Free Gideon's Bargain by Christine Warren

Gideon's Bargain: A Regency Tale,
    © 2003 by Christine Warren
     
     
    Chapter One
    London , 1817
    He had the look of Lucifer, and the reputation of something darker.

Sarah Victoria Spencer stepped out of the shadows that had concealed her form and her fear, and shivered.

Sarah Spencer Marsh, she reminded herself, her skin chilling at the thought. A married woman now, bought and paid for. She hoped her father would be happy with her price. Now that he had disposed of her, the Spencer family had nothing left to sell. Not even their souls.

"Closer. I want to see you."

His voice raised gooseflesh on her arms, the sound deep and rough and rasping, like the purr of a great cat. In the firelight, that was what her husband most resembled. He lounged in an enormous leather chair, his muscular legs stretched out before him, his eyes dark and narrowed. His presence, a thing so palpable and forceful she thought she might reach out and trace its shape with her hands, unnerved her. She stepped forward.

"Closer, madam. I wish to look at what my thirty thousand pounds have bought me."

She raised her chin. "Do you? You did not look at the wedding ceremony."

He had never looked, not once despite the fascinated stare she had been unable to control. His eyes had remained on the vicar, the guests, or perhaps on the stained glass window beyond. Whatever had held his attention, it had not been his bride.

"I saw no reason to. You father and I struck the bargain between us, madam. It was no concern of yours." He raised a snifter to his mouth and drank. When he lowered it, she saw the sheen of brandy on his lips. "Your concern is merely to realize that the service you attended this morning has indeed bound you to me under the laws of England ."

He spoke too softly, too casually. It pulled her tighter than a roar would have. She chose not to wonder if her tension came from the idea of being bound to him, or the idea that her presence affected him so little. Those were dangerous thoughts. "I realize it."

He raised one dark, slashing eyebrow. "Do you? How very interesting. I thought your reluctance to obey my commands might have resulted from some ignorance on your part of the reality of our relationship."

"I am not ignorant of our relationship, my lord," she said with a silent curse for the trembling she could not control, the dangers she would not acknowledge. She had come too far to surrender now to nerves. "I am your wife. You are my husband."

In the glow of the firelight, his black eyes sharpened. "Ah yes, your husband. And tell me, wife, what does it mean that I am your husband?"

Restriction and isolation, if you are as other men. A chance, if you are not. "I am afraid I do not follow, my lord."

"Really. And I had been told you were an uncommonly intelligent woman." He brushed a thumb along his stubbled jaw and considered her for a long minute. "You have addressed me this evening always as 'my lord.' Why is that, wife?"

He led up to something. She knew it. She felt it yawning open before her like a trap, and she stepped carefully around the steely jaws. "Because it is your title. Marquis of Blackenham. You should be addressed as 'my lord.'"

He was shaking his head before she finished. "No, Sarah. A title is not the reason a wife should address her husband so. It is a wife's duty to submit to her husband, madam. A wife's duty to please and obey. A wife should realize that in marriage, her husband is her lord." His tone darkened, smoothed, took on the texture of silk and the menace of iron. He leaned forward. "Am I not your husband, Sarah? Am I not your master?"

Her spine stiffened in the manner of prey, cornered and wary. "You are indeed my husband," she said, not knowing his game. "But I would question your mastery, sir. I am my own woman."

His eyes flashed bright in the darkened room. "No, Sarah. You are my woman."

Was she? The idea made her tremble. She had heard rumors about him and his women, dark whispers of dark practices