Page 66 of Barbarous

“I will scream,” she hissed.

Hugh burst out laughing at her empty threat and his distinctive bellow caused conversations up and down the table to stutter.

Daphne wanted to crawl under the table. Instead, she turned back to Abermarle, who was waiting for her.

“I can’t help feeling envious that Lord Ramsay is the beneficiary of your wit, my lady.”

Daphne somehow doubted the marquess would find being threatened with cutlery and called an idiot as amusing as Hugh had.

“Is Lady Euphemia your only sibling, my lord?” she asked, steering the topic of conversation away from Hugh and the things that made him laugh.

* * *

Hugh leaned back in the hideously uncomfortable chair and hid a yawn with the back of his hand. He knew he was behaving badly, but the stifling atmosphere had brought back all the things he hated about England.

And he was ready to throttle Mia for her incessant demands. He didn’t doubt she was finding England trying, but returning to Oran would be tantamount to suicide.

He’d finally had to tell her—baldly—to stop her relentless nagging. She hadn’t liked that one bit and had given him a look that would scald the bristles off a hog. But at least she had stopped nagging. She was now bothering the poor old bastard on her other side and Hugh watched with amusement as she bothered the randy old goat into a state of heightened arousal.

He glanced around the table and snorted; the meal was hardly half over and already he’d alienated both his dinner partners. He found it diverting that he—the guest of honor—was the only person at the table not engaged in conversation.

His attention wandered back to Daphne.

For the last three-quarters of an hour he’d been forced to watch young Abermarle fall head-over-heels for her, and he wanted to reach across Daphne’s glazed, stuffed quail and grab the marquess by the neck and squeeze. But even a savage like he knew such an action would be frowned upon—and not just because cross-table interactions were faux pas.

So he put the violent image out of his mind and thought about what he would say to Daphne when he finally got her alone, which had to be soon, before he did something damaging to the next unsuspecting male who had the audacity to look at, speak to, or, God forbid, dance with her.

And that dress she was wearing—good God! It looked as if her demented maid had painted it onto her body. Hugh’s first urge upon seeing it tonight had been to throw his coat over her and not uncover her again until they were alone. Preferably in his bed. He couldn’t pull his eyes away. Her corset thrust her perfect breasts deliciously high until they were two mesmerizing swells above silk stretched taut and near bursting. Her nipples could not be more than a fraction of an inch below the low neckline. He swore he could see them outlined against the silk. The bodice began to expand and expand and he looked up to find Daphne glaring at him through eyes that shot pale blue fire.

Hugh shrugged at her and shifted in his seat, his erect rod jammed against the placket of his breeches. The brutal, persistent ache in his pants made him hate, more than ever, the superficial entertainments those around him favored. Well, at least the females. The men ringing the table would only be interested in cards, drinking, whoring, and horses, and not in that order.

Hugh had already whored his way across the globe, lost interest in playing cards more than a decade ago, and he had a good horse. As for drink? Well, he liked a fine brandy as much as any man, but beyond that . . .

What he wanted was Daphne, and soon.

Would this dinner never end?

He closed his eyes and considered the vortex of emotions that had been churning inside him for weeks. Lust, curiosity, anxiety, and—he suspected—love, not that he could be certain. He had never given any thought to the concept of love before, and perhaps he was mistaken. But whatever emotion he was experiencing, it was a singular sensation that both imprisoned and liberated. He felt . . . chained to her; only truly happy when she was near. How could that be? Had he become a slave, yet again? If so, why was he so pleased with his new condition?

He felt movement beside his chair and opened his eyes in time to see a footman deposit a syllabub. Hugh almost leapt to his feet and yelled, Huzzah! just as Lucien would. It was about bloody time.

The table broke up soon after that. All Hugh could think about was how long he needed to stay at this wretched affair before he could steal away with Daphne back to Davenport House, where he’d straighten out the situation between them once and for all.

* * *

Daphne could not wait to get away from the dinner table. Although she tried to ignore Hugh’s fondling and staring, she was certain the entire table must have noticed her distraction—not to mention her arousal. Her treacherous body responded to his least look. Never in her life had she possessed so little control over her own person. She fully expected the crowd to part in horror as she left the dinner table, pointing and whispering at the wanton Countess of Davenport, a woman so depraved she was obsessed with her dead husband’s nephew.

Luckily, Hugh could not continue his torment of her—at least not right now. Instead, he stood with his family near the entrance to the ballroom, looking very much like a martyr facing a fiery, agonizing death as he greeted hundreds of guests.

Daphne looked at the shimmering colors, low-cut gowns, and profusion of jewels on the arriving guests and realized her bodice was no more indecent than most. She’d thought the midnight-blue gauze over a sheath of palest silver had looked simple and elegant when she’d put it on tonight, but now she saw it was almost conspicuously plain.

Her jewels, on the other hand, were unparalleled. The sapphire choker from Thomas was a work of art, row upon row of pale blue fire interspersed with satiny pearls. The only other accessory she wore was a spray of sapphires in her hair, which Rowena had dressed in a simple knot with curls cascading down her back.

Daphne fingered the stones at her throat idly as she looked around the room, her eyes drifting again and again to the tall figure at the ballroom entrance. She recalled the way he’d stared at her during dinner and her nipples tightened. She crossed her arms over her chest and turned away from the receiving line. She needed to think of something else, anything else. Preferably something repellent, guaranteed to keep her rebellious body far from arousal.

“Sir Malcolm Hastings!” Lady Letitia’s majordomo proclaimed from the head of the stairs.

Chapter Sixteen