Page 47 of Desperate Proposals
“Evelyn Wolfenden, a Venus encased in ice,” he muttered to the mirror above his washstand. He lowered his face and splashed water over it several times before looking up again, his hair hanging wet before his eyes.
Who would’ve supposed?
He mopped his face off before ambling over to the fireplace in his bedroom. It was small but modern, like nearly all the house’s fixtures. No room was cold in his house, unlike in the drafty, frigid Methering Manor. If he were being honest—something he found he was still capable of, on occasion—he’d expected that bedding his wife would be much like visiting her ancestral home: chilly, uncomfortable, and best gotten over with quickly.
But then he’d kissed her. And she’d melted in his hands.
Despite that surprising turn, though, he now found himself stunned at being cast out, sent back to his room to sleep alone inhis cold, empty bed. What good was having a biddable wife, after all, if she would only entertain him for the briefest of interludes?
Marcus frowned. No, he ought not think that way.
The terms had been settled, well before he’d been privy to the allure of her thick hips, her ample breasts and pillowy stomach. It would be best to view their bedsport as a pleasant surprise, especially given his initial expectations.
His eyes fell upon the newspapers and letters that had accumulated in the days leading up to the wedding, a stack that was now growing quite large. He scrubbed a hand over the lower half of his face.
He’d best get back to business, to the plan as it had originally been devised. He’d taken Evelyn on as a wife, and tomorrow her female relations would move in as well. Once that was settled, he’d better make his usual rounds, checking in with his usual points of contact throughout the borough, in addition to some new ones. It was time to put his newly won spurs to good use. Worry pricked at him as he recalled the first time he met his future wife, and Evelyn’s blank stare when he’d offered his name. It simply would no longer do, to remain as anonymous as that. He’d make himself into a Knockton man, and then he’d return to London, once the locals knew his name.
His name. He wished his wife would use it.
With his mind on the sound of his wife’s shouts as she climaxed, and how he wished she would call out his name with the same unbridled ecstasy, he picked up the top half of the stack of letters and papers and began shuffling them about.
He didn’t register much of what he was seeing until he paused at one overlarge envelope, with writing in a looping, curling hand. Far too fine of a thing to be mere correspondence. He set aside the rest of the stack, then flipped the envelope and broke the heavy seal. It was an invitation.
Blast it. Now he’d be heading to Birmingham to celebrate Towle’s baronetcy, with his brand-new wife in tow. Add that to the list of errands to be done.
With his head full of enough problems for one evening, he slipped the invitation back into its envelope and tossed it back onto the pile. Then he went to bed, alone on his wedding night.
It was as he had expected, ever since he and Evelyn had first come to their arrangement. But now it irritated him. She would spread her legs for him, and open her lips to his. But she rebuffed his lazy affection, and refused him the comfort of her alongside him through the night. Refused to allow him to call her by her name. Hell,anyof her preposterous mouthful of names. And she refused to call him by his.
He had never before cared much for love, and he told himself that he still didn’t. But he refused to live like those aristocratic boys from his school days, selecting their wives as the middle class chose their professional careers, while paying them as little heed as the latter—as a means to an end, another societal expectation ticked off the list.
No. Marcus would win her over.
If not for love and honor, then because he did nothing by half-measures.
Before he slipped into sleep, a new anxiety poked at the back of his mind—had he been foolhardy in this matter? His thoughts were already consumed by his wife’s ambivalence toward him; would this worrying eventually nullify any advantage he’d gained by bagging a Wolfenden?
The question gave Marcus pause. But then he shook his head and rolled over. Fretting over his wife’s feelings toward him?
He’d bloody well better not.
The next day Marcus rose to find that not much in his life had changed, despite Bray’s uncharacteristic smile as he assisted him in his dress.
All the servants seemed to be in higher spirits than usual, though.The benefits of allying yourself with the local gentry, Marcus supposed. In the past, such favoritism displayed by the staff might rankle him, but as he now basked in the warmth afforded to the Wolfendens, he allowed it.
Funny, that.
After a solitary breakfast, he returned to the pile of papers and envelopes, wanting to get it all cleared before Evelyn rose.
Despite his vow to keep his head, and his deference to her wishes, Marcus preferred to think of her that way, as Evelyn. Evelyn of the light hair and lush kisses. Mrs. Hartley, no.God, no. Never. Mrs. Hartley was his mother.
Marcus grimaced at the response he’d written to Towle, then reached for the ink blotter, rocking it back and forth atop his words.
Evelyn.She would come around to it, in time.
There was a gentle knock at the door to his study. After a brief pause, his wife entered the room, as if she had been summoned by his very thoughts.
He set aside his correspondence and stood, a smile he was certain looked quite obnoxious having appeared on his lips.
