The White Star Line lived up to its reputation for fine dining with courses presented and removed with efficiency. As was the custom, William sat opposite his wife but farther down the table to facilitate conversation. A cheerful Irish chap near William proposed a toast to the newlyweds and all raised their glasses in response. Thankfully, Lady Mandrake was placed at the farthest end of the table. Francesca bent her head in conversation with the captain. William’s ears pricked at the sound of her laughter. He cast a quick glance in her direction in what he hoped was an inconspicuous manner as he didn’t want to draw the ire of Lady Coulton, who was describing their stay in America in minute boring detail.
Damnation. When he’d mentioned yesterday that he wanted to hear more of her laughter, he meant it to be between the two of them, not with . . . strangers. What were they discussing that held her rapt attention?
“Your Grace? Is something wrong?”
Lady Coulton’s question brought him back to the conversation. “Excuse me, madam. You were saying?”
“I was observing that if you continue to stroke your chin in such a fashion, you risk removing it from your face.”
Caught in the action, he lowered his hand but not without another quick glance across the table.
“I see.” Lady Coulton followed his glance. “Your duchess is a lovely woman and you just newly wed.” Memory lit her eyes as she sipped from her wineglass. “I remember that time with great fondness.”
William smiled. He’d learned to divide women into two types, those that enjoyed sexual play and those that “did their duty.” Lady Coulton appeared to be the former, and from her age, a very experienced former.
“Tell me,” he said with sudden inspiration. “Is it possible, just by looking at a woman, to tell if she’s with child?”
“Anxious for an heir, are you?” Lady Coulton laughed and gazed at Franny as if trying to recapture a lost memory. “I suggest you keep improving the odds. You haven’t been married a month yet, have you?”
“No.” He smiled. “We haven’t yet been married a week.” The stress of not knowing her the way a husband should had made the week feel like a year. The moment she had stepped out of her stateroom in that green dress with a neckline that angled like an arrow toward the cleft of her breasts, he’d felt his groin respond.
At first, he’d thought that his consistent immediate physical response to Franny resulted from not having been with a woman for several months. But even the laced mutton he’d noticed working in the public cars of the train last night were of little interest to him. Lily had elicited no response, whatsoever. Perhaps his fascination with Franny was sparked by her unavailability at the moment. His was the yearning that comes with denied goods. That must be it.
“It takes at least a month for the woman to suspect, and two months to be certain. Enjoy the matrimonial, Your Grace. Some women lose interest once they are on the nest.”
He almost choked on his wine. He was fairly certain this did not apply to his wife. She had been begging for his services from the moment they had exchanged vows. Of course, she had an ulterior motive, that of hiding the true parentage of her whelp.
He felt a subtle shift in his gut and attributed it to too much wine. The captain stood and apologized for his early departure. He was needed in the pilothouse as the ship had turned from the coastline and had entered deeper water. Franny stood as well, which served as a signal to the other women to leave the men to their port and cigars.
“I believe I’ll return to our suite,” Franny advised him as she passed him. “The day has been a trying one and I wish to retire early.”
“Allow me to escort you to the room,” he offered with an eye on Lily. She seemed involved with the other women and did not glance at Franny.
“There’s no need. I’m capable of finding my own bed,” Franny replied. “Good night, Your Grace.”
He watched her leave and stilled a desire to go with her. He felt the need to hold on to her company, though he wasn’t sure why. It just felt comfortable, as if she balanced him in some way. Without her, he was a bit off center, the floor less firm as it were.
Lady Mandrake glanced his way and smiled in an undeniable inviting fashion. Granted in the months before he ascended to his title, he would have answered her siren’s call. He’d have her skirts up with little resistance. Now, however, the attraction just wasn’t there.
He wished to bury himself beneath someone else’s skirts, someone who laughed at children’s stories, someone temporarily forbidden. Soon though—he glanced up the staircase at her retreating back. Lady Coulton had said a woman needed two months to be certain. How far along was his Franny? Must he wait another two months? Hopefully, Nicholas would know of a faster determination. He smiled. Perhaps he should have booked their Atlantic passage with an eye toward speed and not comfort.
