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“That you meant to fall in love before we consummated our marriage.”

She looked up at him and opened her mouth. Guilt started to gnaw at him, novel and alien and mostunwelcome.

But then, she ducked her head and buried her nose back into the side of his neck. “I must concede and admit that you were right about this one,” she told him softly. “Maybe pleasure is enough.”

He sucked in a harsh breath. “Right,” he muttered.

Maybe pleasure is enough.

He should have been pleased that she was finally seeing it his way. Why then did it feel as if his words had come back to haunt him instead?

“Ethan?”

He pressed a soft kiss to the crown of her head, his heart aching abominably. “Yes, Duchess?”

“You talk too much,” she complained. “Let us go to sleep.”

He laughed, although the sound echoed hollowly in his ears. “Sweetheart, if you still have enough energy left after what we did, then I did not do enough.”

She let out a huff that sounded quite like indignation. She threw her arm over his chest and murmured in his ear, “Stay.”

He opened his mouth to say something, but he heard her soft snore.

She had fallen asleep. In his arms.

But Ethan could not surrender to slumber as easily as she did. He stayed wide awake, holding her in his arms. His heart pounded loudly in his chest.

He had never stayed with a woman after the act. Had never taken anyone to the bath or cuddled after.

Only Phoebe.

She had upended everything in his life from the moment she declared her most ardent affection for him during his wedding.

Everything was changing before he could even take stock of it.

He sucked in a harsh breath.

He needed to get away. He needed to clear his head and get it straight once more.

Slowly, so as not to wake his slumbering wife, he extricated himself from her embrace and slid out of bed. He hurriedly put his clothes back on as best as he could.

I am so sorry, Phoebe. So very sorry.

CHAPTER 28

He looked like an absolute idiot, running away from hiswife, stumbling over his damned boots as if the hounds of hell were chasing him.

Even the coachman and the footman looked at him as if he had gone half mad, before they composed themselves and readied the carriage in no time. It was at that moment that Ethan thanked the heavens that he paid his staff well for their discretion.

“Are we to head back to the townhouse, Your Grace?” the footman asked him.

Ethan started to nod but then stopped himself. He could not go back to the townhouse—not while his head was not screwed on the right way.

“To Wolverton Estate,” he replied instead.

Even in the darkness, he swore he could see the footman turn three shades paler.

“W-Wolverton Estate, Your Grace?”