Edward felt his mouth gape. “You cannot be serious?” he growled. “It is unheard of and unseemly that a woman should take an interest in such a thing! I believe I have mentioned this fact before,” he added with growing irritation.
He felt unsettled and aggravated by the fact she was here at all, intruding into his private space. He had intended to seek her out, at some point, later in the day, much later ... and ... and see if they could try and find an amicable way to go forward. He hoped that Longwold was big enough that there would be plenty to occupy her, and he could go about his day without too much interruption. The idea that they still hadn’t consummated the marriage was something that bothered him immensely, but he didn’t know quite what to do about it.
The idea that she might actually think him incapable rankled harder than he liked to admit, and the thought of taking her to bed was so heady that he was rather afraid he might actually disgrace himself and act like a green boy.
He gritted his teeth with annoyance, wondering what it was about this particular woman that wrong-footed him so badly. Looking up, Edward realised she was speaking to him and that Charlie, blast him, had gone.
“I don’t see that there can be any objection to me watching my husband spar, in private,” she said. Her voice was low, and though a slight blush stained her cheeks, her gaze was astonishingly direct. “I like to watch you,” she added, and the tone of her voice made his entire body give her his undivided attention. He lowered the cloth he had wiped his face on, holding it in front of him before she noticed the fact that her presence was having a profound effect on him. She took a step closer and Edward was torn between the desire to step back, away from this woman who threatened to upend his life and disturb the little equilibrium he had left to him, and to step closer. In the end, he did neither.
“I’m sorry,” she said, the words so surprising that he forgot he was angry with her.
He frowned, wondering at the remorse in her eyes.
“What for?”
She shrugged and gave him the barest glimpse of a smile. “For trapping you,” she replied, the rather endearing flush to her cheeks growing brighter. “I truly didn’t mean to,” she added in a rush. Somehow, that only irritated him all over again. No. She hadn’t even considered him. Bloody Nibley had been a better bet. Well, she’d gotten more than she bargained for, he thought with a sour smile. “And I know that I’m probably a very long way from the kind of woman you would have liked to marry.” She looked away then, the boldness falling away from her gaze to be replaced with a flicker of vulnerability. She took a breath, raising her chin, and the fleeting glimpse was gone, but he’d seen it and felt remorse for having treated her so harshly. “I will try and make you comfortable, Edward,” she said, and hearing her speak his name was strange and unsettling.
He nodded, unsure of what to say, how to go on. He rolled his eyes inwardly. Good God, what had he become? He’d had no shortage of lovers before ... well, before. He could talk pretty much any woman he chose into bed with minimal effort, and by God, he’d chosen plenty. She was his wife, for heaven’s sake. He should just take her to bed and get on with his life.
Why did it not feel that simple?
She was staring at him and Edward racked his brain for a single intelligent thing to say to her, but his mind was a blank.
She took another step closer, so close that his skin ached. Perhaps she would touch him?
Her cheeks were blazing now and that vulnerability was shining in her eyes again, making his heart feel uneasy.
She could make him care for her.
The thought was unnerving and panic began to grow in his chest. He’d lost too many people to want to care for anymore. Violette was bad enough. His desperate need to keep her safe had almost driven a wedge between them. The idea of his sister alone in London, looking for him, had almost torn him apart.
“W-will you ... will you come to me ... t-tonight, Edward ... please?”
He stared at her as her words slid beneath his skin like a caress, stoking his desires to a flame that blazed beneath his skin, a forest fire, out of control. She reached out a hand and panic gripped him as she went to lay her fingers upon his chest.
He snatched her wrist, holding her away from him, too afraid that he might actually take her to the ground right there in the ballroom if she dared to touch him.
The look in her eyes was horrifying, though, a mixture of devastation and desperate embarrassment, and he felt like the worst kind of monster for treating her so.
He softened his hold on her wrist and tried to keep his voice gentle as he replied.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll come to you. Tonight.” He swallowed and let go of her hand, stepping a little away from her. “Not ... not like this,” he said, hoping that served as some kind of explanation. Perhaps it had, as her face cleared a little, the slightest glimmer of hope in her eyes as she smiled at him. It was hesitant, that smile, unsure of itself, but somehow it hit him square in the chest.
“Tonight, then ... Edward,” she said, her voice soft and so damn inviting he didn’t know how he stood still. Afraid that he might not be able to do so for very much longer, he simply gave her a curt nod, and fled.
***
Belle ran from the ballroom once Edward had turned on his heel and stalked away, and wondered what on earth she had done. Well, it was as it should be, she reasoned. They were married, and married people, they ... they ... Her already blazing cheeks seemed to heat further as she hurried up the stairs to the sanctuary of her room.
Closing the door and leaning against it with a sigh of relief, Belle closed her eyes. She wasn’t entirely sure if she was eager for tonight or if the idea was too terrifying to contemplate. Possibly a very real mixture of the two.
Standing in that ballroom, alone with her husband, her thoughts had been very clear, indeed. Perhaps she really was the wickedly wanton creature he’d described after all? She had wanted to touch him so badly that even her own embarrassment couldn’t deter her. He had been right there, as beautiful and perfect as Michelangelo’s David, and he seemed just as untouchable.
The idea that her touch was repulsive to him was a hard one to ignore. The very thought that he would come to her room and do his duty as her husband when the idea was abhorrent to him made hot tears of shame prickle behind her eyelids.
And yet it made no sense!
Her thoughts drifted back, as they had with startling regularity, to the moments they’d shared in the library. His actions then had not been that of a man repulsed by her, but quite the reverse, in fact. In point of fact, he’d been so consumed that he’d found himself married to her!
Reality reasserted itself and good sense prevailed.