Page 10 of The Duke and the Hellion Bride (Duchesses of Convenience #7)

Chapter Ten

I probably could have handled that a little better...

As Magnus walked back toward his study, he chastised himself repeatedly for his less-than-optimal handling of what was a delicate situation. One that he now decided hadn’t been dealt with in the best possible way.

He had panicked, was why. Faced with giving into the Duchess' demands and looking weak in front of his nieces and Miss Brooks, he had stood his ground as if afraid that he might lose the respect of the household. Now, he realized he had lost the respect of his wife instead.

What did she expect me to do!?She knows what I want of her. It is as if she was purposefully trying to undermine me.

Further to that point, Magnus had resolved not to let himself become undone by his wife again. The last time they had argued, he had crumbled on account of his lust, letting her get away with standing up to him when she should have known better. At least now she would know that he wasn’t one to be taken so lightly.

And hopefully a precedent might be set. Hopefully now she will know better than to argue with him. Hopefully that might nip in the bud any future... testy engagements.

“Your Grace!” Miss Brooks called to him from down the hall. “Your Grace!”

Magnus turned to find Miss Brooks hurrying after him, looking vexed as she did.

“Miss Brooks,” Magnus said. “What are you doing – why are you not with the girls?”

“I debated if I should tell you.” She came to a stop, out of breath and red in the face. “I was not certain if I should. But I worry for the girls. And you deserve to know.”

“What happened?” He looked past her, fear spiking through him. “Are they hurt?”

“What? No, of course not. It is...” She bit her lip. “It is... Her Grace. She has... she has ignored your order and taken the girls outside to play! I tried to stop her but --”

“What!”

“She was insistent! And what could I do?”

Magnus had stopped listening. Where before he was confused with how he felt around his wife, now that confusion was a thing of the past. Anger was what he felt. Fury at being so directly disobeyed.

To stand up to me is one thing. To have conviction in one’s own belief is one thing. But to go directly against my orders...

He stormed past Miss Brooks, his body shaking now with rage.

Magnus heard the girls before he saw them. Laughter was what he heard, coming from the back garden. If he was in a better state of mind, he might have stopped to realize that it was the first time he had heard the girls laughing in such a way since their father had died. He might have understood the importance of such a thing, conceding that in this, his wife had been correct.

Magnus was not in a better state of mind. And so, when he entered the back garden and saw the girls running around the large oak tree in the back corner, falling over and covered in dirt, he snapped.

“What is this!” he roared as he strode across the garden. “Josephine! Adeline! What do you think you are doing?”

The two girls froze as if they were statues. At first, it was just the two of them who he saw, his sights set squarely on their shoulders. But then his wife rounded the tree, hands held above her head as if she was chasing them.

“Do not stop!” she cried. “Otherwise, I will catch...” she trailed off when she saw Magnus coming.

“Duchess!” Magnus exclaimed as he came toward his wife and two nieces. “What is the meaning of this?”

In his wife’s defense, she did not look nearly as petrified as he might have expected. Although that was also a problem, as he sensed immediately this wasn’t going to be nearly as easy an argument to win as it should have been.

“I wish to say that we are playing... but that seems entirely too obvious an answer.”

He came to a stop a few feet away. Adeline and Josephine coward back, half-hidden behind Diana. He hated to see them like that, to think that they feared him. He did not want them afraid! That was not his intent at all. What he wanted was for them to be raised properly, to appreciate what he was trying to do.

“Did I not make myself clear, earlier?” he said, doing what he could to keep his temper under control.

“Concerning?”

He sucked through his teeth, rage building. “You know well what. I asked that Adeline and Josephine be left to their studies, and you deliberately disobeyed me.”

“I thought --”

“I did not ask for what you thought,” he snapped. “I gave an order, and I expected it to be followed.”

“And order?” she scoffed. “I was not aware that I worked for you.”

“That is not --” He bit back his tongue, only too aware of the two girls watching. He took some heart in seeing them hide behind the Duchess in defense, as clearly, they were warming up to her. But why did it have to be in defense of him? “Girls, Miss Brooks is waiting for you inside.”

