Confessions of a Royal Bridegroom

CHAPTER Thirteen



“Now, missus, you leave everything to me,” Rose said, bustling Justine toward her bedroom door. “Mr. Griffin won’t want his new bride taking care of any babies tonight. I’m sure he’s got his mind on other things to do with little mites,” she said with a sly grin. “Like making them.”


Justine practically choked. “Rose, I’ve already explained this. Our marriage is one of convenience and nothing more. I’m sure Mr. Griffin doesn’t expect anything of the sort.”

When Rose crossed her arms over her breasts and raised her eyebrows in disbelief, Justine let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, I certainly don’t expect anything of the sort, and I’ve made that very clear to him.”

Rose let out a soft hoot of laughter. “Blimey, wish I could have heard that conversation. How did he take that?”

Justine scrunched up her nose. “Not very well, I think. Actually, I don’t know. I don’t find it easy to decipher his thoughts.”

“That’s Mr. Griffin, all right, keeping his cards close to his vest. Except when he’s right mad with someone.” Rose gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Then you can tell exactly what he’s feeling.”

“I’ve noticed,” Justine said.

She glanced back at the cradle where Stephen was finally sleeping. It had taken her an hour of rocking and pacing to get him to go down, and exhaustion dragged at her bones. More than anything, she wanted to crawl into bed and pull the linens over her head, forgetting that today had ever happened.

But as tired as she was, she suspected there was little chance of such relief.

Rose took her by the shoulders and again steered her to the door. “You look all fagged out, missus, so if Mr. Griffin don’t come knocking on your door tonight, I’m thinking you should get some sleep.”

Justine was about to thank her when Rose cut in with another devilish smile. “Because I’d bet a week’s wages that Mr. Griffin won’t wait much longer to join you in some bed sport, and then you’ll wish you had gotten as much sleep as you could.”

“Thank you for that image, Rose,” Justine responded drily.

She took one more glance in the baby’s direction and then slipped into her room. After quietly closing the door behind her, she leaned against it, trying to let the troubles of the day leach from her body and mind. Usually when life’s cares threatened to overwhelm her, Justine would tell herself that everything would be fine, and then she would mentally list all the reasons why that would be so. But after the last few days, she had neither the energy nor the logic for the customary exercise. In fact, she was having a great deal of trouble even imagining what life was going to look like either in the immediate future or in the weeks and months ahead.

Pushing herself off the door, she made for the bell pull. If she’d been thinking straight, she should have asked Rose to unbutton and unlace her, but she couldn’t bear any more teasing and innuendo. Rose was a good woman, but she seemed convinced that Justine and Griffin should and would eventually engage in marital relations. Not that Rose would ever use such a careful euphemism to describe what Justine’s increasingly unruly imagination insisted on conjuring up.

While she waited for Clara, the Phelps’ daughter and the household’s maid, she sat at her dressing table and began taking down her hair. The nervous excitement that had flushed her cheeks earlier in the day had disappeared, leaving her wan and heavy-eyed. She grimaced at herself in the mirror. No one could look less like a bride than she did right now.

Justine closed her eyes to keep at bay the resurgent emotions that had almost swamped her when Griffin took her hand during the short marriage ceremony. Although his handsome face had seemed cut from granite, showing no expression, his eyes had blazed with a possessiveness that made her shiver with surprise and anxiety. His fingers had tightened and his thumb had brushed across the pulse on the inside of her wrist, sending blood pumping frantically through her veins.

But then his gaze had narrowed and the odd look of triumph had faded from his eyes. He’d been very careful with her after that, treating her with kindness and solicitude for the rest of the day. Yes, he had teased her, calling her my love when Lady Thornbury raised the issue of her dinner party. Justine had wanted to scold him for that. But she also appreciated that he had tried to support her wishes, and had done what he could to convince the others that the worst course of action would be to go about in public in an effort to portray that their marriage was genuine.

She pressed her palms to her eyes. Why in God’s name was Dominic so insistent about all of this? She understood he was trying to protect her reputation, but part of her still believed that retreating to the country was her best option. If she lived in seclusion, surely the furor over her marriage to Griffin would pass, allowing her to get an annulment at some point. That did seem the most sensible course of action since it appeared her husband intended to leave England as soon as little Stephen’s situation was resolved. And if that was the case, Justine had no desire to spend the rest of her life in some kind of limbo—neither free nor truly married, tied to a man who had little interest in her but as a temporary companion to warm his bed as long as his interest lasted.

