Married to the Marquess (19 page)

“You don’t play whist.” She was surprised with herself for revealing that little bit of information she knew. She had known it for some time, but had never thought of it, as far as she could remember.

Derek smiled in his surprise. “Exactly. One can never be paired with one who always loses at whist if one never plays whist. It is the perfect solution. But tell me, Kate,” he said, leaning forward once more, elbows on his knees again, “is there any time that you don’t hear your mother’s rules in your head?”

She nodded without thinking, and replied, “When I play.”

He looked inordinately pleased by her answer, and his smile grew so much that his eyes crinkled at the corners, their green depths no less stirring for their diminished state. “Truly? There wasn’t a rule for that?”

“Only that I do so quietly and without bothering anyone,” she answered with a shake of her head. “As I said, she did not care for it, but as it was an accomplishment highly favored in a young woman, she could hardly forbid me from doing so. She merely restricted when and where and how I could.” Katherine leaned forward and matched his pose, which she could tell amused him, which amused her in turn. “Sometimes I would play just so I could shut her up.”

“A very noble endeavor,” he whispered conspiratorially. “And I think you should continue to do so until you no longer hear her.” He leaned back and slapped his knee, then rose, holding a hand out to her. “In fact, I think you should do so now, and every night, if you feel so inclined. And I will sit in there for as long as you play and listen to every single note.”

She smiled up at him in amusement, confusion, and even with a bit of pleasure. “It may be a rather lot of notes,” she told him, looking from his hand to his face a couple of times for effect.

“All the better.” He held his hand out a bit further, his eyes teasing her. “My ears have quite remarkable endurance for excellent music.”

Shaking her head, she took his hand and allowed him to lead her into the music room, sit her at the pianoforte, and select music for her. Though he was being more than a little overbearing about the whole affair, she found that she didn’t mind at all. She would play for him as long as he would listen, and if he could listen forever, than she could play forever.

And if this were any indication of how their marriage would continue, she would have nothing to find any displeasure in at all.

Much later that night, Katherine crept as quietly as she could from her room, praying that the door would not squeak as she very carefully brought it to a close, but not enough for it to latch. When she was satisfied enough, she tucked a long strand of her dark hair behind her ear and tiptoed down the hall, past the great stairs that led down to the second floor, and the open entryway that had always been a little grand for her taste. She stopped when she had reached the narrow door at the very end of the hall, and opened that as silently as anybody might be able to, then slid inside and shut the door behind her, allowing the darkness to envelop her.

Once her eyes adjusted, she swiftly made her way down the confined, rather pokey stairs and just when she thought her heart was going to pound right out of her chest, she came to an abrupt halt as another door met her. She turned the latch and pushed the door open, and sighed to herself as the soft light from the kitchen fire brought the return of her sight.

With a grin, she scampered over to the shelves and began the hunt for what had brought her here in the first place; the strawberry tarts that had been prepared for her this afternoon.

She wandered along the shelves and searched all of the cupboards, her bare feet growing a little cold on the stone floor beneath them as they stretched on tiptoe as she searched. Though it was a darkened room, the fire added some light, as did the slivers of moonlight that filtered through the trees and into the one window of the room.

“Blast,” she whispered as she failed yet again. She pulled her head out from the shelves, and accidentally bumped it on the one above, sending a quick jolt of pain through her. She hissed with the pain, and gingerly brought her head fully out, rubbing the top softly.

Well, she was not going to bed without having one, so she might just have to turn the whole kitchen over from top to bottom until they were found.

“Try the middle shelf about three feet to your left, behind the sugar.”

With a shriek of surprise, Katherine whirled around one hand on her mouth, and one at her chest, clutching at her night wrap.

Leaning against the far wall, dressed in only his night shirt and dressing gown, hair slightly tousled, grinning unabashedly, was her husband.

“Well, well,” he drawled, his eyes raking over her in amusement, “if it isn’t my little wife coming to pilfer the kitchens.”

“I… I…” she stammered, her heart still racing frantically in her chest. He quirked a brow at her inability to formulate any words, and she clamped her lips together, focused her thoughts, then managed, “What are you doing down here, Derek?”

“Same as you. I wanted another one of those tarts.” His grin seemed to deepen even further, and with it came the disgruntling effect of warmth spreading through her. “Imagine my surprise to find you down here this late at night. And barefoot, at that. Why, Kate, you astonish me.”

She turned back to the shelves, even as she swallowed hastily, desperate to preserve some of her dignity. “Middle shelf, you said?” she asked, as if he had not just scared the life out of her.

“Behind the sugar, yes,” came his amused voice, a bit closer.

Sure enough, once she moved the sugar out of the way, there were the remaining tarts. She allowed herself a small “Ah ha!” of victory, and turned back around to find Derek standing across the table, hands placed firmly upon it. “Would you partake with me, my lord?” she asked with a quirky grin of her own. “I dare not eat alone.”

His eyes twinkled and he inclined his head. “But of course, my lady. It would be ungentlemanly of me to let you consume these poor tarts unaccompanied.”

“Well, we would not want that, would we?”

