Rules for Heiresses by Amalie Howard

Ten

Gracious, she was a fool. An imbecile. A dolt. An utter dunce.

Why on earth would she do this to herself? Torture herself thus? Hadn’t she learned her lesson when it came to him? He would no doubt find some reason to push her away and then pretend he felt nothing. But clearly, she was a glutton for punishment. She should have brought the sodding tea and left it, but no…she just had to go and touch him. Revel in his thick, soft curling hair, delight in the strong, corded muscles of his neck, and now gorge herself on the spectacular glimpse of deliciously brown skin peeking from beneath the soft, white fabric of his shirt.

Ravenna couldn’t believe that he’d removed his clothing after her scandalous request. She could hardly countenance that she’d asked, that such an audacious demand had even fallen from her lips! It was so shameless of her, though she wasn’t complaining. Because here he was…her gorgeous specimen of a husband in shirtsleeves and entirely at her mercy.

And he had never looked more splendid.

An unrepentant Hades, and her, a salivating Persephone.

His shoulders were deliciously broad, his shape so palpably masculine that Ravenna couldn’t stop from sighing. Her mouth watered indelicately, her blood running hot and her core clenching with need. She was glad she couldn’t see his face and that he could not see hers, but there was something about it that was surprisingly intimate without the connection of their eyes. He trusted her, trusted her touch. And in truth, that made her bolder.

She resumed her attentions, digging her thumbs into the bunched, hard muscle. The duke’s skin was hot beneath her exploring fingertips. She kneaded his shoulders and massaged down the sides of his spine. Soon, there was nothing but their combined breaths in the silence as she worked. His breathing had reduced to ragged sighs, and she could barely breathe herself, but still she soldiered on.

A few more minutes and then she would leave. All would be well, decorum observed, and modesty would be no worse for wear. On the outside, anyway.

“Fuck it,” Courtland muttered, making her startle, and wrenched the shirt over his head.

Oh, for the love of things holy, Ravenna’s knees buckled. She didn’t know where to look. She wanted to absorb every single sinful detail of the masculine feast on display before her. Courtland was, by any stretch of the imagination, the most exquisitely built man she’d ever seen. The glimpse beneath the gap of his neckline had in no way prepared her for the glorious breadth of him or the muscles flexing beneath warm brown skin.

She wanted to lick him. Devour him.

In a mindless haze, she leaned down to press a kiss to his shoulder, and Courtland twisted in the same motion, capturing her parted lips with his. She gasped. He groaned. The kiss was not gentle. Teeth scraped against teeth. His mouth widened on hers, his tongue delving deep, taking control and claiming her with every demanding stroke. Undeterred by his ferocity, she leaned in, wanting more and giving him no quarter, her pent-up desires as greedy as his.

Courtland’s hand reached up to cup her nape, holding her in place as he drank from her lips, drawing moan after ragged moan from the depths of her. With a smothered rumble of his own, he yanked her into his lap without breaking their carnal connection. Ravenna gasped into his mouth. Oh, good gracious, he was fully aroused, his stiffened length prodding through the layers of her riding habit to tempt the hot, simmering space between her thighs.

Her core ached, her nipples puckered beneath her bodice, and she hadn’t even yet put her hands on him. Touch him, yes! Greedy palms traced down the carved planes of his chest, the ridges of his tight pectoral muscles as impressive as the ones on his back. Crisp hair tickled her fingers. If he ever released her lips, she’d feast on that sight as well…see if her nightly fevered imaginings matched up with the reality.

“How I want you,” he muttered against her mouth.

Want.It was such an ineffective word to describe the sheer need barreling through her body with the force of a torrent, but Ravenna nodded, unable to do anything else. Courtland’s eyes glowed like pools of midnight. She’d never seen them so full of reflective light, so full of melting desire. If he wanted to strip the dress off of her, she’d agree to that, too.

“Then take me,” she said. “I’m yours.”

“Mine.”

Ravenna blinked. Was the whispered word a question? A rhetorical one? His eyes ravaged hers, so many emotions barreling through them: need, confusion, worry, sadness, and finally, the creeping arrival of the grim, implacable resolve she was used to.

