Helen Dickson by Highwayman Husband Read Free Book Online Page B

virtue Lucas was not. Before they had married Laura had already fallen in love with her husband-to-be. She was not foolish enough to think the feeling was reciprocated, and nor was she naïve enough to believe she knew how to make him happy. But she had desperately wanted to—somehow—and she had been determined to find out how to accomplish it.
    Lucas having made no attempt to consummate their marriage at any of the posting inns on the way to Cornwall, when they had reached Roslyn Manor and the moment had finally come Laura had yielded helplessly to the hot, searing need within her, while a nameless panic began to take hold of her. Lucas had taken her quickly, dutifully, and without endearment, with no thought to her immaturity and innocence, and after he had withdrawn from her he had rolled away and gone to sleep. It had been nothing more than the joining together of any man and his wife. Duty or pleasure, the thing was done.
    Too stunned to move, Laura had lain looking up at the shadows playing with the light on the ceiling, struggling with disappointment. She had felt so miserable she had wept at her husband’s absolute detachment. If that was love she could not understand why they made so much fuss about it in story books. It had left her with a feeling of disgust combined with a strong sense of frustration.
    Gazing across at him now, Laura could not believe the man she saw was the same man who had left her bed with the dawn and immediately embarked for France. Suddenly she saw his expression gentle, and she was sure she could see approval in his inscrutable eyes. ‘Why did you want to hide from me?’ she asked.
    ‘I didn’t. I just wanted to lie low for a while.’
    ‘But why? Has it something to do with you being a thief—a common highwayman? Why have you taken to the life of a High Toby?’
    As he observed how seriously concerned she looked Lucas’s composure slipped and he laughed outright, a rich, deep sound that reminded Laura of thick velvet. She realised that when he did that he seemed younger, much younger than when his face was in repose.
    ‘I’m sure you will be relieved when I tell you that I am not a highwayman. Tonight was the first time—and the last—that I shall take to the road.’
    ‘Then—why did you do it?’ she asked, quite bewildered. ‘I did not take you for a prankster.’
    His response to her question was a cool inclination of the head. A hard gleam entered his eyes and when he spoke his voice was deadly calm. ‘It wasn’t a prank. It was deliberately intended to infuriate and intimidate Carlyle—to put his back up. You are my wife, Laura, and no one— no one —interferes with anything that belongs to me. I can be a harsh man when angered.’
    Laura felt a moment of unease at the possessive content of his words. ‘I discovered that to my cost,’ she retorted drily.
    ‘When John told me what you were up to—that you were to wed Carlyle and that you were celebrating your betrothal with the entire county—I was furious, naturally so. However, knowing nothing could come of it now I had returned to the scene, my fury abated. When John informed me that you intended travelling home that night I couldn’t resist the pure devilry that came over me, to have a little fun at Carlyle’s expense,’ Lucas said with a roguish grin, the harshness of a moment earlier having vanished.
    ‘And mine,’ Laura reminded him coolly.
    ‘I confess that I was enjoying myself rather well until I heard it from your own lips that you were to be his wife. It rekindled my anger and roused all that is unpleasant in me.’
    ‘I noticed,’ Laura said. ‘Why didn’t you try and stop the celebrations?’
    ‘I did think about it, but I wasn’t ready to show myself—not to you, nor anybody.’
    Laura was about to ask him what the secrecy was allabout, but found herself saying instead, ‘You really don’t like Edward, do you, Lucas?’
    ‘Does one like a rattlesnake?’ he responded quickly.