The silence extended and extended. Growing heavier with every second.
Still he didn’t touch her.
Eventually the strains of the day began to tell. Morwenna had steeled herself to face this engagement party for weeks, long before Garson had formally declared himself. She’d known that she’d say yes to him. It was past time for her to take up a new life, instead of merely existing like a wraith trapped in a prison of grief.
But it had been so hard to take that step toward a new future.
She’d known Robert was dead, had finally accepted it in her mind. But her stubborn, loving heart had fought against taking another husband. Even though Garson was a good man, and she was lucky to have won his love.
So tonight’s shocks had come hard upon weeks of tormented soul-searching and sleeplessness.
She’d have wagered everything she owned on not sleeping a wink. But her heavy lids drooped, and she found herself sliding down in the bed.
“Good night, Morwenna,” Robert said softly, after what felt like hours.
“Good night,” she mumbled back. And just on the verge of sleep, “I’m so happy you’re back , Robert.”
If he replied, she didn’t hear him.
Chapter Four
* * *
Robert lay on his back beside his wife, wide awake and burning.
He’d spent long, lonely years hungering for just this. The comforts of home. The warmth of family. Above all, Morwenna, whose presence had fed his soul from the first time he saw her.
But reality turned out to be a horribly distorted version of the visions that had sustained him.
Seeing his family again had been wonderful, of course it was. But their open affection and joy had made his skin crawl. He wasn’t used to dealing with crowds of people yet, despite eight weeks on the whaler that had rescued him. Those rough Norwegian sailors had largely left him alone, once they met his immediate physical needs for food and clothing, and once they’d done their best to patch up his wounds. The language barrier and also the code of hard men who faced danger every day of their lives had preserved Robert’s privacy.
Entering that packed room downstairs had tied his gut in knots.
Now he stretched stiff—in all senses of the word—and wakeful on a soft feather mattress in the finest linen sheets. And his body, accustomed to a hard wooden pall
et and freezing cold and damp, couldn’t adjust to the change. He was dead tired, so exhausted every muscle ached, yet he couldn’t sleep.
Nor could he stop stewing about the woman curled into a ball on the edge of the mattress, as though even in sleep, she could hardly bear his nearness.
His wife, who had told him there were things he needed to know. Did those “things” include a love affair with the man she’d planned to marry?
Dear God, perhaps she’d taken more than one lover. After all, he’d been gone a long time, and nobody knew better than Robert what a passionate creature Morwenna was.
Savage masculine rage settled in his gut, even as he knew he was unfair. While his animal self might want the woman he loved to swear a vow of eternal chastity in her widowhood, the civilized man who still existed—just!—knew he was acting like a bear.
That civilized man told him he should be glad she’d gone on to find new happiness.
That civilized man could go to hell.
Whatever evil it spoke of him, he couldn’t get over believing Morwenna was his forever. On this side of heaven or the next. And be damned if he’d tolerate her making sheep’s eyes at another man.
He wanted her like the devil. That was no surprise. He’d wanted her naked and in his bed since the first time he saw her at that woefully provincial assembly in Truro.
But he’d imagined on his homecoming, gratitude and sentiment would outweigh desire. In his captivity, he hadn’t known a woman’s touch, and for most of that time, he’d borne his celibacy with reasonable patience.
That wasn’t the case right now. Celibacy in his wife’s presence itched like the devil. Morwenna was lucky he hadn’t pushed her down in front of that glittering crowd downstairs and claimed his rights. Just after he stuck a knife into that much admired gentleman, Lord Garson, so the bastard never again poached on Robert’s dominion.
Lying beside her now, he barely contained his urge to tup her.