Page 41 of Kathryn

Irritation and an unexpected pang of distress stabbed at him. Gerrit grabbed hold of the irritation but suppressed the pain, viciously driving the pitiful emotion back into whatever crack in his consciousness it had crawled out of.

Echoing the chill in her tone he said, “If you are not breeding by the time I go to London then you will accompany me, regardless of what you wish.”

Her plump coral lips parted, and an angry red flush crept from the exposed swells of her breasts up her chest and throat.

Gerrit’s cock, which had gone soft at her rejection awoke with a vengeance. Why was she blushing? Was she imagining him putting a child inside her? He bloody well was and had been for two long weeks.

Or was she merely furious at his high-handed behavior?

He did not care. Frankly, it was rewarding to get a reaction from her that was not jaded ennui or supercilious mockery.

“If you are enceinte when I come to London,” he went on, savoring her sharp inhalation and what it did to her bodice, “then we shall revisit the matter.”

Still breathing fast, she opened her mouth but then closed it.

Gerrit felt a pang of disappointment at her submission. He had eagerly anticipated one of her tart retorts or cutting set downs. Well, it had been a long day, and likely she was tired. He was bloody exhausted.

Again, he reached for his fork. This time, she didn’t distract him with a question. Indeed, she didn’t say another word for the remainder of the meal.

She waved away the footman’s offer of dessert and abruptly stood. “I will leave you to your port, Your Grace.” She strode from the dining room before he could inform her that he did not engage in the after-dinner ritual unless he was in company.

Bemused, Gerrit stared at the door she had just stormed through. While he was pleased that he was no longer furious as he’d been at the beginning of dinner nor as irritated as he’d been after she had insisted on playing ducks and drakes with the table arrangement, he could not help feeling as if something important had occurred during the meal that he had missed, entirely.

Chapter Eleven

Katie sat mute while Becky brushed out her hair and babbled happily, a flush on her plump cheeks as she shared the servant hall gossip, too distracted by her exciting new life to notice Katie’s grim, uncharacteristic silence.

Dinner had been a miserable disaster.

And the day was not over yet.

More specifically, the night was not over.

How could she have ever believed that she could bear being married to such a dictatorial, rigid, passionless man?

“—and you would have laughed, Katie if you’d heard how condescendingly he talked to me.”

Katie snapped out of her self-absorption. “Dulverton was pompous toward you? What did he—”

“Of course it was not His Grace.” Becky cut her a chiding look as her hands split Katie’s hair into three sections. “I daresay the duke does not even know I exist.” Her maid’s tone implied she was quite happy to continue to escape Dulverton’s notice.

“Then who was pompous?”

“His Grace’s man, Mr. Court. I am convinced he is the most arrogant, haughty man I have ever met.”

Not unlike his master. “What did he do?”

“He said there are new trunks for all your clothing.”

“But mine aren’t even two years old.”

“I told him that. He said His Grace did not care to have unmatched trunks visible on the luggage coach.”

Katie stared.

“That is exactly the look I gave Mr. Court,” Becky said, her fingers deftly plaiting. “Not just trunks, but your valises as well,” she went on, tying a green ribbon around the end of the thick braid. “When I thanked him for his suggestion and said our luggage was just fine, he gave me the most odiously snubbing look and said the sooner I learned that His Grace didn’t give suggestions to his servants, the better it would be for me.”

Katie could see the other woman wanted her to refuse the new luggage and take a stand, but the memory of her husband’s behavior at dinner was exceedingly fresh in her mind. She could just imagine what would happen if her own trunks were strapped to the coach tomorrow. She was just too exhausted to argue. And really, what did it matter to her which trunks were used?