The Secret Love of a Gentleman. Jane Lark

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ fingers slipped inside her open nightgown and skimmed over her skin, searching out her nipple. He teased it to a peak.

      She yearned for more than this, she yearned for love. Her palm rested on his shoulder then slid down across his warm, naked chest. Soft skin covered the firm muscle beneath.

      His hand began drawing up the hem of her nightgown and his lips left her mouth to kiss the bruise beside it, then kiss across the bruises on her neck, where his fingers had gripped earlier.

      He did this every day, ripped her apart and then put her back together at night, and she did not even think it deliberate or mean, he was simply cold-blooded. She truly believed he had no idea how his behaviour hurt her.

      When the hem of her nightgown reached her waist, his fingers touched her between her legs, gently caressing and calling to her body.

      The magnetism in his character, his presence, his touch, pulled her to do things for him, to wish to be near him, to love him.

      When he entered her she was damp between her legs and hot, and his intrusion was hard and fast, yet not painful. This was always how he loved her, with a force and strength that sent her reeling.

      The little death swept over her in moments, and in a few more moments he spilled his seed inside her. Another minute’s tick of the mechanism of the clock on the mantle above the hearth and he was withdrawing, disengaging, mentally and physically denying her again.

      The pain of her bruises flooded her senses, while the pain of his lack of care filled her soul.

      He kissed her cheek. “Thank you. God willing there will be a child soon.” Then he got up and returned to his rooms. His departure ripped another little hole in her heart.

      When Caro rose in the morning she had her maid carefully powder her face and neck, and she chose a gown with long sleeves. They hid the bruises, but not the swelling about her lip. She tried to hide that with rouge. It was not the worst it had been.

      Her stomach trembled, along with her hands, as she walked down to break her fast with Albert before he left. The marble-lined hallway was cold.

      A footman bowed his head when she reached the door of the morning room. He held the door open for her.

      Her stomach tumbled over. Every servant in the house must know how she was treated.

      Albert looked up. He’d been reading the paper while eating scrambled eggs, his fork lowered to the plate.

      She longed to see that old look of want and reverence that used to hover in his brown eyes, but instead he stared at her as though she was an oddity in a village fair.

      A sharp and violent sensation raced through her blood, reaching into her limbs—terror. She hoped it did not show on her face. Had she done anything wrong today? He did not only beat her for her lack of ability to breed; everything that went wrong in the house was her fault, a fork out of place, a glass broken, something he did not like on a menu. The servants were her responsibility and therefore their errors were hers.

      “Caro.” He stood up and gave her a shallow bow. “Good morning.” Then he sat again.

      She took her seat at the far end of the table, her fingers shaking when she accepted her food.

      Albert was a dozen years older than her. His maturity and strength of character had seemed a blessing to her younger self when they’d met, when he’d been adoring and attentive. She’d felt sheltered by him then.

      Now, this was their day; they would take breakfast together and then he would leave, and perhaps return to dine with her, or to accompany her to a ball, or ask her to entertain his political friends. Then at night he would lay with her, at whatever hour he returned home from his mistress, or mistresses.

      “I shan’t be home for dinner.” Albert set his napkin down and rose.

      Caro looked up. There was no emotion in his blue eyes.

      She had tried. She had tried to be a good wife. She loved him. She had tried to give him children. She could not. She had failed.

      The blood from her torn heart dried at little more, just as the blood had dried on the cut his ring had ripped in the flesh of her face last night.

      How much longer could she live like this? If she lost another child…

      In the last six weeks he’d beaten her a dozen times.

      After the loss of the last child he’d left her in bed a day later, unable to move, her face grotesquely swollen.

      If she lost another child would he kill her?

      Would anyone care?

      Her brother would care. Drew. He would. Like her, he’d been a cuckoo in the Marquis of Framlington’s nest, and their parents’ rejection had forged a bond, which had held. She’d clung to Drew for security as a child, for the love and attention their parents never gave. Drew was the only person who had returned her love.

      Her closeness to her brother was the only thing in her life that had lasted.

      She finished the last mouthful on her plate to make it appear to the servants that all was well, then rose and left the room, passing through the cold, austere marble hallway.

      Drew had begged her to leave Albert. He had offered to keep her. He’d recently married a woman with money and he’d said he would buy Caro a property somewhere in the country where she would be safe. But how could she run from someone with the power of the seventh Marquis of Kilbride, and how could she leave when she still loved him, and yet… How do I stay?

      The blood about her heart congealed and the bruises in her soul ached.

      If she stayed there would be more beatings and more children lost.

      Drew had promised her security.

      Her fingers slid along the stone banister as she climbed the stairs to her rooms.

      If she stayed nothing would change. Nothing would become better, it could only be worse. The doctor had said she would never have a child and she would always have to look into the eyes she loved, which had once held a look of adulation and were now hollow windows, which merely acknowledged her existence.

      She would run. She had to leave Albert. Yet if she did, she would leave herself here, her soul and her heart. They might be wounded but they were not dead, and they still loved Albert with a loyalty that she did not think would end. She had been so starved of love, to have known what she had with Albert, even for a year, would stay with her forever.

      But there was no other choice than to leave. This was a poisoned marriage. He would kill her in the end.

       Chapter 2

      Caro descended from the coat-of-arms embossed carriage her husband provided for her use, gripping the hand of a footman.

      Her foot touched the pavement of Tavistock Street, the address of her modiste, and her heart raced, its rhythm running through СКАЧАТЬ