“I’m rather astonished to be counseling the font of all wisdom.” Richard’s mouth stretched in a reminiscent smile. “I remember Pen as a girl. She was plucky and impulsive and full of life.”
“Yes, she was.” Cam too found himself smiling.
Richard’s smile faded. “That wasn’t the woman I met last night.”
“You knew her many years ago.”
“You need to convince her that you won’t come down in a hail of reproach if she steps out of line. She’s clever; she’ll soon work out what she can and can’t do without upsetting the old biddies.”
“You make me sound like a despot,” Cam protested.
Richard shrugged. “You chose a woman of spirit. Or at least she will be, once she stops fretting about any whisper of disapproval that might inconvenience you. She’s a Thorne. I can’t imagine she’s terrified on her own account. The Thornes drink recklessness with their mother’s milk.”
“Her reputation precedes her,” Jonas said quietly.
Cam set down his glass with a click. “Shall I knock your teeth down your throat, chum?”
“Threaten all you like—not that there’s much of my hide left to mark. I’m just speaking the truth we all know, Cam,” Jonas responded calmly. “You always said you’d marry a woman of unsullied reputation. In fact, that was why you chose Lady Marianne, if I recall our discussion.”
“Not entirely why,” Cam said uncomfortably. Despite his apology, despite fate selecting another bride, he felt guilty about Marianne Seaton. He’d seen the sideways glances directed at her. Society interpreted Cam’s marriage to Pen as a rejection of his first choice.
“She met your standards of beauty and intelligence. But if she’d had the slightest brush with scandal, you’d never have gone within ten miles of her.”
“Then you arrive home with Penelope Thorne, who’s kicked up her heels from Cairo to Stockholm,” Richard said. “You can’t blame us for being curious.”
Cam sucked in a breath and realized that he had to tell his friends the truth. They knew him too well to believe the tale of falling madly in love. He straightened his shoulders. “Pen is the only woman I’ve proposed to.”
Jonas looked unimpressed. “Obviously. You married her.”
Richard already knew the sorry facts, or most of them. Cam had never confessed his unwelcome yen for nineteen-year-old Pen. “Well, yes, I proposed before the wedding. But nine years ago, I asked her to marry me.”
“You’ve been engaged all this time?” Jonas looked astonished, either at Cam’s delay in claiming his bride or, more likely, at discovering something he didn’t already know. Jonas Merrick prided himself on his omniscience.
“Of course not.” Cam disclosed one of his few failures. “She turned me down.”
“Good for her,” Richard interjected, toasting the absent Penelope. “Didn’t I say she had backbone?”
“Penelope Thorne wouldn’t marry you?” Jonas asked. “The family must have already been in financial straits. There’s always been a whiff of notoriety about the Thornes. Superb soldiers in times of crisis. Nothing but trouble in peace.”
Cam’s lips tightened, although it was an opinion he’d grown up hearing. “Peter was my friend.”
“I know the fellow was charming. Too charming for his own good. And they’re a handsome family. You’ve caught yourself a beauty, Cam.”
“Lady Marianne isn’t exactly a pill,” Richard protested.
“Not at all,” Jonas said. “But even an old married man like me can tell that the new Duchess of Sedgemoor will turn heads. Once she gets some confidence and—forgive me saying so—buys some decent clothes, she’ll be so spectacular you won’t get near her for admiring swains, Cam.”
Hell, that was the last thing Cam wanted. He’d decided young that he didn’t want a duchess whom other men panted after. Yet here he was under the sway of a woman who set masculine hearts racing. His lifelong ambitions for a quiet domestic life were doomed.
He bit back a surge of jealousy to think of anyone else touching Pen, of her doing to another man what she’d so breathtakingly done to him last night. His stomach clenched tighter than a fist. Anyone trying to poach Pen away would face annihilation.
He paused in lifting his glass, wondering when he’d turned so primitive. Passions were dangerous, unless leashed. Yet he’d kill any bastard who came sniffing around his wife.
“Are you all right, Cam?” Richard asked.
Cam must be staring at his friends in a complete daze. He felt out of kilter, as if someone had chopped a couple of inches off one leg.
“Of course.” They’d recognize the lie, but surely they’d never guess the reason behind it.