“Almost as beautiful as the day you came into the palace to speak the vows with me.”
“I wasn’t aware that you had even noticed me then,” she replied distantly. “You seemed quite disturbed by the whole affair, so much so that I was expecting you to call a halt to the ceremony ere it was done.”
“I was greatly troubled.”
“I suppose any man hates to be coerced into a marriage that he abhors.”
“I don’t abhor the marriage, only the circumstances that brought it about.”
“Did you resent my encouraging your lusts, Colonel? I seem to remember they were already brewing.”
“They were,” he admitted. “I’ve desired you from the very beginning, Synnovea—from that first moment I held you naked in my arms. Since then, I could think of no other woman. You’ve been the only one I’ve dreamed of having.”
“You didn’t seem to want me at all after our marriage,” she reminded him. “If not for His Majesty, I’m sure you would have left me.”
“Aye,” he acknowledged thickly. “But I was angry. You had used me, and you didn’t seem to care what I might have suffered because of your ploy. I was very nearly gelded because of you.”
“I should have married Vladimir,” she muttered dismally, struggling to subdue her tears. “It would have been better for us both if I had.”
“No, dammit! I want you as my wife!”
Synnovea lifted her gaze to his, her lips drawn into a poignant smile. “Do you, Ty?”
“Aye! You must believe that.”
Natasha joined them at the bottom of the stairs, and her vivacious chatter allowed them to endure the meal with only a modicum of responses. She had no idea what was troubling them, only that something seemed to be terribly wrong between them. Synnovea’s aloofness toward her husband was unswerving, while Tyrone’s gaze hardly strayed from his young wife. Although he sipped from his glass far more often than was his usual habit, the couple barely touched their food. Natasha found her attempts to draw them into discussions of any sort were for naught. Long, awkward silences followed her efforts at conversation. Any questions pertaining to the tsar’s enjoyment of the parade were met by Synnovea’s forced smiles, and noncommittal shrugs or brief comments from the colonel. Frustrated by their taciturnity, Natasha finally begged escape as she clasped a trembling hand to her brow. It was now throbbing from the ordeal of watching two cherished friends punish themselves and destroy everything they had come to enjoy together.
Though other men might have shown some sign of being affected by the amount of wine he had consumed, Tyrone felt coldly sober when he finally escorted his wife upstairs. Finding Ali awaiting them, he retreated to the dressing room, where he doffed his clothes and donned the kaftan his wife had made for him. When he returned to the larger room, the Irishwoman was just brushing out her mistress’s silky tresses. He lounged in a nearby chair, deeply appreciating the opportunity to watch this ritual and the stirringly beautiful vision of his wife clothed in a softly hued dressing gown, but when Synnovea bade Ali to braid her hair, Tyrone knew her hostility hadn’t wavered in the least.
“I prefer it loose,” he announced brusquely and waved the old woman away.
Reluctantly Synnovea responded with a consenting nod when Ali turned to her with a questioning glance. Sensing that something was terribly awry, the servant took her leave and quietly closed the outer door behind her.
Having gained the privacy he had been waiting for, Tyrone went to his wife and tried to take her in his arms. “I need to talk to you, Synnovea.”
“There’s nothing to be said,” she answered coldly and slipped free of his grasp with an irritated jerk. Immediately she crossed to a small writing desk that stood near the windows and, after opening and closing all of the drawers, finally selected a leather-bound volume of sonnets from a shelf near the top. She refrained from meeting the eyes that followed her every movement as she came back to her side of the bed. She swept back the covers that Ali had turned down moments earlier, fluffed the pillows, and hurriedly shrugged out of her robe before slipping beneath the covers, giving him no opportunity to peruse her meagerly clad form. Lying back upon the pillows, she opened the book and made an earnest effort to appear interested in the contents.
Tyrone had no idea how to repair the rift between them and feared his explanations would seem trite. Fretting over his difficult dilemma, he glanced at her often but could find no encouragement in her forbidding manner. He finally took up the conversation where he had left off. “Major Nekrasov was here.”
“You said that,” Synnovea goaded, lifting her slender nose with a lofty air as she kept her gaze fastened on the verses which she was striving hard to read.
“Is it your custom to entertain men while I’m away?” As much as he realized that he was accusing her unfairly of offenses when, in truth, it was he who should have been explaining, he just couldn’t seem to help himself. Perhaps the wine had addled him more than he had thought.
“Nikolai and I were never alone,” Synnovea informed him with unswerving chilliness. “We were in sight of everyone who passed the door—”
“Obviously the major fancies himself in love with you,” Tyrone interrupted. “Given the opportunity, he’d take you to bed. He seems most willing.”
Synnovea plopped the book facedown upon her bosom and, with a coolly disdaining stare, met her husband’s brooding gaze. “Major Nekrasov has been a good friend to me in the short span of time I’ve known him. If not for the fact that he warned His Majesty of Aleksei’s intent, you wouldn’t be here today, at least not as a whole man.”