Josephine looked at the duchess. “But... but she said...”

“I know what she said. Sadly, your studies come first.” He attempted to soften his features, noting now how filthy the two girls were. Covered in dirt, that alone piqued his rage once more. “Before you see her, please clean yourselves up. It will not do to be covered in filth.”

Both girls looked to the duchess for confirmation.

“Go on,” she said. “The emperor has spoken.” She winked at them both and then pushed them along. “I promise we will play again soon. I still must teach you both how to be better at hiding, don’t I?”

“You promise?” Adeline asked.

“Just try and stop me.”

The two girls giggled at the response but then turned serious when they caught Magnus watching them. They bowed their heads and hurried past him, properly chastised, a state of being that Magnus took no pleasure in.

Only once they were out of ear shot, did he speak again.

“I wish you would not make me out to be the bad guy,” he said.

“Then you should not act like it.”

“I am not --!” He started to snap, again forced to catch his tongue. “I only want what is best for them.”

She scoffed. “And what do I want? To ruin their lives?”

“I did not marry you to be their friend. I married you to raise them in the ways of the ton , to be a mother.”

“Which is what I am doing,” she shot back. “If I am to help rear them, they need to trust me. And if they are to trust me, they need to like me.”

“Liking you has nothing to do with it.”

“I disagree.”

“And why am I not surprised.”

She was unlike any woman that Magnus had ever met, and never before had that been more apparent. Oh sure, when they had first met, she was hostile and argumentative, but he had written that off as nerves and embarrassment. Clearly strong willed, he did not think she would be so... so... so obstinate.

Worse still, nothing he did or said seemed to have an effect on her.

Magnus attempted to stare her down, standing over her as if to force her to bend to his will. He decided immediately that this was a bad idea as not only did she stand up to him, but it forced him to look at her properly, something he had been avoiding doing since the previous evening.

He nearly gasped when he met her dark eyes. When his own flicked down to her pouty lips. When he then searched a little lower, gazing briefly at her covered bosom which struggled mightily against the confines of her top. She was quite short compared to him, all curves, a soft body that with his blood boiling as it was, he wanted nothing more than to get his hands on and --

No! Do not become undone. Do not let her get to you.

“I appreciate what you are doing,” he said evenly, forcing himself to look into her eyes and not at her chest and body and lips. “But you must understand why I do not wish the girls to be outside playing like this. It is... it is unseemly.”

She frowned. “It is nothing of the sort.”

He groaned and he felt his pulse rise. “Why must you argue?”

“I do not do it on purpose. Only when I disagree... which seems to be often,” she added with a smirk.

“Women of the ton should not be out playing, covered in dirt. That is a man’s business.”

“They are not women. They are little girls. And if they remain cooped up indoors all day, they will grow to be lifeless bores that resent you. Surely, you do not want that?”

“I think you are being a tad over dramatic.”

“You will just have to trust me.”

He snorted. “Would that I could, Duchess. But so far, you have given me no reason to --”

“And please,” she cut him off. “Duchess? That is so... formal. We are married. Surely it is not too much to call me by my name? Diana, in case you had forgotten,” she chuckled.

He swallowed. “Diana...”

“There, that wasn’t so hard.”

It was harder than it should have been. A sense of intimacy that seemed to announce the situation in a way that Magnus had been trying to avoid. They were alone. Their tempers were frayed. She was baiting him, as if she wanted a repeat of what happened the last time they argued.

“Be that as it may,” he said. “From now on, you are to do as I request. Is that understood?”

Please. Let this be the end of it...

“No,” she said.

He groaned again, his eyes drifting, and his hands wanting to take her.

“We are married,” she continued. “And that means that we are to raise these girls together. I am aware that this is a marriage of convenience, but isn’t the very point for me to be a mother figure to them? For they need such in their life.” She raised an eyebrow at him, her expression becoming suggestive. “Unless there is another reason you married me...?”

“I...” He felt his tongue begin to salivate, his mind wandering to places he dare not let it. A growl escaped his lips, blood flowing south of his waist… “It is as I always said. The reason is a marriage of convenience.”

