left the air.
She put her hands against his chest and shoved. “Stop it!”
She smelled like rose blossoms after a rain, an quintessentially British smell that he hadn’t even remembered until now. He braced his arms on either side of her head, gazed down at her furious face, and declared, “I want to stay married.”
“Not even a pirate gets everything he wants!”
“Why not?” He bent down and nuzzled her neck. He felt the shock of his touch reverberate down her body. “I like you. And you’re damn beautiful. Why not stay married?”
“Because I don’t want to!” she said in a near shriek.
“How can you know until you try it?”
“I don’t want to try it. You don’t understand. I have a life here. I have children; I have friends. There’s no place for—for you.”
Her words punctured the sensual haze that had his hands hovering just below her breasts. No place for him?
There was a faint, hollow ring within his chest every time he heard the word home. He didn’t belong in the world of his father, that of titles, and noblesse oblige.
Nor did he belong on board ship, not anymore. That life was over.
Poppy—no, Phoebe—was his home, his new home. Even if she didn’t want to acknowledge that.
He straightened. Tousled hair spread around her face. She looked vulnerable and unbearably desirable. His fingers trembled to pet and caress her until she was as aroused as he was.
So much for the impotence of their wedding night. He’d had an erection from the moment she entered the room.
“Very well,” he said, falling back a step.
She sat up, stark relief on her face. “You’ll be happier in London, Griffin. People there are more sophisticated than they are here. Why, they probably won’t turn a hair at that mark on your cheek.”
He burst into laughter. She sounded like someone reassuring a merchant awaiting his imports that pirates were far and few between.
“You would be terribly bored here,” she insisted.
There was no doubt in his mind but that he would spend the rest of his days in this precise place. Unless Arbor House became too small for all the children he hoped they’d have. “Perhaps I will pay my father a visit now, as we are not far from Walford Court.”
He watched her eyes lighten and added, “But I will return home for dinner, if you wouldn’t mind holding the meal for me. Would it bother you if my father disowned me? I think there’s a reasonable chance that he will.”
“Not at all,” she said, before adding, “but it doesn’t matter what I think.”
“You are my wife. What you think matters.” Their eyes caught for a moment and he put everything in that look, telling her silently that there was no chance he would leave the marriage. Under any circumstances.
She swallowed, and he thought she probably understood.
“I am your husband, Phoebe,” he stated. “The marriage may not be a legal one yet, but it will become one tonight.”
“Why would you want me?” she whispered. “You . . . the children . . . I’m not a lady, Griffin. I’d make a wretched viscountess.”
He couldn’t help grinning. “Do you imagine I’ll be a suitable viscount? We can cause our scandals together. I would like children of my own blood, but I don’t mind that Colin will inherit my title. Frankly, inasmuch as your dowry brought my father’s estate back out of debt, you should have the right to choose its successor. And you did.”
“About the children—”
He put a finger over her lips before she could make whatever apology she had in mind. He didn’t want to hear about the children’s father, not now. The man was dead.
“I want you, Phoebe.” His voice had dropped to a husky key that spoke for itself.
She responded with a look of panic. Yet the ripple in her slender throat as she swallowed sent another slash of lust through him. He was in bad shape.
“My mother . . . I am . . .” A moment of silence. “All right.”
It felt as if she had accepted his marriage proposal again, not that there’d been a first one. Their marriage had been a business matter settled between their fathers, with talk of jointures and dowries and settlements.
This was a simple matter between a man and a woman.
“It’s a bad bargain for you,” he said, voicing what he was thinking. “I spent years on the wrong side of the law, I’m lame in one leg, and ferocious to boot. Scarred and tattooed.”
She looked him over.