“Don’t, Courtland, please,” she whispered. “Be with me.”

“Fuck, this is impossible!” The cry was bitterly furious as one hand fisted in her hair and the other in her skirts. His forehead pressed against hers, his heady male scent surrounding her. “I can’t. We can’t.”

“Why? I’m here…willingly. I want this, too.”

“This is lust, Ravenna,” he replied through his teeth. “That’s all this is, and we both know that.”

She blinked her confusion. “So what?”

“It’s a fool’s cause. The sooner we accept that, the better off we will be.”

The blunt words were shocking, but nothing could hurt as much as when he lifted her off of him in one swift move and stood, reaching for his discarded shirt. She watched in silence as he put himself to rights, covering up that beautiful body of his…hiding himself from the world—from her—once more.

“Why would you say that? Surely, we can make the best of this, even if it means we seek comfort in each other? We’ve married for better or for worse.”

“We might be husband and wife for now, but I am not the man for you, Ravenna.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Getting more deeply involved with me will muddle things for both of us. It will ruin things for you and the future you deserve. I won’t take that from you.”

Ravenna blinked, trying to understand. Was he talking about his birth? She shook her head. “You know I don’t care about any of that, and besides, that’s my decision to make.”

His eyes were bleaker than she’d ever seen them. “You should care. Blood makes a man.”

“Blood is a bodily fluid that keeps us alive. It has little to do with who we are and what we make of ourselves.”

“Said like a woman who has lived a charmed life.”

The words were soft but gutting, and her breath hissed out on a pained exhale. “I might not walk in your shoes, Courtland, but please stop treating me as if I’m incapable of learning. As if I have no hope of empathizing.”

“You don’t. How could you?”

His eyes widened as she whirled away from the desk. “I can try. And before you ask me why, it’s because I care about you! I always have. This is about you and me. I think you’re afraid, Courtland.” She ignored the beat of the muscle in his cheek and the layers of hardness in his eyes. “You’re keeping me at a distance because you’re terrified to let anyone in. You’re terrified to let someone get close to you, and you know it.”

“Have a care, Ravenna.”

She frowned at him. “Who hurt you so badly?”

“I am warning you, that is enough. Cease this.”

“Why, Courtland?” Ravenna exhaled, her chest aching with a heart-wrenching need to comfort him. Whatever he felt about not deserving her didn’t come from others, it came from him. From some place deep down inside that no one could breach, not even her. “Nothing you can say will push me away.”

“Sure about that?”

The sharp rap on the door knocked them both from the intense standoff. “Your Grace?” Rawley called. “Your brother is here and insists on seeing you immediately.”

Ravenna froze. What was Stinson doing here?

“Fine,” the duke bit out. “Give me a few minutes and have Morgan show him in.”

She blew out a breath, furious at being dismissed as though she didn’t warrant any more of his attention. He’d already shut her out and closed down. It was in his very mien, in his shuttered gaze and taut mouth. She was tempted to rail and scream, and shake some sense into him, but this was neither the time nor the place.

“Lord Borne, Your Grace,” the butler intoned.

Ignoring Courtland’s derisive snort at the announcement, Ravenna turned as her brother-in-law walked in. Stinson looked the same. Tall, elegant, and handsome. There was a definite resemblance between the brothers, and Ravenna was struck by the similarities, some she’d never picked up on until they were in the same room side by side.

Notwithstanding Stinson’s stark, pale skin and Courtland’s golden-brown complexion, they shared the same bone structure in their high-bladed cheekbones and angular jaws. Though Stinson’s hair was chestnut while his brother’s was jet black, it was obvious to anyone that they were related.

She frowned at Stinson. The curious lack of joy at seeing his brother alive struck her as decidedly odd. She was missing something, it seemed. Something that had to do with the chasm between them.

“So it’s true then?” Stinson demanded without preamble, eyes widening and then filling with unadorned bitterness when they landed on her. “You’ve married.”

“Yes” came the duke’s eventual reply, his glacial gaze panning between them. “You are acquainted with my duchess.”

Stinson tensed but then bowed. “I am.”