He shook his head rather somberly. “No, not at all.”

Like two naughty children, they devoured at least two of the delicious tarts a piece, giggling and shushing each other as if some stern, sallow faced nanny were about to descend upon them. Derek, she soon discovered, was deplorable at hiding his laughter, and he discovered that she had a difficult time maintaining her composure if others could not. It made for several moments of uninhibited snickering that had both in tears.

When at last she was stuffed, and had licked the last of the strawberry from her fingers, Katherine sighed. “What is going to happen when the staff comes back tomorrow and sees that half of this plate is gone?”

Derek shrugged lightly as he carefully placed the plate back on the shelf and replaced the sugar in front of it. “Oh, no doubt they’ll come to me with concerns, and I will simply wave it off and say it must have been some hungry vagrant, and they should just make a few more.”

Katherine grinned up at him. “This hungry vagrant would enjoy that, I think.”

He chuckled and helped her from her seat, then followed her as she ascended the servants’ stairs again. “The servants’ stairs, too, Kate?” he commented behind her as the darkness fell upon them. “I am surprised at you.”

“It’s the most direct route to the kitchens,” she defended without shame. “And I am more than capable of navigating these stairs without difficulty in the dark, thank you very much.”

“So it seems,” his voice returned, sounding thoroughly amused. “I can’t see a blasted thing and have stubbed at least three of my toes already, while you succeed without any effort. You’re not part feline, are you?”

She snorted in a not very ladylike manner. “Hardly. Just practiced.”

“Ah, so you venture down to the kitchens by night often, do you?”

She bit back a groan. She hadn’t meant to let that little detail slip out. However, now that it was, she saw no reason to deny it. “On occasion, yes. I have done so after our marriage frequently, and I believe I did so as a child, but the intervening years, I rarely did.”

“Why is that?” he asked with real curiosity as they finally reached the door, which he opened for her.

She nodded her thanks, then slowed her pace to walk beside him down the hall towards their rooms. “It’s quite simple. I had a wedding dress to fit into.”

“Even so young?” She peered over at him and he was watching her, his eyebrows raised in surprise.

“You forget who my mother was,” she sighed. “I began hearing about my wedding the day I turned thirteen. Preparations started then, and my figure was the chief subject for criticism. I simply
had
to fit my dress perfectly. Therefore, the desserts were entirely removed from the house. Not that it helped much anyway, as the dress she forced me into was too small regardless.” She smiled with a touch of humor. “I don’t know if you could tell, but I thought I was going to faint clear away before the service had ever begun. Mother kept telling me beforehand how frightfully pale I was and pinched my cheeks repeatedly to get some color back in them. I shudder to think what I really looked like.”

They stopped as they reached her bedchamber, and Derek turned to face her outside of the door. “I thought you were a beautiful bride,” he told her, his eyes fixed on her face.

“You did?” she asked in surprise, her heart catching somewhere in the vicinity of her throat as those eyes held her captive and unable to breathe.

He nodded slowly, and for the first time, she realized just how close he was to her, how close he had been to her. The air was suddenly too thin, and she could not feel her toes. “It made me so mad,” he murmured.

“What did?” She almost couldn’t bear to ask, her words nearly stuck in her chest.

“The way you affected me.” His words were low and rasping as he took all of her in, and everywhere his eyes touched she felt warm until she seemed nothing but an ember herself.

She swallowed with some difficulty. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Don’t be,” he breathed, reaching out to touch a long strand of hair that had fallen over her shoulder. He played with it, twirled it around his finger, and with each touch, Katherine felt herself slipping further and further on the precarious slope she had found herself on. “You have lovely hair, Kate,” he mused, almost to himself. “You should wear it down more often. It becomes you.”

“K-Katherine,” she managed, her voice weak and quivering.

“Oh, no,” Derek said with a slow shake of his head as he continued to toy with her hair, his eyes now back on hers, and something pulled her closer, lured her in to the warmth she saw in them. “No, you’re not Katherine. You haven’t been for some time. I don’t even know Katherine. All I see is Kate. Try her on for size.”

His words danced across her face as they drew nearer, slowly, maddeningly hesitant and tentative, but closer indeed, and she could not find thought, let alone voice to do as he wished. Her eyes had been on his lips as they had moved, and now she somehow dragged them away back to his eyes.

Her confusion must have been obvious, for he only gave her the slowest, briefest hint of a nod. “Say it,” he whispered as his fingers in her hair brushed against her ear slightly, sending a chill through her. “Say your name, Kate.”

She shuddered involuntarily, and from somewhere deep within, she felt more than heard herself whisper, “Kate.”

The flash of pleasure in his eyes was so potent that she almost swayed into him. “That’s my girl,” he said in a voice so soft she could barely hear him. He was so close, so close she could feel the breath of his words on her cheeks. “That’s perfect. You might even like her, you know, Kate.”

His nose grazed hers then, the briefest, barest hint of a touch, but it made her eyelids flutter and she could hear the blood pounding in her ears, and some small, stubborn part of her reared its terrified head and from her lips came the breathless words, “Do you?”