All in all, a depressing thought, although she couldn’t deduce if it was the idea of him leaving her a virtual widow while he flitted around the world that bothered her, or the very idea of him leaving at all. She had a sneaking suspicion it was the latter, and that was simply unacceptable.

Justine gave her eyes a quick rub and then opened them. Pulling her spine straight, she picked up her beautiful new brush and began stroking it through her hair. It didn’t matter how she felt, since Dominic and the others had all but taken that choice out of her hands, at least for now. When they pointed out how the scandal and gossip would hurt her family, Justine had realized they were right. The only way forward was for her and Griffin to put on a good front.

That her new husband was furious about the blatant attempts to make him respectable was clear and to be expected. But what she hadn’t expected was his eventual capitulation to Dominic’s plans. That had surprised her. Griffin Steele did not strike her as the type of man to sacrifice his own needs and desires for anyone else, but it would appear that he had done just that for her.

A quick knock on the door pulled her out of her reverie. But before she could answer, the door opened and Griffin, clad only in trousers and the dressing gown he’d worn the other night, strolled into the room. Justine’s brush hand froze in midair as her gaze helplessly traveled over him, finally coming to a halt on his bare feet. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen a man not properly shod in boots or shoes. Somehow, seeing Griffin’s naked, masculine feet seemed even more shocking than seeing him without a shirt.

She jerked her eyes up to meet his amused gaze. His dark eyes were warm with humor, and with something she was finally starting to recognize. In defiance of her assurances to Rose, it seemed that Griffin had come to claim his marital privileges. A silly, feminine part of her was thrilled, but another, much larger part, was horrified.

And not simply because she felt so physically unprepared. Justine couldn’t imagine there was a woman more emotionally ill-equipped to deal with a man like Griffin Steele than she.

“I thought you were Clara,” she said weakly.

“I know,” he said. “I told Clara I would be helping you tonight, and sent her off to bed.”

Justine glowered at him. “That was rather forward of you, don’t you think? And I most certainly do not need your help, sir.” She waved her hand, still tightly clenching the brush as if trying to shoo him away. “I do hope you don’t think something is going to happen between us tonight, because it’s not. I thought I was quite clear about that.”


He easily captured her wrist. “Right now, all I’m thinking about is why you keep running away from me. You dashed out of the dining room before you’d barely had anything to eat. I don’t bite, Justine.” He plucked the brush from her hand. “Not unless you want me to.”

When he stepped behind her and started to draw the brush through her hair, her heart jolted hard against her ribs. She started to stand, but he gently pushed her back onto the low seat.

“Don’t be a ninny,” he said. “I already gave my word that I wouldn’t do anything you didn’t want me to do. But I am your lawful husband. It’s perfectly respectable for me to help you get ready for bed.”

She let out a little snort as she stared at him in the mirror. “There’s nothing respectable about you at all, and you know it.”

A low, husky laugh, one that sent shivers down the backs of her legs, was his only answer. Deciding she was too tired to fight him—and taking him at his word that he wouldn’t force himself on her—she sighed and slowly relaxed, letting the soothing brushstrokes bleed the tension from the muscles of her face and neck.

“I love your hair,” he said after a minute or two. “It’s like velvet fire under my hands.”

“You’re welcome to it,” she said in a sleepy voice, her eyelids threatening to flutter shut.

“Ah, yes. I imagine you don’t like the attention it draws to you. Thus, all the ghastly caps.”

She sighed. “They’re not that bad. But it’s true that I’m not very fond of the color. My cousins teased me endlessly about it when I was a child, and I must say that some of the so-called gentlemen of the ton weren’t much better. They were always making jokes about whether I had an evil temper to match my hair.”

“Idiots,” he murmured, continuing his steady, smoothing strokes.

“Well, I thought so,” she said in a drowsy voice. “I was the most timid wallflower one could imagine. The last thing I wanted to do was draw anyone’s attention.”

Griffin put the brush down and deftly parted her hair into three, thick strands. “And why was that?” He started to crisscross the strands into a neat braid.

She stared at him in the mirror, taking in the calm concentration of his expression as he worked. “Where did you learn to play lady’s maid?”

He flashed a smile. “There’s very little I don’t know about a woman’s toilette, Justine.”