“He seems most willing,” Tyrone reiterated with emphasis as he approached the bed. “Perhaps as much as I was.” He laughed sharply. “I was so anxious to have you that you thought nothing of using me for your little gambit. You had no qualms about letting me touch your soft breasts. Would you let him fondle what you now withhold from me?”
“I withhold nothing from you!” Synnovea sneered hotly, her aplomb disrupted by a fury that her husband had never glimpsed before. “You were the one who sought to draw the limits between us when you asked the tsar to grant you an annulment upon your return to England! After setting such boundaries between us, would you now have me welcome you with open arms? ’Twas your intent to leave Russia unshackled, so how can you cast the blame on me because I dare withhold myself from you tonight? What more can you expect? You want neither me nor the burden of this marriage. Major Nekrasov, however, is interested in having me as his wife. He overheard your gallant request and came here to ask me to marry him after you leave.”
“Did he, now?” This time Tyrone displayed a range of temper that Synnovea had never seen before. It distorted his handsome face, and before that towering wrath, she could do naught but shrink back upon her pillow in sudden fear as he leaned near. “Would he also sample your womanly softness ere he speaks the vows with you and cuckold me behind my back?” He growled at the very idea. “Be damned! ’Twill not happen to me again!”
Synnovea gasped in outrage, and her hand came forward with an angry sweep, cracking loudly against his cheek.
Tyrone’s head jerked aside with the impact of her blow. Then, with lean nostrils flaring and cheeks flexing tensely, he bent a fiery glare upon her. “Angelina pledged her troth to me in marriage, too, and then behind my back played the harlot with a despicable rake….”
The green-brown eyes widened as Synnovea stared at him in sudden horror. “Are you saying that you’re married to someone else?” Before he could answer, she scrambled across the bed and leapt to her feet on the far side. Tyrone swung around the stout post and stalked toward her. As he neared, she stumbled back against the wall and flailed the air with a clenched fist, warning him to keep his distance. A snarl of rage tore free from her throat as she bestowed an accusing glare upon him. “You deceived me! You let me think you were without a wife! And all this time, while you played the injured one, you were the one who had duped me!”
&
nbsp; “Dammit, Synnovea, it’s not what you think!” Recognizing her panic, Tyrone tried to take her by the arms, but she pulled away and sneered at him in loathing disdain.
“Don’t touch me, you lying lout!”
“Listen to me, dammit!” he barked. Catching her by the shoulders, he gave her a harsh shake as he commanded her to give heed to his words. “I was married in England several years ago, but my wife died before I came here! You are quite properly the only wife I now have!”
The sharp, piercing ache, mingled with a disturbing sense of having been cruelly betrayed, slowly dwindled into a feeling of reprieve as Synnovea gaped up at him. It was as if her life had been given back to her, as if he had been absolutely lost to her for a time, but was safely hers again. Another memory came winging back, impelling her to carefully peruse the handsome visage so close above her own. “You’re the man you spoke about weeks ago, the husband whose wife betrayed him with another….”
A pained frown creased Tyrone’s brow. “I’m the one.” Leaving her, he made his way around the end of the bed and halted before the windows. Clasping his hands behind his back, he stared into the darkness beyond. “Even before suitors were allowed to call upon Angelina, she had men swarming about, waiting in droves to bid for her hand. She was beautiful, of course, but it didn’t hurt that her father had made provisions for an enormous dowry. Once she reached a proper age, she spent much time at court and was entertained by some of the most famous of roues. Our parents were neighbors, and I watched all of this from afar while she was growing up, thinking her naught but a child.
“She saw me out hunting one day after I had returned from a campaign. She rode over to talk with me, perhaps to show me that she had grown up since last we met. She was witty, charming, very lovely, everything a man could possibly want in a wife. She told me that even as a child, she had dreamed of becoming my wife and had set her cap to win me. Though I was amused at the time, she seemed dedicated to the idea of wearing down my resistance, until I finally proposed. I married her without considering that she might become bored with my frequent absences from home. After all, she had been fervently courted by a collection of gallant swains. You know the rest. While I was away in the third year of our marriage, she betrayed me with another man who made light of the affair when she told him that she was carrying his babe. He laughed and ridiculed her for having taken him seriously. He boasted to others of his deed and his bastard whelp that she carried within her womb. I came home and found Angelina trying to hide her condition from the world, though by then she was already well along.”
“You say nothing of love, and yet I sense that you cared for her.”
“Aye, I cared for her in a way any husband might care for his wife,” Tyrone conceded, but checked himself before adding, But I care for you more.
“I’m your wife,” Synnovea reminded him softly. “Does that make a difference?”
“Aye.” Tyrone allowed the single word to suffice for an answer, though his heart yearned to say more. If she really knew how he was wont to treasure even her slightest smile, she’d understand how much he regretted ever mentioning the word annulment.
“I’m truly tired, Ty,” she murmured, feeling thoroughly drained. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to go to bed now…and sleep.”
