Page 51 of A Duchess to Unravel

Alistair smirked as he heard Theo’s anger-filled rambling from down the hall. After the punishment he’d put her through at dinner, he’d suspected he was going to get another visit and sure enough…

He swung his door open and let out a satisfied chuckle as he saw Theo before him, fist raised ready to, no doubt, bang it down.

“Good evening,” he greeted, waving her in.

Theo glared at him and dropped her fist to her side. For a moment she simply stood there, working her jaw back and forth as she seethed, then crossed her arms. Alistair stood in a relaxed position, leaning against the door.

“Are you going to come in or not?” he asked.

“How dare you,” Theo shot back, moving with a quickness to enter his study. “Howdareyou play such a trick in front of my friends!”

Alistair calmly shut the door behind her and began to loosen his cravat.

“They are my friends now as well, Theo,” he replied, “You must learn to share them.”

“Alistair!”

He yanked his cravat from his neck with a quickness and gave her a challenging look.

“I warned you not to cross the line into disrespect, Theo,” he replied, “And that little show you put on at dinner was you running right through that line. You will do better to pay heed to my warnings next time.”

He walked through his study to the opposite door that led to his bedroom, and opened it; Theo closely following him.

“What I eat and when I eat is none of your business!” She yelled.

Alistair rounded on her so quickly that she bumped into his chest. She gasped as she nearly staggered back, but he her caught her shoulders and held her close.

“You are my wife,” he said through gritted teeth. “Everythingregarding you is my business.”

Pleasure surged through him as Theo’s cheeks grew flush, but he let her go and turned back around, shrugging out of his dinner jacket.

“Especially when we are living in the same house,” he added.

Alistair tossed his jacket toward a chair, not caring if it landed or not.

“Oh, so you are permitted to know my business but I am not permitted to know yours?” Theo retorted. “We have not spoken in two weeks! I did not even know you had left the castle!”

“As I said at dinner I returned every night,” Alistair replied, working at the buttons of his shirt next. “And if you wanted to know more about what I was doing, you know you can come and ask. I did not keep you from coming to me for nearly two confounding weeks.”

He waited for Theo’s sharp-tongued reply, but it never came. He turned around, wondering what on earth would stop her from her tirade, and he was surprised to see a look on her face he could not quite read.

“What?” He demanded, unbuttoning his cuffs.

“You knew it had been two weeks?” She asked. “And you found them confounding?”

Her tone had lost all its edge, her eyes had gone from flat and glaring to soft and wide. Suddenly Alistair realized why she was so angry.

“Of course I know it has been two weeks,” he sighed, adding a gentleness to his tone, “A man does not forget something like that. He counts the days until it can happen again.”

Relief poured from Theo’s eyes, but her stature was still closed off.

“You never visited me,” she said.

“I never said I would,” Alistair replied, taking a step toward her. “I told you, when you were ready for me, you come to me.”

“For a lesson,” she corrected him.

“For anything,” he corrected her.