Page 40 of The Lyon Whisperer
“I’m sure they will.” Her violet gaze turned steely.
He’d seen her in her fierce mode once before—the night she ventured to his house at midnight to lay out her conditions.
“In the meantime, sir, do you mind telling me what you’re about?” She questioned him like a queen interrogating her subject.
Fighting a smile, he sauntered to the bed and dropped onto the edge of the mattress, stretching out his legs and crossing them at the ankle. “I thought I’d explained. I’m here to look into Mr. Bender’s concerns regarding—”
“I think you know my question pertains to another matter entirely.”
He arched a brow.
She threw up her hands, her icy demeanor cracking. “The bed, sir. The bed. Theonebed. We had an agreement, if you recall.”
“I certainly do recall. Do you recall that we are man and wife? This village’s future Lord and Lady Culver, Viscount and Viscountess of Everston?”
She looked slightly taken aback. “What does that have to do with our sleeping arrangements?”
“I, for one, do not relish the idea of hearing about how the newly wed Lord and Lady Culver maintained separate chambers a week into their marriage. You know how much I dislike my name being dragged through the gossip mills.”
She bit her lower lip, her expression one of uncertainty.
It didn’t sit right with him. After all, he’d purposely put her in this position.
He shook off the odd prick to his conscience. He’d spoken the plain truth, one she should have considered herself. If averting gossip was not his primary motivation in requesting one bedchamber, well, she was partly to blame for putting him in this lamentable position of hungering after his wife.
She cleared her throat. “I suppose I should have thought things through when you invited me along. Still, my point remains. There is but one bed, and we have an agreement.”
By God, the woman had nerves of steel. Many a soldier under his command would not dare to press him the way she did. He didn’t know whether he admired her tenacity or should take heed. But that was a puzzle for another day.
“I’m aware, and I have no intention of breaking our agreement. However…” He paused, choosing his next words with care. “That does not mean I do not wish for our physical relationship to progress. I wish it, Amelia, very badly.”
“I see.” Her cheeks flushed scarlet. “Th-then you are saying—” She gestured to the bed, but further words evidently failed her.
He rose and closed the distance between them. He gripped her shoulders. “Amelia.” His voice sounded low and husky to his own ears, revealing too much of what he felt. “I’m saying Ihopeto kiss you, and to touch you, and to make you feel exquisite things you never dreamed of, but nothing will happen you don’t want to happen. I give you my word as a gentleman.”
She gazed up at him, her violet eyes glittering with a strong emotion he could not discern, much to his displeasure.
Then her mouth curved in a brilliant smile.
Her smile hit him like a punch to the gut with reverberations all the way to his groin. Hell’s teeth, he was hard as a randy youth, and he hadn’t even kissed her yet.
He removed his hands from her, pivoting on his heel and striding to the window to hide his inconvenient condition.
“I do have another question.” Her voice, husky and enticing as always, was not helping matters.
He studied the square below, hoping the mundane scenes of villagers moving about their business would distract him from the pulsing need raging through him. “Of course you do. What is it?”
“Should we ask for an extra pillow and blanket for you, or do think the request too telling?”
He glanced over his shoulder, amazed to see the light of challenge in her gemstone eyes.
“I’ll be sure to pass on the request on my way out. I’ll tell them how very cold you tend to be.”
She blinked. A moment later, she threw back her head and laughed in a decidedly unladylike manner that, he had to admit, charmed him beyond measure.
Chase glanced overthe field of blackened logs. Weeks after the fire that had taken a large chunk of promised inventory, the scent of acrid smoke still permeated the air, burning his nostrils.
“It’s good of ya t’ have made the trip, m’lord, but there was really no need. As I told yer Mr. Bender, I’ve everything in hand, you can be sure o’that.” Mr. Briggs, the Irish-born forester Chase had hired to replace his last overseer roughly a year earlier, spoke in a confident manner, but the wariness in his eyes told a different story.
