“I had no notion that you would prove to be such a jealous wife.”
She flinched at the disturbing accusation, refusing to admit the sensations churning through her.
“I am not jealous.”
“No?”
“Certainly not. You, after all, made no promise of fidelity.”
He regarded her as if he were offended by her words. “I am your husband.”
“That has no meaning among nobles. Society treats marriage as nothing more than empty vows and—” She gasped as Gabriel hauled her against his rigid body, his arms lashing around her to hold her in place. “What are you doing?”
“I assure you that our vows were not empty. You are mine and I will not endure you taking a lover.” His eyes blazed with a perilous fire. “Not ever.”
Again she felt that thrill of excitement at his primitive claim, and again she was swift to squash it.
“While you are allowed to do as you please, as I recall,” she instead muttered.
His gaze lowered to linger on her lips. “What I please is to have my wife in my bed where she belongs.”
Talia trembled, acutely aware of his warm body pressed so intimately against her own.
This had to be some new punishment, she told herself. He could not possibly want her with the raw hunger that tightened his face and hardened his body.
“Ah, yes, which explains why you so eagerly banished me to the country,” she reminded him.
His head lowered until his breath brushed her cheek in the promise of a kiss.
“I was angry and not thinking clearly.”
She dared not allow herself to be swayed. “And why I just discovered you with a near-naked woman in your arms.”
He shifted to nibble at the edge of her lips. “She was not in my arms.”
Renegade excitement tingled through her, making her knees weak and her heart flutter.
“But she had been, had she not?” She had to know the truth. It was like a nagging thorn in the center of her heart.
He teased her lips with slow, melting kisses. “I have no interest in women such as Sophia,” he whispered, his hands tracing the delicate curve of her spine. “Not so long as I have my sweet, biddable bride returned to me.”
It was her sharp, urgent response to his touch that had Talia abruptly turning her head to escape the delectable kisses. She did not want to remember the breathtaking pleasure of being skillfully ravished by her husband. Or the aching satisfaction of being held tenderly in his arms as she slept.
It had only made the inevitable rejection more painful to endure.
“That sweet biddable bride no longer exists,” she snapped.
He nuzzled at the pulse pounding at the base of her throat, his tongue tasting of the fluttering beat.
“I could demand her return.”
She grasped the lapels of his jacket as warm bliss poured like honey through her body. Oh, heavens, she wanted to press even closer to his hard muscles. To feel those clever fingers stroking over her bare skin and his lips exploring her in the same intimate manner he had used during their wedding night.
Instead she held herself rigid.
She had her pride, did she not?
“You could demand that the sun rise in the west, but it is likely you would be disappointed.”