“I don’t think you do,” he murmured in awed tones.

“Yes, I do,” she said, her hands clenched at her sides. Blast him. Did she have to spell it out? “Do I need to say it? Fine. He had no interest in me. On that point he was quite clear. He found me undesirable.” She giggled. A shrill, humorless laugh rife with pain.

“Meredith, your self-image cannot be that skewed.” He watched her in blinking silence for several moments. “Is that what you thought all these years? That Edmund didn’t want you because he found you lacking?”

She scowled and crossed her arms. “I’m so pleased my shame is a topic of interest to you.”

“Shame?” His eyes scoured her face. “Dear girl, Edmund did not desire you because he could not. No hot-blooded man with healthy appetites would leave their marriage to you unconsummated.” His meaningful look was not lost on her. At the bewildered shake of her head, he clearly decided bluntness was in order. “He could not desire you because he preferred men.”

Her arms dropped limply to her sides. Myriad thoughts raced through her mind, the governing one being disbelief. “That is preposterous. I have never heard such a thing. It cannot be—”

“My sweet, naive girl, it is true. Trust me.”

She splayed a hand to her bosom. “Then it was not me Edmund found objectionable?”

He smiled wryly. “It would have been the female population as a whole that my brother found undesirable.”

“All these years I thought it me.” She pressed her fingertips to her lips and averted her face to shield the springing of hot tears.

“Look at me,” he commanded.

She shook her head vehemently, pitching forward to bury her face in her hands, too embarrassed and overcome by his revelation to face him. She was unaware he had moved until he grasped her by the shoulders. “You’ve suffered enough. Needlessly. No more. You are desirable. I only have to look at you to want you.” His voice grew husky. “Hell, we’ve been arguing because of that very thing. I want you, Meredith. Badly. And I won’t accept a name-only marriage.”

He tilted her face up and ran the rough pad of his thumb over her moist cheeks. Lowering his head, his intention became clear. He meant to kiss her.

Slippery as a fish, she wiggled out of her chair and stood several feet away. “We cannot,” she stammered.

“Cannot?” he echoed. His hands fell, looking strangely bereft at his sides. If she hadn’t moved, she would have those hands on her right now.

“Perhaps I can’t separate intimacy from love,” she cried out desperately, inching behind her chair. “You don’t want that, and I certainly don’t either.”

He paused, clearly thrown off at her confession.

“You don’t want love, Meredith. Love makes people weak and vulnerable. It brings only suffering.” He said this so matter of fact, she knew he believed it.

“Perhaps. But I can’t say I won’t fall prey to it.” She took a deep breath, adding, “Or that I won’t come to want it from you.”

His face hardened with resolve, and that familiar steel returned to his eyes. “I’m hardly the type of man to marry a beautiful woman and not lay a hand on her. Especially after I’ve already had a taste. Just keep reminding yourself what a bastard I am and you’ll be incapable of loving me.”

She shook her head stubbornly and ignored the part about being beautiful. Now was not the time to let his words muddle her head. “You’re marrying me out of some misplaced sense of responsibility,” she insisted. “I don’t think it ethical to share each other’s bed when we have no intention of being a true spouse to each other. Just because we did it once doesn’t make it right.”

His hands opened and closed at his sides, and she sensed him battle the urge to shake her senseless. Her eyes dropped nervously to the worn carpet at her feet, avoiding his reproachful gaze.

“Think whatever you like. But tonight we will consummate our vows. And I doubt very much that your ethics will lodge much of a protest. As I recall, you found it quite enjoyable before.”

His words galled her. Mostly because of their truth. If he waged a campaign of seduction against her, she did not stand a chance. Despair washed over her. From that first night when she stumbled upon him outside the nursery, her heart had begun its descent. But she had to try. Pride demanded it. The crush of Edmund’s rejection wouldn’t compare to what this man could do to her heart. A lifetime tied to a man who could not return her love would be hell. Every moment spent praying that he never realized her heart was irrevocably bound to him would be agonizing. Just being near him day after day, suffering his apathy in the face of her love would slowly destroy her.

Mr. Elliot, hair wet and molded to his head like a helmet from a fresh washing, chose that moment to arrive. The innkeeper and his wife stood in as witnesses. The jolly-faced woman plucked some flowers from a vase and thrust them into Meredith’s hands. Clutching the sticky wet stems in her palms, she numbly listened to the words binding her in marriage for a second time.

“Do you, Nicholas, plight your troth to this woman before God and these witnesses?”

“I do,” Nick replied, voice cool, calm.

Mr. Elliot turned to her and repeated the same question. She tried to absorb the moment so she could later recall it for dissection, but it passed in a blur. She must have answered satisfactorily, for Mr. Elliot pronounced them husband and wife and Nick’s hands were on her shoulders turning her to accept his kiss. His lips merely grazed hers. One second she felt their light pressure, then she was spun about and hugged by the innkeeper’s wife, the woman chatting as happily as if she had not stood witness to hundreds of weddings in her back parlor.

And just like that, it was done.

She was wed to the very man who had vowed to be rid of her.

Chapter 23

They dined at a small linen-covered table in their room. She didn’t know whether the innkeeper had assumed they wanted privacy or if Nick had requested the arrangement, but she could have done without the strained silence.

