Page 40 of Marigold and the Marquess
“What do you mean?”
“You and I will maintain separate quarters. We shall not share a bed.”
“We won’t?” She tried to hide her disappointment, but she was never very good at hiding her feelings.
“No,” he said, his manner gentling. “It will be much easier for you to obtain an annulment on the grounds of my madness and inability to consummate our marriage if we maintain this arrangement.”
“Are you saying you will not properly make me your wife?”
“Not quite. I am not that much of a monk. There are ways to pleasure you in bed short of coupling. I will come to your bed, just not share it with you all night long.”
“I have no idea what you are talking about. Why can we not simply be married like any other couple? I am not going to seek an annulment, so you may as well set that plan aside.”
“No. And do not frown at me, Marigold. I promise, you will not be disappointed in our arrangement.”
“Our thirty days of bliss?” She blushed. “If you say so. However, I shall reserve judgement.”
He cast her a conquering sort of look, as though confident of his abilities.
Well, he had only to look at her and she melted, so perhaps she would enjoy whatever he had planned. But she would never agree to an annulment, so this objective of his was a complete waste of time. “Leo, what if it turns out none of those men are guilty? What if you are looking completely in the wrong direction? Have you ever considered this?”
“I am not wrong about them.”
“Can you say this with a moral certainty?”
“It has to be one of them.”
“Why? Is this your anger speaking because you do not like those men and want them to be guilty? You chose Beldon because he is a little rat always trying to steal what is yours. You chose Cummings because he is next in line to your title and he’s probably also a little rat. He would not be on your list if you thought he had any honor in him. Next is Denby.”
“Are you going to tell me what I feel about him?”
She nibbled her lip. “I would like to, but you haven’t told me anything about him yet. Who is Denby? Why are you so set on seeking vengeance on him?”
CHAPTER 7
LEO HAD THOUGHTMarigold would be more biddable because this was her first year out and she was inexperienced. Not only was she inexperienced, but she had a genuinely sweet disposition and was not inclined to hurt anyone’s feelings. So it irritated the hell out of him that she was determined to kick his arse into shape.
He had spent four years in a dark pit sustained by thoughts of revenge, and not even Marigold, this little ray of sunshine his soul seemed to crave, was going to change his mind.
Had he made a mistake in stepping forward to do the honorable thing when they were caught in the library?
Were he not so desperate for this taste of bliss, he would have found a way to quietly avoid marrying her and also make their scandal disappear. He did not know if Lady Barrington could be paid off to retract her story, but it would have been worth a try.
As for Marigold, she scorched his soul.
Now that he was betrothed to her, it would take every last drop of his strength to let her go. He would do it, if this became necessary to protect her.
She was stubborn, opinionated, and far more self-assured than he had expected. In truth, these qualities made him like her more.
She thought he was a lion, but she was just as fierce in her determination to have their marriage succeed.
No one had ever fought for him as she was willing to fight, not even his parents who were not often around but had always shown him affection when they did deign to spent time with him. They had grown fairly close by the time he was old enough to go to university.
They would have grown closer had his parents not died soon after. First his mother, then a few months later his father.
Upon his father’s passing, Leo had suddenly felt completely alone.
Of course, Cummings, his little rat of a cousin, wasted no time in coming around to sniff out the situation, using his father’s funeral as a pretext to glean whatever information he could about the extensive Muir holdings and the state of Leo’s health. No doubt Cummings was hoping the next influenza outbreak would do him in, as the recent outbreak had done in his parents.
