Scotsmen Prefer Blondes (Muses of Mayfair) Page 21

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Malcolm should have been elated. He should have ushered her back to the breakfast room, fed her, and arranged separate housing within the hour.

  He should not have felt like throttling her.

  And he most certainly should not have turned on his heel, walked through the door, and locked it behind him.

  He didn’t plan to leave her there — he just needed a few minutes to think. And it was easier to think when he wasn’t confronting those expressive blue eyes, or considering how her breasts looked better cupped in his hands than they did covered up by yards of black crepe.

  Admittedly, the vibrations from Amelia pounding on the door as he leaned against it weren’t conducive to rational thought. But now that she had admitted exactly what he already realized and acknowledged that they shouldn’t be ruled by their passion, why did he feel like he was making the worst mistake of his life?

  Malcolm banged his head against the door.

  “Let me out before I make you regret this!” Amelia shouted. The words were muffled by the wood, but her annoyance rang through.

  He grinned. He already regretted it, but whatever revenge Amelia planned would likely amuse him.

  That amusement wasn’t what he wanted in a marriage. He’d always thought his wife would be a paragon, one who could preside over his dinner table and perform credibly in the ton.

  Amelia was better suited to preside over a battlefield than a teapot.

  Malcolm knew what kind of wife he should have looked for. But faced with a choice between Amelia in all her glory and prim, dull Miss Etchingham, his body had made the choice for him. It wasn’t just his body that wanted her, though. He could lose hours talking to her, let days pass without wanting the sound of a fresh voice.

  He would have to control himself if he wanted to leave her long enough to accomplish anything for his clan. But while he would force himself to find some distance, he only needed it during the day. He hadn’t even survived one night without her. Surely they could find a compromise rather than parting ways entirely?

  His wife cursed on the other side of the door. Something metallic scraped across the stones. He turned the key and pulled the door open. Amelia stood inches away from the threshold, dragging an ancient broadsword.

  “Not very sporting of you to try to kill me,” he said.

  Amelia grunted as she lifted the sword. “I came downstairs planning to kill you — no sense wasting this dress.”

  But a laugh lurked in her eyes, and she didn’t struggle when Malcolm took the sword from her. It was meant to be wielded with two hands, and he swung it in an easy arc before replacing it on the wall. “Darling, violence will not solve our problems.”

  “Neither will locking me away when the mood strikes you,” she said. “If we cannot even finish a conversation without wanting to kill each other, how can we live together?”

  “Not all of our conversations end like this. We haven’t fought at all since the wedding.”

  “We haven’t spent our time talking, you dolt.” He snickered at that, but she didn’t rise to the bait. “If we were accustomed to talking, you would have consulted me about London.”

  He held up his hands. “I’m sorry.”

  She glared at him.

  “Truly,” he said.

  “Do you know what you are apologizing for?”

  He didn’t — he just wanted her to calm down. But he knew better than to admit it. “I apologize for not asking your opinion.”

  She crossed her arms. “And if I said I wanted to stay here? What would you do?”

  “Do you want to stay here?”

  “I find I love the Highlands more than I expected.”

  That had nothing to do with him, but he still felt a boost of satisfaction at knowing she was settling into their home. “We’ll return for Christmas. But I must go to London for the start of Parliament in November if I’m to meet potential allies.”

  “So you’ve decided about Christmas too?” she asked. “Really, are you such an autocrat that you cannot even feign interest in my opinion?”

  He winced. “Marriage requires adjustments. I’ll admit I’m not accustomed to asking anyone’s preferences.”

  She didn’t seem mollified by that, so he went on the attack. “You know, darling,” he said, watching her face. “You’re not so good at this marriage business either. Have you met with Graves or the housekeeper a single time since becoming my countess?”

  She deflated. He hadn’t seen her shoulders drop like that before. He almost felt guilty — almost.

  “Your mother has things well in hand,” she said.

  “But it’s not her house anymore. It’s ours. She’ll remove to the dower house when she’s finished redecorating it, and then the castle, our house in Edinburgh, and the house we’ll open in London will all be yours to manage.”

  Amelia scowled. “You sound like that’s a reward.”

  He spread his arms to encompass the room around them. “You said you loved the Highlands. If you want this to be your home, then make it so.”

  Her eyes were stark. He knew she still had secrets — knew it even more now that they’d spent several weeks together. A woman of her passionate leanings wouldn’t have spurned the attentions of all men for a decade unless she was hiding something.

  Malcolm doubted that he wanted to know what she was hiding, even though the question ate at him. He wanted her to tell him freely, not because she’d been caught. Still, he wasn’t above prodding a bit, if that would encourage her to compromise and keep living with him.

  He strolled around her, like a wolf circling a deer, and sat in the chair he’d previously placed her in. She turned, watching him, sensing his shifting mood.

  He leaned back. “If you don’t want to share my house, of course, there are other alternatives.”

  “What are those?” she asked, her eyes narrowing suspiciously.

  “I’ve a house on the western isles, utterly remote, that would give you as much solitude as you desire. Although I must warn you that your bed there will be quite chilled without me in it.”