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, HE COULD ONLY PRAY HE was dying and would thus end his misery. The entire stateroom rose, then dropped like a rock, taking his stomach with it. The elaborate meal from the night before threatened to make a reappearance in the most undignified, disgusting manner. “Hodgins,” he called, his voice hoarse and gruff. “I need the pail.”
“It’s right beside you, Your Grace.”
Damnation! When had Franny come into the room? She should be in her stateroom, not at his bedside observing his humiliation. He pulled the sheet high over his shoulders. “Go away,” he groused. “Let me die in peace.”
She didn’t listen. She was still there. He could sense her presence even though his eyes remained tightly shut. Perhaps it was her scent, that rarified fresh honey scent that seemed to cling to the air surrounding her. Lord, even the thought of scent made his stomach roil. He listened for the sound of her departure even while trying to hold back the foul impending spew.
“Go,” he repeated. Bloody hell, where was Hodgins when he needed him? He called his name once more but the effort set his stomach in motion. He launched himself over the side of the bed, holding the sheet in place, and emptied his innards into the conveniently placed ceramic pot. Exhausted and mortified, he spit the last bit of stinking drool into the receptacle and hung limp over the rail of the berth.
A cool hand gently tugged his shoulder, helping him to turn onto his back on the mattress. He felt useless, spent, as feeble as a child and it rankled his gut.
“I suppose I should let you die here all alone. I would enjoy being a wealthy widow.” Like some angel of mercy, she pressed a moist cloth about his face, removing the vestiges of sweat and sickness.
“Seasickness is common enough,” she said, coaxing the hair that had fallen forward on his forehead off to the side. “More so on this northern route.”
He cracked open his eyes, letting her face fill his vision. “Not for you.” He should be grateful for her administrations, but he couldn’t help but feel shamed by her witness to his debasement and resentment that their positions were not reversed.
“My father once told me I was born with the sea legs of a mariner.” He heard a smile in her voice. “I’m not prone to seasickness, but I’ve nursed many so afflicted.”
She removed the chamber pot to the water closet, while he tried to gain composure. He was after all a duke, although at the moment, a rather reeking, wretched, foul, disgusting duke. Now emptied, his stomach settled a bit, but the room’s movement suggested the comfort wouldn’t last. She returned with a freshened pot.
“Where’s Hodgins?” he managed with some difficulty. Her dress had a pattern of wheels that seemed to turn with the tilt of the floor. The heavy gold locket around her neck swayed back and forth like a metronome on a piano. The combination made him dizzy and disoriented.
“Your man is similarly affected and can be of no assistance,” she said. “I sent him where you should be, above deck on the steamer chairs. I’m sure you’ll be more comfortable. The fresh air—”
“I can’t manage to stand, much less walk. How can I go above decks?” he groused. With the bounce of the vessel, he was liable to be tossed into the ocean. He already worried about the seaworthiness of the steamer in such turbulent waters. A bit of bile touched the back of his throat. Of course, even if the hull were to crack in two, he’d never be able to navigate his way to the lifeboat.
“Save yourself,” he grumbled. “I don’t want you to see me like this.”
“Why not?” She moved closer. A ripple of freshness radiated about her like a shield against the foul stench in the room. “You’re no different than—”
“I’m a duke.” His chest rose and fell in shallow breaths. “A member of the peerage, a man of dignity. I will not be seen as a sickly weakling.”
He tried to sit up, but she pressed on his shoulders to lie back down.
“Rest. The strongest of men are afflicted by mal de mer, none have died as yet. I’ve sent Mary to check with the cook staff for some ginger wine. It’ll calm your stomach.”
Did she suggest wine would be a deliverance? He had thought the quantities consumed the night before were partially responsible for his current malfeasance. Was she suggesting the hair of the dog as a cure? His stomach turned again at the thought.
She pulled the sheet to his waist. He stilled, waiting for her reaction. She might need the wine to fortify herself to care for him, now that the puckered flesh of his scar was visible. Water splashed into a bowl, then squeezed through a cloth. “What are you doing?” he asked with suspicion.
