Rogue's Mistress(37)
Chapter Seventeen
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The atmosphere was polite but strained between Mercy and Julian as they sat at a small table in the saloon; she ate her breakfast while he read the New Orleans Crescent. The fact that he kept staring at her over his newspaper did little to increase her comfort. She couldn’t help but glance at him, too; Julian looked very handsome and appealing in his ivory-colored suit and milled linen shirt.
Mercy’s thoughts were still focused on their lovemaking. Studying the other couples in the saloon, who were nonchalantly eating breakfast or sipping coffee, Mercy wondered how many of them had gamboled wildly in bed before going off to the saloon to calmly drink cafe au lait. How could they all appear so unruffled, so unchanged? She felt neither.
She spotted Lavinia and her family seated at a table near the port doors. Lavinia waved gaily; Mercy waved back.
“Your breakfast is good?” Julian asked, laying aside his paper.
She glanced at him awkwardly. “Oui.”
He looked her over in a dark, smoldering way, taking in the low, lacy bodice of her pink frock. “The cut of that gown is rather daring,” he murmured. “You turned a lot of gentlemanly heads when you walked in here.”
Mercy clenched her teeth in exasperation. “Must you again criticize my clothing? It is the fashion, after all.”
“I’m not criticizing, my dear,” Julian said patiently. “Merely pointing out that you look entirely too tempting for your own good—or mine.” Tightly he added, “I’m definitely taking you shopping in St. Louis.”
His comment won a rebellious glower from his wife. Julian sighed, flashing her a conciliatory smile. “Have you thought of what you’d like to do today? The cabin is bound to be too oppressive for us to spend much time there.”
Mercy felt herself blushing, and wasn’t certain whether she was relieved or disappointed that the day would afford them little opportunity to be alone. “I’d hoped to spend some time with Lavinia,” she said stiffly. As he scowled, she laid her fingers lightly on his and entreated him with her eyes. “Please, Julian. The Morgans are disembarking at Memphis, and I haven’t seen Lavinia in so long.”
He nodded. “Very well.” He reached out to playfully tug one of her curls. “Go visit with your friend. Perhaps ’twill make you feel better.”
“Thank you, Julian.” Wearing an expression of intense gratitude, she rushed off to grab Lavinia.
***
“So what is marriage like?” Lavinia asked.
The two former schoolmates were hanging on the railing of the boiler deck, giggling and gossiping. The day was bright and hot, and the steamer seemed to be groaning as it chugged upriver.
Mercy waved off her forthright friend. “Don’t ask!”
“Come on, Mercy. How am I ever to know what to expect if you won’t tell me?”
Mercy shrugged. “Marriage is . . . different.”
In a fascinated whisper, Lavinia asked, “Did it hurt when he bedded you?”
“Lavinia!” Mercy was scandalized.
“Well, I’ve heard such horror stories . . . We all have.”
Mercy sighed. “It did hurt. But not in the way you would think.”
Lavinia’s brown eyes grew huge at this revelation. She started to pursue the subject, then clamped her mouth shut. Instead, she said, “You never did tell me how you and M’sieur Devereux got betrothed in the first place. All I can remember from school is how you used to fight with your guardian like a she-cat, and the way you constantly spoke of how much you hated him. This is quite a change, I must say. Furthermore, what on earth happened to Philippe Broussard?”
As Lavinia waited in breathless anticipation for Mercy’s reply, the latter frowned. Suddenly, the circumstances of her betrothal to Julian seemed intensely personal and private; to reveal them seemed, in some strange way, a travesty, even a betrayal of her wedding vows. She reeled at the sudden feeling of wifely loyalty toward Julian.
“Well, Mercy?”
Glancing at her friend, Mercy quickly decided she could relate the basics without slipping into lurid detail. “Julian has always told me what to do. When it came to marriage, he was no different.”
Lavinia emitted a delighted gasp. “So he simply told you you were to marry him?”
“Oui.”
Lavinia sighed dreamily. “Oh, my! How utterly masterful and romantic! And what about Philippe?”
Mercy straightened the cuff of her frock and frowned. “Julian decided Philippe was unsuitable.”
