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“And have the servants set everything up in the gazebo outside,” he added. “The weather is glorious. It would be a shame to waste all this sunshine by hiding away indoors.”

“As you wish, Your Grace.”

Morton did not need to know that his master liked watching the sunlight glance off Phoebe’s golden curls, nor did he need to know how it made the golden flecks in her eyes shimmer like fairy dust.

He just needed to put the damned bonbons on the tea table.

“Is the Duchess in the parlor?” Ethan asked.

The butler shook his head. “Miss Ella told me that she and Her Grace will be in the Duchess’s rooms, getting ready. They have yet to emerge.”

Ethan smiled, pleased that he had not been the only one fussing over his appearance with Huxley earlier. It was just that Phoebe was mistaken on one thing—no matter what dress she put on or how she wore her hair, he would always prefer the sight of her naked, her golden curls spread across his pillow…

He groaned and resisted the urge to slap himself.

Focus, he reminded himself, desperately trying to put the thought of her naked on his bed out of his mind.

If he failed, then he might very well have to kiss that fantasy goodbyeforever.

“Your Grace?”

The soft voice seemed to draw on all the pent-up desire he had been holding in for the better part of the day.

He turned around and found Phoebe standing at the foot of the staircase, her luscious curves encased in a lovely dress the color of pale buttercups in the morning sunlight. Her hair had been pulled back and held with a few simple pins, but the rest of her golden waves cascaded past her shoulders down to her back.

She was breathtakingly beautiful. How the hell was he supposed to keep his sanity intact with her looking like that?

“Wife.” He regarded her with a teasing smile as he reached for her hand and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to it. “Do you intend to serve yourself for tea?”

Her eyes narrowed quickly. “You wish!”

He laughed and tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow. “Well, a man can dream.” He paused and then frowned. “On second thought, they better not. Only I can dream of you.”

There they were again—those strange, possessive tendencies.

Ethan quickly pushed away those dark thoughts, focusing on the radiance of the woman beside him. He smiled at her as he led her out the doors to where the afternoon sunlight spilled golden onto the gardens.

Phoebe looked up at him in confusion. “I thought we were having tea in the parlor.”

He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “How dreadfully boring. Do you not think it more romantic to have tea with the flowers blooming all around us?”

She smiled up at him. A good sign, he believed.

“I did not think you given to romance, husband,” she teased him. “What has brought on this un-Wolfish behavior?”

“Well, a certain duchess, if you must know.” He chuckled.

He led her to the gazebo, where the servants were laying out plates and pastries, as well as the bonbons he had brought earlier. At the sight of the familiar, delicately colored pastries, her eyes lit up.

“You brought me bonbons?” she asked him excitedly. “How did you know?”

“Trade secrets,” he told her with a mischievous waggle of his eyebrows.

Trade secrets named Alice Barkley Fitzroy, in particular.

He led her to her seat and pushed it in, pausing to brush a lock of hair from her shoulder and breathe in that soft, feminine fragrance that was distinctly her.

“You must forgive me,” he told her huskily. “I could not resist.”