She scoffed. “I can imagine.”

“None of that, wife. Now answer my question. Why did you avoid calling attention to yourself, unlike most other girls? God knows you’re pretty enough. I would have thought all the young beaus of the ton—stupid and shallow as they are—would have perceived that much about you, at least.”

Her traitorous emotions preened at his offhand compliment, but since he was standing in her bedroom, partially undressed, she thought it best to ignore it.

“My father drew more than enough attention as it was. For a spy, he was a remarkably flamboyant man although, oddly enough, that worked in his favor. Uncle Dominic always said that Papa was so extravagant in his behavior that no one would believe for a minute that he worked for the Service. But neither my brother nor I much cared for the attention. People used to gossip about him and all his outrageous antics.”

“But your father was gone from London a great deal, was he not?” Griffin asked.

He bent over her shoulder to select a ribbon from a small dish on the table. Justine could feel the heat of his body all along her back, and when his silken-clad arm brushed against her shoulder, nerves made her stomach jump.

At least she told herself it was nerves.

“True, but my aunt wasn’t much better,” she said in a rush, trying to ignore the prickly sensations that shivered across her skin. “She was artistic, and quite radical in her politics.” Justine thought back to the noisy, lively salons her aunt used to host, ones stuffed full of artists and writers and everyone her grandfather used to call the wrong sorts of people. “Not that Aunt Elizabeth wasn’t a lovely and kind person, but she wasn’t always comfortable to live with.”

She met Griffin’s eyes in the mirror as he tied the ribbon at the end of her braid, and gave him a self-deprecating smile. “I know it makes me sound missish, but I used to live in terror that she would say something outrageous on the occasions when we were in polite company. She used to make my grandfather positively demented.”

“Ah, that would be your father’s father.”

She nodded. “Yes. Grandpapa hated gossip, and even the slightest hint of scandalous behavior. My uncle—the current viscount—also takes a rather dim view of that sort of thing,” she said with a sigh. “Not that I really blame him with several children to marry off.”

Uncle William would surely see her marriage to Griffin as a terrible misalliance that would reflect poorly on the family. Justine didn’t even want to think about the conversation she would surely have with him on that topic. He would be apoplectic.

Griffin rested his hands lightly on her shoulders. “Then I imagine your uncle will simply be enchanted to know you married me.”

Justine tried not to look too morose. “It’s not your fault, of course, but no, he won’t be very happy about it.”

“What a coil, to be sure, but not one that requires unraveling tonight. Come, up with you.”

His hands slipped to her waist. With one swift movement, he lifted her to her feet, leaving her blinking. Griffin was neither a brawny nor an excessively muscled man, but he possessed a lean masculinity. She was no lightweight, though, so he was obviously a great deal stronger than he appeared.

When his hands went to the back of her dress, she jumped, twisting around to bat at him. “What in God’s name are you doing?”

“I’m unbuttoning your dress, and then I’m going to loosen your stays,” he said with exaggerated patience. “Someone has to do it, unless you want to sleep in your clothes.” He turned her back around. “Now, stop putting up a fuss. Anyone would think you’re a silly chit instead of the mature, sober woman I know you to be.”

Justine couldn’t help it. She stuck her tongue out at his reflection in the mirror.

“Very mature,” he added.

She stood still while he swiftly unbuttoned her gown and loosened her stays. He didn’t linger or make a production out of it, and she found herself relaxing in his expert hands. For a man who could make her nerves skitter and dance with a simple touch or look, he was an oddly comforting person to be around. That didn’t make much sense, except for the fact that she knew she could say anything to him and he wouldn’t judge it amiss. And aside from wanting her in his bed—which she suspected was largely an automatic reaction to any woman under the age of fifty—he didn’t seem to expect much from her, either. If anything, he wanted to take care of her, and that was a novel sensation, indeed.

“There,” he said, giving her a little shove in the direction of the ornate Chinese screen in the corner. “Go put on your night rail and robe, and then I’ll tuck you into bed.”

She peered over her shoulder at him. “That won’t be necessary.”

He smiled. “I know, but I’m enjoying our conversation. And it is our wedding night, after all. You can at least talk to me.”


When she eyed him suspiciously, he held his hands up, palms out. “No tricks, I promise.”

She shrugged, taking him at his word. After all, what could be the harm? She had no intention of throwing herself at him, at least not tonight.

