ë Archer - Demon’s Bride

He had returned home after one term, swearing never to go back. After that, he had worked beside his father once more, only by then work meant not the saddlery but Exchange Alley.

She dropped her gaze, yet only slightly, before looking up again. “So, those of noble birth are all the same person wearing different masks?”

Her voice held a bite, faint, but there, and he respected her for it.

“There are ... exceptions.”

“And I am indeed grateful you made an exception for me.” She moved away from him. “I find myself chilled. I’ll return inside.”

He caught her wrist as she turned, and drew her back. “Neither of us is who others suppose us to be.”

She gave this consideration, which was more than he had given her. “These past few days have been educational.”

“For both of us.” He still believed most aristos to be spoiled buffoons, but he was sage enough to admit when there was something to learn. Mostly, he was learning the intricacies of his wife. “Stay out here with me. Please,” he remembered to add.

Her wrist slid from his grasp, and for a moment, he thought she would storm back into the house. Instead, she looked pointedly at his arm, which he offered. She accepted, and they resumed their stroll, with the sounds of crunching shells beneath their feet and the distant tolling of Saint George’s bell marking the hour.

Ten o’clock. Bram would be at the Snake and Sextant, the usual meeting place for the Hellraisers before they ventured out for the night’s exploits. Edmund went out seldom, now that he had the wife he had coveted. John often had dealings at Whitehall that kept him late. Which meant that Bram was alone. Unless Leo joined him.

He waited for the feeling of restlessness that always presaged his evening entertainment. The need to do and see more and more. An unceasing appetite for the pleasures afforded by wealth.

Part of him felt he should go, merely on principle. Prove to himself that marriage had not changed him, nor the essence of himself.

Yet jagged and uncertain their conversations might be, he found himself enjoying Anne’s company. He liked talking with her. If he required a rationale, he could tell himself that he merely wanted to speed up the process of rogering his wife. And he did want that. But she was more than a receptacle or ornament. A person. Entire and genuine. Soft, but not fragile. Innocent, yet not immature.

There could be much more to Anne than he had first accounted—a thought both alarming and intriguing.

Since the subject seemed to interest her, he said, “The money my father earned from the commission was substantial. More than he could make in a year. But he didn’t put it back into the saddlery. He invested it instead. In a shipment of Indian cotton.”

“I didn’t realize saddle makers knew so much of overseas trade.”

“They don’t. My father would go to the pub and have someone read him the newspaper. Got his imagination sparked by tales of wealthy nabobs and all the faraway places making such wondrous things. He wanted to be a part of that.”

“It was a bold thing to do,” Anne said quietly. “Invest when he had so little experience with it.”

“The neighbors called him a fool for pissing away a year’s earnings, and all for a bit of Oriental cloth. Their smirks died when he earned thrice what he had invested.”

“What a fine day that must have been for you.” She smiled.

He remembered it vividly. The letter that came from London. Leo reading the letter aloud as his father stared at the banknotes stacked on their single, rough table. His mother’s tears. And his father’s vow that he would invest again, and again, until they could have butter on their bread and fresh tea in their cups. His father had contracted a sickness that day, a sickness for the future. Leo caught it, too. A fever in his blood, one he hoped would never be cured.

“By the time I was fifteen,” he said, “we were more than comfortable. We were rich. And every day, I grow richer.”

“Gaining you everything you want.”

He chuckled at that. “There is always more.”

“Never enough?” She glanced up at him through her lashes.

“When I become the wealthiest man in England, perhaps then.” But he doubted it. He stiffened when he caught the soft music of her chuckle. “You think my ambition ridiculous.”

She shook her head. “You mistake me. My laughter is for the peculiarities of circumstance. Yesterday, I found myself married to a man I barely know. And today, I learn that this man and I share something unexpected.”

“We share a name now.” And a bed, though they had only slept in this bed.

“Something else. For I realized just now”—she moved to stand before him—“that the saddler’s son and the poor baron’s daughter are more than husband and wife.” A rueful smile curved her lips. “We have both stood outside the assembly hall, watching the dancers.” She glanced toward the house. “Now it’s time to go inside.”

