A Portrait of Love (The Academy of Love #3) - Minerva Spencer Page 0,75
behavior was expected. She was mortified to the bone.
Right from that first awkward ride to see the view at Whitcomb Simon Fairchild had caused her to behave in ways that were not normal or regular for her.
Honey didn’t know who she was when she was with him.
And God help her: all she wanted was to be that woman again. And again.
“You look as if you are in pain, my lady.”
Her eyes flew open and met his.
“You’re awake,” she said stupidly.
He nodded gravely. “I am awake.”
Why did she feel as if there was more to those words than their face value?
He stretched and tried to rearrange himself in the cramped carriage, grimacing as he shifted on the seat.
“I’m sorry.”
He glanced up. “For what?”
“For refusing to ride in the duke’s traveling coach when you suggested it. I daresay it is far more luxurious than this.”
“It is.”
They rode in silence—awkward on her side, at least, although he looked contented enough to gaze out the window.
Honey kept seeing him as he’d been on the bed. His body slicked with sweat; his taut belly ridged with muscle. Even the scars he bore—and there were many—seemed to make him more attractive, more … dangerous.
But then she recalled how sweet he’d been last night, how slow and patient with her. It was obvious he had not experienced sexual release last night or he would not have needed to do such a thing this morning. Would he?
Honey had been insensitive to his needs last night, too immersed in her own pleasure to think about him.
“You’re doing it again,” he said, a trace of a smile on his lips.
“Doing what?” she asked, although she knew exactly what he meant.
His smile grew a few degrees warmer. “When is the last time you went to Brighton?”
Although she resented the way he’d ignored her question, she couldn’t help being grateful to talk about something less anxiety-provoking than what she’d been thinking about.
“My father took us there for three summers starting when I was seventeen.”
“For any particular purpose?”
“At first it was because of a woman who lived there most of the year.”
Perdita Davis had been a beautiful widow who’d hidden her dislike of Honey from her usually astute father for all but the last few weeks of their association.
Honey had disliked the woman every bit as much.
Dislike? Or was it jealousy, you felt?
She scowled at the thought. I was not jealous.
Simon interrupted her internal feuding. “Your father did not wish to remarry?”
“I don’t know.”
“He didn’t enjoy female company?”
She frowned; just what was he getting at?
“He did,” she admitted, “But he never seemed to come to the sticking point.”
“Why do you suppose that was?”
“I don’t know.”
Simon’s smirk grew and he turned to look out the window.
“Why are you smiling like that?”
“Because you are a bad liar Honoria.”
Honey stiffened. “I don’t know what you mean.”
He sighed, as if she were a tiresome child refusing to eat her dinner or finish her sums. “He didn’t remarry because of you and you know that. He loved you more than anyone else.”
Guilt flooded her at his words. “What of it? I loved him just as much.”
“I know you did. What did you think of the lovers he took?”
When she didn’t answer, he laughed.
“What?” she demanded rudely.
“You should see your expression.”
“What about it?”
“You were jealous; you disliked those women who came between you.”
“That’s not true,” she retorted.
He just smiled.
She opened her mouth to deny it again, but then stopped.
Why bother lying? It had driven her to distraction when her father’s lovers had invaded their happy life. Even though she’d been young, she’d known that jealousy was an ugly, damaging emotion; she’d tried to hide her feelings, but of course her father knew her better than anyone.
She had always suspected, at the back of her mind, that he had remained unmarried because of Honey.
While she loved him all the more for it, she couldn’t help feeling guilty that she’d deprived him of intimacy. He’d been so young when he died—only forty-five—and her mother had died decades before, leaving him alone to raise their daughter.
Honey had forgotten that unpleasant aspect of her character—her capacity for jealousy. How like her new husband to make her remember it. After all, he was so good at eliciting other unpleasant behaviors.
“I doubt that you kept him from remarrying, Honoria. I imagine his devotion to you irked his lovers and that he saw that,” Simon said. “All those women must have known they would never be first with him. And so it should be.” He smiled