Page 91 of The Captive Duke
“Maybe you’re the cause of my restless slumbers.”
“You don’t like it when I rub your back, Countess? When I make those circles on your nape, slower and slower until the arms of Morpheus beckon?”Hedelighted in that ritual, for it relaxed him and pleased him to be of service to her.
She kept her powder dry until they were approaching the house. “I really do need a nap, Christian.”
Christian.Her version of wheedling, and damnably effective. “Then so do I.”
“No, you do not. You need to ride out. You’ve foregone that pleasure to tarry with me for the past few mornings, and dear Chessie will pine for you.”
“The way he pined while I was in the hands of the French? The brute was eating out of Easterbrook’s hand by the time I stumbled back to life.”
The observation held genuine annoyance, because the familiar mental tickle was back. Something to do with the horse.
“I’m sure in his way, Chesterton was praying for your safe return. Now, shoo.”
“I’ll walk you upstairs, Gilly.”
She huffed out a breath. “Christian…”
Even in that sniffy, huffy tone, he loved to hear her say his name. “Either you take my arm, or it’s George and John.”
She took his arm, and they progressed through the house in silence. When they reached her door, she tried to close the thing in his face, but he slipped through and turned her by the shoulders.
“None of that,” she said.
“You are ever eager to relieve me of my clothes, Gilly, but you’ve yet to allow me the same pleasure.”
“And I’m not about to allow it now.”
“So modest.” He wrapped his arms around her from behind, because when they were married, surely, she’d trust him with her nudity. “Will you dream of me?”
“I cannot know such a thing.”
“Iknowyou have nightmares.”
She walked out of his embrace and sat at her vanity, removing pins from her hair as if they—or something—had been irritating her.
“I know,” he went on, letting her put some distance between them. “I have them too, and you soothe and comfort me. I’m aware of your kindnesses, Gilly. I’m grateful for them.”
“You say I have nightmares too.”
He watched her, watched the nervous twitching of her fingers, and knew he was probing close to her wounds. “Your nightmares pass. I hold you, speak a few words, and you become quiet.”
“I don’t…” She regarded herself in the mirror, her expression wary as a thick blond braid came unraveled down her back. “I don’t talk in my sleep?”
“You do not.” Though if she did, it would clearly bother her tremendously. “But you know, Gilly, if you have some dire secret, I would keep it for you. If you put a period to old Greendale’s existence, the man would probably thank you himself were he able. From what I’ve gleaned, at the end, he wasn’t able to chew his food or tend to his bodily functions. An old codger like that would likely rather be dead than so helpless.”
He kept his eyes on her, watching for any sign he’d guessed a truth.
His Gilly, taking another life? He could not picture it, not even in kindness, not even if Greendale had ordered her to do it. She’d probably object to Christian exterminating even the likes of Girard.
The thought gave him pause—uncomfortable pause.
Gilly twitched a few more pins from her hair. “You wouldn’t be nervous to think I killed my husband? Wouldn’t retract your proposal lest you end up in the family plot? You’d endorse such violence despite all biblical admonitions to the contrary?”
“Gilly…” He shifted to stand behind her and put his hands on her shoulders, which revealed her to be as tense as a fiddle string. He spoke quietly near her ear.
“In France, I went a little mad, sometimes more than a little. I sustained myself on fantasies of the havoc I could wreak when I got free, the blood I would spill, the tortures I would devise for Girard and his corporals and lieutenants and superiors.”