  She grinned before she caught herself. “You are remarkably self-assured.”

  “You make it easy to be,” he said.

  “Would that I could be so confident.”

  Her voice was soft, suddenly uncertain. Doubt should have no place in her heart — she was too strong for that.

  He held out a hand for her. When she took it, he pulled her into his lap. “Come to London with me, Amelia. I want you there, distraction or no.”

  She toyed with a button on his waistcoat. “What if I can’t be what you need? I don’t want to be a mere distraction, but I never aspired to be a hostess, or a mother, or a wife.”

  “What did you aspire to be?”

  She didn’t answer. Was this her secret? Some hidden longing? A secret passion she couldn’t name?”

  He tried to guess. “You aren’t... I mean to say...”

  He cut himself off. She looked up at him, her eyes wide. He finished his question before he choked on it. “You and Miss Etchingham aren’t of the, er, Sapphic persuasion, are you?”

  She paused, just for a moment, just long enough for his heart to stop. Then she burst into laughter, and the peals of it bounced off the bare stone walls.

  “You thought Prue and I were lovers?” she asked when she could speak again. “Really?”

  “Not really — not after everything you and I have done. But few women dream of something other than children. What’s your dream?”

  She closed her eyes. When she opened them again, there were tears there, but he didn’t know if they were from laughter or mourning. “It was just a dream, my lord.”

  “Tell me,” he urged, shamelessly going back on his plan to give her time.

  She searched his face, looking for something. Then she said, “What if I told you I wanted to write?”

  “Is that all?” he asked.

  “All?” she echoed.
“You really think it’s nothing?”

  She looked affronted. He had just broken through — he couldn’t let her shut him off again. “I didn’t mean it as an insult,” he assured her. “But compared to being in love with someone else or committing high treason with your letters, writing seems preferable.”

  “No treason,” she promised. Then she sobered. “It’s just not something I had planned to give up, and yet marriage to you...”

  He kissed the side of her neck, reveling in the way she opened for him. “As long as it doesn’t cause a scandal or keep you from your duties as my countess, what’s the harm? I’m sure it’s fashionable in some circles for you to write bits of poetry or what not.”

  “So if I don’t cause a scandal, I can write?” she asked.

  Her voice was breathy from his kiss, but the look in her eyes said that the fate of their marriage rested on his answer.

  “Yes,” he said. “I’ll even go you one better and say that as long as your nights are mine, you can use your days however you wish.”

  Her eyes lit up. He almost felt guilty — it wasn’t much of a compromise, not when he knew he would need to stay away from her during the day if he was to accomplish anything meaningful in Parliament.

  His guilt buried itself when she kissed him, hot and hungry. He let her take the lead this time — and she nearly broke him on the stone floor. When they finished, her black skirts were covered in dust and his trousers were hopelessly creased.

  But she would go to London with him. And her secret, now that she had divulged it, was benign enough.

  It was a victory. He had won their battle. But he may have lost the war.

  Because looking up at her, as they both came undone, with the sunlight streaming through her hair and the light in her eyes, he realized he had fallen in love with his wife.

  Bloody hell.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  London - 26 November 2012

  Amelia pushed her loathsome eggs around her plate. She should have hired a new cook, but she didn’t want to admit that they would stay long enough to need one. Malcolm sat at the head of their new breakfast table, thumbing through the morning papers and making notes in a ledger that had rarely left his side since arriving in London a month earlier. His fingers, when he came to their bed at night, were almost as blackened by ink as hers.

  Every night, he was ravenous for her. It was astonishing, the speed with which he could transform from the proper, duty-bound Earl of Carnach to the passionate, playful man she’d married. When they were in their chamber, he shed his reserve like he shed his clothes, claiming her like he had to take everything he could before the sun rose.

  If this were a fairy tale, he had fallen victim to some dark enchantment — a magical lover at night, destined to turn back to stone in the morning.

  He was always out of bed when the sun rose. In Scotland, they had lain in bed for hours some mornings, making love and laughing and getting crumbs from their breakfast in the sheets. In London, he was already cloaked in his mental armor before her sleep-fogged brain could register the change. He would eat breakfast with his papers and leave the house shortly thereafter, obsessed with meeting peers and keeping abreast of the issues of the day. And he wouldn’t return until it was time to dress for that night’s parties — parties where he made all the right noises and said the right things to the right people.

  Parties where he never laughed.

  It was maddening. Amelia had thought she wanted her days to herself. But when they stretched endlessly in front of her, broken by dull duties to her household rather than passionate demands from her new husband, she wanted the old Malcolm back. She wanted the seductive sorcerer from their library, not the sober politician from their breakfast room. She wanted him to see what the life he’d chosen would cost them — and to understand that there were possibilities other than hardening his soul into a graveyard effigy before his body was even dead.

  Amelia sipped her tea. It had grown cold while she brooded. She found she hated it almost as much as her eggs. As she set the cup onto the saucer, she let it slip from her hand. The tea rushed over the lip, flooding the tablecloth and cascading onto Malcolm’s untouched copy of the Gazette.

