Page 32 of The Wolf Duke's Wife
“The world reasserts itself,” Tristan whispered.
They rejoined the party, joking about taking the wrong path and becoming lost in the shadows. Christine’s mind reeled, though, whirling.
Accept his proposal to protect myself. Accept to help another. Someone who is in trouble and may even be desperate. Tristan used the word trouble in a particular way, the way it is used when talking of a young woman and an unmarried man. How can I not help?
That night, long after the house had quieted, Christine sat by the window of her chamber. A hot bath had soothed her body but not her spirit. She replayed his words over and over, hating him for his arrogance, hating herself for the way her skin still tingled where his nearness had brushed her.
He pulls me one way and pushes me another. I cannot keep up. When we danced, he was charming and handsome. Graceful and gentle. Now he is cold and calculating. Which will I end up married to?
She suddenly realized that she was thinking in terms of marriage. As though it was decided.
Even if I agree, it will not come to marriage. A betrothal of convenience is what we are discussing. It will never get as far as marriage. And not even betrothal until I have assurances that he intends no harm to Charles. And when I know the reason for his interest.
The only light outside was the white blanket of moonlight. Drawn by restlessness, Christine leaned out into the cool night air. Her breath caught. Tristan was there. He sat beneath one of the great oaks, coat about his shoulders, a glass glinting in his hand. His head was tilted back, eyes half-hidden in shadow. At his feet moved a shape, slender, russet, wild. A fox.
Christine watched, scarcely daring to breathe. She kept absolutely still, not wanting Tristan to see her. It seemed to her that she was seeing a part of him he kept hidden. That he did not know he was observed and had, therefore, let his guard down. The animal crept forward, paused, then stretched its nose toward Tristan’s outstretched hand. He murmured something she could not catch, his voice softened by the night.
The fox took the morsel and darted back, then returned, emboldened. Tristan chuckled low, patient, as though he had allthe time in the world to win its trust. It was absurdly, impossibly gentle. A man spoken of as a beast coaxing a creature of the wild with tenderness.
Christine felt something shift inside her, some fragile crack in the wall she had built. The door behind her creaked. A maid entered with a taper, bustling to light the lamps.
The little flame flared, gilding Christine in sudden light. She stiffened in horror, her nightgown clung still damp from her bath, thin as gauze in the glow. She whirled back to the window.
Below, Tristan had lifted his head. The fox had fled into the shadows, but Tristan did not move. His gaze was fixed on the lit window. Fixed on her.
Heat surged to Christine’s face. She knew that she should draw the curtains or move out of sight. But she did neither. One hand held the nearest curtain. The nightgown hung from her shoulders, breasts pressed against the thin fabric. Light from behind would outline the shape of her.
He sees enough to imagine what is revealed only in silhouette. To imagine touching me. Kissing me. I am a harlot for standing here on display! Wicked!
But she could not stop herself. Her head spun, her skin tingled. She was naked before him once more and whispered his name, the closest she could come to being touched by him. The syllables on her tongue were like licking his body. Like kissingmuscles that must be hard as steel. Naked, he would be more beautiful than David. Her face burned at the wanton thoughts.
No man has elicited such a response before. Never.
“Lady Christine?” the maid asked, tentatively.
Dragged back into the real world, Christine jumped and seized the curtain, dragging it closed. But not before she saw it, the faint curve of his mouth, not mocking this time, but something else. Something private, knowing, dangerous.
She stood trembling in the half-light, the maid fussing obliviously with the taper. Christine pressed her fingers hard into the curtain’s fabric, as though it could steady her.
She told herself it was shame, mortification at being seen so. Yet some treacherous part of her thrilled that he had seen her. Not Gillray’s drudge. Not society’s castoff. Simply Christine.
And he had smiled.
Eleven
The next day, Tristan did not see Christine at breakfast. He wandered the halls of the ancient house, contemplating visiting her room in order to push his question of the night before. It felt as though he were a ship lost at sea. He wandered listlessly, tugged by currents and winds. So certain had he been that he would see her that her absence was disturbing.
She saw me last night. I know she did. I saw her. Saw her body. Does she entice me? Did she know how much of her I could see?
The vision of her, outlined by the sudden light, was intoxicating. It had haunted his dreams. The fact that he had touched her, kissed her, held her in his arms, made the sight he had seen all the more enticing.
I must be careful. I did not come here to form an attachment but to gain revenge. Attachment is weakness. Feelings are weakness. I will not be weak!
The corridors of Greystone carried voices like funnels, every alcove a snare for gossip. Tristan had little patience for eavesdropping, yet when he heard his own name, he paused in the shadow of an open door.
“…a disgrace, that girl showing her face here at all,” Lady Martha’s sharp tones drifted out, “as though her brother had not robbed half of London! And then to parade herself before my George, sniffing about for what she lost. Shameless.”
Lord Bingley’s drawl followed, smug and brittle.
