What a Duke Dares (Sons of Sin 3)

e of his possession like dire punishment. “Do you mean to bar me from your bed?”

“I made promises to you.” She twirled the glass in her hand until the wine flared ruby.

It was the same dead tone she’d used when she said that she’d done her duty. Disappointment pierced him. But what could he expect after his rough wooing? “If duty alone compels you, our marriage bed will be a cold place. I think we can do better than that.”

“You’re an optimist.” She sighed and the resistance seeped from her body. “Cam, can you give me some time? Surely we don’t have to decide everything tonight. It’s been a long and difficult day.”

Guilt, his constant companion, stabbed deep. It had been a long and difficult few months. She’d lost both aunt and brother, and faced death several times. He’d risen to take her in his arms before he remembered that his embrace was the last thing she wanted. He subsided into his chair and surveyed her discontentedly.

A bride proved more bewildering than any mistress. His sympathy went out to the Grand Turk with his hundreds of wives. Then all impulse to amusement fled when he saw his wife’s closed expression. “Pen—”

She raised her hand. “Not… yet.”

With that he must be content. It had been a devil of a wedding night.

Chapter Twenty-One

After dinner, Cam accompanied his wife upstairs. For a day and a half, he’d been a married man. The experience bore no resemblance to his expectations. For a start, he’d kept his hands to himself. Being with Pen without touching her—when he had every legal and moral right to roger her from here to China—was a torture he wouldn’t inflict on his worst enemy.

He’d woken with the dawn in his own bed, rigid with longing, miserable, lonely, feeling like a dog someone had kicked into the gutter. And sick with guilt over hurting Pen. At breakfast, to his bewilderment he’d encountered a stranger. This tranquil, restrained woman wasn’t Pen. Pen was impulsive and opinionated and ready to shoot a man if he wronged her. Yet this morning she’d played the perfect duchess. It could have been Lady Marianne facing him over the marmalade.

And Cam had loathed it.

He’d burned to wrench his wife from her chair and muss her neat perfection. Then fling her across the polished table and do things likely to make the butler resign.

But he’d behaved himself, although just being in the same room was torment.

The only logical choice, given his bride’s reluctance for his company, was to devote the day to business that had accumulated during his absence. So why then had he found himself showing Pen every nook and cranny of the vast house? And in return, all she’d expressed was polite interest. Not once had she called him a blockhead or objected to an arrogant remark. He worried if perhaps last night he’d done her brain some injury.

Now, confused, unhappy, and shamingly randy, he trailed after her into the duchess’s cave of a bedroom.

Pen turned with an expression of well-bred surprise that he’d never seen before. “Your Grace, what are you doing?”

Cam glared at her. “Why the hell are you ‘your grace’-ing me? You’ve called me Cam since you were toddling.”

She flushed. “As you wish. But I’d still like to know what you’re doing.”

He shut the door with a sharp click. “I’m coming to bed with my wife.”

Her eyes widened with alarm. “Now?”

He stalked toward her, tugging off his neckcloth and tossing it to the ground. “Now.”

“You said you’d let me think about it.”

Clearly a welcome was too much to expect. He shrugged off his coat and flung it across the room. “Have you?”

She retreated again. “Have I what?”

Impatiently he flicked open the silver buttons on his silk waistcoat. “Have you thought about it?”

She frowned as if questioning his sanity. “Of course I have.”

He let the waistcoat fall where he stood. “Good. No need to call your maid. I’ll undress you.”

At last Pen stood her ground. “Why are you doing this?”

His smile was mocking. “My dear, you might be innocent, but you’re not that innocent.”