A Breach of Promise (The Rules of Engagement #1)(22)

Lydia tried to console herself that she’d been wise to escape a loveless marriage, the trap of so many miserable women whose husbands eventually and universally abandoned them for the arms of a mistress. She should have been pleased by the news. It was what she’d wanted, wasn’t it?

The stark truth pierced her chest. No. It was what she’d said she wanted. If she were brutally honest with herself, she’d never stopped wanting him, but her pride would not allow her to be taken with indifference. She had told Lady Russell that she’d rather be despised than merely tolerated. That was a lie as well. What she truly and desperately wanted was what he had given her in those blissful moments when he made her feel like the most important thing in the universe.

That was why her chest tightened so painfully and her throat felt like sandpaper when he donned his polite and indifferent mask, or avoided her gaze altogether as he’d done for the last half hour. Lydia had accused Marcus of pressing his suit only out of injured pride, but she’d seen the raw desire in his eyes and glimpsed the man behind the mask. Honesty forced her to confess the same sin for which she’d condemned him—her miserable, damnable pride. She’d thought to save herself heartbreak, but how could her heart ache any more than being ripped from her chest? For that’s what she felt now—alone and empty with her cold, passionless pride. Marcus hadn’t broken her heart this time—she’d done it to herself.

*



“I’fackins!” Sally cried when Lydia entered the hired chamber. “Your gown and hair! You surely mustn’t appear at Woburn Abbey in such a state, m’lady! We must order the gown pressed and I’ll do up your hair. By the look of it, ye must ha’ fallen asleep in the coach?”

“Travel does weary one so,” Lydia said.

“For my life, I can’t imagine how a soul could sleep with all that rocking and jostling.” Sally gave her a sly look. “Though I don’t know how any female with breath in her body could sleep in ‘is lordship’s company neither. ‘E’s an exceeding ‘andsome gent, Lord Marcus, don’t ye think m’lady?” Sally gave Lydia a knowing wink.

Lydia caught a glimpse of her reflection with a gasp of horror. I’fackins indeed! With her hair a nest of tangles and her bodice unevenly laced, she truly did resemble a Covent Garden doxy! No wonder the maid was so cheeky! Flushing rubicund, Lydia replied with icy hauteur. “I only think you’ve a saucy tongue in your head, Sally, which will surely lead you to trouble. Now please help me with my laces.”

“Aye, milady.” Sally’s stifled giggle said the dignified affectation had failed.

Having helped Lydia out of the gown, Sally descended the stairs in search of the innkeeper’s wife to order its pressing, leaving Lydia in only her shift and stays. Pulling the remaining pins from her hair, she attempted to finger-comb the mess of tangles. At the light tap on the door, she flung it open, expecting Sally with the tea tray.

It was Marcus.

He froze in the doorframe, tea tray in hand, raking over her dishabille—taking in the mounds of her breast clearly displayed by low-cut stays, her hair hanging loosely over her shoulders—his dark-blue eyes dilated to the deepest shade of indigo.

Lydia’s breath hitched. She took three steps backward, her gaze flying over the room in search of anything to cover her near-nakedness.

“Pray don’t trouble yourself on my account,” Marcus said in a low rumble, as if reading her mind. Stepping into the room, he kicked the door closed behind him.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” Lydia’s eyes were wide, her breath coming fast.

“Why delivering your tea, Miss Trent.” Marcus advanced two more steps into the room, his heated gaze never leaving her but flickering and flaming into a raging, blue blaze. “It seems the maid, Sally, must press your gown herself. It may take some time, I’m told.”

“The gown?” Lydia blinked.

He stared, his eyes undressing her. The air between them crackled with the heat of sexual awareness.

“Aye. The gown.”

“Th-the tray.” She swallowed hard and stepped forward to take it from him.

“Devil take the tray.” Marcus dropped it with a clatter and jerked her into his arms, jolting a bolt of fire to her belly. There was no gentleness in his hold. His voice was low and ominous in her ears, his breath hot and moist against her neck. “You didn’t tell me to leave, Lydia.”

“No,” she whispered, her heart hammering apace. “Don’t leave.”

His hands squeezed her shoulders. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Do you know what you’re saying?”

“Yes, Marcus.” Her mouth was dry. She wet her lips and upturned her face. “I know exactly what I’m doing. Please lock the door.”

He dragged her hard against him, hungrily seeking her mouth. Groping blindly at their clothes between fevered kisses and hungry moans, they backed toward the door. The tumblers turned with a loud click and Lydia was crushed between the hard, cold panel at her back and the hot, solid wall of Marcus at her front.

Tearing his mouth from her, Marcus yanked her laces and ripped at linen, divesting her of shift and stays. Cupping and squeezing Lydia’s breasts, he dragged his lightly stubbled face against her neck, following her heated pulse with hot tongue, open kisses and love bites.