Chapter 13
“Do not fuss, Mary,” Pru snapped as the maid fiddled with and primped her hair. “It is only dinner at home with my family.”
“And Viscount Romney,” Mary reminded coyly as she pinned another golden curl in place.
As if Pru could forget Titus’s stated intention of dining here this evening.
As if she could ever forget a single thing about that impossible man. That impossible, wonderful, delicious man, who made her toes curl and her loins heat merely thinking about him and their lovemaking earlier today.
Eau de Titus’s cum, indeed.
Her blue gown had been completely ruined, of course, and was even now screwed up into a ball and consigned to the darkness at the back of her wardrobe. But a long soak in a scented bath for Pru had taken care of any lingering evidence of their lovemaking. Apart from a slight soreness, which had eased marginally in the bath but still ached enough as a reminder of Titus’s possession.
Could she even now be expecting his child?
Even the possibility of it warmed Pru’s insides.
She could see that child now, a little boy who looked exactly like Titus, with dark curls, deep blue eyes, and his father’s tall and perfectly formed body.
Or a golden-haired little girl whom they would name Priscilla, in honor of her sister.
Those images made Pru’s heart ache for it to be reality.
Except…
She could not marry Titus because he felt obligated to offer for her based on lovemaking she had instigated.
Her father had given no further remonstration on that subject when Pru had seen him an hour ago, already dressed for dinner and on his way downstairs. Although the smile on his lips and the happy glow in his eyes seemed to indicate Pru’s mother and their discussion might have something to do with her father’s mellowness of mood.
How delightful it must be to have the freedom to take one’s husband upstairs and make love with him at any time one chose.
Not that Pru particularly liked to think of her parents in that way—she doubted any grown child did—but the return of her father’s evenness of mood after several hours in the bedchamber with her mother was undeniable.
None of which changed the fact Pru was now expected to go down to dinner, with Titus as her parents’ guest, in the knowledge those same parents were both fully aware Pru had gone to Romney House earlier today and seduced him.
Titus was beginning to think Pru had ignored his earlier warning and decided to remain in her bedchamber this evening, when she entered the drawing room where he stood talking with her parents before dinner.
Pru didn’t just enter the drawing room, she swept into it, resplendent in a fashionable silk gown in a light color she had not worn since her sister’s death. The low neckline of the cream gown revealed a delicious expanse of the tops of her voluptuous breasts. Her golden curls were fashionably styled and secured at her crown with diamond pins, with several more loose curls at her temples and nape.
A fragility of nape which showed a slight redness where Titus’s teeth had bitten there earlier today when Pru lay over his desk with his cock buried deep inside her.
The thickening length inside his evening breeches told him his cock wanted inside her again.
Her parents moved discreetly away as Pru crossed the room to give Titus a formal curtsey. “My lord.”
He nodded. “Lady Prudence.”
“The weather is clement for this time of year, is it not?”
“Very clement,” Titus answered dryly. “Might I compliment you on your appearance this evening?”
“Thank you.” She gave a brittle smile. “Will you be retiring to the country soon for the winter months?”
Was this how she intended to spend the evening, by treating him as no more than a polite acquaintance to make small talk with?
It was a game Titus refused to play. “I have no plans to go anywhere until my wife can accompany me.”
Pru shot him a quick glance. “I was not aware you had a wife.”
“But I will have,” he assured her. “And, remember my warning of earlier,” he continued softly as she would have spoken. “The presence of your parents this evening will not protect you from me or the spanking you are very rapidly earning for yourself.”
A blush colored her cheeks. “We agreed only if I allow it,” she reminded him sharply.
Titus leaned down until his lips were only inches from the delicate curve of her ear. “If you continue to treat me in this standoffish manner, I shall make you beg for it.”
Her eyes flashed with temper. “You most certainly will not!”
Titus gave a wolfish grin as he nodded. “And I shall enjoy doing it too.”
“You arrogant—” She broke off to draw in a deep and controlling breath. “It seems dinner is now served.” She indicated toward where the butler—a different and younger man due to the previous butler’s death—stood in the doorway.
If Pru had thought she would be saved further embarrassment once they were seated at the dinner table, then she was wrong. Her mother, in her infinite wisdom, had decided to utilize the small family dining room this evening rather than the more formal room usually reserved for when they had guests. Because her mother now believed Titus to be a part of that family?
