Page 64 of The Viscount and the Vixen
She was a siren, luring his father out of his reclusiveness. Each evening, he made his way down to the music room. Locke had begun pouring a scotch and setting it on the table beside his father’s favorite chair in anticipation of the marquess’s arrival. Sometimes his father spoke of the love of his life. In the past several nights Locke had learned more about his mother than he’d learned in all the years prior.
Apparently, she’d been a bit of a hellion herself: brave, strong, and bold. He’d only ever known his father as a broken man, but perhaps he wasn’t quite as damaged as Locke had always thought.
Groaning, he stretched his arms overhead, then lowered his fingers to the water. Too tepid. Another bucket of boiling water should do the trick. Swinging around, he came up short at the sight of Portia standing just inside the doorway. He’d already set aside his dirt-covered jacket and removed his gloves, but grime had settled into the creases of his face and neck. He was well aware of his disheveled—and horribly smelly—state.
Her gaze roamed slowly over him as though she’d never seen him before. “You work the mines,” she stated quietly but with confidence.
He’d known sooner or later she might learn the truth of it. He’d have preferred later, but considering that she now had a few additional servants, and each of them were no doubt related to someone who labored in the mines, he saw no point in denying the truth, although he wasn’t going to confess it either. Apparently she had the wisdom to accurately interpret his silence.
“Does your father know?” she asked into the silence that followed her earlier words.
“No, and I prefer that he not. I also prefer that you leave so I may see to my bath.”
“How long has it been since there was any tin?”
“I’m not discussing the mines with you but rest assured, you will receive your allowance—”
“Damn you, Locksley!” she cut in with such vehemence that he snapped his head back as though she’d slapped him. Although God help him, the fire burning in her eyes was an aphrodisiac that might have drawn him in if he wasn’t embarrassed that she’d learned the truth of his days. “Do you honestly believe that’s the reason I’m asking? You’re a lord. You’re not supposed to be digging in the mines.”
“I’m another set of hands, hands for which I don’t have to provide a salary.”
“So it’s been a while.” Her tone reflected a fact in the same way a solicitor might make his case before the bench. Why did he feel as though he were the one in the prisoner box?
She took a step toward him. He backed up, slammed into the tub, cursed, pushed out the flat of his palm to still her. “Don’t come near me. I reek to high heavens and am likely to cause you to swoon.”
A corner of her mouth tilted up. “I’m not as delicate as all that. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because it’s not your business.”
Now she was the one to jerk back as though she’d been slapped. “I’m your wife.”
“Your job is to warm my bed and provide my heir. That is the extent of your wifely duties. The estate, the management of it, the income are my duties. Nothing is to be gained by discussing them.”
“A lessening of your burdens, perhaps?”
“More likely an adding to them, as you’ll no doubt begin pestering me for details or resenting if I suggest you not spend so frivolously. You’ll not do without, Portia, so I don’t see that you need to concern yourself with my troubles.”
She gave a brusque nod. “Sometimes, Locksley, you are an utter ass.”
With that, she spun on her heel and quit the room.
For reasons he couldn’t fathom, he laughed. Long, loud, and hard. Then he did something even more confounding. He moved to the side of the tub, grabbed the edge, and heaved with all his might until he upended it and sent water cascading over the floor.
Bowing his head, he clenched his fists.Damn. Damn. Damn.He had never wanted her to learn the truth of how he spent his days, frantically tunneling at the earth, desperate to find even the tiniest vein of ore, to uncover some evidence that more tin existed, that their financial future wasn’t completely and utterly hopeless.
Nearly an hour and a half later, he stood at the window in the library, downing scotch. He’d come straight here from the bathing room, now wearing the clothes he’d donned that morning before changing into the sturdier and rougher attire that he sported when going to the mines.
Portia was correct. He’d been an ass. Was still in danger of behaving as one because he couldn’t shake off the anger that riveted through him now that she knew the truth of his situation. He was embarrassed that he got his hands dirty, that he engaged in backbreaking labor that no gentleman should. That he hadn’t paid more attention to the mines when he reached his majority, that he hadn’t noticed sooner that his father was not the best steward for the estate.
That he returned to the manor each evening covered in sweat and grime. It was bad enough the local villagers knew. But he could envision Portia in London attending a tea, tittering with a group of ladies, laughing at the notion of him working for his supper as though he hadn’t been born into an elevated position in Society.
Hearing the footsteps, he turned slightly and watched as she charged into the room, wearing the deep blue gown that always made her appear so incredibly striking, that always made him want to remove the silk in all due haste. It taunted him now because he suspected she was going to object when next he went to touch her with hands that toiled. She had married him assuming him to be a gentleman, but a gentleman did not spend his day in the dank and chilled air beneath ground. A gentleman didn’t stink of labor rather than play.
He hadn’t been certain she’d join him for dinner now that she knew the truth. He hated the relief that swamped him because she was here, that she wasn’t leaving him to stew in solitude.
She came to an abrupt halt before him, her whiskey eyes searching his features, and he wondered what she saw now when she looked at him. A man who feared he might be a worse steward than his father, a man who shouldn’t have taken her to wife, who shouldn’t be striving to get her with child when he wasn’t certain if the lands would ever again be profitable. He shouldn’t yet be bringing an heir into this world, and yet he seemed incapable of not plowing into her each night. For a while, when he was lost in the heat of her, his troubles faded away. Yet they always returned with the sun, always—
His thoughts slammed to a halt as he realized she was holding something toward him. Glancing down, he saw resting in her palm the velvet pouch that he’d handed her the morning after they’d married.
