out of the sea air—then is it something else about my person that repels you, or is it a general unwillingness to bed me?”

Leo took a deep breath. “I'm neither unwilling nor repelled, but I don't wish to discuss your breasts—which I have to say I find utterly delightful as they are—and would, in fact, like to have an explanation that I have been attempting to seek from you for the last two days. The time has come,
Wife
, for the reckoning.”

Dagmar flinched just a little at the emphasis on “wife.” He never once questioned the validity of the marriage documents she'd brought with her, although just the day before he demanded to have charge of them, and reluctantly, she'd given them over into his possession.

One thought led to another, and before she could stop herself, she said, “I don't need the marriage lines to divorce you, you know. They're in the records of both the bishop and Copenhagen. And of course, my cousin sent the bishop to marry us, so he would be able to testify that we were properly wed.”

Leo looked confused. “According to the papers, we've only just been married, and you're talking about divorce?”

“Not in the sense you mean. I simply wanted to point out that should I desire it, I could divorce you. I believe it's more difficult in England for a woman to divorce her husband, but in Denmark, it's not at all uncommon.”

A wry smile twisted Leo's mouth. “Thank you for the warning. Now then, shall we start at the beginning? Where did we meet?”

“In Copenhagen.” She smoothed a hand over the bed linens, wondering what it would be like to burrow into them and cocoon herself with his scent. “I like the way you smell.”

“Oh no,” he said, waggling a finger. “I'm familiar with your ways now, so there will be no distracting me with talk of your breasts and how large they are, and how perfectly they would fit into my hands and how I would like to rub them all over myself. We are going to stick to the topic at hand. Where in particular did we meet?”

“My back garden.” She thought about what he said. This rubbing of her bosom on his person hadn't, at first, seemed an overly attractive thought, but the more she dwelt on it, the more pleasing it became. Should she invite him to take her breasts in his hands? She looked at his hands where they rested on his thighs, then she looked at his thighs and lost all thoughts of anything else.

His brow wrinkled. “Your garden? Was it a party of some sort?”

“You have very nice thighs.” She was staring, she knew, but she couldn't stop herself. Through the stretched material, she could make out the heavy thigh muscle that indicated a man who spent a vast amount of time in the saddle. “If I let you take my breasts in your hands, would you let me stroke your thighs?”

He fell off the stool.

Instantly, she was on the ground next to him, checking to make sure he hadn't hurt himself. Somehow, her breasts ended up in his hands, which she took as permission to do as she wanted with his thighs.

“Oh!” she said, startled and pleased not just by the sensation of her bosom, suddenly feeling quite demanding, resting in the warmth of his hands, but also by the sleek lines of thigh muscles that her hands were happily exploring. “Oh!”

“Oh, indeed,” he said, his voice sounding strangled at he stared down at his hands, now overflowing with bosom. He flexed his fingers. She moaned and arched her back. “I think we might even go so far as to say, ‘good God!' or even, ‘bless my garters,' not that I understand why garters enter into the subject. Dagmar, if you continue on that track, you'll end up causing me to burst my trousers, and as they are borrowed from the captain, I'd hate to ruin them.”

Dagmar stopped rubbing her breasts against his hands and looked down, somewhat surprised to find both of her hands now stroking a very full front of his trousers. She pursed her lips for a moment at the buttons holding the fall up, then quickly released him.

“That is not flaccid,” she accused, her gaze firmly on his erection.

“Not in the least, although you needn't sound so annoyed by the fact.”

“My sainted mother told me that men were flaccid by nature, and to be otherwise was dangerous, as you were in the bath, although even then you weren't this…pronounced.”

“You weren't stroking my thighs in the bath.” He seemed to be having some problem breathing, and Dagmar was about to offer to assist him to his bunk when he shifted her so that she sat astride his legs. “I can't believe I'm even thinking this, although it's perfectly natural given the fact that you are clearly trying to seduce me, but when you said you've never been bedded, did you mean that figuratively or literally?”

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