Ravenna felt a looming presence and knew that the duke had come to stand beside her. Whether that was for her benefit or Stinson’s, she did not know. A hand rested at the small of her back, his thumb brushing against her gown, and she bit her lip, cursing her body’s instant and stupid response. This was part of the performance, nothing more.

Gnashing her teeth, she pushed a smile to her face and stepped out of his touch, moving toward her old friend. Ravenna felt her husband’s glare against her back but she ignored it.

“Stinson,” she greeted him fondly, hands outstretched. “It’s been an age. You look well. How’s everyone?”

Instead of kissing her hand, Stinson took it and leaned down to kiss her cheek. Ravenna heard the growl before her brain registered any hint of danger, but the look on Courtland’s face was enough to make a grown man quail. “Get your damn hands off my wife.”

Ravenna frowned. “My lord duke, what has gotten into you?”

He glared down at her, his eyes chips of stark black ice and his nostrils flared as though he was holding on to his control by the slimmest of margins. “Leave us.”

Her temper blazed at the curt demand. How dare he order her about?

“Please don’t depart on my account, dearest,” Stinson drawled, clearly unconcerned by the murderous scene unfolding in front of him. “You’re family now, after all. I admit the news took me by surprise, but you’ve always been precious to me.”

Her husband’s fingers flexed at his sides at the endearment and the declaration. Ravenna could have sworn there was a nasty edge in Stinson’s voice, some unspoken communication passing between the brothers, but Stinson’s face held the wide, unaffected, friendly smile he always used with her. A perverse part of her wanted to stay just to flout Courtland’s demands, but she couldn’t bring herself to defy him in front of others, even if it was only his brother.

“Perhaps another time then,” she said with the most gracious smile she could manage given the simmering frustration beneath her skin. “It’s good to see you, Stinson.”

His lips curled upward. “And you. I look forward to catching up soon.”

“It’s Lord Stinson,” Courtland hissed at her before glaring at his brother. “And definitely not Lord Borne as announced, considering his borrowed title of marquess is now obsolete. And no you won’t see each other, not if I can help it.”

Shocked at his vicious tone, Ravenna blinked up at the stone-faced duke and shook her head. His expression was positively glacial, rage emanating from him in thick waves. A stormy possessiveness also glittered in his eyes, which baffled her. A few moments ago, he couldn’t wait to get away from her, yet now he was behaving like a lion whose pride had been trespassed upon by another.

Perhaps it was a different kind of pride. As in male pride. He didn’t want her, but no one else could have her either. The man was simply impossible to predict! Ravenna gritted her teeth, stifling the burst of anger, and swept from the room before she did or said something she regretted. Perhaps when she was calmer and her husband was more amenable, she would revisit the subject of Stinson. Revisit the subject of them, too.

In the meantime, she had her own battles to fight.

* * *

“To what do I owe the visit, Brother?” Courtland asked after his wife had left, stalking over to the mantel and pouring himself a liberal drink. It probably wouldn’t help with his headache, which had lessened a little, but he needed it so as not to decimate the man currently ensconced in his study. He did not offer his uninvited guest a drink.

He hadn’t cared that Stinson had been throwing himself about as their father’s remaining heir—or that he’d all too happily assumed the courtesy title of the Marquess of Borne with Courtland supposedly deceased—but seeing his hands upon Ravenna had awakened a primal deadly instinct inside of him.

“Why are you here?” The question from his half brother was blunt and belligerent.

There it was—the rub—as if neither of them could exist in the same country…as if the reality of his existence was only bearable when they were separated by an ocean. He eyed his brother. The last time he’d seen Stinson, he’d been fourteen, barely a man. Now a decade later, they were close to the same height, give or take a couple inches, and the distinctive features he saw in the mirror every day were evident in his brother’s adult face.

Courtland had wondered if his younger brother would show signs of a dissipated lifestyle, but he seemed fit and hale. He’d filled out, grown up, and yet the hostility in his eyes had not diminished. Instead, it burned.

“Answer me, damn you! Why are you here?”

“I am now duke,” Courtland replied evenly. “This is my place.”

“You’re not welcome.” His brother’s mouth twisted into a sneer.