That errant thought had her stumbling over her feet. Where in heaven’s name had that come from?

Flustered, she hurried behind the screen and began yanking off her dress. It took an enormous effort to ignore the blood pounding through her veins in a mix of trepidation and excitement, and to ignore her heightened awareness of the man on the other side of the screen—a man with the reputation as a rake of the first order.

A man who was now her husband.

But as she slipped her stays from her body, she reminded herself that she’d not seen any indication of rakish behavior on his part, not since she’d arrived in his household. The opposite, in fact. True, he delighted in saying outrageous things, and he had kissed her. And then there was that late-night encounter in the kitchen. But he’d made no real effort to seduce her and had done everything in his power to protect her—as he clearly protected all the females under his care. If anything, his conduct had been both disciplined and restrained.

As she carefully folded her gown and placed it in the small trunk behind the screen, Justine forced herself to consider the strong possibility that Griffin’s reputation had been exaggerated. Why then, did he make no effort to refute all the rumors and whisperings about him, letting everyone think the worst? It was an interesting question, but not one she had either the wit or energy to parse tonight.

“Are you sure you don’t need any help?” came Griffin’s sardonic voice from the other side of the screen.

“Certainly not,” she said, hastily divesting herself of the rest of her clothing. “I’ll be right out.”

“Don’t rush. Perhaps you can tell me about your family while I wait.”

Clutching her wrapper to her chest, she peeked around the corner of the screen. Griffin was wandering around the room casually inspecting her meager belongings, reaching out a hand to absently stroke the soft wool of a shawl she’d left over the back of a chair, then picking up a book from the small pile on the table by her bed, reading the title. There was a quiet sense of possessiveness to his actions, and an intimacy that robbed her of breath.

She retreated behind the screen. “What do you wish to know?”

“Did you always live in London?”

“Mostly, but my brother and I did spend a good deal of the summer in the country at my grandfather’s estate, especially when Papa was away.”

She smiled, remembering the fun she’d had with her cousins, especially the boys. She’d had no trouble keeping up with them, roaming through the woods for hours on end, or learning to ride. “I enjoyed that very much, and I’m not ashamed to admit that I often cried when I had to return to London.”

“Despite your proper and surely disapproving grandfather?”

She slipped on her wrapper, knotting it firmly about her waist.

“Grandpapa never disapproved of me,” she said as she came out from behind the screen. “I used to spend all sorts of time with him in the library helping him with his translations. He was a rather good scholar, you see,” she explained as Griffin drifted across the room to her. “In fact, he used to say that I was the cleverest of his grandchildren. Only to me, of course. It wouldn’t be proper to say that sort of thing to the others.”

He stopped only inches away. Justine had to repress the impulse to step back—not because he frightened her, but because her awareness of him thrummed inside her body, silently urging her into his orbit.

Griffin’s mouth curved in a dangerously seductive smile as he gazed down at her. “I might have known you’d be a little bluestocking. Tell me more.”

His gaze, so full of secrets, sucked her in, tempting her with forbidden thoughts. Almost unconsciously, she raised her hand to the neckline of her robe, pulling it tighter.

“Why do you even care?” she whispered.

His eyes half closed and he leaned toward her, as if trying to capture some elusive scent. “For some reason I’m unable to fathom, I want to know everything about you. I want to know what your favorite toy was when you were a child, what was your most treasured possession. Who comforted you when you cried, or if you ever climbed a tree. I want to know what you like to eat and what makes you curl up your sweet little nose. I want to know when you first wished to kiss a boy. I especially want to know about that,” he finished with a wicked purr.

She stared into the dark well of his eyes, transfixed. His voice lulled her into a dangerous submission and she swayed, ever so slightly, leaning toward him. His gaze flared hot in response.

But when he reached for her, the moment shattered. Justine let out a self-conscious gasp and jerked away, rushing to her dressing table to straighten up her things with shaking hands.

Griffin muttered something under his breath—something unflattering, she suspected.

“There’s no need to be frightened, Justine,” he said in a dry-as-dust voice. “I’m not an ogre.”

“I’m not the least bit frightened. I just don’t want to talk about silly things like my childhood, that’s all.” She straightened her new brushes and mirror into a careful line.

Griffin leaned against the post at the foot of her bed, as if he intended to spend the rest of the night right there. The heat had faded from his eyes, replaced by a sardonic amusement that made her inwardly wince. “Don’t you think a husband and wife should know something about each other, Justine? How else are they to get along?”