No matter the reason, Pru found herself seated directly opposite Titus at the small oblong table, with her parents at either end. Pru suffered his proximity as they were efficiently served wine, the soup, and main course by Mayberry, previously the under butler, but having now stepped into Parker’s place as head butler. None of the family could bear the thought of bringing a stranger into the house.
Romney engaged her father in conversation as they finished eating the main course. “Do you have any plans to return to Bedfordshire soon?”
“That will depend upon…developments here,” the earl replied lightly.
Pru was about to demand what developments when she felt a stocking-covered foot pressing against her ankle. Titus’s stocking-covered foot.
Although, there was no outward appearance of his subterfuge as he continued to converse with her father. “Of course.”
“A Christmas wedding might be nice,” her mother offered as Mayberry served dessert.
Pru gave a startled squeak as that stockinged foot now traveled the length of her calf.
“Perhaps that is a little too far away.” Her mother misunderstood the reason for Pru’s distress. “Next month, then?”
“I do not—” Pru broke off with a gasp, becoming completely befuddled as that silk-covered foot caressed along the length of her inner thigh before coming to rest on the heat of her mound.
“I spoke to the Prince Regent after leaving here this afternoon,” Romney announced. “He has very kindly granted Pru and me a Special Marriage License. I intend talking to the man at St. George’s Church tomorrow so we can be married next week.”
“I am not—” Pru groaned as a marauding toe entered the slit in her drawers and pressed against her nubbin.
“Next week?” her mother echoed in alarm. “I do not see how we can we possibly be ready by then.”
“Pru only needs a gown. The one she is wearing this evening is perfectly suitable.” Romney gave a dismissive smile—as if his toe were not presently rubbing between Pru’s thighs, stimulating her clitoris to hard and aching attention. “What Pru does or does not wear to our wedding is completely irrelevant to me, as long as she is my wife at the end of it.”
To anyone else—to her parents?—Titus’s comment might sound like that of a lover eager to marry, but Pru was not fooled for a moment. Titus wished to get the foolishness of their wedding out of the way so that he could concentrate on what was really important to him: identifying and arresting the traitor to England. No doubt he believed his offer of marriage to her to be another—misguided—way of protecting her.
“You—” Pru did not even have the breath to squeak as the soft pad of Titus’s toe tapped against her nubbin and heat coursed through the whole of her body.
“But what of the wedding breakfast?” Her mother frowned.
Romney’s brows rose. “I had thought, in the circumstances, you would prefer the wedding be a quiet affair.”
“I— What circumstances might they be?” Pru managed to splutter, her cheeks burning now.
“The recent death of your sister and butler, of course,” the viscount answered evenly, his toe now gliding up and down the moist and sensitive length of her nether lips.
Pru closed her eyes briefly at the pleasurable sensations coursing through her body. “Of course.”
“I will naturally go along with any plans you care to make,” Romney told her mother before glancing at Pru. “You are looking a little…feverish, my dear. Are you feeling quite well?”
She felt more than a little feverish, damn him. She felt as if she were on the brink of climaxing. “I believe I might benefit from stepping outside for some air and leaving you and my parents to enjoy their dessert—”
“No,” the viscount stated emphatically. He gave Pru a warning glance before continuing mildly. “I believe it is raining outside.” He glanced at the butler and received a nod of confirmation. “Perhaps a stroll about the entrance hall might suffice instead? With your permission, sir?” He looked to the earl without so much as consulting Pru as to his arbitrarily changing her plans.
“Of course, of course,” the earl returned jovially.
That left Pru with no option but to go along with the suggestion. Besides, the entrance hall would do as well as anywhere to tell Titus what she thought of him and his reprehensible behavior this evening.
Mayberry pulled back Pru’s chair for her, effectively allowing her to escape those intimate caresses beneath the table.
Romney had obviously replaced his evening shoe as he also stood to move about the table to take a light grasp of her arm.
Pru narrowed her gaze on him as they stepped outside into the cavernous and candlelit entrance hall. “I take it you decided we would walk inside because there is still a murderous assassin outside?”
His jaw clenched. “Yes.”
She gave a shake of her head. “How many more people have to die before you and your friends succeed in apprehending him?”
