The Reluctant Duchess (11 page)

“Will you stay with me tonight?” she asked.

“This door locks
, Anna, he can’t hurt you.”

“That’s not why I’m asking.”

He looked down at her for a long time, his expression inscrutable.

“I will,” he finally answered.

Annabelle gave him a smile, which she hoped was alluring and taking his hand, she opened her door and led him inside.

Richard helped her to disrobe until she was wearing only her chemise, then he
sat her at her dressing table and slowly removed all the pins from her hair, until her curls hung around her shoulders once again. He picked up a curl and pulled it out to its maximum length, then let it spring back.

“I’
ve wanted to do that since the day I met you.” He smiled at her in the mirror.

Annabelle smiled back, then stood up and turned to him, meaning to undress him and return the favour
, but he caught her hands as they reached for his cravat.

“I can do this. You go into your dressing room and get into you
r nightgown,” he said. “We’ll be faster that way.”

She nodded, although she wondered why it had to be fast at all.

She removed her chemise, found a nightgown to pull on and by the time she returned to the bedroom, Richard was under the covers and the candles were snuffed out leaving only an oil lamp on his bedside table for light.

Hesitantly she climbed in beside him, lying on her back and facing the ceiling, wondering what she should do next. Thankfully Richard took the initiative and leaned over her, kissing her gently. His hand went to her shoulder and caressed her
there, slowly lowering his hand until he came into contact with her left breast. He traced the outline with his index finger as he continued to kiss her. He heard her moan softly into his mouth and as his resolve weakened, he wondered briefly if he had the strength to do this.

He
trailed a series of light kisses across her jaw and onto her neck, where he lavished some attention, his right hand now running over her left nipple, feeling it harden through the fabric of her nightgown. One of her hands had gone to his back and the other was running through his hair.

So slowly that Annabelle didn’t notice for a while,
his caresses and kisses slowed down. Then he pulled away so that he was looking down at her.

With her
dark curly tresses fanned out across the pillow, her pupils dilated with desire, her chest heaving with passion and her lips plump from kissing, he thought that she had never looked more beautiful.

“Not tonight,” he said, brushing a stray lock of hair off her cheek.

“What?”

“You aren’t ready for this,” he said
kindly.

“I am ready!”

“No, you’re not.”

She pushed him off her and sat up, clutching the sheet to her chest, despite the fa
ct that she was wearing a nightgown.

“When why did you say yes!” she snapped.

“Because I would very much like to wake up with you in my arms tomorrow morning, Anna.”

“And you’ve suddenly lost your ability to make love to me!”

“No, of course not but when you give yourself to me, Anna, and you will give yourself to me eventually, I want it to be because you want to be with me, not because you are trying to repay some debt that you feel you owe me.”

Annabelle had
the good grace to blush for thinking badly of him.

Richard pressed a chaste kiss to her bare shoulder, then put his arms around her and pulled her down, so that she was resting against him, her head on his chest.

“There is plenty of pleasure to be had in simply holding someone,” he said, as the arm behind her back began caressing her hair.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I didn’t mean-”

“Hush,” he cut her off. “Given the men you have had in your life, I’m not surprised that you distrust me but I give you my word, I will earn your trust one day, Anna.”

Hesitantly, Annabelle moved her arm from her hip and brought it to rest on Richards’s chest.

“Why do you call me Anna?” she asked.

“It suits you,” he said simply. “I’m surprised that no one else ever calls you that.”

“Father was insistent. It means ‘beautiful Anna’ in French, he used to say. I suppose he didn’t want anyone forgetting how beautiful his creation was.”

“You are beautiful,” Richard admitt
ed, “but your father was wrong. You are a straightforward woman, without artifice. Annabelle is ostentatious but Anna; whilst it is still a lovely name, its elegance lies in its simplicity.”

Alt
hough he couldn’t see her face, he could feel Annabelle’s lips turn up in a smile. Then he felt the gentle tickle of her lashes as her eyes began to close.

He lay there, all the while caressing her hair as she slept, unwilling to sleep
whilst he held her in his arms, but the day had been long and despite his efforts, he soon drifted off to sleep with her.

Anna awoke to find a delicious warmth covering one side of her body and she smiled as the events of last night came flooding back. So as not to wake him, she slowly raised her head to look at his face

He looked very peaceful in repose, younger and more boyish. His thick dark hair, which she had so enjoyed running her fingers through last night, was mussed, falling over his forehead.

Slowly, she stretched up until her face was level with his, then she placed a feather light kiss against his lips. When she pulled away she could see that the corners of his mouth were turned up in a smile.

“So you are awake,” she said, at which the smile widened and his eyes opened.

“Are you disappointed? Did you hope to have your wicked way with me without my knowledge?”

She smiled at his teasing but it quickly faded.

“What's wrong?” he asked.

“I’m just a little sad that this dream has to end,” she explained, trying to force a smile.

“But I thought you loved the coffee house, and it’s not as if you haven’t worked hard this weekend.”

“I do love my co
ffee house and I’m not shy of hard work but…” How did she explain that she was going to miss the easy comradery that they had shared here, and that she was fearful of losing that once back in London.

“But what?”

“Things are going to change,” she lied. “I have to stay one step ahead of Frederick, then the newspapers will print my little outburst from last night, making me the subject of gossip and ridicule again and of course, since you were so attentive to me yesterday, people will speculate about us.”