The bed wasn’t nearly as large as hers at Oak Run, but her eyes continually strayed to its hovering presence, a constant reminder of what was to come, of the wedding night that awaited consummation. The two of them would barely fit in its tight space. They would have to sleep pressed against each other—or on top of each other. A blush heated her face at that image. She took a small sip of her claret, forcing her eyes away from the bed.

“You don’t like the food?”

“It’s fine.” She stabbed a piece of roast chicken in an effort to appear hungry, her mind still grappling with Nick’s earlier revelation. Edmund had not desired her because he preferred men.

Not because he found her personally objectionable. Her entire measure of herself for the last seven years had been based upon that stinging rejection. Now she didn’t know what to think. She was a stranger to herself. Everything she had known, everything she thought, had been based upon… a misunderstanding.

“If you’re finished, I can call for them to clear the plates.” He leaned back and patted his trim stomach. “I’m stuffed.” She noted his plate had indeed been picked clean. While she silently tortured herself, he had enjoyed his dinner.

“You might as well,” she sighed, belatedly realizing that brought her closer to the moment of reckoning. She should have delayed dinner as long as possible. Perhaps until daybreak. Anything to postpone climbing into that bed.

“Would you care for a bath? I can have one sent up.” He set his napkin on the table.

Leaping at the chance for another delay, she nodded. “Yes, please.”

When Nick departed to make the arrangements, she proceeded to unpack her wrinkled clothing from the valise. Shaking out a day dress, she hoped the wrinkles might be gone by morning.

Nick soon returned with a maid who quickly cleared away the dishes. Two boys arrived with steaming buckets. They dragged a hip bath to the center of the room and emptied the buckets into the gleaming copper tub. When the last boy departed, she looked expectantly at Nick, waiting for him to take his leave. Instead, he shut the door, sat on the bed and proceeded to tug off his boots.

“What are you doing?” she demanded, strangling the nightgown clutched in her hands.

“Undressing,” he answered as if it were obvious.

“Here? In front of me?” She looked around frantically as if there might be someplace to hide.

She spied the screen and pointed to it. “Use the screen.”

He arched a brow superciliously. “Meredith, we’re married. And we have already seen each other naked. You hardly need act the affronted maiden.” His first boot clunked to the floor, quickly followed by the second.

“We’ve not seen all of each other,” she hotly reminded.

He paused thoughtfully before smiling dazzlingly. “True. We’ll have to set that matter to rights, won’t we?”

She scowled and tried another tactic. “I thought you were going to let me bathe.”

“I am.”

“So why are you undressing, then?”

“I intend to wash after you.” Shrugging out of his waistcoat, he motioned to the tub. “Don’t let the water grow cold. Get in.”

“With you in the room? No, thank you.” She flung her nightgown on the bed and crossed her arms.

“Take a bath,” he snapped as if she were a wayward child and he the afflicted parent. “I assure you I won’t ogle. I’ve seen n**ed women before, even at their baths. And since we are properly wed, I certainly don’t intend to humor your modesty. You wanted a bath. Get in.” He loosened his cravat and sent it fluttering to the bed.

“Your presence during my bath offends me,” she ground out, dropping her hands to her hips. It took all her control not to stamp her feet. “I would like my privacy.”

“Too bad.” He yanked his shirt from his waistband. She tried not to appreciate the muscle and sinew rippling beneath the sheer linen of his shirt with that angry motion.

“You’re being very ungracious. I simply cannot bathe if you insist on staying in the room.” She grit her teeth, waiting for him to relent and leave.

“Very well. Don’t,” he replied, pulling his shirt over his head. “But there’s no sense letting the water grow cold.” His white shirt landed on the floor like a descending dove. Her jaw went slack and she salivated at the sight of his n**ed chest. A white-ridged scar rippled across his ribs with every movement, emphasizing his tanned skin. Her fingers itched to trace its outline.

His hands were on the buttons of his breeches, and before she had time to look away, those breeches slid down his narrow hips. She spun around but not before catching an eyeful. His low chuckle raised the tiny hairs at her nape. The mental picture of him sliding those breeches down his h*ps stayed with her, tormenting her as she heard a splash of water followed by his low groan of pleasure.

“Meredith, you don’t know what you’re missing,” he called. Somehow she knew he wasn’t referring entirely to the bath.

Careful not to look in the direction of the tub, she grabbed her nightgown off the bed and moved behind the screen to change, doing her best to ignore the sounds of him bathing. Unable to resist, she peeked carefully around the screen and admired his smooth, broad back. Satisfied he was concealed from the waist down, she emerged, planning to be asleep before he joined her in bed.

Or at least feigning sleep.

He stopped lathering soap to stare at her as she hurried past, giving the tub a wide berth. The heat of his eyes followed her.

Turning back the covers, she lifted a foot to climb into bed when he spoke. “Would you mind bringing me a towel? I don’t want to get water on the floor.”

Grudgingly, she picked up one of the neatly folded towels. Careful to keep her eyes from straying to the murky depths of the water, she walked closer and handed it to him, stretching her arm so she did not have to draw too near. She stared at the towel in her hand, its worn, frayed edges a safer sight than the man before her and the temptation he presented.