But he hadn’t picked up the habit. And his privacy… well, the less said of that the better. It was very much under threat.
Luke strolled along a pathway that led around the back of the house. Stupid idea to come to Spain on his own. He should have brought a companion, or at least a manservant, someone to keep them from being alone together all the time. He should have hired her a maid.
He could do that now, hire someone from Valle Verde, someone she could talk to, someone from home. Brilliant idea. He strode along, feeling better.
It would help if he could keep his hands off her, he thought. But he couldn’t. Her slender, lissome body, all silken skin and warm, responsive eagerness. He recalled the feeling of her limbs twining around him, the blind rapture of her face lifted to his as he entered her, the feeling as her body closed around him and clenched tight… He groaned. He was ready, right now, to turn, march back to the bedchamber, and bed her all over again.
Control. He needed more control.
It wouldn’t be so bad if it was only her body that obsessed him, but she had an… allure about her that he couldn’t resist; an honesty, a zest for life that entranced him.
And she was very good company. He enjoyed talking to her almost as much as bedding her. Almost.
God, he couldn’t recall the last time he’d lost control so completely with a woman. Lost all awareness of who and where he was. Never before…
He shoved the thought aside.
Luke walked past the stables. He would have liked to go in, see what was happening there. Ramón had an eye for good horseflesh, he could see, but a man’s stables were private. One needed an invitation.
He walked on. There was a spring in his step that hadn’t been there for… he didn’t know how long. And the bouts of restlessness and gloom that had plagued him ever since…
His headstrong little wife kept him busy, that was all. Careering all over the country.
His nightmares, too, were less severe. Isabella woke him almost as soon as they started. She seemed to know, even in her sleep, that he was dreaming again.
All this time he’d never realized the solution was not to sleep alone. Simple, really.
In many ways marriage suited him surprisingly well. It was just a little too… intimate.
He could still almost feel her fingers touching that damned scar. Blast it. She’d see it eventually. And then the questions would start. Stripping him bare.
Behind the stables half a dozen women sat around by a trestle table laughing and chatting as they stripped the husks from cobs of maize. They smiled at Luke and bobbed their heads. Luke greeted them and walked on, his thoughts miles away.
He’d had a wound once that had been treated and bandaged and left to heal. The bandage had become glued to his wound. It had been quite all right; there was no pain, just some throbbing, which was quite bearable, and a faint smell, but only if you sniffed it up close.
Finally Rafe and Gabe insisted he remove it. It was crusted on, part of his flesh. He’d tried soaking it, but it wouldn’t come off. Luke was all for leaving it as it was; no harm, it would eventually fall off of its own accord.
But Rafe had fetched a physician, and the fellow had taken one look and ripped the bandage off, painful, tearing the old wound open again and releasing a flood of pus.
The healing had to start all over again, and yes, exposed to the air it healed quickly, but to this day Luke was sure if left alone it would have healed by itself. And far less painfully.
He wasn’t going to let anyone rip off his protective covering again. Not even his wife.
Especially not his wife. She still had… illusions.
Vanity, thy name is Luke, he thought ruefully. But he’ddeprived her of her home, her country, and any choice in marriage, and he didn’t want to rid her of her last illusions about her husband.
Vanity? No, he decided. Cowardice.
So be it. A man was entitled to his privacy.
He would get her a maidservant to talk to. That would put an end to this… galloping intimacy.
Bella sought out her sister and broached the matter of the pearls.
“And so is revealed the real reason you decided to ‘drop in’ to Valle Verde,” Perlita said in a hard voice. “Those pearls.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Bella protested. “It was just… while I was here, I thought—”