After the revelations of the evening, Anne had anticipated Leo might press the moment and claim his husbandly rights. A shivering sense of excitement and apprehension had accompanied her over the course of the night, that uneasy comingling of want and fear. Yet when they had lain side by side in bed, he had done nothing more than kiss her cheek before turning over and falling quickly, deeply asleep.

Leaving her again to stare off into the darkness, her mind churning.

This morning, she heard him stir, and the quiet exchange between him and his valet. She sat up when Spinner left the chamber.

“Did I wake you?” Leo frowned in concern as he tugged on the cuffs of his dark blue coat. Its slim cut emphasized the leanness of his form, the breadth of his shoulders, and with the early morning light seeping in beneath the curtains, he was a crisp, handsome herald of day.

I cannot believe I am married to this man.

“Last night gave me much to think about,” she said.

He drifted closer to the bed. She felt acutely conscious of her rumpled nightgown, her state of near undress, when he had armored himself in impeccable tailoring. She sat in bed, whilst he stood. Their inequality unsettled her.

“I would like to help,” she said.

“Help.” He spoke the word as if uncertain of its meaning.

She made herself meet his gaze. “You and I, we’re not precisely desirables amongst the ranks of Society. I have breeding and connection, but no wealth. You have fortune, but no pedigree. Each of us with something the other lacks. Before we wed, I was apprised by my father of the monthly allowance you settled on me.” The amount still stunned her. She could not possibly spend it within the course of twelve months, let alone one. “So you have given me what I lacked before our marriage, and I want to do the same for you.”

He raised a brow. “I want nothing given from obligation.”

“Not obligation—a desire to help.” She fought frustration. What a stubborn man, determined to see everything as a battle. “There are men of the gentry with whom you could form connections. Men of power and influence.”

“I know many of those men, and they’re little willing to accept me as one of theirs.”

“It’s in the approach. If you go at them head-on, they become cornered dogs, snarling and bristling. But a slower side advance might yield better response. Perhaps not a tail wagging, but at least a tentative sniff. That is far better than a bite.”

A smile tilted the corner of his mouth. “I believe you are calling these noblemen sons of bitches.”

She bit back a shocked laugh. “Some men of science theorize that humans are merely animals. I’ve been to assemblies—my conclusion is that animals are more civilized.”

“How do you propose we tame these savage dogs?”

“Through the bitches—I mean, the wives.”

“Bitches,” Leo confirmed.

Again, Anne found herself appalled ... and also thrilled by his candor. “A few morning calls on the right wives could secure us any number of advantages. Including invitations to private gatherings and dinner.”

Outsider Leo might be, but he recognized the benefit of dining with select company. Alliances fashioned over the roast, and confederacy shaped between after-dinner glasses of brandy. Anne actually disliked paying calls, and had found them exceedingly tedious when her mother dragged her along on them. Either the conversations were full of meaningless prattle, or else scandals were dragged forth with all the glee of a resurrectionist procuring a corpse.

“Seldom have I received dinner invitations,” he noted.

“Single men might not. There are advantages to marriage.”

His gaze, suddenly hot, raked over her, and she struggled to keep from folding her arms protectively across her chest. Yet deep within her, a quick flare of response ignited.

“I’m aware of some of the advantages,” he murmured.

Anne dropped her gaze. Last night, as he had slept, she stared at the shapes his body made beneath the bedclothes, their solidity and strength. He heated the bed far more than any warming pan, and as the night’s chill had seeped into the room, she had wanted to press herself against him. Only partly for warmth.

“Doors may open for you now. Married men are seen as more respectable than bachelors.” She traced the knotted pattern on the counterpane. “Less threatening, too.”

Leo made a soft noise, something akin to a laugh, though absent of any humor. “Perception and the truth seldom overlap.”

She glanced up. “Are you a threat?”

“To you, never.”

Some comfort in that, yet she did not miss what was couched in his response. But his gaze warmed as he looked down at her.