Page 34 of The Beast’s Unwanted Duchess (Icy Dukes #1)

" I t's a pleasant day, wouldn't you say, husband?" Alice asked, looking up into her husband's face from her position with her head on his lap.

"It's a pleasant day, wouldn't you say, husband?" Alice asked, looking up into her husband's face from her position with her head on his lap.

"Indeed, it is perfect," he answered absentmindedly, still reading from his newspaper while he stroked her hair absently with his free hand.

"We have been blessed with great weather for the last couple of days. I must confess, I am thoroughly enjoying it."

"Given your recent inclination towards outdoor picnics, it is no surprise you find the weather agreeable," he said, glancing away from his newspaper to peer at her playfully.

Over the last week, she had resorted to dragging her typically serious husband from the dusty ledgers in his study into the sunlight. Since he had a strong aversion to water, she had yet to convince him to join her for a swim.

Instead, they had picnics at the riverbank while she settled for watching the sunlight play on the water, transforming it into a golden hue at sunset.

Sometimes, she skipped stones in the river for fun, making it a game to outdo her husband in throwing distance.

While she enjoyed their picnics, she enjoyed swimming more.

She enjoyed the feel of the water on her body and how it loosened the tension underneath her skin after a stressful day. It brought her joy. A joy she wanted him to experience alongside her husband.

She could not fathom the idea of spending her life hating one of life's best pleasures simply because of a parent's unfortunate choices in the past. Her goal was to dispel his aversion to water. Now that she understood the reason for it, she was more sympathetic.

"Are you complaining, my love?" she inquired.

"Of course not pet, while I would grumble whenever you drag me to one of these...interludes, I must confess it has done wonders for mood. The confines of my study can be gloomy sometimes," he confessed.

"See? I am always right. Admit it, you cannot function without me."

"I sense I would be stepping into a trap if I agree to that," he said, laughing.

"I love spending time with you, husband," Alice said with a sigh, nestling deeper in his embrace and rubbing his forearm.

"The day is always brighter and lovely whenever I am with you. It is safe to say you are the sun in my universe, Your Grace."

"While I can never lay claim to such glory as the sun, I understand the sentiment, and I feel the same about you," he said, looking down at her with an affectionate look.

His left hand caressing her face slowly roused fires of intimacy that seemed to reside so close to the surface of the skin. A little longer and she would forget her mission for bringing him here in the first place.

"Do you know what would make this day even better?" she asked sitting up and turning to face him.

He promptly folded his newspaper with a flick of the wrist. Fixing her with his undivided attention.

"Dare I ask?" he asked warily.

"Swimming," she said, looking directly into his eyes. So she saw when his initial excitement faded into indifference.

"Dearest Alice, you know my stance on this matter. I do not like swimming, and you know why."

"You are right. I do know why, husband, but for how long will you keep denying yourself the simple pleasure of swimming in the cool waters of a river that runs through the grounds of your own estate? Just think of it as you being in our bath."

Victor had enjoyed taking his bath since she had the bathtub installed. The time he spent lounging in the water told her what she needed to know about his affinity for water.

"Except this river differs greatly from a bath, wife," he said in an exasperated tone.

"Well, they are not so different in the sense that they involve immersing oneself in a body of water. I, for one, enjoy the feeling of water on my skin. I do not have any reason to refuse its remarkable benefits," she said, standing up and proceeding to shed her clothing.

"Alice..." he began.

"Yes, husband?"

"I thought we were having a good time here on dry land. Is there any reason why we must enter the water? Here, come back," he said, patting the space beside him on the blanket.

"Besides we have barely had much of the meal that cook prepared for us. I wager she would not be happy if we leave the food to waste."

"I never knew my husband was given to gambling," she smiled mischievously, enjoying Victor's discomfited mood.

It was funny to see him working so hard to convince her to abandon her swimming plans.

"Besides what she doesn't know would not bother her," she said, giggling and walking backward, turning at the last moment to dive in.

