Page 76 of Madcap with a Marquess
She served again. Rupert struck the ball hard, his entire body behind his swing. Franny didn’t even have time to react. It whizzed by her, straight into the dedans gallery. Again.
“Oh, dear. I believe that is Forty – Fifteen. Game point.” His words were as sickly smug as the grin on his face.
She scowled at him. “Do not think to distract me with your newfound tennis skills, husband. I do not believe for a second you won’t bed me because you’rehonoringme,” she ground out. “Vexing man.”
“Are you telling me you’re angry with me for treating you nicely?”
“Yes, I suppose I am. I don’t want you to be nice to me!” The adrenaline pumping through her veins was like oxygen to a fire, causing her frustration to burn dangerously hot.
“Beg pardon?” he said incredulously. “That is completely nonsensical.”
He was pulling on his hair. She wanted to pull on hers.
Instead, she walked to the net, stepped over it and strode up to him. And poked him in the chest with her finger. “It makes perfect sense, Rupert.” She stabbed him with her finger again. Urgh, why was he so gloriously hard!? “Before—the way you used to act when you finally let yourself out of whatever cage you hold yourself in—that is who I want. I had thought when we talked in the tack room…I had thought we had both made it clear we didn’t need to be anyone other than ourselves. I thought we were making progress.”
He scrubbed a hand down his face, pulling down at his mouth. “You don’t understand, Franny.”
She rested her hands on his firm, sweaty chest, reveling in how alive he felt, how solid. “Then explain it to me, Rupert.”
He tried to back away, but she followed him, sliding her hands up to grip his face. He stiffened beneath her touch, like clay baking under a hot sun. This is how he had been all week. She touched him, and he froze. Panicked. Like if he didn’t move, she’d let him go, disappear. But she wasn’t going to let him go.
“I don’t want some half-baked version of you, Rupert. I wantyou. Not this polite and courteous stranger who only appears to like me.”
She wanted it all with him. Friendship. Desire.Love.
“Franny, do you hear yourself? I have been absolutely barbaric toward you these past two weeks. I was either berating you like a pompous arse or tupping you like a brute. And yes, maybe you found pleasure, but I should be gentle with you. You do not want that man. I am beingbetterfor you.”
“No, you are most definitely not being better for me.” She slid her hands to the nape of his neck, interlocking her fingers. She gave him a gentle shake. “I am proud of you, Rupert. Youarechanging. Or not so much changing but finally allowing yourself tobe you.”She pressed a soft kiss to his lips, to his cheeks. “But for some reason, you still will not allow yourself to fully be you…with me.”
“God, Franny, you act like it’s easy to change. I amtrying.” He finally managed to extricate himself from her embrace and stepped back, chest expanding violently as though they had just played another tennis match.
“Try harder, Rupert. Stop holding back. Why do you hide part of yourself away?” Her voice was low. She fairly growled the words at him. And promptly leapt onto him and began peppering his face with kisses. She would simply kiss him until he gave in. Love him until he gave in.
“I have been this way for two decades!” He roared the words, but she drowned it out with her lips.
Her back collided with the wall, his towering form pressing her against the cool stone, his heaving chest colliding with hers. Her legs slid down his sides until her feet hit the floor. She ground her hips against his, his unmistakable erection prodding into her belly. Her blood thrummed, anticipation settling heavy between her thighs.
She was getting closer to breaking through. Breaking barriers. Together, they would tear the last of them down.
“It has been ingrained in me for over twentyyears to behave a certain way, to believe certain things,” he said roughly. “That some things, some desires, are morally wrong.” His words came out pained, as though his desire for her was an affliction. “And you have shown me the error of my ways in so many things. But I promise you, this—the things I want to do to you? They are sinful.”
“You are safe with me, Rupert.” Couldn’t he see that? He could be whoever he wanted to be with her.
“But that’s the problem, Franny.” He bent closer to her, the side of his face skimming hers. “You break my composure. When you make me angry, I lose control. When you touch me, I lose control.” He ran his nose along her neck, inhaling deeply. “Youare not safe withme.”
Her breath stuttered at the soft threat laced in his words, the way they came out calm, almost adoring—obsessed. This. This was what had been missing.
His hand settled on her neck, his thumb coasting over her throat. He squeezed lightly, pressing her into the wall. Her pulse thundered through her, and her body trembled with all-consuming need for the glowering dark-eyed man holding her prisoner. His eyes were shut so tight they were nothing more than a jumble of wrinkles sitting under heavy brown brows.
Rupert’s breath shot out of him, shot over her, almost stinging with its strength. “I will not run away.”
Her heart melted into a bubbly mess. She reached up and caressed his face. Her poor, tortured husband. Tortured by his own hand. His own mind.
“Talk to me, Rupert, love.”
“I am just as bad as the Earl, Franny.” His voice broke and so did a part of her, at the pain thick and coarse in his voice. Realization settled over her like a mason setting stone on her shoulders. “I frighten you. I hurt you. I bruise you. Just as he did.”
It all made so much sense now—his running, his avoidance, his holding back.
