Page 62 of Married to the Forbidden Duke
Alice tugged Fortuna back into a walk and digested the information slowly, her face pale. He couldn’t imagine what she was thinking. Pity, perhaps. Or a twisted sense of justification.
“You see?” he spoke into the silence between them. “Even if you no longer hate me, you can rest assured knowing my own father did, and I will never be able to atone.”
She looked at him then, her eyes stark. “When my parents died, I knew they loved me.”
“Then you have that to comfort you.”
“Did your father know you wanted to make amends?”
“He knew, and he didn’t care. In his eyes, there was nothing I could do to make amends.” He shifted on his horse, wishing he was anywhere else. When she’d invited him out with her, he hadn’t imagined it would be for this. He hated bringing up the past, and hated discussing his father even more. A reminder of how utterly he had failed.
But for Alice, he would endure it. He was far from perfect, and there were plenty of wounds on his soul. She could see them all, if she so chose.
“Is that why you wanted to marry well and gain respectability?” she asked, as though finally his actions made sense to her.
“I knew that for myself, I didn’t deserve happiness, but I also knew my father deserved a son who maintained the family name in—well, if not honor, then not disgrace.”
“And then I came along,” she murmured. “And I ruined even that.”
“I can’t bring myself to feel bitter, for all that,” he said, and looked at where her hands gripped the reins, a little too tightly. “I would rather make amends by offering you a position as my wife. And, Alice, you should know that you are more than I ever could have imagined you would be.”
“Even after my terrible behavior?”
“Who can begrudge you that? But—” He licked his lips. “Knowing you as I do now”—intimately, more intimately than he could ever have hoped for—“I can say with certainty that I would not rather have married any other lady.”
She stared at him for a long moment, then wheeled her horse around, urging her into a gallop. He followed her, driving hard.
“What are we doing?” he yelled after her.
“Returning home,” she called over her shoulder, and he had nothing to do but follow.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The moment they reached the house, Alice took Frederick’s hand and dragged him upstairs. He let her set the pace, and when they reached her bedchamber, he remained almost motionless as she ripped at his buttons.
“What do you want from me?” he asked, hands clenched by his sides, as though he wanted nothing more than to touch her.
Good.
“I want to use my mouth,” she breathed.
She saw the way he swallowed, eyes darkening, still fixed on her. Oh yes, he liked the sound of that a lot.
Their conversation in the park had put a lot of things into clarity for her. Not only did he regret what he had done, but he was battling his own kind of loss. In some ways, a harsher one. Theyeach had their demons, but she was beginning to think they could vanquish them together.
This was a test, of a kind. She pushed at his chest, and he obeyed her, walking backward to the bed. There, she pushed again, and he fell into a seated position, hands bracing on the covers.
“So you wouldn’t rather marry any other young lady, hmm?” she asked, finally forcing his waistcoat down over his arms. That joined his coat, discarded on the floor.
“No,” he muttered hoarsely.
“I want you to beg for me.” She removed his shirt, then applied herself to the buttons at his breeches. Now she had given full rein to her desire, it overpowered everything else inside her. All other thoughts and feelings.
She would not give this up merely for the sake of spiting him. After five years of living in darkness, it finally felt as though she was alight again.Alive.
She freed his length and wrapped her fingers around it the way he had shown her before. Then, watching his face slacken with pleasure, she moved her hand. He groaned.
“May I touch you?”