She was temporarily disoriented while her body adjusted to the cool temperature of the water. She held herself still under the water, testing out her long-forgotten skill of holding her breath underwater.

While growing up, she and Catherine often went swimming. They usually dived in and settled at the bottom of the river, competing to see who could hold their breath for longer before their need for oxygen outweighed their competitiveness.

Every single time, she won, and nothing felt better than the sound of her sister swimming upwards and gasping for air as she cleared the surface of the water in search of much-needed air.

It was one of the few skills in which she could claim superiority over her seemingly perfect sister, and while she knew it was not necessarily a practical skill needed in her daily life as an aristocrat.

The knowledge of how well she could trump her sister when it came to the water helped soothe the part of her heart that was battered from the continuous verbal injury her father seemed to enjoy meting out on her.

It felt good to know that even though she could never master the art of etiquette and ballroom charm, she was, in fact, good at something, proving to herself that she was, in fact, not useless at all.

"Alice!" She was jolted from her reverie by the sound of her husband calling her, his voice frantic with worry.

She must have spent too long enjoying the water and testing her peculiar skill, unfortunately forgetting that she had a husband with a severe phobia for water waiting for her at the riverbank.

She hurriedly stretched her arms out, diving upwards until she cleared the water, dragging in air and moving her wet hair out of her face enough to spy her husband watching her.

His whole frame vibrated with a strong emotion that seemed like a cross between anger and fear. He had shed his clothes at some point and stood at the riverbank in his smalls. It seemed he had been getting ready to dive into the water in search of her when she stayed below the surface for too long.

"Do you value yourself so little that you would try to kill yourself?" he asked in a dangerous low rasp. She knew that tone. It was the proverbial calm before the storm.

Her husband was very angry. The teasing reply on her lips died, and she decided to try to calm him down.

"Victor, it is not what it looks like -"

"It definitely looked like you were trying to drown yourself. Am I such poor company that you would wish to kill yourself just to be free of me? If so I can…"

"I was doing nothing of that sort. I would never…"

"You do not have to placate me. I am not a child."

"Then do not behave like one. You stubborn man!" she screamed at the top of her voice, stunning him into silence.

He was silent for so long that she began to fear that she might have pushed him too far.

Suddenly, he stepped into the water, swimming strongly towards her, his eyes blazing with rage.

She instinctively moved backward away from him.

She kept stepping backward but had to stop when she noticed she was venturing towards the deeper part of the river.

While she did not worry about herself, the same could not be said for her husband, an amateur swimmer, even though you would not guess that by the strength of his stroke as he advanced toward her.

When he stopped in front of her, he caught her against his chest, his body trembling with barely leashed emotion.

While Alice knew she should be afraid, instead, she could not deny the pleasure of the opportunity to be so close to the glorious skin of his chest. Her husband looked like one of those Roman sculptures, and his anger, instead of making him scary, made him even more attractive.

While she was aware that line of thinking made absolutely no sense, she had long accepted that her feelings and thoughts about this man made absolutely no sense.

It seemed that she was not the only one who felt the tension building between them because, the next moment, he bent his head and caught her lips in a fierce kiss that took her breath and weakened her knees.

She had to hold on to his strong frame to maintain her balance.

"Mischievous woman," he said, breaking the kiss, his eyes slightly dazed. "I should punish you for what you just did," he said softly, cradling her face and placing a kiss on her nose.

"But you are enjoying the water aren't you?" she asked softly.

He looked away from her face, turning round the water. He seemed to realize then that he was, in fact, standing in the middle of the forbidden river of his childhood voluntarily.

"See? I told you it was harmless," she said with a sunny smile.

"Yes, you did say so, darling," he said, hugging her to his body and settling his nose into her shoulder, inhaling her unique scent.

She was indeed an angel sent to him by God to deliver him from the demons of the past that haunted him. Since the day he saw his mother's lifeless body floating in this river, he always thought of the body of water as evil.

It was funny how the clear, pure water of this particular river suddenly became evil simply because his mother had decided to take it as her final resting place.