Page 9 of The Seductive Love of a Lady
One of the service maids must have been into the room. A single oil lamp had been left burning by the door.
He lowered her legs with a tenderness that spoke of the love he said he felt – it made her want to believe him. She had thought his choice of friends was evidence that John’s depiction of Andrew’s character was right. However, if John was wrong about Andrew, perhaps she was wrong about his friends. Perhaps they also hid their good sides behind bravado…
‘Should I get to know your friends, and judge them for myself?’
‘Ah, so are they to be on a suspended sentence? I would like it if you did know them better.’
Andrew was funny when he wished to be, and kind… and he had no reason to pretend he was in love now he had her money.
‘And my judgement, Mary? Where do I stand?’ His hazel eyes studied her.
She turned her back and removed her shawl. ‘You are my husband…’ She lay her shawl over a chair. ‘Do you want me to pour you a drink?’ She would not admit she loved him when she was not sure what he felt.
From his expression he appeared to be trying to solve a puzzle. ‘That is a very wifely offer. Yes, I will have a drink.’
‘Brandy?’ she asked.
‘Yes, please. It is all I have, anyway. From a bottle my rich friend, Peter, bought. We will buy our own brandy and whatever you like to drink tomorrow.’
While she opened the decanter and poured the brandy into a glass, he removed his hat, gloves and evening coat.
When she put the decanter down, he stood behind her and his hands slipped about her waist, embracing her, as his lips kissed her shoulder.
‘Do you want me to ring for a kettle of water for tea?’ he asked.
She turned, forcing him to step back. She held out his drink. ‘No, the maids will be in bed, I would not want to wake them. I am not thirsty anyway, and besides, you do not even have a teapot.’
‘Another item to add to our shopping list.’ He accepted the glass. ‘Have I taken you from heaven, Mary, and brought you here to share hell with me?’
Sometimes he said the strangest things, but the words proved that he was leagues deep. Her fingertips touched the bruise about his eye that had turned from red to yellow now. ‘Does it hurt?’
‘Somewhat. So do not touch it.’
Her hand lowered.
‘Come and sit in a chair with me.’ He put the glass on the games table, beside an armchair, sat down and patted his thighs, his roguish smile playing on his lips.
She sat sideways on his lap, smiling at his foolishness as she draped an arm around his shoulders.
He reclaimed his drink and sipped from the glass.
She pressed a kiss on the bruise on his jaw.
His smile broadened and he touched a fingertip to his lips. ‘It hurts here, too.’
‘Did Papa and John hurt you badly when they hit you?’
‘Now she asks…’ His voice rang deep. ‘I am sure you do not care if they did. I believe the word is comeuppance.’
‘You were a day late in carrying me over the threshold. I am a couple of days late in asking if you were hurt. We are even.’
His fingers brushed strands of her hair back from her face, while he sipped more brandy.
‘You did not hit them…’Why had she not noted that before?He had not fought against them. He had accepted their anger.Comeuppance– if he respected their anger, that was not the action of a bad, or a deceitful, man.
‘That would have been unjust, don’t you think? If I was your papa, or your brother, I’d have punched me, too. In fact, if anyone took you from me now, there would be carnage.’
Her fingers pressed against his midriff, as she moved to get up.
