Calypso Magic (Magic Trilogy 2)

"I, however, should make you a deplorable wife. I am not from your precious England, Lyon. My life, my experiences, have made me vastly different from you."

"What is it that you want?"

"I want to go home and pick up the threads of my life again."

"You won't be able to.

You will no longer have control. Have you so soon forgotten that you now have a stepmother? And a stepbrother? Life, my dear, as you experienced it, will no longer exist. The threads are broken."

"I will make do. I am still my father's heir."

"I shouldn't count on that, now that he has a stepson in the house. Dammit, Diana, let me take care of you, let me protect you. I will protect you to the best of my ability."

She was silent for many moments. "Lyon, 'tis enough. I don't need any man to protect me. No, hold your tongue. I heard you out. I suppose I am like other women. I do want a husband and children. But for me to consider marriage, I would demand that the man love me, love me and respect me, as me, Diana, not simply as a woman's body in his bed or as a brood mare to produce his children. I should demand that he belong to me as I did to him. And that, my lord earl, is quite beyond you."

His frustration came to the fore. "Diana, love doesn't just sprout up in an instant. It is something that can develop between two people; if they care for each other, it ---"

"You felt love for Charlotte, if not in an instant, at least very quickly."

He cursed floridly.

"After you have dealt with your inheritance, Lyon, you must return to England. You will find a lady to suit you there. A lady who will be quite willing to accept all that you have to offer. In short, a lady who knows your rules and is quite willing to play by them."

"This is ridiculous," he said, turned over on his side away from her, and set himself to sleep. But his body was rigid, his thoughts in chaos. And he was angry, both with himself and with Diana. He'd let her see a part of him that he wasn't in the habit of showing anyone. And as for her, he disliked experiencing her more and more as a person, as a woman separate from him, a woman who saw things clearly, perhaps too clearly, a woman who refused to bend to his will. Oh, hell.

Well, she had shown herself thoroughly a woman tonight, much to his chagrin. She demanded love, no doubt the romantic sort that he could no longer accept. He drew up his errant thinking at the sound of a sob.

He sprang upright on the bunk. "What the devil is the matter? Diana?"

14

I don't like devils. They vex me and are most unpleasant.

—RABELAIS

"Diana?"

Oh, why couldn't he just disappear and leave her alone? He was infuriating.

The sounds were muffled now, and he pictured her with her fist stuffed in her mouth. He eased off the bunk, oblivious of the fact that he was naked, and came down on his knees beside her.

"Come, what is wrong? Are you not feeling well? Is your belly cramping?"

She saw red through her misery. "Must you think everything related to my being a female? Oh, go away, Lyon!"

He touched his hand to her shoulder and frowned when he felt her flinch. "I will go away after you've told me what's wrong. Answer me. I am uncomfortable when you are silent, since you never are."

"Very well. I am unhappy. I want to be home. I don't want to have to worry about you ravishing me when I am not on my guard. I don't want to be forced to do anything I don't believe is right. There, I have answered you, now go away."

He sat back on his heels. He wished he could see her face, but the cabin was dark as a pit. He said, very deliberately, "If you promise to marry me, I will promise not to ravish you."

She said quickly, too quickly for his ears, "All right. I promise to marry you once we reach St. Thomas."

"You are an execrable liar, you know."

"Damn you, Lyon! What if I were the one to demand marriage? I couldn't force the issue by ravishing you. It isn't fair."

"Perhaps it isn't fair. However, as a man, I am endowed with more innate good sense than you are. As a man, it is up to me to assist you to reason, to make you see things more clearly ---"