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The worst would be to stay away from her. He approached the window, raking his hand through his midnight wavy hair. To stay here boiling in his past and present mistakes would not help. Abruptly, he left the study for a walk to the lake.
If there was hell on Earth, this was it! Conrad realised, spread on the sheets trying to get a modicum of sleep. Both hands under his head, he stared the shady canopy, while the fire died in the fireplace. He heard feint noises earlier, but now everything went still. She probably fell fast asleep. Unlike him here. Impossible not to remember their moments together and wish for more.
He tossed and turned in bed, thinking and desiring, until the small hours took him to an unsatisfying slumber.
Conrad was wrong. She did not fall asleep. She lay in her chambers cold and lonely as repose would not come so easily. After a long day, tiredness should have prevailed, but it did not. She did not fathom how she came to this humiliating point. How could she want a man she did not trust, a man she did not love anymore, a man she strove to keep distant from at any opportunity? This was unfair, utterly unfair. Her body craved him like a vital nourishment, without which it would not survive. Outrageous! Irrationally outrageous. The more irritated she got, the more sleep eluded her. Damn him to blasted hell! The man she once loved got her hyped for him. Falling under his power in this dejected way would do her no good! What would happen when he reversed back to his old–and usual–ways? She would be here cast aside again, like a ragged doll. No, oh no! This would not recur. Not in a million years! With that in mind, she turned to the side and finally found slumber.
Chapter Nine
As the days, and nights, passed by, the difficulty of not noticing him escalated, to madness point. She found herself in constant alert for his movements, senses sharpened on him. She tried to ignore it, ignore him. Her awareness would not abate though. She intensified her routine at the state. She took on the most tiresome tasks in the hope of fainting in bed at night. To no avail. Next day, she would see him riding his horse and her body responded as if she was an emotionally starved woman. She cursed him with all her might. Worse, she cursed herself for being so senseless as to allow this to happen.
If Conrad spent one more day–one more hour, one more second like this–he would burst! He could foresee only that. The want of her burned in him. Each night in the chamber next to hers proved to be the most gnarling experience of his life. After tasting her and the combustion of their encounters, he wanted it, her, with ever more desperation.
Of course, she had been avoiding him! She needed no excuse for it. Now, there was no reason for her to consort with him he must admit. He missed his wife, a hell of a lot. Their easy conversations, their simple coexistence, the little things of daily life. Everything.
Aurelia turned in her bed for the hundredth time a few nights afterwards, realising she would not conjure sleep so surely. Bed covers flung aside, she wrapped one of her wool-knitted shawls around her shoulders. Maybe reading would help. She left her chamber for the library, holding her
candle, her long rosewood tress falling over her shoulder. In the library, she placed her candle on the long reading table, reaching a shelf nearby.
“Contracted insomnia as well.” His deep voice sounded from the other side of the room, statement more than question.
Startled, she turned to him, sitting in the shadows, barely lit by her candle. Aurelia breathed a very unladylike imprecation. The more she ferreted out to avoid him, the more he crossed her way.
“Good evening.” She tried for an aloof treatment. A twitching sounded on upholstery followed by him entering the candle light radius. For a moment, she only gawked at his attractiveness accentuated by his white shirt and breeches. His tall frame exhibited the unbuttoned shirt, revealing his muscled, delicious chest. A flash of them in the height of passion in her bed popped up in her traitorous memory, zinging electricity through her.
Blindly, she extended her hand and took the first book it landed. Pulling it from the shelf, she turned to the door. Strategic retreat, her mind commanded. Immediately!
“I came for a book.” She lifted the tome to show it to him. “I will go back now. Good night.” Done elegantly, she congratulated herself.
His tall frame neared her, blocking her access to the door. “Running away again, are you.”
He advanced more steps; unashamedly, she backed away colliding with the reading table in the same way her heart collided with her ribs.
“I wonder if you fear me.” He drawled, his voice huskier.
She held the book in front of her as a shield. “I cannot fear someone I despise!”
He emitted a lopsided smile, his midnight hair falling on his brow, making him seem more devilishly mesmeric. “It did not show a few days ago–oh sorry–nights ago.”
The memory of her unconditional participation in said nights heated and angered her at the same time.
“I cannot claim to be perfect.” She breathed a derisive smirk.
“Indeed. But we want to make an heir, don’t we?” Why did it seem he was nearer? And why did the room temperature escalate? Scorching heat bloomed in her!
“We?” She managed to sound ironic.
He took the book from her hand, lowering his head to read the title, unhurriedly. He stood so close; she smelled his clean male scent.
He lifted his eyes again and locked with hers. “A child will strengthen your position as the Viscountess.” Now she registered the evening stubble darkening his manly face.
She squinted her eyes with suspicion. “Oh, I see. You want to get it done with it.”
Fire jetted from his dark eyes. “More like I want to do it.” He said suggestively.
Scalding humidness pooled in her, the mere connotation of the answer priming her. “So you can go your disgraceful way.” She attempted to ignore the urges her body signalised.
His intensity transmuted into fury. “Have you seen me ‘going my disgraceful way’ lately?”
