Page 47 of A Most Improper Duchess
‘I met your brother.’
Arley half choked on his next word before his expression turned from conciliation to anger. ‘Half-brother, and he is not welcome in my house. I will not be dictated to by a man who is lazy, and irresponsible. Phineas has a tip off.’
‘Your banker friend? Oh, but of course, he is not a banker.’ Vivianne wrestled with her gloves and slapped them to the floor. ‘More lies!’
‘What did Winton say to you?’ Arley demanded.
Vivianne bottled her rage with a held breath until it tempered into crisp, cold clarity. ‘He called me a whore.’
‘I will have him shipped off to finish his service with—’
‘Arretez, Arley! I am a whore! I sold my body. On stage, and between sheets. Even now, I sell myself to you. I sell my history, my friendships, my dance, for food and a bed and a duke’s company. Nothing has changed.’
‘Everything has changed. I am going to marry you.’
‘Send me back to Paris, or to your estate. Or even here in London, set me up in a small apartment. I can live quietly, and my terrible reputation will hurt no one.’
‘You bloody will not!’ He slammed his fist into the table. ‘I don’t care who you were. I only care who I am when I am with you. How you have given me the world simply by showing me how to see it. Everything, from a drop of rain to a dance step, is more radiant and dazzling because I share its miracle with you. You have worked so hard, and no one will tell me I cannot have you as my wife!’
‘Free me from this insanity. Let me be who I am.’
Arley shoved his chair back so hard it toppled, and he crossed the short distance to her. She stepped back but did not lower her eyes from his outrage.
‘Get into my bed,’ he ordered.
‘Make me your mistress.’
‘No. I will not do what he did. I will not be a man of shadows and absences.’ Arley raked his fingers through his hair, clenched his hands into fists, then shook himself free. He pressed his palm against his forehead, and when he spoke his voice was again that of a mouse, weighted with apprehension and heartbreak. ‘Have I ever treated you as a courtesan?’
‘The night we met,’ she said, her voice hoarse from shouting.
He swore under his breath. ‘After that. Have I ever tried to buy your body? To take anything from you that you did not want to give?’
Vivianne shook her head. Her anger shattered into fragments and anchored hard in her chest with a painful realisation. He was the only man she had ever given herself to. The only,onlyone. Even when she had tried to seduce him and place him in her debt, he had evened the balance between them.
‘And I never will. I should have told you about Winton. I am still learning how to shoulder this weight with another and how to be a part of something beyond myself.’ He gripped her chin, and brought his lips to hers, his kiss all force and eloquence. Even now, in his anger, he was roses and sunshine, softness and light. His fingers gripped as hard as steel while his tongue and lips were silk ribbons of desire. ‘I will never treat you like that. Never.’ Arley bent and scooped her up. Vivianne flung her arms around his neck, not sure if she sought respite from his ferocity or wanted to dive deeper into his torrent, his possession, and his certainty. His love, so jagged and untethered, promised to be terrifyingly constant. She clutched at his familiarity.
What else could she do? She could not return to Paris unless she wished to starve, and she did not dare go home. And even through his lies, when she pictured Arley’s face, his smile, his half-bent form as they emerged fromles Catacombes, as they tumbled in his bed while he made his promise of love, she knew she could not leave. His heart, his hearth and the safety he offered her were everything. She needed him.
He crossed the short distance to his bed, but with each step he felt less angry and determined. He bent his head and pressed his forehead to hers.
‘Only a duchess can share a duke’s bed.’ His muscles bunched as he laid her on the covers. He curled the ribbon at her chest around his finger and slowly unravelled the bow. ‘Even now, I feel so inadequate beside you. You, who are all sparkles and ferocity. Fragility and strength. You have been treated so badly, yet still your brightness persists. You give so generously and take so little for yourself. But not tonight. Tonight, you will learn to be greedy. To think of no one but yourself. Tonight, you will give me nothing. You will only take.’
Arley tugged off his coat and dropped it to the floor. The side of the bed dipped as he eased himself beside her, and she rolled into him a little. With light fingers and a slightly awestruck expression, he brushed a loose curl from her cheek. ‘Loosen your hair for me. Please.’
It took a long time to burrow out every pin, bead and hair comb. He patiently collected them in his palm, and their glass clacked as he dropped them onto the side table. He tickled his fingers through her hair. Tendrils of luscious delight slithered through her nerves and sent little bumps over her forearms, igniting in her stomach and shuddering over her thighs. A sigh, deep and wanting, puffed from her lips.
‘I have not worshipped you as I should. From afar, yes, but when you have been near me, half stripped, and so sublime…’ He pressed his fingers firm against her scalp, and she arched against the mattress as her skin prickled. ‘Dear lord, you are magnificent. Roll over. I want to undress you.’
Earlier that evening, the maid had counted aloud each of her 56 buttons as she had fastened Vivianne into her dress, and Arley huffed and grumbled and eventually counted out 62. Vivianne, her head burrowed into her arms, giggled at his frustration and confusion.
‘You are laughing at me,’ he chastised. ‘And I am so earnestly trying to be a worthy lover.’
‘Let me help,’ she laughed as she rolled from him.
‘No.’ He pushed her back against the mattress. ‘I will figure this out. I will learn how to undress my wife.’
Vivianne settled over his pillows and relaxed into his comfort. His bed smelt like him, only concentrated—like a garden at the end of a summer day, when flower petals curled into their last display before they dropped, heavy with the scent of both languor and restlessness. If he took all night, what did it matter? His fingers stroked at a vulnerable patch of skin between her shoulder blades.
