The Ugly Duchess

Page 18

James frowned down at her. “You mean you want to develop that bovine look that some women have? Udders?”
His shudder was obviously genuine and highly satisfactory. “This is the perfect size,” he added, putting a hand directly on her breast. “Just right for a man’s hand. My hand.”
Theo was wearing a walking dress that flattened what little she had in the front, but even so, James’s hand seemed to curve around her breast quite nicely. She felt somewhat calmer, until it all flooded back into her head. “I don’t think I can ever leave this house again. Everywhere I go people will be calling me the ugly duchess, you just know they will. Even if they don’t say it to my face, they’ll be thinking it. I cannot bear it. I don’t have the courage.”
His hand tightened on her breast for a moment and then he wrapped his arms around her again. “They’re all idiots,” he said into her hair. “You are beautiful.”
“I’m not,” Theo said miserably. “But it’s nice of you to say so.”
“I’m not just saying it!” He was at a near bellow again.
“Remember how you resolved to control your temper now you’ve turned the grand age of twenty?”
“Any man alive would be enraged by this kind of lying insult to his wife. Tomorrow I’m going into the office of each one of those rags that call themselves newspapers, and I shall put my hands around the neck of the proprietor, and—”
Theo put a hand over his mouth. “There’s no stopping it, James. The illustrations are everywhere. I saw people all around Hatchards, gawking at the window. And on the way home, I realized that a portrait of me in that ghastly dress is in the front of every store. I’m stuck with the label. For life.”
“Nonsense,” James said, more quietly. “Lots of people acquire unpleasant nicknames that are soon forgotten. Richard Gray was known as Little Dick for a while. And Perry Dabbes—Lord Fentwick, now—was Periwinkle. Then everyone forgot about it.”
“Apparently, they didn’t,” Theo pointed out. “You remembered both of those names without hesitating. And what’s more, I bet there are lots of men who think Periwinkle every time they see Lord Fentwick.” She hesitated. “Is that a reference to the size of his male organ?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“I should think small would be a benefit. I’m certain most women would prefer it. They should boast about those nicknames.”
A little laugh exploded from his mouth. “Am I to take it that you’re sore from last night?”
“Yes,” Theo admitted. “I wish you had a periwinkle.”
“I’m glad I don’t, even though I am sorry if I hurt you in any way, Daisy.”
“My point is that no matter the size of their organ, at least they’re not ugly. It’s the worst thing you can say about a woman.”
James’s arms tightened again. “You are not ugly, Daisy. Do you think that I’m ugly?”
She glanced up at him. “You are breathtakingly handsome, and you know it. I’m very irritated just by the sight of you.”
“I may know it, but I don’t give a damn,” he said. “Still, a man’s got some pride. Why on earth do you think that I would marry an ugly woman?”
Theo thought of saying Because you just did, but she choked back the words. She didn’t really want to convince him that she was ugly. He and her mother were the only people in the world who idealized her this way. It was comforting to have a few people blind to reality.
“I would never marry an ugly woman,” James continued with the superb confidence that came from being born not only handsome, but the heir to a dukedom as well. “I have some pride, you know. I married you because you are delectable, and beautiful, and also because you don’t look like all those other girls.”
Theo sniffed. She hadn’t cried over the prints, but James was making her feel like crying now. “What do you mean when you say that I don’t look like the other girls?”
He frowned. “All pink and puffy.”
“But that’s what Bella looked like,” Theo objected. Then she stiffened. “Bella is part of your past, is she not?”
“I said good-bye to Bella the morning after I proposed to you. I gave her an emerald, though I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known how Father played ducks and drakes with the estate.” He was stroking her hair the way you might soothe an agitated cat.
“Oh, that’s all right,” Theo said, feeling a swell of generosity. “I’m sure she doesn’t have an easy life. But I have to say that she doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to me, James.”
“A mistress is one thing,” James said stubbornly. “A wife is quite another. I couldn’t bear having all that pinkness around every day. And besides . . .” His hand slid from her shoulder back to her breast. “I didn’t care for her bosom, to tell the truth. A man could suffocate if he wasn’t careful.”
Theo gave him a cracked bit of a laugh. “Must you do that?” she asked after a while as he continued to caress her breast. “It’s making me feel rather odd.”
“Why don’t you remove your clothes and we can make each other feel odd?” he suggested.
“James! People don’t do that sort of thing at this hour.”
“It’s almost evening,” he said, glancing outside. “And I’m pretty sure that people do it all day long if they’re lucky enough not to live with a passel of servants.”
“Do you wish you didn’t have servants?”
He rubbed a thumb across her nipple, and even through the layers of cloth she felt it so keenly that she actually jerked. “Do you like that?”
“I suppose,” she said uncertainly.
“I wish I’d been born a laborer,” James said suddenly, and quite ferociously. “I would be able to do just as I wish, and marry whom I want, and work in the outdoors and never have to spend hours with a man like Reede. Let alone have him look at me as if I were a veritable idiot. Which I am.”
“You are not,” Theo cried. “You know perfectly well that you could have had a first at Oxford if you’d cared to stay past a year.”
“Except I’d have jumped in a lake with stones in my pockets first.”
“That’s irrelevant. My point is that you were the top of your class at Eton, when you could be bothered.”
“Thank God that’s over.”
His hand started moving again, which Theo had to admit she rather liked. In fact, she was actually considering removing her gown, scandalous though it would be. “So you would truly like to be a laborer?”
“Yes.”
“You did choose your own wife,” Theo said softly. “You shocked everyone with your declaration.”
His hand tightened for a moment. “Yes. I suppose I don’t feel that I’m ready for marriage. If I have to get married, I wouldn’t want anyone but you.”
“Well, I would hate being a laborer’s wife, so I’m glad you were born to be a duke. It would be so exhausting to cook and clean and lay fires all day, and then just wake up and do precisely the same the next day. I would rather be planning a ceramics factory. And what did you think of my idea for having Ryburn Weavers specialize in re-creating the kind of figured fabric they wove in the time of Queen Elizabeth?”