Page 28 of A Deal With a Notorious Devil
“If you had wanted a docile wife, you should have married elsewhere,” Phoebe said. “I’m not afraid of you, and I won’t be snarled at simply because you haven’t the wherewithal to leash your foul temper. Is that clear?”
Frigid blue eyes narrowed. “I will not be commanded in my own home,” he returned, and she thought the sharp slash of the words had been meant to put the fear of God into her—or perhaps just the fear ofhim.
She took a deep breath and reminded herself from whence he had come; a world anathema to her own. One where weakness was reviled, where even the slightest display of it might mean baring one’s neck to a blade. He wielded his power with ruthless efficiency because it was his greatest asset, the first currency to which he had laid claim. To surrender it—even a fraction of it—must be unthinkable. “This is why you married me,” she said, gritting her teeth. “Somewhere within that abominably thick skull of yours, you must understand that certain changes will be required of you.”
“Notthesechanges.”
A raw laugh eked from her throat. “Did you imagine me to be some sort of fairy godmother? That I could wave a wand and weave a spell that would see you settled within the bosom of polite society without effort?” Her hand fisted in her discarded napkin, pressing pleats into the fabric. “That will not happen.”
“I’ve no intention of wasting my damned time upon such inconsequential things as—as fashionable clothing!”
“That’s what the damned valet is for, you miserable arse.” With a flick of her wrist, Phoebe tossed her napkin straight into his startled face, relishing the jerk of his shoulders as it connected and the smothered oath that he bit off into the fabric.“You may embarrass yourself in public with my blessing. I’m not inclined to waste my efforts on an ungrateful boor.”
She turned on her heel and stomped out of the dining room with a queer sense of satisfaction. From the odd, strained spluttering sounds that followed her out the door, she surmised that her husband was unaccustomed to not having the last word.
∞∞∞
“Charity!” Chris barked as he slammed the door of his flat shut behind him. “Where the hell are you?”
“Here, darling. No need to shout.” Charity appeared at the top of the stairs, her dark hair a wild tumble streaming over one shoulder as she belted her dressing gown at her waist, looking for all the world as if she had just slipped out of bed. Probably she had, he conceded—in all the years of their acquaintance, he had rarely known her to rise before early afternoon. A creature of the night, she’d said. Much like himself. She batted her lashes, producing a sweet smile. “You didn’t send word round that you were coming,” she said. “What have you brought me?”
A short laugh rumbled in his throat as he set aside his cane and dug in his pocket to withdraw a jewelry box. Baubles, she called them, though the word could hardly be applied to the precious gems a woman of her rare beauty could command. In reality it was the closest thing to a pension that a woman of her profession was likely to receive.
Courtesan, she called herself, because it sounded more refined than mistress—or worse, whore. He’d never cared what she called herself, provided she made herself available when he called upon her.
“Oh, Chris. It’s lovely,” she sighed, her delicate fingers running across the large, rectangular cut gems of the necklace he’d gifted her with. “Rubies?” she inquired lightly, as if it were nothing more than an idle curiosity.
“Of course. Would you have accepted garnets?” Charity, he had long learned, hadn’t a charitable bone in the whole of her body. He rather liked it that way. Made her perhaps the most honest woman of his acquaintance; one who pretended to be nothing other than what she was.
“Don’t be daft. You wouldn’t so insult me, besides,” she said, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Come, sit. I’ll pour you a brandy.”
“Whisky,” he grunted, shrugging out of his coat; the very one that Phoebe had said was unfashionable. He yanked at the knot of his cravat as he draped the coat over the back of some godawful chair, with spindly legs and gilding all over it. “What the hell have you done with the place? Looks like a damned brothel.”
“Well, I had to have something to occupy me while you’ve been absent,” Charity said with a flip of her wrist as she poured from a crystal decanter. “And, really, darling—it was so appallingly spartan. I don’t know how you could bear it.”
He’d borne it because he hadn’t cared. He’d bought this place years and years ago, but it had only been a place to lay his head of an evening, convenient because it had been directly above his office. But it had never been a home—leastwise, not the sort that he had wanted for himself.
He’d given its use over to Charity when he’d purchased his house in Mayfair, since he hadn’t much need for it any longer. But he hadn’t visited in months. And she’d changed much in the meantime, it seemed. “I suppose I can expect the bills to be sent round?” he asked as she handed him a glass. His cravat sailed atop the coat as he settled onto a couch that seemed of more useas an art piece than furniture. It was damned uncomfortable.
“Naturally,” she said as she sat beside him. She sipped her liquor as she splayed her free hand across his thigh. “I confess, I did not expect to see you for some time,” she said, dragging her nails along the wool of his trousers. “New marriages have a way of interfering in other relationships.”
“It’s not that sort of marriage.” The whisky turned sour on his tongue. He swallowed back the remainder in a long gulp, the burn settling in his stomach with the rest of the churning anger that had yet to abate. “How did you hear of it?”
“It’s in all the papers,” she said, her voice faintly chiding. “You might have told me.”
“Bit of a rush job,” he said. “Don’t concern yourself with her. She won’t with you.”
“Oh? How unusual. Tell me about her, then, your wife.”
You may embarrass yourself in public with my blessing. “She’s a damned menace, is what she is,” he said on a scathing snarl. “One day in my house, and she’s turned it up on end. Went about hiring all sorts of servants. Told me I needed a damned valet.”
Charity’s nails stopped mid-scratch, her lips pursing. “Well…”
“Good God, not you, too!” Chris thrust his gloved fingers through his hair, wrenching at the wind-ruffled locks. “Damned disloyal females. Can’t trust a one of you.”
“Darling, you do tend to dig in your heels,” she said soothingly. “And you are such a solitary creature. I wonder why you married at all, honestly.”
“Had to,” he said. “Borrowing her respectability, as it were. I didn’t want a wife, and she didn’t want a husband. Thought we’d rub along well enough together. One damned day, and we’re already at one another’s throats.” He cast his head back, rubbed at the bridge of his nose.
