Page 30 of Married to the Icy Duke (Duke Wars #3)

B ang. Bang. Bang!

Isaac’s fists smacked against the padded punching bag over and over again. There was a worn patch in the middle where countless fists had eroded the fabric. Isaac wondered how long it would take to punch through to the wooden core within.

He took a step back, flexing his hands and rolling his shoulders. Sweat streamed down his forehead, stinging his eyes. He blinked hard, forcing himself to focus on the punching bag ahead of him.

In his mind, he could hear Charlotte’s gasps echoing, her cheek pressed against his shoulder. He could feel the way she shuddered and how her legs had given out at the peak of her pleasure.

He could still see the outline of her curves in his mind’s eye, tantalizingly hidden first beneath the bathwater, and then beneath the clinging white drying sheet.

Clenching his jaw so hard that his teeth squeaked, Isaac aimed another punch.

Bang !

The punching bag jerked backwards, juddering on the chain that suspended it from the ceiling. His breathing came hard, and he was obliged to take a step back for a moment, breathing deeply. He tilted back his head, closing his eyes.

I shouldn’t have touched her. When will I learn?

Never, apparently. He wasn’t sure what demon had prompted him to take her in his arms and touch her in that manner, but it had been a great mistake.

He had let his own selfish desires take over, and he hadn’t even gained anything.

In fact, he’d walked out of that washroom painfully hard, his heart thumping in his chest, with the feeling of having put himself further away from Charlotte’s affections than ever before.

No, no, no, he thought, horrified. I do not want to receive her affections, any more than she cares to bestow them! You are going mad, Isaac.

Baring his teeth, he aimed another punch at the bag. Too soon, however, he hadn’t quite caught his breath and threw the punch oddly. A flare of pain shot through his hand.

Groaning aloud at his own stupidity, Isaac stepped away from the punching bag, shaking out his injured hand. He flexed it, gauging the damage.

Aside from a bruised and throbbing hand, he had done no serious damage, however. He was lucky.

Not lucky, he thought grimly. Foolish, more like.

Only a matter of hours afterwards, Charlotte had come down to eat dinner with the rest of them. She was entirely demure and calm, dressed in a new, paint-free gown, with her hair dried and no hint of moisture clinging to her.

She’d made polite conversation with Sybella while she ate her dinner, and entertained Tommy—who had ventured the word ‘no’, over dinner when he was urged to eat a Brussels sprout—all without glancing at Isaac’s way, even once.

He found, to his absolute horror, that he wanted her to look at him. He craved it more than anything else. It mattered. She mattered. And try as he might, he could not seem to return to his haven of cool indifference.

“You’re up early.”

He flinched at Tristan’s familiar voice. Glancing down, he saw his friend standing in the middle of the clubhouse, far below the mezzanine.

It was early, hours before breakfast. Outside, pink-tinged dawn flooded the world, inching in through the windows and casting window-pane-shaped squares of light across the ground.

Nobody else was in the Devil’s clubhouse this early.

Generally, the place opened shortly before breakfast, but some important members, such as Isaac, were granted early entrance.

He didn’t respond to the underlying question in Tristan’s voice, which was clearly Why are you here ?

“I am early,” he responded shortly. “I wanted to get a little practice in.”

The pain in his hand had receded a little. He would probably not risk punching the bag much more, but perhaps a proper sparring session …

Tristan narrowed his eyes at his friend.

“There’s something you aren’t telling me,” he stated. He’d brought a bag of things—something to change into, no doubt, after the well-worn clothes he was currently wearing got too sweaty and grubby to wear out in the world—and dropped the bag on a nearby armchair. “And I demand to know what it is.”

He began to climb the mezzanine steps towards Isaac. Isaac rolled his eyes, propping up his elbows on the railing, and stared out at the quiet, entirely empty club floor.

“It’s odd, being in a place which is meant to be so busy and full of people,” he remarked thoughtfully, half to himself and half to Tristan, who was approaching. “There’s something unsettling about it, I think.”

“I come here most mornings,” Tristan responded with a shrug. “I find it peaceful.”

“Hmph. How different we are.”

Tristan reached his friend and set his elbows on the railing, too. For a moment, the two men stood side by side, shoulder to shoulder, and stared out at nothing.

“I do not believe that it is the clubhouse which is unsettling you,” Tristan said at last, with the air of a man choosing his words with great care. “I think perhaps it is something else.”

