For Love of the Duke(53)

Katherine set her bonnet upon her lap and toyed with the strings that dangled from the ivory creation. “Surely there was some affection there,” she protested. “Even as my parents’ marriage was carefully arranged by their fathers, my mother very much loved my father.”

A harsh chuckle escaped him. “My parents detested one another. My father had a string of mistresses, my mother a string of lovers. I assure you, Katherine, there was little affection between them.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh,” she said faintly, the color deepening on her cheeks.

Sweet, Katherine. She spoke of logic and practicality and the benefits of a marriage based on convenience, but for all of it, she was still hopelessly innocent, and the thought of that raised an unholy terror inside of him.

Suddenly uncomfortable with the intimate direction their conversation had taken, Jasper cleared his throat. “You should rest, Katherine. The snow will slow our travel to Castle Blackwood.”

She peeked out the window. “Will you tell me of it?”

Jasper sighed. He should have expected with her stubborn streak that his words should have the opposite request. “It is cold. Dark. Expansive.” Devoid of cheer. For a too-brief time, however, there had been laughter within those castle walls. Now all that remained were the echoes of Lydia’s agony and his own despair.

Katherine wrinkled her nose. “That hardly sounds like a warm place to call home.”

“I never suggested that it was.”

She pursed her lips. “Well, you have me there.”

And this time, it seemed his laconic responses halted her steady stream of questions.

He desired silence. So why did he feel a pang of regret when she folded her arms, closed her eyes, and shifted away from him—the loss, both physical and not.

He pulled out his watch fob and consulted the time. With their travel slowed by the conditions, they should have to stop at an inn along the way. Meanwhile, he would be shut away in this suddenly too-small carriage with his new wife’s lean, lithe frame and breasts made for sin.

A small sputtering snore slipped past her lips. Jasper tucked his timepiece away.

He sought the steady, slow rise and fall of her breaths. Except…he squinted in the dark…and grinned. “Are you feigning sleep, Katherine?”

She shook her head. “Er…No. That is.” Her lips settled into a mutinous line. She burrowed deeper into her corner.

He reached across the carriage and pulled Katherine onto his lap.

She squeaked. “Wh-what are you doing?” She wiggled back and forth.

Jasper groaned as his shaft leapt in response. “Be still.” Hoarse desire laced his command.

She stopped abruptly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Oh by all the saints, she truly was this innocent. He counted to ten.

Katherine shoved an elbow into his stomach, and he grunted. “Did you hear me, Jasper? I said I was sorry for hurting you.”

He closed his eyes, and again counted to ten. What manner of madness had possessed him to drag her delectably lush body atop his? Where nothing more than the thin threads of their garments separated his flesh from hers?

“Jasper…?”

“Bloody hell, I heard you.” Jasper took a deep breath, and gentled his tone. He opened his eyes, braced for the shocked hurt in her brown eyes. “Oomph.” All the air left him on a hiss, as she planted her fist into his stomach.

In the short span of time they’d been married, she’d delivered an impressive slap to his cheek, elbowed him in the side, and now planted him a jab Gentleman Jackson himself would have been proud of. He’d married quite the bloodthirsty wench.

Katherine squirmed in an apparent attempt to free herself. But her delicious movements only brought the sweet curve of her buttocks closer into contact with his rock-hard shaft. Had it been any other, more mature, more experienced woman, he’d believed her undulating movements intentional.

However, not even the Mad Duke of Bainbridge could mistake the fury flashing in his wife’s eyes as passion. In the event there was even the slightest bit of doubt, her next words killed all wonderings.

She jabbed a finger into his chest. “Let us be clear, Your Grace,” Ahh, so it was, Your Grace, now. “You are the one who denied us the generous wedding breakfast arranged by my mother. It is you who is determined to run off to your,” she held her hands up mockingly and deepened her voice. “Cold, dark, expansive castle.” Katherine pointed her eyes to the ceiling of the conveyance. “Cold, dark, and expansive,” she muttered, as if more to herself. “Who describes ones home in those terms?” She jabbed her finger again at his chest. “Furthermore, who would care to live in a home that is cold, dark, and expansive?”