Free Vicar's Daughter to Viscount's Lady by Louise Allen Page B

‘The…undergarments and the nightgowns. I have never had pretty things like that before; it was kind of you to buy those for me.’
    Elliott’s mouth twitched, she could see out of the corner of her eye. Bella turned on the seat so she could look at him directly. ‘Why are you smiling? Have I said something amusing?’
    ‘No, forgive me. It is just that a man really needs no praise for buying things that contribute to his own pleasure.’
    The amusement had been replaced by a curve of his lips that reminded her acutely of Rafe, just before he kissed her, and it took a sick moment for his meaning to sink in. The carriage went through a deep cutting in the road and shadow fell into the small space, almost hiding Elliott’s face. It gave her courage to utter the question. ‘You mean you expect a…a real marriage?’ she said all of a rush as they emerged into sunlight again.

Chapter Six
    ‘ A real marriage as opposed to what, exactly?’ Both Elliott’s dark brows winged upwards.
    ‘What we will be doing. Or not doing. I mean, we are marrying in the expectation that the baby is a boy, your heir. So we would not need to…to share a bed afterwards. If it was. A boy, I mean. If it is a girl, I can see you would want an heir, so…’ But that was a long time away, she did not need to think about that now.
    ‘Arabella, are you suggesting that I do not come to your bed until after this baby is born and that if it is a boy that I never do?’ Elliott demanded.
    ‘Well, yes. I mean, you do not want to marry me because you love me, or anything like that, so…’
    Elliott twisted on the seat to face her, but she turned away abruptly and stared out of the window, presenting him with the rim of her new bonnet and what she knew was a pink-flushed cheek. How did I ever get into this conversation? I am ready to sink…
    She heard him draw breath in through his grittedteeth. ‘Arabella, we are getting married. I am prepared to do my duty by Rafe’s child and by you, but I am not prepared to become a monk in the process!’
    His voice deepened to a growl and she turned back, even more flustered by this sign of the temper she had suspected lurked beneath that calm and controlled exterior. ‘Oh! But I thought—but I do not know you!’ And, surely he did not desire her? Elliott showed no sign of finishing her sentences now. He sat and watched her flounder, his expression unyielding.
    Eventually he said, ‘How long did you know Rafe?’
    ‘Eight days,’ she confessed.
    ‘You were constantly in his company? You became intimate in every way, understood him, mind and soul?’
    ‘Why, no. We could only meet in a clandestine way, snatch an hour here and there. How many couples know each other mind and soul before they marry? I loved him. I mean, I thought I loved him. I did not know him at all, of course,’ she added with wrenching honesty.
    ‘You fell in love with a man you had known for a handful of days, if you add up those snatched hours,’ Elliott said remorselessly. ‘Rafe was complex and complicated, just like any other human being. You could not possibly have thought you knew him any better than you know me.’
    ‘But I do not love you!’ she threw at him.
    ‘True.’ Elliott nodded. ‘What was it that so destroyed your judgement, your instinct for danger? Were you were dazzled, desperate, beguiled or seduced?’
    ‘No! Yes, I mean I was all of those things. But haven’t you a mistress?’ Bella asked rather desperately. She had to know, she realised.
    ‘No, not just at the moment.’
    ‘But you could get one,’ she suggested. ‘I wouldn’t mind.’ Please take one. Then I will not have the humiliation of my ignorance, my clumsiness. My fear.
    It was obviously entirely the wrong thing to say. Elliott looked thunderous. ‘Then you should mind,’ he growled. ‘Why should I in any case, when I will have a wife? As it happens, I believe in marital fidelity.’
    ‘Then you would want to come to my room.’