Dark Deceptions: A Regency and Medieval Collection of Dark Romances(49)

She glanced up.

“I will never allow anyone to speak to you like that. Do you understand? You are my wife and deserving of respect. I will give Miss Gayle her references and send her—”

Georgina gasped. “No!” She couldn’t be responsible for another woman losing her work. Not when she still battled the horrors of being alone with nothing more than false references to her name. She’d wish that on no other woman. She tried again. “Please do not dismiss her. She cares for you.”

Adam raised her right hand to his mouth. He brushed his lips across her knuckles. A shiver of awareness coursed through her body.

“You are a good woman,” he said solemnly.

Her mind screeched a silent protest at his familiar words. How many times would he hurl that mocking statement at her? It only served as a reminder of her deceit.

She swirled away from him, ripping her hands free. Not for the first time that day, the urge to flee surged like a wave amidst a storm. Adam stood between her and the doorway, and he was looking at her with such gentle concern she wanted to cry and she hated that she wanted to cry because tears were a sign of weakness and…She needed to put some distance between them. Hurrying over to the long window, she pulled back the curtain and peered down into the bustling street below.

Georgina had traveled down a path that could not be undone, and because of it, he would be forever trapped in a marriage that, for him, was nothing more than an obligation. Her throat seized up.

“You should not have married me,” she whispered, laying her forehead against the pane.

“I married you because I wanted to, Georgina. I don’t give a damn about anyone’s opinions or expectations and neither should you.” A trace of annoyance underlined his words.

She laughed, shaking her head. “Oh, Adam, you belong to a different world than I do.” She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I have to care about others opinions and expectations. You do not. You—”

“Georgina, we now belong to the same world.” His jaw flexed as if he were trying to remain in control of his temper.

Oddly, she was not afraid. Adam would not hurt her.

Georgina, however, could hurt him a great deal. All it would take was a whisper of the truth about her lies and he’d toss her into the street. A spasm wracked her body. She had to hug herself to try in vain to stifle the growing shiver. She pictured herself alone in a cold Newgate cell while the guards violated her, while the rats gnawed at her. Bile climbed up her throat.

“Georgina?”

Adam’s voice came as if down a long, long hall—distant and faint in her ears.

He pressed his lips to the nape of her neck and the horror receded. She sucked in a deep breath.

Adam pulled her back against his chest and rocked her in a gentle rhythm. “Do you have nightmares?”

She nodded. All the time.

“They haunt me as well. I don’t think a night has passed that Fox and Hunter don’t pay a visit to my dreams.”

Oh God. Agony struck her heart like a thousand knives. She knew nightmares. Had lived with them her entire life. And because of her horrible, vile father, Adam’s life would never be the same.

Tears blurred her vision. She had to tell him. Now, before they consummated their union and Adam was forever bound to her, a woman he would soon loathe and revile.

She turned in his arms and raised her tear-filled gaze to his. “Adam, I-I n-need…” She took a deep breath and tried again. “I need to tell you about Fox.”

Adam pressed a finger to her lips. “Not now. Not on this day. They took so much from both of us. I’ll not allow them to ruin this day, too.”

Georgina took a step away from him. She threw her palms up. “No! I have to say this.”

Adam closed the distance between them. He framed her face between his hands—hands which had caressed and soothed her. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It does!” she cried. She needed him to listen. Needed him to know every last ugly truth. She should have told him. Long before now, before she’d trapped him into a marriage with his captor’s daughter.

He kissed her, effectively silencing her next words. He pulled back, dropping a final kiss on her brow. “It doesn’t matter. Not now. Not ever.”

Not ever.

Her heart stirred with hope. She was ready to move forward. With Adam as her husband. She’d never meant anything to her father; the day he’d left her alone would forever mark the moment she’d been born again.

Take what Adam offers. Leap on the wings of new beginnings, Georgina. Soar.

Georgina turned around, presenting him with her back. She spoke on a breathless whisper, “Will you undo my buttons?”

Adam sucked in a breath but, with a jerky nod, began to work freeing the long row of buttons. In moments, cool air kissed her exposed back, the modest chemise little barrier to the chill.

Georgina wiggled the fabric past her hips where it pooled in a silken heap, twining about her and Adam’s feet. In spite of her undergarments, she felt remarkably bare. She made to cross her arms over her breasts, but Adam stayed her with his hand.

“Don’t,” he begged hoarsely. “I want to see all of you.” The rapid rise and fall of his chest indicated that he was as aroused as she was. Georgina shrugged off her modest dress and stood before him, shivering with alternating waves of modesty and desire.