The Regency Season: Decadent Dukes: Rufus Drake: Duke of Wickedness / Griffin Stone: Duke of Decadence / Christian Seaton: Duke of Danger

Oh, dear Lord!

Why had she continued to question and pry? Why could she not have just left the subject alone, when she could see that it was causing Griffin such terrible discomfort? The stiffness of his body, the tightness of his jaw, and the over-bright glitter of his eyes were all proof of that.

But no, because she was irritated with him over his earlier behaviour, those ridiculous assumptions he had made concerning her conversation with Arthur Sutton, she had continued to push and to pry into something that was surely none of her business. Into a subject that obviously caused this proud and haughty man immense pain.

‘Do you have children, too?’

His mouth tightened. ‘No.’

‘How did she die?’ Bella knew she really should not ask any more questions, but the look on Griffin’s face indicated that if she did not ask them now she might never be given another opportunity. And she wanted to know.

Besides which, Griffin could only be aged in his early thirties now, and he said his wife had been dead for six years, so surely that wife could not have been any older than her early to mid-twenties when she died?

‘She drowned,’ he bit out harshly.

‘How?’ Bella gasped.

‘I will not discuss this subject with you any further, Bella!’

Bella knew she really had pushed the subject as far as Griffin would allow, as he turned away to look out of the bedroom window.

She hesitated only briefly, her gaze fixed on the rigid set of his shoulders and unyielding back as she swung her legs to the floor, before rising quickly to her feet to cross over to where the Duke stood. ‘Now it is my turn to apologise.’ Her voice was huskily soft as she stood behind him. ‘I should not have continued to ask questions about something that so obviously distresses you.’

He made no response, indeed he gave no indication he had even heard her.

Bella waited for several long seconds before lifting her arms up tentatively and sliding them gently about his waist, hearing him draw in a hissing breath as she did so. She could feel the way that his body became even more rigid beneath her hands as she rested them on his abdomen.

Realising her mistake, she started to draw away.

‘No!’ Griffin’s hands moved up to hold those slender arms about his waist. ‘Stay exactly where you are,’ he ordered as his body relaxed against Bella’s warmth and the soft press of her breasts against his back.

It had been so long since any woman had voluntarily offered him the comfort of her arms other than for that brief prelude occasionally offered before the sexual act began.

Griffin’s eyes closed as he now savoured the sensation of just being held. Of having no expectations asked of him, other than to stand here and accept those slender arms about his waist. At the same time as Bella’s softness continued to warm him through his clothing.

Griffin had not realised until now just how much he had missed having a woman’s undemanding and tenderness of feeling. He had not allowed himself to feel hunger for those things that he knew could never be his.

He had to marvel at Bella, giving that tenderness and warmth so freely, when circumstances surely dictated she was the one in need of that comfort.

For the moment Griffin did not want to think about those circumstances, to give thought to the fact he knew nothing about this young woman. Why should he, when he had known even less about the women in whose bodies he had taken his pleasure these past six years? No, for now he intended to simply enjoy the moment.

Bella had not moved since Griffin had instructed her not to. But she still couldn’t stop thinking about the wife he’d lost so tragically.

Had Griffin been very much in love with her?

Had their marriage been a happy one?

Had Griffin been nursing a broken heart since losing his wife?

Could that broken heart be the reason he had never remarried?

‘Your thoughts are so loud, Bella, I can almost hear them,’ Griffin chided dryly.

‘Can you?’ she breathed shallowly, sincerely hoping that was not the case. Griffin seemed such a private man, so closed off within himself, that she was sure he would not appreciate learning of the many questions about him still raging inside her head.

‘Oh, yes,’ he murmured as he slowly turned in her arms.

Bella’s breath caught in her throat as she found herself so suddenly facing him. It had been so much easier to hold Griffin when she was not looking up into his mesmerising and handsome face.

When she could still breathe.

When her thoughts had not suddenly turned to mush.

When he could not see how her body was betraying her responses to him. Her face felt flushed, eyes fever-bright, and the tips of her breasts had become swollen and sensitive beneath the material of her overlarge gown. She also felt an unfamiliar sensation low down between her thighs.

Griffin’s large hands moved up to cup her cheeks as he tilted her face up to his, looking down searchingly. ‘Are you a witch?’ he murmured gruffly.

Bella could not look away from the compelling heat in those silver eyes. ‘I do not think so.’

He gave a slow shake of his head. ‘I think you must be.’

‘Why must I?’

His eyes darkened, his expression grim. ‘Because you have made me want you!’

Her heart leapt in her chest at the fierceness with which he delivered the admission.

There was such an unmistakeable underlying anger in Griffin’s voice, telling her that he resented those feelings.

Because he still loved his dead wife, and the desire he now felt for Bella was a betrayal to those feelings?

Or was his anger with himself rather than her, for feeling that desire for someone he did not know or completely trust?

He gave a humourless laugh. ‘You can have no idea how much I envy you, Bella!’

She blinked at the strangeness of the comment. ‘Why on earth would you envy me?’ At the moment she had nothing. No past.

No future. No name. Even the dress she was wearing belonged to another woman.

Griffin’s hands tightened against her cheeks. ‘Because your lack of knowledge about your past means you have no memory of pain or loss, either. Or the mistakes you might have made,’ he rasped harshly. ‘Because the blank of that past allows you to start afresh. To decide what that past might have been, and to make the future your own.’

That was one way of looking at this situation, Bella supposed.

Except she would much rather know her past. Whatever that past might be.

To not know who or what she was gave her the constant feeling of walking along the edge of a precipice, when one misguided step or action would hurtle her over the edge of that precipice to her certain death.

She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. A movement Griffin followed hungrily, causing Bella’s heart to falter in her chest as she found herself suddenly unable to speak.