Mastered by Love (Bastion Club 8)

That he wanted her, desired her, she accepted without question.

That that want ran deep, she now understood.

She’d never imagined being the focus of that degree of desire, having so much male passion concentrated on her; the recollection sent a delicious shiver through her. She couldn’t deny she’d found it deeply satisfying; she’d be lying if she pretended she wouldn’t be happy to lie with him again.

If he asked, which he would. He wasn’t, she knew, finished with her; that had been explicit in their final moments that morning.

Thank God she’d had sufficient wit to seize the chance and make it plain that she neither expected nor wanted to receive an offer from him.

She hadn’t forgotten that other offer he was due to make—to the lady he’d chosen as his duchess. Not knowing if he’d made a formal offer yet, she’d needed to ensure he wouldn’t, in some Machiavellian moment, decide to use her virginity—the taking of it—as cause to marry her instead.

While he’d toed the grandes dames’ line, he wasn’t happy about it; he might well seize an opportunity to take a different tack. And to him, marrying her might be preferable to having to deal with some unknown young lady who would know very little about him.

She—Minerva—would be a more comfortable choice.

She didn’t need to think to know her response to that. He would be a sound husband to any lady who accepted the loveless partnership he would offer; just as long as said lady didn’t expect love or fidelity, all would be well.

For herself, love, real and abiding, was the only coin for which she would exchange her heart. Extensive experience of Varisey unions had bolstered her stance; their type of marriage was not for her. Avoiding, if necessary actively resisting, any suggestion of marrying Royce remained an unaltered, unalterable goal; nothing on that front had changed.

And, to her immense relief, spending the night in his bed hadn’t seduced her heart into loving him; her feelings toward him hadn’t changed all that much—or only on the lust side, not in terms of love.

Thinking of how she now felt about him…she frowned. Despite her resistance, she did feel something more for him—unexpected feelings that had developed since his return. Feelings that had driven her panic of yesterday, when she’d thought he would die.

Those new feelings had grown through seeing him with his people, from his attitudes and actions toward those he deemed in his care. From all the decisions and acts that distinguished him so definitively from his father. The physical pleasure he’d introduced her to hadn’t influenced her as much as all those things.

Yet while he might differ from his father in many ways, when it came to his wife and his marriage, he would revert to type. He’d demonstrated as much in his approach to his prospective bride.

If she let herself be bullied into marrying him, she would risk falling in love with him—irrevocably, irretrievably—and then like Caro Lamb she would pine, wither, and eventually go mad when he, not at all in love with her, left her for another. As he inevitably would.

She wasn’t so foolish as to believe that she might, through loving him, change him. No; if she married him, he, indeed everyone, would expect her to stand meekly by while he indulged as he wished with an endless succession of other ladies.

She snorted, threw back the covers, and swung her legs out of bed. “That’s not going to happen.”

No matter what she felt for him, regardless of what evolved from her infatuation-obsession, no matter what new aspects of attraction developed over the however many nights she might spend in his bed, she would not fall in love with him, ergo she wouldn’t marry him.

At least they were both now very clear on that last point.

Standing, she crossed to the basin and pitcher on her dresser; pouring water into the basin, she let her thoughts range ahead. As matters now stood…

Setting down the pitcher, she stared at the settling water as the immediate future cleared in her mind.

Of necessity her liaison with Royce would be short-lived— he would marry soon, and soon after, she would leave. A few days, a week. Two weeks at most.

Too short a time to fall in love.

Slipping her hands into the bowl, she splashed water on her face, feeling increasingly bright. More alert and expectant, almost intrigued over what the day might bring—reassured and confident that there was no reason she couldn’t indulge with him again.

The risk wasn’t significant. Her heart would be safe.

Safe enough so she could enjoy without a care.

By evening, expectation had turned to impatience. Minerva sat in the music room, ostensibly watching yet another of Shakespeare’s plays while she brooded on the shortcomings of her day.

A perfectly ordinary day, filled with nothing more than the customary events—which was the problem. She’d thought…but she’d been wrong.

Royce had summoned her to his study for their usual morning meeting with Handley; other than a fleeting moment when she’d walked into the room and their eyes had met—and he and she had both paused, both, she suspected, suddenly reminded of how the other’s skin had felt against theirs…but then he’d blinked, looked down, and she’d walked forward and sat, and he’d subsequently treated her

exactly as he had the previous day.