“Well, you seem to know quite a bit about me, but I know very little about you,” she retorted, feeling unaccountably defensive. It was as if he’d exposed something inside of her, something she’d rather not know about. “I hardly think that’s fair.”

“What would you like to know?”

“Are you still planning on leaving England?” The question had popped from her mouth before she’d even thought of it.

He dipped his head once. “Of course.”

She waited, but no other information seemed to be forthcoming. “That’s all you have to say about it?” she asked incredulously.

He simply shrugged.

That made her temper flicker to life. How could he be so casual about something that had the potential to affect her so greatly? She barely knew how to respond to him anymore, how to think about their future together. The day had been so tumultuous, so replete with upsets.

She stiffened, suddenly remembering what she’d learned about him this morning from Patience and Rose. Justine couldn’t believe she’d managed to forget something so important. Right now, the very idea that he’d withheld such vital information seemed almost dishonest.

“My love, are you going to stand there in a brown study all night, or is there something else you’d like to ask me?” Griffin prompted with a grin.

“Quite a number of things, when I think about it,” she said. “For instance, I had no idea who your father was until Rose and Patience told me this morning. That was a revelation, believe me. And I don’t think it right that you withheld that information from me before our marriage.”

He slowly uncoiled from his relaxed pose. Too late, she remembered Mrs. Reeves’ pointed warning not to broach this very subject. Still, she told herself, she had every right to know. After all, they were married now.


“Just what did they tell you about my father?” he asked in a dangerously quiet voice that had her questioning her certainty of a moment before.

“That he’s a prince, Ernest, Duke of Cumberland.” Even saying it now, it seemed so impossible. “They didn’t say who your mother was.”

“That’s because she didn’t matter to anyone. My mother was a fourteen-year-old girl who my father”—the word sounded like brimstone on his tongue—“seduced and tossed aside, never again to be acknowledged. Not that I suppose she had any desire for him to acknowledge her. God knows I don’t want it from him.”

“Not that you suppose? You mean you don’t know what your mother wanted?” she asked cautiously.

When he crossed his arms over his chest, the silk gaped at the throat to reveal a gryphon’s claw, seeming to cruelly dig into his bronzed flesh. “How should I? She abandoned me when I was an infant. I never knew her.”

He tossed the words at her like they were rocks. Her heart clenched at the bitterness shooting through each syllable. Clearly, there was so much left unspoken, a man’s entire history hidden behind a wall she suspected few if any had ever breached. No wonder he guarded himself with such determination.

“I’m sorry,” she said, wishing she’d bitten her tongue before exposing him to such painful memories. “I didn’t know.”

His eyebrows arched with an uncannily aristocratic disdain. “If you had known that I was the by-blow of a man known for the worst sort of vices and a woman who lacked all decent feeling, would you have married me, Justine? Or would you have preferred the censure and scorn of the world rather than soil yourself with my name? With my touch?”

Her eyes widened with horror. How could he think that about her? “Of course not! We are not responsible for the actions of our parents. And you didn’t even know them. Their faults are not your faults.”

His mouth pulled into a hard, disbelieving line. She took a few steps closer, desperate to convince him . . . to comfort him.

“It was never my intention to insult you, my dear sir,” she said, investing as much sympathy as she could into her voice. She itched to touch him, to stroke his silken-clad shoulders, letting her fingers drift down to settle on his warm skin. The desire was so strong and unnerving that she clenched her fingers by her side.

“You’ve been nothing but kind to me,” she said, “and I will always be—”

He seemed to leap across the space between them, one hand landing on her shoulder and the other taking her chin, forcing her to look up at him. She swallowed hard at the sight of his cold, flat gaze, chilling in its lack of emotion. But even though his black eyes looked implacable and merciless, his touch was gentle. Even in his anger, she knew he could never injure her.

“Kind?” he barked out in a harsh voice. “Don’t mistake indulgence for kindness, Justine. I never fall prey to that emotion. In that, I am just like my father.”

“I don’t believe it.” She refused to shrink before him. “You are nothing like your father or your uncles. I’m sure of it.”

He snorted his contempt for that notion as his hands dropped from her. “I am just like them. And the sooner you realize that, my dear wife, the better for both of us.”

On those discouraging words, he turned on his heel and stalked from the room.