She smiled. “Attempting to make you more comfortable.”
Her fingers slipped around his jaw, soft, gentle, sweet; hesitating for a moment on the whorl of his chin where the hair grew the thickest. “I’d attempt to give you a shave,” she said. “But I’m not sure you’d trust me with a razor.”
His lips twitched at that.
“I don’t think I can harm you with a washcloth.”
He thought of her gentle touch and kindness in tending to him in this most vile state. He thought about how she’d just exposed his naked chest to her hungry eyes and she’d not so much as flinched at the violence marked there. He thought about her sometimes inappropriate attire, the sway of her hips, the low-cut gowns. He doubted arousal was possible on such a bilious stomach but wondered if she was so desperate for consummation that she understood that. He glanced at the inviting cloth in her hand, then narrowed his eyes. “I’m not as certain.”
“Ssh . . . lie still and close your eyes,” she said. “It will be easier on your stomach if you just lie perfectly still.”
Fran watched as he reluctantly closed his eyes yet gripped the bed rail as if bracing himself for assault. Even in the shadows of the attached berth, she could see he was a well-formed man, with a wide powerful chest. Enticing black hair that begged to be touched obscured his masculine nipples before trailing to an area beneath the sheet. She’d noted all this before on their wedding night, but she hadn’t had the luxury of a prolonged study then.
She started at the top of the nearest shoulder and dragged the damp cloth down his muscular arm, cleansing the underside. As the cloth approached the inside of his elbow, it brushed his side as well. He sucked in his breath.
“Do you need the pot?” she asked, but he carefully shook his head.
“Then I’ll continue.” She waited for a reaction but saw only a tightening of his jaw. She rinsed out the cloth and cleansed his hand, pausing to admire his strong fingers. She’d felt their strength when he grasped her arm, but she hadn’t appreciated the flat of his palm, marked with hardened calluses—the mark of a man not afraid to work.
“I thought dukes contented themselves by flaunting their title and looking pretty.” The words fled her mouth before she thought to retract them.
His brows dived in a scowl. One eye opened a crack, honing in on her scrutiny of his hand. “You think I’m pretty?”
“Not at this moment.” She smiled. No, “pretty” would not do justice for this half-naked man. “I meant that I did not expect a duke to have hands hardened by labor.”
“One does what one must when there’s no one else,” he said. “The abbey needs repairs.”
“I see.”
She placed his hand palm down on the mattress so she could cleanse the back of his arm. The cloth traveled the length, flattening and straightening the dark hair with moisture. Such an intimate sensation, viewing a man thus. Always before his arm had been covered with cloth. Even when he came to her room that first night, his smoking jacket had covered this very male component. As tempting as it was to dwell on the very maleness of this appendage, she didn’t linger.
“I’m going to wash your chest now.” She congratulated herself on the evenness of her voice, that she didn’t let the novelty and her curiosity show. He nodded hesitantly, yet she thought she saw him brace his hands.
She rinsed the cloth, then swirled it around the base of his neck, raising her knuckles just enough to feel the abrasiveness of his unshaven chin and jaw. The scrape on the back of her hand sent a tremor through her, causing her to wonder at the reaction if that scratchy chin were to meet other more sensitive parts of her body. Just the thought warmed her far more than the radiator heat on the ship.
She brought the cloth down the wide plane of his chest, over the enticing mat of black hair that flattened under the layer of moisture. Like that on his arms, the hairs lay flat and straight, revealing a pebbled nipple. It felt hard beneath her washcloth like a tiny shell of a button, but as she didn’t wish him to know of her interest, she continued to the other side.
She gasped. His eye opened a crack and watched her.
“What is that burned into your chest? Who would do such a thing?” She stared horrified at the circular scar containing a helmet and shield with much filigree.
“My father. He marked me as a remembrance to do my duty as the future duke.”
“He branded you, as if you were cattle?” The thought rankled, but then she thought of how her mother had made her, as a child, endure an unnecessary and painful back brace for years just to ensure she had straight posture.