It was an age before she returned to the moment. It was an instant.
He sensed the moment, turning, pressing his lips to the soft inside of her thigh, lingering there until she pushed him away, removing her leg and lowering her skirts, smoothing them with careful precision as she willed her heart to stop beating.
Willed him to stand. She hated him there, on his knees, as though he gave penance.
As though he wanted her.
As though she was for having.
As though he was.
“Sera—”
“No.” She cut him off. Unable to let him finish.
Afraid of what he might say.
“No,” she repeated. Louder. Clearer. “No, Duke. This changes nothing.”
Chapter 14
A Modern “Meet Duke!”
After making him desperate for her, his wife avoided him for a full week. Oh, she sat at breakfasts and luncheons and dinners, and she took her sherry and played croquet on the lawn. She did her requested duty with no sign of hesitation or distaste.
She even saw dossiers delivered to him with clockwork regularity—the ladies’ respective qualities and interests outlined with impressive thoroughness. Indeed, once she received her divorce, Sera could easily find work as a professional matchmaker.
Of course, she wasn’t receiving a divorce.
He’d never planned to give it to her, but now there was no way it was happening. Not when he’d touched her again. How often had he tried to remember that exact sound she made when she found her pleasure. The exact taste of her. The exact feel of her lips against his, of her fingers in his hair, of the weight of her in his arms.
It was all the same, and somehow, none of it was. She was entirely different.
This changes nothing, she’d said.
She was right. It changed nothing.
He still wanted her. He was still going to win her. The only difference was the urgency of his desire to do so. He’d been patient as Job, dammit. He’d given her a week to find him again. To seek him out. He’d sat at meals, the proper duke at his end of the immense dining table. He’d greeted the suitesses—they were going to have to find a better descriptor—pleasantly when he passed them in the hallway.
The times he had gone hunting for her, he’d been waylaid by a collection of cloying mamas, and once commandeered into going hunting for an easier prey with Lord Brunswick, a man who was decent with a shot, but altogether too gleeful at the prospect of shooting things.
For the last seven days, Haven had done his best to stumble upon his wife accidentally. Or, rather, to ensure that she stumbled upon him.
And she hadn’t.
It was as though she had eyes and ears throughout the house, and perhaps she did, considering her mad sisters seemed to be everywhere. The Marchioness of Eversley had taken up residence in his library, Landry’s wife couldn’t stop telling his stable master how to do his work, and that morning, when Mal had dressed, there had been an uncanny amount of white fur on his trousers from Sesily’s damn cat. Not to mention the ass Calhoun, marauding the grounds like a damn pirate, tipping his hat at anything in skirts.
Calhoun.
Even at meals, Sera and Haven were separated, regularly seated at opposite ends of the formal dining room—a room in which he could not remember the last time he’d been—and she disappeared immediately following dinner.
Mal was ashamed to admit that he’d spent three nights listening to the silence on the other side of the adjoining door to their rooms before he’d given up and interrogated the servants about his wife’s evening activities—desperate to know if she was, in fact, spending them with Calhoun, who made himself as scarce as his wife did in the evenings. It was only then that he was told that Mr. Calhoun left the house after the evening meal, and returned the following morning at dawn, before most of the house had rung for tea and toast.
Which meant Sera was alone at night.
In the next room.
Her silence was making him mad.
He’d given her space, dammit, sure she’d return to him. Sure she’d seek him out for—if nothing else—pleasure. She’d come apart in his arms, hard and fast and with an intensity that had brought him with her. That had left him on his knees as she’d straightened herself and turned tail.
And it had been turning tail.
She’d hied out of that room as though Lucifer himself had been on her heels. Coward.
Of course, he had not chased her.
Resisting the thought, Haven stood from the desk in his private study and went looking for his wife. This time, he would find her. And this time, she would not be able to avoid him.
She was in the kitchens, surrounded by his possible future wives and their mothers, as though the women were not houseguests, but rather sightseeing in Bath.
“Now,” she was saying. “As mistress of Highley and Duchess of Haven you will be expected to arrange meals for the duke and any of his guests.”
As Seraphina Bevingstoke had never once played the duchess, Malcolm couldn’t contain the little grunt of surprise that came at her words; the sound was louder than expected, clearly, as it attracted the attention of the entire assembly.
Sera’s face was all calm, even as Mal noted the way her eyes flashed with anger. “Your Grace? Do you require something?”
Yes. You.
“No,” he said. “Please. Go on.”
There was a pause, and he could see she wanted to argue. He raised a brow in invitation. Let her argue. If that was what he could have of her, so be it.
Her lips pressed together in annoyance, and he wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to kiss her always, honestly, but particularly when she was annoyed.
She began anew. “The duke enjoys game, lamb, and duck.”
He did laugh at that. What a ridiculous play in which they all performed.
Sera’s annoyance became anger, and she turned on him again. He took it back. He wanted to kiss her particularly when she was angry. She was most beautiful then. “Your Grace,” she said, not hiding the disapproval in the words. “Again, may we assist you in some way?”
“No,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning against the doorjamb. “In fact, I’m finding this supremely edifying.”
“You are surprised to find that you enjoy duck?”
“I’m surprised to find that you are aware that I enjoy duck.”
She raised her brows. “Am I incorrect?”
“No,” he said. “But you’ve never planned a meal for me in your life.”
He knew he goaded her. But if this was what he could have of her, he would take it.
She smiled. “Considering we’re in the process of divorcing, I would think you’d be happy I haven’t attempted to poison you.”