“As you say...”

It might have been his imagination, but she almost sounded regretful. Was it possible that Magnus had completely misunderstood her own feelings and intentions? That what had happened yesterday wasn’t a case of him forcing himself on her...

“Good,” he said. “I am glad we are on the same page, finally.”

It was subtle. And it happened quickly. But their eyes met, locked onto one another, and the intensity of that stare seemed to wrap around the two like a cocoon. Standing mere feet apart, all he had to do was reach out and take her. He knew she wanted it. He could feel it in the way she looked at him.

And oh, how he did too. And why not? She was his by right. She liked to argue. She liked to fight. Perhaps the best way to shut her up was by busying her mouth with something else.

Another groan escaped his lips. Magnus felt himself stiffen at the thought of what he wished to do. His body began to shake, hands sweating, the desires swirling inside of him so powerful he could hardly control them any longer.

“I... don’t do it again.” Magnus tore his eyes from her and spun about, intending to rush back inside before he did anything foolish. But in his haste, he stepped in a patch of mud, his foot slipped out from under him, and before he could do much of anything... “Wowa!”

It all happened so quickly.

Magnus went down like a bag of dirt. He was on his back, looking up at the sky, dazed and confused and unsure. Not to mention, covered in dirt.

“Magnus!” Diana cried out. She hurried toward him, reaching down to pull him up.

In that moment, Magnus did not think. His head spun. His pride was wounded. Diana’s hand reached for him, he took a hold, a pulse rushed through his entire body as if fire sprung from Diana’s fingertips and without worrying about consequences or what was right, he pulled her down with him.

Diana didn’t so much as resist.

Her body seemed to mold into his own as she fell on top of him. His legs spread and she found herself between them. His legs closed and she moaned as their lips met. His hands on her waist. Her hands around his face. His tongue opening her mouth and exploring her sensually and passionately and erotically because he wanted to taste every inch of her.

In the mud, they rolled. His hands moved from her thick waist to her thicker, softer rear. He grabbed and squeezed, and she yelped and then bit into his lip.

For a few seconds nothing seemed to matter. The fight they were having. Magnus’ determination not to succumb to his ravenous arousal. His promise that this was but a marriage of convenience and he would not force himself on her. He was not! He could tell at that moment that she wanted him as much as he now knew he wanted her...

Only then, as quickly as it had happened, it ended.

A stick found its way into Magnus’ back, driving in deep, forcing him to yelp and snapping him out of his sexually induced trance. He realized suddenly what the two were doing, how inappropriate it felt, even if it probably wasn’t. His hands all over her. The way he held her – forced her onto him. He was thirty-three, she was but a girl by comparison. Somehow, it did not feel right.

“No!” Magnus erupted and shoved her backwards.

“Ow!” she yelped as she tumbled.

Magnus was on his feet, blood pumping through his veins, breathing stagnated and harsh. He looked down at his wife in the mud, he felt a pang of disgust in himself for putting her there, he very nearly went to help her only to curb that notion because he did not want to risk touching her again.

“You... you should clean yourself up,” he said instead. “It would not do for the girls to see you like this.”

Diana could not have looked more perplexed. Was it so wrong that even in that state, he still found her impossible seductive. How he wanted to lean forward and push back her matted hair, wipe the dirt from her face and...

“Excuse me?” she said from her position still on the ground.

“I told you...” Magnus forced himself to straighten, putting on airs of being disgusted even if the opposite was true. “Women do not play in the mud. You should lead by example.”

For perhaps the first time, Diana was rendered speechless. Huh, so that is what it takes? She stared at him in shock, quickly turned to anger, quickly turned to disgust which had her lip curling into a snarl.

Magnus did not wait for a response. He raised a warning eyebrow at her and then turned and strode across the garden, desperate to be away from Diana before she ensnared him once more.

It was only once he was inside, ducking into a spare room, closing the door behind himself, that Magnus stopped to think about what had just happened – what he had just done! He had lost all control. Dammit, he had wanted to lose control! He was attracted to his wife, that was now undeniable. The only question was... what was he going to do about it?

To that, he had no answer.