Annette Blair - Scandalous Brides

Shot with possessive fury, Hawk sat up. “You distracted me with your nonsensical chatter about your beef-witted suitor. I would have expected him to teach you what you wanted to know; though I am pleased I overestimated him.” His harsh tone surprised even Hawk, but before he could apologize, he saw that Alex’s eyes were no longer bright with mischief, but glistening with tears.

Even as she stepped away, Hawk wanted to call his words back. “Devil take it!” Hurting her had not been his intention. “Alex, I did not mean—”

A stifled sob escaped her as she ran.

“Wait, come back.” Hawk could not stand quick enough to stop her, before her dressing room door shut with finality.

Alex paced, attempting, at the same time, to catch her breath. What had just happened? What did Hawksworth mean, touching her ankle, her leg, in the way she would allow only a husband, only him to do, then insinuating that she might have permitted Chesterfield such liberties before their marriage.

She leaned against the door separating them and closed her eyes, tears slipping beneath her lashes, despite her attempt to stem the flow, despite her fury at herself for allowing them.

Her breasts ached and that place between her legs pulsed. There, she wanted Hawksworth, with a need, nay a desperation, the likes of which she had not experienced with Chesterfield, or anyone.

Had Bryce continued touching her, she suspected what might have happened had been the something wonderful Chesterfield enigmatically promised, but she sensed only Bryce could deliver.

After what he had just implied, however, how could she get close enough again to find out?

Alex turned and touched her brow to the door. “Why did you say such a horrid thing,” she asked, smacking her palm against the shuddering portal as if it were her stubborn husband’s chest. “Why?”

“Because I am a weak, jealous bastard,” Hawk said as faintly as her words had come to him. He closed his eyes, regret lancing him for causing her pain once more.

Why had he said it? Hawk wondered. Anger? Jealousy? Because he could not make love to her. Because if he consummated their marriage, he would bind her to him, without hope for her future, damn it to bloody hell.

She also deserved better than his abuse, which he had not intended.

He should grant her an immediate annulment and leave Huntington Lodge without looking back. He was too jaded for such an innocent. And still, he wanted to go to her, now, this minute, apologize until she granted him forgiveness, except that he must stand before he could take a step to do anything more.

Bracing himself against the agony of rising, Hawk realized that he deserved all the wretchedness God saw fit to give him, so he closed his eyes and pulled himself upright, be damned to the pain.

After anguish, at length, passed, he released his breath and opened his eyes… only to find Alexandra on the opposite side of the bed, horror etching her features and paling her skin to flour paste. “Lexy, forgive me. I can be a blackguard, sometimes.”

“You said you were free of pain, but in pushing you down, I hurt you by making you rise again.”

“Not as badly as I hurt you.”

“You move always with some difficulty; I noticed that. But rising from so far must be—”

“Getting easier by the day. Alex, listen. About my unforgivable insinuation—”

“I am sorry I pushed you. I meant only to be playful.” Alex lowered herself to sit on the bed, keeping her back to him.

“I wish I could say the same.” Hawk came around to sit beside her. He tried to take her hand, though it turned out that he ended up fighting her for it and lost. “Damn it, will you not hear me out?”

She looked him full in the face. “Not now. Please, I do not wish to speak of it, right now.”

“So be it, then. But later, you will hear what I have to say, if I have to tie you to the bed.”

With the image his promise engendered, life shot through Hawk once more, and he cursed his fickle body as he rose.

“Breakfast in half an hour, your grace,” Myerson called from the dressing room.

“Just a minute, man.” Hawk handed Alex a more modest dressing gown, and once she donned it, he called his valet into the room. “Since I no longer have bachelor quarters, or even a separate bedchamber, I will not require your services as valet for the nonce, but I do believe if it is agreeable to you that her grace has tasks you might perform about the house.” He looked to Alex for confirmation.

She had composed herself admirably. “Thank you, Hawksworth. Yes, Myerson, we very much need your services, if you do not mind. Meet me in the kitchen in an hour and I will go over your new duties. Until then, and if you have already broken your fast, you may see if Mrs. Parker can use your help.”

“Very good, your grace.”

After Myerson left, Alexandra went wordlessly into her dressing room, shutting the door.

Hawk dressed and made his way downstairs. Alex needed time to compose herself, and he required even more time to dislodge his very big foot from his very big mouth.

As he entered the breakfast room, conversation came to an abrupt, uncomfortable halt.

Hawk took the empty chair beside his uncle. “Good morning.” He nodded and took to buttering a piece of toast, aware he was cross as a bear. “Do not stop talking on my account,” he said, assuming that they must have been discussing his disfigurement, or his overlong absence, or any number of subjects for which he was heartily embarrassed.

“Come now,” he said. “We are family. I am certain you must have questions that have gone unanswered for far too long. Would you not rather ask than conjecture?”

To Claudia’s exclamation and Hildegarde’s gasp, a hedgehog ran from beneath the table. Then Beatrix crawled out from beneath and popped up between them. “I have a question, Uncle Bryce.”

“Excuse me,” he interrupted, “but did I just see a hedgehog cross the room?”

“That’s Nanny.” Beatrix, the unrepentant eavesdropper, came around to climb on his lap. “Do not worry, she will be back.”

“Nanny?” Hawk asked.

Giff chuckled. “Bea wanted to give her hedgehog a name with hog in it, but all she could think of was Hogmanay, except that Bea calls it Hogmananny, so that’s what she named her hedgehog.”

“Nanny, for short,” Hawk said. “Good name, Bumble Bea. I approve. Have you shown Nanny to your cousins?”

Bea shook her head. “Aunt Bree says Damon and Rafe have a cat and a dog both, so they will not care for her.”

“Ah, but I think they will. Hedgehogs are such unique pets, after all.”

“Really?” Beatrix beamed, picked up the toast Hawk had just buttered, and took a bite. “When can we move back to the London house, so I can show them?”

Hawk accepted a replacement for his toast from Hildegarde. “Thank you, Aunt,” he said, taking a bite to stake his claim. “Why do we not wait, Bumble Bea, until Alexandra joins us before I tell you how things stand with my title and estate.”

“You mean you have not even told her yet?” the wide-eyed child asked. “Take care or you will make her cry again.”

“Make her… cry? What are you talking about?” Could Bea have heard them earlier?

The child of seven-going-on-forty gave a long-suffering sigh. “Before you died—or we thought you did—you wrote to Aunt Sabrina, Damon, and Rafferty’s Mama, remember? They were staying with us then?”

Why did everyone suppose that he had forgotten the members of his family while he was away? “I remember.”

“You did not write a letter to Alex when you were dying, or even think of her at the last, and that made her cry.”