Ann Lethbridge - Secrets Of The Marriage Bed

Surrender to desire...

After one night of passion, the dissolute Duke of Dunstan made Julia his wife, but their honeymoon is far from blissful. Alistair trusts no one with his shameful secret, and that means keeping his tempting new bride at a distance...

Julia longs for Alistair to yield to the powerful desire between them. But when the dark secrets of the marriage bed threaten their future, this new couple must overcome the past and surrender to their wildest passions to find a new, oh-so-delicious beginning together!

She lifted her chin and pinned a teasing smile to her lips.

‘Shall we gallop ventre à terre in the other direction?’

Once more a corner of his mouth twitched with the hint of a smile. ‘Now, that really would be rude.’

Hope bubbled in her veins. Was the distance between them closing? This barrier meant for others and not for her?

‘Do we care? Being of the ducal sort?’

His eyes flashed amusement. ‘Behave, madam.’

Thrills chased through her stomach. He’d used that deep seductive growl the night they’d made love. Her insides softened, liquefied. Longing filled her. For him. For his touch. For the way he had made her feel.

‘I will behave if you will,’ she quipped. He had intended to arouse, she was sure of it. The man did nothing without purpose.

Author Note

You might already have met Alistair and Julia, in One Night as a Courtesan. They are a couple who kept interrupting other stories to remind me that while I had married them off I had not given them a proper happily-ever-after. They were quite insistent that after what looked like an excellent beginning things were not going well, and they needed me to give them a helping hand. So I did.

Along the way I also learned that kaleidoscopes were invented during the Regency era, and learned a new name for a swarm of butterflies.

I do hope you enjoy their story.

If you would like to know more about me and my books you can visit me at annlethbridge.com, where you can sign up for my newsletter, prizes offered with every issue, and find my links to your favourite social media.

Secrets of the Marriage Bed

Ann Lethbridge

www.millsandboon.co.uk

In her youth, award-winning author ANN LETHBRIDGE re-imagined the Regency romances she read—and now she loves writing her own. Now living in Canada, Ann visits Britain every year, where family members understand—or so they say—her need to poke around every antiquity within a hundred miles. Learn more about Ann or contact her at annlethbridge.com. She loves hearing from readers.

Books by Ann Lethbridge

Mills & Boon Historical Romance

and Mills & Boon Historical Undone ! eBooks

Rakes in Disgrace

The Gamekeeper’s Lady

More Than a Mistress

Deliciously Debauched by the Rake (Undone!)

More Than a Lover

The Gilvrys of Dunross

The Laird’s Forbidden Lady

Her Highland Protector

Falling for the Highland Rogue

Return of the Prodigal Gilvry

One Night with the Highlander (Undone!)

Linked by Character

Wicked Rake, Defiant Mistress

One Night as a Courtesan (Undone!)

Secrets of the Marriage Bed

Haunted by the Earl’s Touch

Captured Countess

The Duke’s Daring Debutante

The Rake’s Inherited Courtesan

Lady Rosabella’s Ruse

The Rake’s Intimate Encounter (Undone!)

Visit the Author Profile page

at millsandboon.co.ukfor more titles.

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This book is dedicated to my sister-in-law, Ro, who entertains me and my dear husband in grand style whenever we visit her in Wales and never minds if I have my nose in a book or my head in a story.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Author Note

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

This picture of domestic bliss should have sent Alistair, Duke of Dunstan, haring off for a brandy at his club. Instead, standing in the shadows outside his wife’s withdrawing room, watching her delicately ply her needle, he wanted...more. A painful twisting in his chest for something he could not name, along with the far more easily controlled inconvenience of lust. When he really should not want anything at all.

A bitter smile pulled at his lips. The only woman he’d wanted this badly in years he couldn’t have because she was his wife.

What the devil had he been thinking when he’d offered marriage? A question he’d asked himself more than once these past two weeks. He didn’t need a wife. Hadn’t wanted one. Why be tied to one woman when any number of them, from princess to pauper, were ready to fall into his bed? Marriage was his worst idea ever.

And he’d had more than his share of bad ideas.

If she ever learned the truth, she likely would turn away in disgust.

Of course, he hadn’t been thinking the night he’d met her. At least not with the brain atop his shoulders. Drunk on the aftermath of exquisite passion, the legend of the Dunstan rubies had put words in his mouth he would never have uttered had his mind been in full working order. Pride hadn’t permitted a retraction.

A Dunstan never went back on his word. That was something he should have recalled before he’d opened his mouth, having sworn years ago to put old mistakes right. Mistakes that made marriage out of the question. And yet here he was...married.

He lingered in the dark, out of sight, when he should have walked away.

Her head bent towards the light of the candle, her gaze fixed on her needle, Julia might have been posing for a portrait. From this vantage point, he had a perfect view of her profile. A small straight nose, a high intelligent forehead, a seductively elegant neck rising from a gown of the finest pale blue silk. A gown that covered a body every curve and swell of which he knew intimately.

He would not think about that. An odd longing clutched at his heart. What would it be like, just for once, to bask in a woman’s affection?

Affection. His lip curled at the word. He had never known it and didn’t want it. Men who craved affection were weaklings, led around by the nose, or some other part of their anatomy. He only had to look at his father with Isobel to know better. After Alistair’s own mother’s death, his father had been a pawn to Isobel’s queen. Alistair had had a few happy years with his half-brother, but eventually, to please Isobel, his father sent Alistair away to school for being sullen and difficult with his new mama, while keeping Isobel’s precious son close to home.

At first, in hopes of being allowed to come home, he’d been the perfect student. As time went on, and he realised it wasn’t working, he’d instinctively taken the opposite tack, getting into every sort of scrape available to a wealthy young man away at university. Until finally, the bagwig had sent him down.