  He jumped, pulling his ledger out of the way before picking up the dripping paper between his thumb and forefinger. She felt a swift stab of satisfaction as the ink ran and the paper reverted to pulp.

  Malcolm looked up at her, but there was no heat in his gaze — just concern. “Are you feeling well, dear?”

  Dear. Not darling. It shouldn’t have bothered her. But her voice couldn’t hide the chill. “Quite. I am sorry my clumsiness has ruined your morning.”

  He dropped the paper back into the puddle. “Warwick, send a footman out for another paper.”

  The butler bowed. He shouldn’t have had to be told — but then, Amelia suspected the hiring agency had not had many appropriate butlers to send on such short notice, and she’d done little to train him.

  “Do you care to go upstairs while you wait for the paper?” she asked her husband. “I’m sure we can entertain ourselves.”

  She didn’t even want to — she was too annoyed to fall into his bed so easily. But her request was a test.

  For a moment he looked like he might pass. His eyes lit up, turning to that warm silver she now only saw at night, and his hand reached out to caress her cheek. His touch melted some of the ice around her heart, once again erasing the memory of his decision that she was just a distraction...

  But when she melted, he hardened. He dropped his hand. “Would that I could. But Parliament just opened two days ago. I cannot miss a session already.”

  “Does it matter?” she asked before she could stop herself. “Does anyone care whether you’re there?”

  His silver eyes turned to steel. “I must start as I mean to go on. Someday they’ll care. But they won’t unless I’m there enough that they know me.”

  “How lovely that you’re giving them a chance to know you,” she murmured.

  Malcolm raked a hand through his hair. He looked like he wanted to argue. She hoped that he would. Their fight in the tower before leaving for London had cleared the air for a moment — but as she suffocated in the ton and he did his damnedest to conquer it, she knew their marriage was far from sorted.

  They might not be ruined by her secret writing career after all — while Prudence refused to see her, there wasn’t a single whisper about The Unconquered Heiress with Amelia’s name attached to it. But after four weeks in London, Amelia knew the biggest danger to their marriage likely wasn’t her writing — it was all the words they weren’t saying to each other, welling up between them. Soon those words would be an ocean, unbridgeable, with dangerous riptides that could suck them both away.

  She wanted him to say how he felt. Instead, his voice cooled. “You’re overset. I trust your tongue will be more civil at the parties we’re attending tonight.”

  She sucked in a breath. When he grasped her hand to kiss it, she kept it in a fist. He kissed her knuckles anyway.

  “If all you want is civility, you should have married someone else,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “Can we not talk about our marriage yet again?” he asked, gripping the arms of his chair. “What’s done is done. We’ll have all the time in the world once I’m settled in Parliament. But I trust you can amuse yourself for now.”

  They had talked about their marriage — just enough for her to feel nauseated and depressed, and vaguely homicidal.

  She lifted her chin as she rose from her chair, tossing her napkin into the pool of tea between them. “Very well, my lord. I will amuse myself. And tonight I will be exactly the type of wife you need.”

  He stood, still pretending to be a gentleman despite the glare in his eyes. “If you aren’t, you’ll get that conversation you seem to want — but I promise you will not enjoy it.”

  She swept out of the room, ignoring his threat and the servants who gaped at them. He
seemed to forget that these people were newly hired and not at all as loyal as his family retainers in Scotland.

  But she didn’t care about her reputation. She needed to be away from him, to think about which of them was the guilty party in the mess that their marriage was quickly becoming. She wasn’t innocent either, not with her secrets, not when she was too scared to tell him how she felt or what she’d done until she was certain of his reaction.

  And eventually she needed to decide whether to fight for him — or whether her writing, which is all that had mattered for so long, was still enough.

  * * *

  That night, Malcolm leaned back into the cushions of their new town coach. Amelia had greeted him quietly when he’d knocked on her door to escort her downstairs — not with annoyance, as he expected, or pleasure, as he wanted, but with calm resignation. Even now she refused to look at him. She looked down at her hands instead, where they were primly folded in her lap.

  “What ails you, dear?” he asked. “You haven’t seemed yourself today.”

  Her temper sparked. But if it melted the ice, it only melted it enough to drown her emotion. By the time she spoke, she had frozen again.

  “Isn’t this what you want, dear?” she retorted. “Propriety?”

  She’d promised that morning to be the type of wife he needed. Now he knew she was doing it to provoke him — and she had succeeded. But the carriage was rolling to a halt at the first rout party of the evening. He couldn’t afford to discuss their marriage now, not if he wanted to stay cool in the face of the ton.

  So he let her statement pass. She glared at him before she remembered the show she was putting on for him. She returned to staring at her gloves and didn’t look at him again.

  The first event passed in a blur of faces and a procession of inane conversation. Malcolm had never liked rout parties, so called for the route taken through the house — he and Amelia made a circuit of the drawing rooms, greeted the hostess, touched fingers and exchanged civilities with the other people they passed, and were out the door a quarter of an hour later.