Page 105 of Claiming his Cursed Duchess

“Initially, yes. I had no choice. Claridge dangled the letter as a bargaining chip and I agreed to the marriage, believing that it would be a simple transaction—that we could live alongside one another peacefully enough. Then I met you, and all of my plans were put asunder.”

“With a cursed bride?”

“Withyou,Rosaline. Only you.” He carefully pushed a lock of her hair behind her ear. “My love. Whatever curse has doggedus, let it be gone. Fire has reclaimed our curses, both yours and mine. Let them stay in the ashes. I may have begun this marriage on rocky ground, but I have come to see you as my foundation now. I do not want to be without you.”

He squeezed her fingers as their eyes connected and she sighed, finally able to admit the truth as the moon came out from behind the clouds and bathed the room in a pale silver light.

“I love you too, Adam. I do not wish to live apart from you either.”

Adam leaned forward, his eyes wild with delight, and covered her mouth with his own, their tongues meeting together in a delicious dance as he groaned desperately, pulling away from her.

His gaze clouded as he looked over the bruise on her head. “Claridge will pay for this, I swear it on my life.”

She took his hand gently in her own. “But not now. Tonight we will be together, in spite of him.”

“You will sleep beside me, is that understood, my duchess?”

She chuckled. “It is, Your Grace,” she said smiling broadly and he laughed, walking to the window and drawing the curtains.

He returned to the bed, lying down beside her and putting an arm around her waist.

She felt safe and secure in a way that she never had before, and when she closed her eyes, it was with the promise of a new day.

And a better future to come.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Acouple of days later, a carriage pulled up outside a seedy tavern at the edge of the city.

Vagrants and urchins scurried away in its wake as a man stepped out, his body covered with a heavy cloak, a hat covering his face.

He entered the tavern without fanfare, his blue eyes darting around the gloom, smoke heavy in the air, a miserable fire spitting in the hearth.

“Can I help you, sir?” asked a toothless man from behind the bar, hobbling over to him, black soot beneath his gnarled fingernails.

“I am seeking a man of my acquaintance. I need no assistance. Be about your business and leave me to mine.”

The owner paused, nodded his head and asked no further questions. Adam raised his eyebrows.

There is no protection amongst thieves and criminals, it would seem.

He glanced around the room, but his quarry was nowhere in sight.

Instead, he walked slowly up the stairs as he reached the landing and the door of the first room.

He opened it without knocking, caring little for who he would disturb. There was an elderly man asleep on the floor, slumped against the bedpost, a bottle in his right hand, but no one else present in the room.

Adam moved on.

Four rooms later he sensed something as he approached the last door at the end of the hall.

Someone as slippery as Claridge would favor such a place—close to the back stairs, and the privy.

He paused, drawing in a deep breath, conjuring an image of his beautiful wife to mind and letting the white-hot fury course through him again.

Then he kicked down the door.

Claridge was asleep, the early hour clearly not having suited him and he shouted in alarm, tumbling to the floor as he leaped from the bed.