“That is slightly unfair, Pru.”
“Is it?”
He frowned his irritation. “We are doing all that we can to put an end to this treachery.”
Pru knew she was being a bit unfair. After all, it could not be easy for any of The Sinners, most especially the Duke of Stonewell, to know their investigations might lead to his own wife being arrested for treason and murder.
She eyed Romney curiously. “Have you really been to the Prince Regent and acquired a Special Marriage License since you left here earlier?”
“Yes.”
Pru gave a pained wince. “Did he ask the reason why?”
“No.”
“No?”
Romney shrugged. “Presumably, he realized there are very few reasons why we might wish to marry so quickly.”
“We do not wish to do anything of the sort.”
His lips thinned. “Nevertheless, we are going to do so.”
Pru gave a shiver at the implacability of his tone, tears welling in her eyes at what seemed to be the futility of continuing to argue against marrying him. It seemed even the Prince Regent was against her.
“You are cold.” Romney quickly drew off his evening jacket to place it about her shoulders, instantly surrounding Pru with the warmth and the distinctive aroma that was Titus: spicy cologne and male musk. As usual, her senses reacted to that seduction, her breasts tingling, the nipples engorging, the slickness increasing between her already sensitive thighs.
Titus frowned as he saw Pru’s discomfort in walking. “Are you sore from our lovemaking earlier?”
A blush colored her cheeks. “A little.”
“Would you like me to kiss it better?” he offered gruffly.
She gave a rueful laugh. “This is hardly the place for that. Besides,” she added before he could make a reply, “I believe it was your previous kisses which led to my present dilemma.”
Titus was more inclined to think it was because they could not keep their hands, or anything else, off each other. But he doubted that Pru would appreciate him making that observation. “Perhaps a little salt in your bath might help?”
Pru shook her head, the color still high in her cheeks. “I have already tried that. It eased it a little but not completely.”
“Then perhaps a distraction?”
Her gaze sharpened. “I believe I have had quite enough distraction for one day.”
Titus chuckled. “One can never have enough distraction.” At least where Pru was concerned, he did not seem able to do so.
It had been sheer torture sitting opposite her at the dinner table, able to look at her but unable to touch. Until he came up with the idea of removing his shoes and caressing her with his stockinged foot. That he had very much enjoyed. “Would you parents notice, do you think, if we went upstairs to your bedchamber?”
“The question is entirely rhetorical because we are not going upstairs to my bedchamber,” Pru stated firmly. Although she had reason to believe her radical-thinking mother would no doubt applaud Pru’s daring if they did.
“Then where else can we go so that I might have the privacy to kiss you, at least?”
Pru’s heart leaped in her chest at the intensity of Romney’s tone and expression, her stomach fluttering wildly. “You are not going to kiss me. In fact,” she continued triumphantly as an idea occurred to her, “I have decided there shall be no more kisses, or anything else, until the traitor is found and arrested.”
Romney’s brow darkened. “Once you are my wife—”
“Our marriage will change nothing.” Pru might come to regret this decision, wanting Titus as much as she did, but she felt a need to take back control of her own life. “If I am to be bullied and coerced into this marriage, then I shall at least have a say in its future.”
Romney’s scowl deepened. “Refusing to share a bed with your husband is more than having your say!”
“Then we will have the marriage annulled.”
“I shall be sharing your bed if your refuse to share mine.”
“Then you will have to divorce me,” she challenged. Divorces were rare and usually took years to accomplish, but they did happen.
He reached out to grasp her arm and turn her to face him, allowing Pru to see that he really was angry. “Is the idea of marriage to me so abhorrent you are talking of divorcing me before we are even wed?”
Pru felt flustered by the question. The truthful answer was she could imagine nothing she would like more—would love more—than to be Titus’s wife. But the circumstances under which it was to happen were far from ideal. “No more abhorrent than it must be for you to be forced into marriage with me.”
“Do you really think me a man who would allow anyone or anything to force me into doing something I do not wish to do?” he bit out between clenched teeth.
Her eyes widened. “Are you saying you—” The clanging of the front door pull, quickly followed by a loud and persistent knocking on that wooden structure, prevented her from completing that question.
A loud and urgent knocking, which demanded an immediate answer.