“I should say so, yes. And yours too, of course. I would have told you the truth of the matter, but you rushed from Kilbracken as if the very devil were on your heels, so I didn’t have the opportunity. Then my father and Sophia wouldn’t allow me to say a single word.”
“Why did you continue the charade?”
“Because, as I told you, I didn’t want to marry a Sassenach. I didn’t want to leave my home or Scotland. Since I couldn’t avoid it, I knew you would leave me alone as soon as possible if I appeared the ugly dowd. And, of course, you did.”
Hawk was silent for many moments. He stretched his arms over his head and lounged back in his chair. He looked indolent, and in perfect control. She felt a frisson of alarm. What was the wretched man thinking now? Something evil, no doubt.
He said finally, “You are quite beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
“And you are everything I didn’t want in a wife.”
“You, my lord—”
“Philip,” he said mildly.
“—you are everything I don’t want in a husband!”
“Then it appears we are even. I imagine that you had a difficult time keeping that sharp tongue of yours in your mouth when I was about.”
“A very difficult time, you are quite right about that.”
“I got the sister who was the worst, didn’t I?”
“Worst? I beg you to define that!”
“I should say,” Hawk said thoughtfully, stroking his fingertips over his jaw, “that you are headstrong, willful, too independent, and quite used to having men fall all over you like panting puppies.”
To his fury, she grinned at him. “You sound just like my father. And on such short observation,” she marveled aloud. “Most impressive, my lord.”
“Frances, I can beat you, you know, and indeed I shall if you don’t cease your sarcasm.”
“No, you can’t. If you tried such a thing, I should lay you low, I swear it.”
“I should be curious to know just how you could bring me low. You’re half my size.”
“I would think of something.”
Yes, oh yes, she would, he knew. Hawk swept his mind nearly clean to find something that would intimidate her, put her back in her woman’s place where she belonged. He sat forward suddenly and bestowed upon her his most leering smile. “Would you like to know why I came back unannounced?”
“No, but you will tell me, I suppose.”
“I came back to seduce my wife. My guilt drove me back. I wanted, finally, to see your breasts.”
To his immense satisfaction, a flush started at her shoulders and spread upward to her eyebrows.
“My mistress informed me very tartly that spectacles, ugly caps, and gowns could be removed. That is what I intended to do. That is what I now plan to do, very soon.”
Frances licked her lips. She stared at him. “No,” she said, shaking her head, her voice a thin, high sound.
“You are my wife. You will obey me both in our bed and out of it.”
He had terrified her, he knew it, but something deep within him was angered at her immense and obvious distress at him bedding her. He wasn’t ugly, for God’s
sake. He was an excellent lover.
And you’ve got excellent teeth, stupid sod!