Lavinia hooted with laughter. “Unsuitable? How fascinating. And I must agree. M’sieur Devereux is definitely the better match, my dear. Why, he’s so dark, so handsome—so virile!”
“Vinnie!”
“Not to mention wealthy,” Lavinia went on, uncontrite. “As for Philippe—he always seemed such a washed-out pansy to me.”
Mercy could only glower at her friend.
“Tell me,” Lavinia continued in a low, intense whisper, “is M’sieur Devereux truly marvelous in bed?”
“Lavinia Morgan! You are beyond redemption!”
“Did I hear I someone mention redemption?” came a high-pitched male voice.
With matching guilty expressions, the girls whirled to watch Dempsey Morgan approach, wearing a subtly striped brown suit and a bowler hat, and carrying a pair of binoculars. The two girls exchanged forbearing glances, then Mercy flashed Lavinia's brother a frozen smile. “Good morning, M’sieur Morgan.”
He grinned idiotically. “Good morning, Madame Devereux. You and Lavinia must be catching up on old times.”
The girls shared a conspiratorial look, then giggled.
A confused frown flitted across Dempsey’s pale face, then he shrugged. “Quite a fine morning, I must say, if a bit warm.” He raised his binoculars and squinted through them. “I’ve been examining the flora and fauna along the shoreline. A truly fascinating array of our Creator’s majesty.”
As the girls listened indulgently, Dempsey launched into a lengthy sermon on the array of wildlife and greenery along the Mississippi. He pointed out alligators, various types of deer, as well as several species of birds. He recited the biological name of practically every tree, plant, and flower on the bank side.
“Dempsey, will you cease being such a phenomenal bore?” Lavinia protested at last.
Dempsey’s delicate features paled. “Then what would you ladies like to discuss?” he asked, and frowned in renewed perplexity when both girls again collapsed into giggles.
Just then, Julian strode up with a cigar in his mouth. He glanced in scowling disapproval from the laughing girls to Dempsey. “Bonjour, Mam’selle Morgan, M’sieur Morgan,” he said tightly. “If you’ll both excuse us, I must have a word with my wife.”
Again Mercy was pulled away by her glowering husband. This time, she was livid. As soon as they were out of earshot of the others, she hissed, “Julian, must you be so rude? Dragging me off and sputtering like a steam engine about to explode.”
He didn’t answer, tossing his smoke over the railing. She couldn’t read his expression beneath the brim of his Panama hat, but the swift, economical movements of his body and the way his fingers dug into her wrist as he tugged her along told her he was furious.
When they were at last inside their cabin, he slammed the door and thrust off his hat. “Madame,” he said, advancing on her, “your days as a flirt are over.”
Mercy was outraged. “A flirt? What on earth are you ranting about?”
“I saw M’sieur Morgan ogling that low-cut bodice.”
She balled her hands on her hips. “Ogling! For your information, Dempsey Morgan was giving us a fascinating lecture on the flora and fauna of the region. He’s an accomplished naturalist.”
“He’s an accomplished voyeur,” Julian snapped back. “Furthermore, I find it incomprehensible that you had flora and fauna on your mind when you giggled at him, preening like a light-headed belle.”
Mercy threw up her hands as the dam of resentment that had been building in her for weeks finally burst. “Julian, you’re such a prig!”
He appeared stunned. “A prig?”
“Yes!” She waved a hand angrily. “You’re supposed to be my husband now, not my guardian. Instead, you keep treating me like a naughty little girl. You’re acting like a stiff-necked puritan—”
“A what?”
“And, furthermore, Lavinia and I were having a grand time until you came along!”
He suddenly looked so stricken that she almost took back her words.
She chewed her bottom lip in the tense silence. “Look, Julian,” she said at last, “I’ll admit that I played some games with you before we were wed—”
“Indeed you did,” he put in meaningfully.
“But it’s over now.” Grudgingly, she said, “You won, didn’t you?”
He startled her by throwing back his head and laughing. “Mercy, I’m stunned. You, conceding defeat?”
She crossed her arms over her bosom to cover her embarrassment. “I’m not conceding defeat, only pointing out that just because I’m enjoying myself in the company of others doesn’t mean I’m a flirt.”
“I acknowledge your point, then,” he returned stiffly, staring at her in an intent way that she found unnerving.