Married to a Stranger by Louise Allen

Author:Louise Allen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781408923665
Publisher: Harlequin (UK) Limited
Published: 2011-10-09T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

Callum would not come to her tonight, not after that ghastly scene in the drawing room. Sophia sat bolt upright in bed, her hands knotted in the sheet. How much had Hawksley heard? She had not been aware of the door opening behind her—had it been ajar? The entire staff could have overheard.

She felt sick. Callum was obviously furious—how could he be anything else? Her foolish teasing had turned into a display that he could characterise as vulgar or jealous or immodest, or all three. And she could not blame him. Why had she reacted so badly to the thought that he might take a mistress? It was what men did. And she could hardly delude herself that hers was a love match.

He had been so polite throughout dinner afterwards that it had cut like a knife. Of course he was well bred and so much in control that he could preserve a perfect front before the servants. From somewhere she had conjured up equally polite responses with the result that they must have sounded like complete strangers who did not take to each other very much, gamely making conversation during some interminable dinner party.

Hawksley had looked as though he was stuffed. So had Michael and Andrew. But then good servants always did when they were trying to be inconspicuous during meals.

He won’t come tonight. He won’t come until he forgives me—and how am I ever going to make him do that when I dare not mention the subject to apologise?

The door opened and the candles flickered wildly. ‘Callum?’ It came out as a squeak.

‘Who else were you expecting, pray?’ There was an edge to the question that she supposed she deserved. Her husband was still in evening breeches and tailcoat. As she watched, wide-eyed with apprehension, he began to undress, each garment placed on the chair with a deliberation that only tightened her trepidation, notch by notch.

‘No one, of course. I was not expecting you. I thought after we had quarrelled that you would not want to come to me.’

‘That was not a quarrel,’ Callum said as he sat down and rolled off his stockings. ‘That was a clarification of expectations.’

He stood up and draped his shirt over the back of the chair. Sophia’s eyes followed his hands to the waistband of his breeches. The thin silk hid nothing, which was something that young ladies were expected to ignore. One averted one’s eyes from this insight into male anatomy, although as one outrageous dowager had said within Sophia’s hearing at a party, it was interesting to see what the young men were thinking about.

Callum was not, apparently, thinking about making love to her. Then why had he come? Perhaps she was going to get another lecture about her behaviour, although she could not think of anything else she had done wrong. Not yet. A sin of omission, then. Sophia swallowed a sigh.

He stood there, hands at his waist for a moment, then turned and began to systematically snuff

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