Pendragon (Sherbrooke Brides 7)

“No, but he was betrothed, something I didn’t know about until it was too late.”

“I see. If Jeremy walked through that door this very instant, told you he wanted you, would you go with him?”

“No.”

“Because you’re a damned vicar’s daughter.”

“Because I don’t break my promises.”

He plowed his hand through his hair, making it stand straight up. Meggie smiled.

“So I am stuck with a wife who loves another man,” he said finally, and hated the words as they poured out of his mouth, hated them to his gut. They were stark and ugly, those damnable words, sounded like nails in a coffin lid.

“Listen to me, Thomas. I have a very high regard for you. I very much like it when you kiss me, when you love me. You have given me great pleasure just as, I trust, I have given you. Jeremy isn’t part of my life now. Only you are. I am your wife and I will protect you and honor you until I die.”

“Wonderful,” Thomas said, and began pacing, his dressing gown flapping at his ankles. “Just bloody wonderful. An honorable wife who’s already betrayed me. Damnation.” The fingers went through the hair again.

She said suddenly, “That is why you were so very rough with me on our wedding night, wasn’t it? You were thinking about Jeremy and you wanted to punish me.”

“I’m not proud of it, but yes. I heard you talking about him and I couldn’t bear it. I hurt you.” He paced again. She could feel anger radiating off him. She realized fully what she’d done to him.

“I’m very sorry, Thomas.”

“Yes, naturally you are because you’re so damned honorable and you recognize that you’ve done a very wrong thing.”

“Yes, but you are my husband, Thomas, forever.”

“Isn’t that just dandy?”

“Why did you withdraw from me again? Two weeks ago.”

“You dreamed about him. You said his name aloud.” He slammed his fist against the wall. “Damn you, Meggie, I had just given you immense pleasure and you dreamed about that damned bastard! I wanted to kill him—I still do.”

“What do you want to do to me?”

“I don’t know. I’ve thought about it, but I just don’t know. I don’t want to hurt you again, not with sex. Never with sex again.”

“I don’t remember dreaming about Jeremy. To be perfectly honest here, Thomas, I don’t think of him all that often anymore. You are my husband. Pendragon is my home. I want to be your wife, in all ways. I hate that you distrust me, that you blame me, that you don’t want me anymore.”

“Oh, God knows I want you, Meggie. I am a young man, young men are randier than goats, and I have grown up hearing that goats will bed anything that wags a tail or chews a boot.”

“That’s vulgar,” Meggie said, and laughed. It dried up very quickly. She said slowly, looking at him intently, “Do you think perhaps that we can start over, Thomas?”

“Start over? Start over what? This sham of a marriage?”

She’d been wallowing in guilt, knowing she’d been profoundly wrong. She’d been trying to exert reason and logic, trying to make him see how hideously sorry she was, but now she felt anger filling her, coming right out of her mouth. “This isn’t a sham marriage! Blessed Hell, Thomas, I wouldn’t let a man do what you do to me, and I surely wouldn’t let a man hear me scream in pleasure, if this were a damned sham marriage! I am your bloody wife. Do you hear me? I will grow old with you. Get used to it!”

She was breathing so hard that she was panting now. She realized in that instant that he was looking at her breasts, heaving and pressing against that wicked peach satin. She, the vicar’s daughter, straightened her shoulders, stuck her chest out, and said, “So what are you going to do about it, Thomas?”

He slammed out of the White Room.

Meggie stared at the still vibrating door. This was not good. She knew she’d hurt him very badly. But she couldn’t control her dreams. She tried and tried, but she simply couldn’t remember even dreaming about Jeremy. Oh yes, it had been after he’d sent her the carved statue of Mr. Cork. What could it have been?

And then she remembered.

She bounded out of bed and burst through the adjoining door into his grand and massive and very gloomy bedchamber, which she’d had cleaned, but not really paid much attention to since Thomas spent so little time in here. He was standing by one of the long skinny windows, staring out over the sea.

“Thomas, I remember.”