Sipping his brandy, Courtland ambled toward the other side of his desk, taking his time. He’d known it would not be easy coming back, and especially dealing with Stinson’s wild claims and his unfounded jealousy. Or his incessant attacks on Courtland’s legitimacy. “I’m here to tend to my affairs. I think it best if we simply agree to stay out of each other’s way.” He steepled his fingers. “How are my sisters?”

Stinson scowled. “How dare you insult them? They’re no sisters of yours, and none of us wants anything to do with you.”

“Not even money from the ducal coffers?” he asked silkily.

“Wealth won’t make people accept you,” Stinson said. “And that money doesn’t belong to you.”

“Doesn’t it? Grandfather’s solicitor seems to think it does.” Courtland smiled and waved a hand at their opulent surroundings. “Though I have no need of it. I have more than enough of my own, as you can clearly see.”

“This place was sold years ago,” his brother said. “It’s not yours.”

“It is. I was the one who bought it.”

Stinson’s gaze narrowed. “So you married Lady Ravenna for the same reason you acquired this house in secret. To prove that you’re better than me. Here’s a hint—you are not. You will never be. You’re just the mongrel born on the wrong side of the blanket from your conniving commoner of a mother, and soon that news will be fodder for the masses, too.”

His blood boiled in his veins at the insults, but Courtland kept his face composed and his hands occupied around his glass instead of his brother’s neck. “Is that what you came to tell me? You made those feelings perfectly clear eleven years ago. I assure you I have nothing to prove to you or to anyone.”

Stinson slammed his fist down on the desk. “Stay out of my way.”

“Or what?”

“You’ll find I’m not the boy I once was.”

The threat was empty. Stinson was exactly the same as he’d been as a boy. Cowardly and hateful. Only now he was driven by greed and narcissism that had increased tenfold with adulthood. “Is that a threat?” Courtland drawled.

“Take it as you see it.”

“Rawley!” Courtland called out, knowing his cousin would be close by.

“Yes, Your Grace?” His man of business appeared with two sizable footmen in tow. Courtland had to bite back his grin both at Stinson’s expression and at Rawley’s preparedness. His cousin knew him better than he knew himself.

“Show my dear brother out before he hurts himself with all his grandiose posturing.”

After Stinson took his leave, his face purple with fury at practically being thrown out, Courtland sat back in his seat. Stinson didn’t worry him. Courtland would do what he came to England for, and then quite happily go back to Antigua.

His headache still throbbed at the base of his skull, but his wife’s recipe had worked better than he’d expected. The tea, at least. The rest of it… Well, thinking about what had very nearly happened made him groan.

Then take me.

He would have, too, if reason hadn’t intervened, followed by a timely interruption.

He let out a low chuckle at Ravenna’s statement that blood was naught but a fluid. Her cleverness and her unswerving loyalty astounded him. In another world at another time, perhaps he and Ravenna could have remained betrothed as children, married as adults, and perhaps life would have been different. Perhaps even he could have let himself love her.

His throat knotted. Love wasn’t in the cards for him. Once more, his astute little wife was right. Loving someone meant letting them inside—letting them see the real him with all his flaws, all his fears, and all his faults—and that was something he would never again do. If his own brother by blood could barely stand to look at him, much less love him, how could he expect anyone else to?

Still, he owed Ravenna an explanation, at least, for his behavior around Stinson, as well as the irascibility arising from his own jealousy.

“Rawley,” he called out. “Where’s the duchess?”

The man appeared like a wraith. “Her Grace has gone out, sir.”

He frowned. “Gone out where?”

“I believe she took the carriage to visit her mother, shortly after Lord Stinson arrived.” Rawley cleared his throat. “She seemed quite…agitated.”

Courtland couldn’t begrudge her that, of course, and he knew why she was upset. He blew out an aggravated breath and scrubbed a palm through his hair, remembering the sublime feel of her fingers kneading over his scalp. He also knew he could not let her face the Dowager Duchess of Embry on her own.

Not if any of the gossip had reached London.

“Tell someone to get me a horse,” he said.

Rawley grinned as though him riding to a damsel’s rescue was an everyday occurrence. “Right away, Your Grace.”

“And Rawley?”

“Yes, Your Grace?”

“Wipe that bloody smile off your face before I do it for you.”

His clown of a cousin only smiled wider.