“Tell me what you mean, Tristan.”

“To put it another way, how is your dear bride-to-be? Still at your house? Still causing trouble?”

Isaac squeezed his eyes shut momentarily.

Whenever he closed his eyes, he could see Charlotte on the insides of his eyelids, standing in the bath with wide eyes and flushed cheeks, a drying sheet clutched around her like a ridiculous little robe.

Want coiled in his chest. He wanted to wrap her in his arms. He wanted to kiss her, wanted to pull away that sheet and toss it across the room.

In short, he wanted her .

That, as one might imagine, was going to be a serious problem.

Isaac dropped his forehead to his crossed wrists, resting on the railing, and breathed in deeply.

What on earth have I gotten myself into?

A heavy hand landed on his shoulder. Tristan heaved a sigh.

“Come on, old friend. Let’s go to one of the sparring rooms, shall we? You can work all of this out, and perhaps tell me just what, exactly, is going on.”

Isaac nodded, straightening up, and wordlessly followed his friend along the mezzanine to a narrow, private doorway at the other end. It had been too long since he’d sparred properly. Perhaps his worry over Tommy’s health had distracted him.

One thing was clear, however—Isaac was not going to tell Tristan what had gone on in that washroom.

The sparring rooms at the clubhouse were only open to certain members. Members who were given access were required to act like real gentlemen, not thugs, and they had to be talented at boxing already.

At the very least, the proprietors wanted to know that there wouldn’t be a stream of clumsy, avoidable injuries. They didn’t want the fighting to make its way back to the clubhouse floor, either. No sore losers were permitted to fight, no men given to violence, and nobody who could not be trusted .

There was one boxing ring in each room. Generally, a referee would wait, hired specifically to watch closely any matches that went on. However, the hour was early, and there was no referee yet.

That was no trouble for Tristan and Isaac, of course. Often, when they fought, there was no clear winner. It was all about tactics, footwork, and clever sparring, rather than knock-out blows and such.

“Lady Charlotte is on your mind, I can tell,” Tristan remarked, quite suddenly, about a minute into their first round.

“And how am I meant to respond to that?” Isaac shot back, neatly aiming a jab, which Tristan ducked. “She’s in my house. I am going to marry her.”

“Affection in marriage, I’ve been told, is entirely natural,” Tristan grunted, dancing around the ring on the outside, carefully out of reach.

“If you’re learning some fondness for her, that is a good thing.

It’ll keep you happy. It’ll keep her happy, too, and heaven knows she needs some of that. Happiness, I mean.”

Isaac let loose a shallow jab once more, and this time it caught Tristan on the jaw. He staggered back, disoriented for only a split second, and gave his head a little shake.

“Nice shot,” he muttered, a smile spreading across his face. “I assume you took exception to what I said.”

Isaac clenched his jaw. “I never wanted a bride.”

“Nobody is forcing you to take one.”

He let out a long, slow breath. “Perhaps not, but I have thought long and hard, and it will be the right thing for Tommy. Sybella likes her, too. And I suppose this marriage will be a good thing for Charlotte, too. If I were to call it off, everybody would be unhappy.”

“Would you be unhappy if you called it off?”

Isaac blinked, taken aback. Tristan had a way of asking sharp, insightful questions that cut to a person’s core. He seemed to ask the questions, the ones that you never knew you needed to hear.

In that instant of disorientation, Isaac dropped his guard, just a little. Tristan darted forward, delivered a one-two jab to Isaac’s chin and darted back, leaving his friend reeling.

“God, Tristan!” Isaac snapped, lifting a gloved hand.

“We’re still boxing,” Tristan responded mildly.

“I still want to win. We can always stop and chat instead. I have no objections to that. But I know you, and I know that the moment your mind is fully disengaged, you’ll close down and insist that nothing is wrong, everything is fine, and that there is nothing, nothing at all to discuss. ”

“That isn’t true.”

“It is, but let’s not waste breath on arguing about it. So, shall I repeat my question? Would you be happy or unhappy if you canceled the wedding?”

Isaac breathed in. “I don’t know. That’s the plain fact. I don’t know. Are you happy now?”

He aimed another punch at Tristan. His friend dodged it easily, chuckling.

“Careful, now. Isaac, you aren’t obliged to marry to please others. That’s the beauty of being a man like you, a duke . You’re free.”