“Would that last one be so bad?” he asked, slightly hurt.

“Not bad as such but… I have always been uncomfortable with being talked about and no doubt, some of my regulars will think that the ‘ice maiden’ has melted and try their luck.”

“But if you a
re linked with me, they wouldn’t dare.”

She smiled sadly at his naivety. “You have not lived the life of a woman,” she explained
. “You are free to do as you wish without reproach but my character will be called into question. I am already a serving wench, as Frederick said, which makes many feel that they can have me, as well as what is on my menu. Add your new protection of me to that, and people will reach the conclusion that I am your mistress and they will conclude that I will welcome all callers.”

“Surely not.”

“When I first opened the coffee house, I had to increase the number of petticoats that I wore each day, because my poor bottom was becoming so bruised. Men are simple creatures when it comes it women; we are either pure and chaste, or we have fallen so low that we will open our thighs for anyone, without question. There is no middle ground. I cultivated a cold persona at work, refusing every offer that I received because it was the only way to survive, unless I wanted to change profession to a lady of the night.”

Richard had loved his fair share of women over the years
, but he had cared for each one and had never gone where he was not wanted. He preferred to charm a lady into bed, rather than pestering them into giving in. Of course, he knew more than his fair share of men who weren’t above such tactics. As he looked back now, he could see that he had agreed with them. He had known many a woman to be handed around the barracks because if she would sleep with one soldier, she would sleep with any. He had never questioned that, even when some looked less than enthused by the attention they were getting, or had repeatedly refused a soldier.

There was one lady that he would never forget, despite sharing that mind-set.
It had been shortly after he joined the Army and his sergeant began an affair with the daughter of a local shopkeeper. She was smitten with him and easily persuaded to visit him in the barracks, where he could show her off. After the affair ended, she stopped coming around of course, but one evening he heard cries and screams and went to investigate. He was informed that the sergeant had passed the girl onto his friend, another sergeant. Richard thought the practice ungentlemanly but it wasn’t uncommon, so he sat down to play cards with the others, ignoring the noises he could hear from the next room.

When the sergeant emerged a little later, his face
and neck was scratched.

“She’s a fighter,” he grinned, causing the others to laugh.

The girl emerged quite some time later, her dress having to be held in place as it was so torn. Her eyes were red and her wrists bruised, but she allowed the sergeant to feel her body and kiss her goodbye in front of the others, so Richard thought little of it. Some women did play hard to get after all, and she
had
accepted his attentions afterwards, so she must have wanted it. That belief had been proved correct as she became mistress to four other soldiers that year, so she couldn’t dislike it.

Nevertheless, her red ringed eyes and bruised w
rists had often haunted him when he closed his eyes at night.

Now he realised that she had probably allowed herself to be talked into sex because she was in love. Why
would
she then want to sleep with other soldiers with whom she wasn’t in love? He had never asked himself that question until now, with the thought of other men feeling that way about Annabelle.

His previous affairs had always been discreet
and he had never even considered sharing a woman, or even telling the others her name. Annabelle was right though, news of his attentiveness this weekend would spread, conclusions would be drawn and Annabelle’s impeccable character would be tarnished. There was no way around it, unless…

“Mar
ry me,” he said.

“What!” Annabelle sat up, turning to look at him.

“Marry me,” he repeated. “Then no one will think you a loose woman.”

“You want me to marry
you to save my reputation?”

“Why not?”

“Why not? Perhaps because I will lose everything that I have worked for. Or because I don’t want to become someone’s property, not even yours. Or because I simply don’t love you.”

Her words stung and he got out of bed and pulled his britches and sh
irt on, laying the rest of his clothes over one arm. When he found his pocket watch, he checked the time.

“The carriage l
eaves in an hour,” he said, his voice cold and impersonal. “I suggest you be on time; I do not like waiting.”

Annabelle watched him
, wondering how their nice morning had gone so drastically wrong. She regretted sounding so harsh as she refused his offer of marriage but she had told him her views before. Did he think her morals were so loose that she would enter into marriage just to save her reputation? She deserved better. Hell, even he deserved better than some loveless marriage of convenience.

Most of the guests were still sound asleep, so Richard breakfasted with his mother in her sitting room.

“Is something wrong?” Lavinia asked as she detected his
dark mood.

“No.”

Lavinia waited until his breakfast had been served before continuing the conversation.

“Annabelle is a very special girl, isn’t she? I don’t think that I have
ever met anyone who had endured as much as she has and still managed to thrive. She’s very strong, isn’t she?”

Richard grunted his agreement.

“Just be careful that you don’t mistake that strength for an absence of weakness, Richard. Everyone has something that they are afraid of and fear can make us do odd things.”

Richard looked over at his mother, wondering how she
was always so insightful. He still glared though, because he wasn’t in the mood to be told that he was wrong.

“I am not a child,
Mother, please stop treating me like one.”

They ate in silence after that and when Richard headed out to the carriage that was waiting out front, he fou
nd Annabelle already inside. She looked lovely, with her damp hair starting to curl around her face. She offered him a tentative smile as he climbed in but he ignored her, unfolded his newspaper and began to read, using the paper to shield her from his sight.