The Librarian's Spell by Patricia Rice (reading eggs books TXT) 📕

I was eighteen and knew nothing at all. I thought her husband would kill me. Instead, a child gave his marriage legitimacy. He was willing to support Richard if I set aside funds for his future.”

“But you left the instant Richard was born, so you’d not be tempted again?” Lydia wasn’t entirely sure how to handle this conversation, except as commentary for his journal. Was he saying he wouldn’t produce any more illegitimate children, that he had more experience now? Except he had two more mistakes to his name.

“The marriage wouldn’t look legitimate if Susan continued to fall into my bed,” he said dryly. “Any time we saw each other. . . Edinburgh is much smaller than you realize, and I hadn’t learned how to say no to a beautiful woman. And this wretched magnetism assured that she wasn’t the only one latching on to me. I was too green to finesse the ugly scenes. I had to leave. I’m not sure Richard understands that, and there is no way I can explain it to him.”

“He’ll believe whatever his mother told him anyway. It’s interesting that once her husband died, she told her son the truth. There doesn’t seem to be any resentment that I can see. He is a very fine, level-headed lad.” Lydia jotted notes, but she was more fascinated by the man than her work.

“Susan and her husband were both blond and small. Richard is dark and tall, like an Ives.” Max shrugged. “I’m sure he had questions. He might never have asked them if Susan hadn’t gone to my mother and demanded support after her husband died.”

Lydia smiled at that. “Your mother would not have taken that news lightly. Did you hear the thunder on the other side of the world?”

“When the letters caught up with me, they filled a mail bag,” he admitted with a laugh. “I’m rather amazed that she has not removed my head for not telling her about the others.”

“She has been living on the dream of one son who never comes home. To have three grandsons she might coddle. . . She will collect them all, one way or another. It’s an interesting way for her to visit the world through their eyes.”

“You are not any more upset than my mother.” He stopped in front of the table where she took notes of this conversation.

“Had I been married to you, I would have cut your throat,” she said wryly. “I’m a vicar’s daughter. I believe in vows and faithfulness and all that. Have you ever heard the Malcolm marriage vow? I vow to love, honor, and take thee in equality for so long as we both shall live. . . ? Equality means the wife doesn’t have to put up with a straying husband.”

But he would stray once he left here, she knew. It was inevitable. She had to think straight and not let his masculine proximity undermine her resolve.

Max placed his hands on the desk and leaned forward until their noses nearly touched, and her pulse escalated. His was a rather large and manly nose.

“Equality is a concept I understand better than love and honor. My father may have been a brilliant investor and my mother a dotty socialite, but he listened to her and used what he learned from her to make us all richer. That’s what a partnership is about—respecting and understanding each other’s differences. That only happens if both partners are equal.”

Considering she fraudulently held her position, Lydia didn’t feel very equal. And Max was the educated grandson of an earl, while her education and origins were much humbler.

“I have no problem with equality,” he continued, dismissing her fear as if he truly believed they were matched. “If only I could control the behavior of others. . .”

“And control your own behavior,” Lydia reminded him forcefully, leaning forward until their noses did touch. “It takes two to make a child.”

He tilted his head and kissed her.

She could no more resist his kiss than he apparently could resist the women who fell into his bed. She caught his rough cheeks between her hands and kissed him back.

Shoving aside all her neatly stacked papers, Max sat on the table. Accepting her invitation, he threaded his fingers through her hair and plunged his tongue inside her mouth.

He’d taught her this heated exchange last night. Hot lava flowed through her blood. Unbalanced, Lydia grasped his shoulders—his muscled, steady shoulders that held her as if she were a wisp of nothing.

Max swung his legs over to her side of the table and yanked her fully against him, until she inhaled earth and shaving soap and masculine musk and nearly swooned in his arms. She ran her hands under his coat and pushed up his waistcoat so she could feel the ripple of muscle in the same way he touched her. She gasped when he reached her breast, but her corset was impervious. She wanted out of it, right now.

“I have this overpowering urge to make a child with you,” he whispered against her mouth. “A daughter this time, one like you, with sunset hair and a laughing smile and caring nature. Marry me, Lydia. I will do everything in my power to be faithful.”

He might believe that now. . .

But what she didn’t know wouldn’t kill her. Instead, she had every certainty that she might die if she never knew what it was like to share this man’s bed.

“You will make your mother a very happy woman,” she whispered, refusing to give him power over her. She had to go into this the same way he did—logical, practical, lustful, but not in the least bit romantic. She would not swoon at his feet like the others.

Max carried his kisses down her throat. “I am likely to make you a very unhappy woman. You stand forewarned.”

Fear churned in her stomach. His honesty in this allowed her to be very clear that this was not a true marriage, in any sense of the word she knew. But she’d been destined to lead a lonely life