Page 41 of Temptress in Disguise
He expelled a weary sigh. Rules were about control. A way of coping with trauma. A means of preventing pain. But for the first time since he’d set the boundaries, he had to admit the lines were blurred.
“I don’t want you to fear me. You’re my wife. Forget the rule.” He ignored the warning voice in his head. This woman had the power to destroy what was left of his bruised heart. “Be yourself, and we’ll muddle through somehow.”
His comment drew a smile from her lips, lips made for kissing no one but him. “As God is my witness, you can trust me, Aramis. Fate forced us together for a reason. I truly believe that.”
Fate had wrapped them in its tight tendrils and refused to relinquish its grip. For the first time in years, he wasn’t hacking at the vines in a bid to escape.
He sat back in the seat. “Before I open this, we should discuss what keepsyouawake at night.” Her tears amounted to more than being framed for a crime she did not commit. Sensing her hesitance, he felt the need to make a small confession. “All my life, Aaron has taken every punch meant for me.”
The guilt was immeasurable.
She met his gaze, her eyes holding an empathetic smile. “You don’t have to tell me. Not if it’s too painful.”
His shrug was a means of convincing himself it didn’t matter. “The skin on my arm has healed, but the fire rages on in my brother’s chest.” The sudden break in his voice confirmed it mattered a great deal. “The pain of failing to protect his kin hurts more than any blow he’s ever suffered. I could have sought vengeance. I could have helped to heal his heart and conscience, but I thought it better buried.”
“And so you ask for forgiveness at night when he cannot hear you?” Tentatively, she reached out and touched his knee. “You say what you cannot bring yourself to say to his face?”
“I don’t know what I say at night.” But he knew it was an accumulation of his many failings. Pitiful words that should not leave a dangerous bastard’s mouth.
“I could tell you.”
“I’m not sure I want to know.”
Silence descended, though her hand remained on his knee.
Heat warmed his thigh. A feeling that proved arousing and unnerving in equal measure. A new kind of lust. One he was keen to explore.
“Melissa had a plan to get rid of me.” She closed her eyes briefly as if reliving the memory, the colour leaching from her face. “She held a party to celebrate the new year. Persuaded one particular guest to enter my chamber. She paid him to ruin me, to kidnap me and keep me a prisoner in his house amid the wilds of Dartmoor.”
Anger rumbled inside him as violent as Thor’s thunder. He should have dealt with Melissa long ago, before she could ruin other innocent lives. But a lover’s deception was not grounds for a stint in Newgate. “I need his name.”
She gulped. “Mr Ingram. He’s a friend of my uncle’s.”
The thought of any man touching her hit like a hard punch to the gut. “How did you foil their plan?”
“Lydia suspected something was amiss. She burst into the room and chased him out. She untied me and?—”
“Untied you?” Ingram was a dead man walking.
“I was sleeping deeply and didn’t hear him enter. It all happened so quickly. It’s why I couldn’t fight back.” Her brows knitted in confusion. “I thought I’d locked the door. But then Gibbs has proven how easy it is to trip the mechanism.”
Or Melissa had given Ingram the spare key. “And so you left Hartford Hall.” Aramis clasped her hand to reassure her she would never have to deal with the likes of Ingram again.
“We left for London that night. Lydia’s modiste made costumes for the Belldrake and introduced her to Mr Budworth. The rest is history.”
The dislike he harboured for Miss Fontaine eased a little. “I suppose your sister deserves some credit for assisting you. Doubtless she’s done what was necessary to put food on the table.”
Naomi’s frown deepened. “Lydia spends all her earnings on new clothes and fripperies. I work to pay the rent and buy food and coal. I’ll not lie. Lydia can be unpleasant when deprived. But heaven knows where I would be had she not come to my aid.”
He did not reply.
He was too busy trying to rein in his errant thoughts, thoughts that had no place in a cold man’s mind. The devil rode a beast; he did not sweep in on a white charger and provide for his wife’s every comfort.
“While on the subject of your sister, I should read the letter.”
She snatched back her hand and closed her eyes briefly. “What if I’m wrong and she’s suffering somewhere?”
Instinct said that wasn’t the case. He doubted Lydia Fontaine was cowering in a dark corner. But why leave her sister behind?
