His alone to bed.
He had to fight to keep his smile from turning wolfish. Who would’ve thought chasing one’s own wife would be so arousing? “I have every right to woo you, to court you. After all, we had no time before we were married. Why not do it now?”
“Why bother at all?” she asked. Her voice sounded dazed.
“Why not?” He teased her mouth again with the rose, watching as the flower pulled down her lower lip, revealing the moist inner skin. His groin tightened at the sight. “Should not a husband know his wife, cherish and possess her?”
Her eyes flickered up at the word possess. “Do you possess me?”
“I do legally,” he said softly. “But I don’t know if I do spiritually. What do you think?”
“I think you don’t.” He pulled back the flower to let her speak, and her tongue touched her bottom lip where it had been. “I don’t know if you ever will.”
Her frank gaze was a challenge.
He nodded. “Perhaps not, but that won’t stop me from trying.”
She frowned. “I don’t—”
He placed his thumb across her mouth. “What other talents have you not told me of, my fair wife? What secrets do you keep hidden from me?”
“I have no secrets.” Her lips brushed his thumb like a kiss as she spoke. “If you look, you’ll not find any.”
“You lie,” he said gently. “And I wonder why.”
Her eyelids dropped, veiling her gaze. He felt the moist heat of her tongue against his thumb.
He caught his breath. “Were you found, fully formed, in some ancient spot? I fancy you as one of the fey, strange and wild, and completely enticing to a human male.”
“My father was a simple Englishman. He would’ve scoffed at the thought of fairies.”
“And your mother?”
“She was from Prussia and even more pragmatic than he.” She sighed softly, her breath brushing his flesh. “I am no romantic maiden. Just a plain Englishwoman.”
He very much doubted that.
He took his hand away, caressing her cheek as it left. “Did you grow up in London or in the country?”
“The country, mostly, though we came to London to visit at least yearly.”
“And did you have playmates? Sweet girls to whisper and giggle with?”
“Emeline.” Her eyes met his, and there was a vulnerability there.
Emeline lived in the American Colonies now. “You miss her.”
Eont size="3">“Yes.”
He brought the rose up to absently brush her bare neck as he tried to remember details of Emeline’s childhood. “But you did not know her until you were nearly out of the schoolroom, yes? My family estates adjoin hers, and I have known both her and her brother, Reynaud, since the nursery. I would’ve remembered you had you been with Emeline then.”
“Would you?” Her eyes flashed with anger, but she continued before he could make a defense. “I met Emeline when I came to visit a friend in the area. I was fourteen or fifteen.”
“And before that? Who did you play with? Your brothers?” He watched as the rose brushed her collarbone, then moved lower.
She shrugged. The rose must tickle, but she didn’t bat it away. “My brothers are older than I. They were both away at school when I was in the nursery.”
“Then you were alone.” He held her gaze as the rose dipped between the upper curve of her breasts.
She bit her lip. “I had a nanny.”
“Not the same as a playmate,” he murmured.
“Perhaps not,” she conceded.
When she inhaled, her breasts pressed a little against the rose. O, fortunate flower!
“You were a quiet child,” he said, because he knew it must be true.
Even with the stories he’d heard yesterday from her aunt, he knew in the main that she would’ve been a quiet child. A nearly silent child. She held herself contained. Her limbs under strict control, her body small and neat, even though she wasn’t a little woman. Her voice was always well modulated, and she stayed at the back of gatherings. What childhood had made her so determined not to be noticed?
He leaned closer to her, and even though the sweet scent of roses surrounded them, he smelled spicy oranges. Her scent. “You were a child who kept her inner thoughts secret from the world.”
“You don’t know that. You don’t know me.”
“No,” he conceded. “But I want to know you. I want to learn you until the workings of your mind are as familiar to me as I am to myself.”
She drew in her breath, pulling back almost as if in fear. “I will not become—”
But he laid a finger against her lips and then quickly straightened away again. He could hear voices on the path they’d just come from. A moment more and another couple rounded the corner.
“Pardon,” the gentleman said, and at the same time Jasper realized it was Matthew Horn. “Vale. I had not thought to meet you here.”
Jasper bowed with irony. “I have always found it instructive to walk my mother’s gardens. Just this afternoon, I have been able to teach my wife the difference between a peony plant and an iris.”
A sound that might have been a muffled snort came from behind him.
Matthew’s eyes widened. “Is this your wife, then?”
“Indeed.” Jasper turned and met Melisande’s secretive brown eyes. “My heart, may I present Mr. Matthew Horn, a former officer in the 28th Regiment like myself. Horn, my wife, Lady Vale.”
Melisande held out her hand, and Matthew took it and bent over it. All quite proper, of course, but Jasper still felt an instinctive need to lay his hand on Melisande’s shoulder as if to claim ownership.
Matthew stepped back. “May I present Miss Beatrice Corning. Miss Corning, Lord and Lady Vale.”
Jasper bent over the pretty chit’s hand, suppressing a smile. Matthew’s presence at the salon was explained, and his motives were similar to Jasper’s. He was in pursuit of the lady.
“Do you make your home in London, Miss Corning?” he asked.
“No, my lord,” the girl said. “I usually live in the country with my uncle. I think you must know him, for we are neighbors of yours, I believe. He is the Earl of Blanchard.”
The girl said something else, but Jasper lost it. Blanchard had been Reynaud’s title, the one he should’ve inherited on his father’s death. Except Reynaud had been dead by then. Captured and killed by the Indians after Spinner’s Falls.