“Of course,” he replied, allowing that she had had a most trying afternoon. “I yield you that request. If it would ease your mind, you need have no fear that I’ll force you against your will.”
Synnovea dipped her head in a disconcerted nod and, after regaining her place in bed, turned on her side away from him.
Tyrone heaved a sigh, feeling as if the firebird had just escaped from his hands. It seemed that they were back where they had first started in their marriage. Now it seemed that he would have to woo her and wear down her resistance.
18
Tyrone couldn’t even begin to think of making preparations to leave the city when he knew that Synnovea was still reeling from Nikolai’s revelation. He wouldn’t have blamed her at all if she had decided that she wanted nothing to do with him. It was the same way he had felt after she had carelessly used him. Yet he just couldn’t go away, letting her believe that he didn’t want her as his wife.
The first light of dawn streamed through the windows, bathing the chambers with a soft rosy glow. Tyrone stood beside the bed, watching his sleeping wife, unable to recall an occasion when he had ever accepted her presence casually. There had been times when he had either smoldered with desire or fumed with resentment, but whatever his reaction, his heart had been firmly ensnared and his senses completely alert to her.
He had dreamed of her again during the night and had been snatched to full awareness by the pressure of her tantalizing curves against his naked back. Snuggling up close to him was her way of seeking warmth, and no amount of reasoning convinced him that she had forgiven him and wanted him to make love to her. As often as he had taken advantage of her proximity recently, he still ached for her. Indeed, he seemed constantly caught in a rutting heat for her, like some slavering beast sniffing the air for one of its own in season.
It came as no surprise that he enjoyed being her husband. That was more than he might have said about Angelina at times. His first wife had been more like a child, ever vying for his affection or needing affirmations of his devotion in overt displays, hanging onto him when he had just wanted to sit quietly for a few moments and converse with her, or visit with his grandmother or his parents without being embarrassed or distracted by her constant attempts to kiss and hug him. Perhaps she had grown up with the idea that she could command love. Having been the only offspring, she had been pampered and overly coddled by her parents. Her incessant demands had come close to disrupting their lives, for whenever she had been forced to share his time or affection, she had later pouted and complained that he didn’t actually love her and that he cherished everyone else far more. Once she had even urged him to prove his love by lending his attention solely to her. When he had countered by promising to comply if she, in return, would give up her friends and family for him, she had vehemently refused. Grudgingly she had had to extend to him the same privilege by allowing him to visit those whom he had esteemed as kin or regarded as close companions.
It was bold in Tyrone’s mind that Synnovea was very much a woman in every sense of the word and not at all unreasonable about anyone usurping her rights and privileges as his wife. There had been only one real instance wherein her jealousy and disdain had been manifested, and that was when Aleta had sought to seize his attention, along with other things, in the doorway of their chambers. But no one in his right mind could have disputed Synnovea’s right to be offended then.
Now here he was, struggling with an overwhelming desire to awaken her and tell her how much he yearned to stay with her. Yet he held himself in check. He was a soldier; he had duties that would take him hither and yon. Perhaps he wouldn’t even come back from his planned campaign to take Ladislaus and the leaders of his miscreants prisoner, and she’d be left a widow. If he was killed, then it might be better if she thought the worst of him. Her resentment would carry her through any grief she might feel over his passing, and she’d no doubt find it easier to forget him.
Heaving a weary sigh, Tyrone moved away from the bed and finally went downstairs to bathe. After dressing, he joined Natasha in the dining hall, but by then he was no less disturbed by his inability to hide his anxiety than he had been the night before.
“You seem preoccupied this morning, Colonel,” Natasha commented, having affectionately settled on that particular form of address. In her mind, it most aptly suited him, for he was a man well accustomed to authority. Still, she suspected at times that he was totally at a loss as to how to deal with his young bride. “Is something troubling you?”
Releasing a long, pensive breath, Tyrone leaned back in his chair. “As the time for my departure approaches, I find myself reluctant to leave Synnovea. It makes me wonder if it will get any easier.
”
Natasha studied him carefully. “If I allowed myself to mull over your statement, Colonel, I’d be tempted to think that you’ve fallen in love with the girl.”
Her conjecture failed to surprise Tyrone. “What am I going to do?” He made no attempt to hide his concern as he confessed, “Major Nekrasov came here yesterday to inform Synnovea that I, in a moment of inanity, had wheedled an agreement from the tsar that would have granted me an annulment upon the fulfillment of my military contract here…if I could confirm that I had managed to withhold myself from Synnovea during our marriage.”
Natasha’s brows lifted in surprise. “Do you have hopes of accomplishing that feat, Colonel?”
He laughed shortly. “Our marriage has already been well consummated, but after Nikolai’s visit, Synnovea wants nothing more to do with me.”
“I’m sure her bruised feelings will mend in time,” the woman encouraged. “A little patience is required to see it through.”
“There lies the problem. I don’t have much time. I’ll be leaving here fairly soon, and I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. Weeks or mayhap even months. ’Tis difficult to predict.”