Mistress - Amanda Quick [69]
“Yes, it was,” she flung back furiously. She tried once again to shove him off of her. “But you have ruined it.”
“Why did you have to choose me?” Marcus’s voice was raw. “Why didn’t you pick Hoyt or Lartmore or someone else to take you on this particular tour for the first time?”
“Because I chose you, you great, half-witted idiot. Get off me”
Marcus looked thunderstruck. “Iphiginia—”
“Off, I said.”
He flinched as though she had struck him. In the moonlight, Iphiginia saw the sheen of sweat on his forehead. His dark hair was damp with it. His jaw was locked. Every muscle in his body was as hard as though it had been carved from marble.
Marcus gritted his teeth and slowly began to withdraw from her body. Iphiginia wriggled impatiently.
“Hold still,” Marcus said urgently. “Damnation.” He wrenched himself free of her with shocking suddenness.
“Ouch.” Iphiginia yelped in dismay. “That hurt.”
Marcus did not pay any attention. His features were contorted in an expression of what appeared to be unbearable anguish. He sucked in his breath, shuddered heavily, and collapsed, facedown, alongside her. A terrible groan shuddered through him and then he lay absolutely still.
“Oh, my God. Marcus, are you all right?” Iphiginia forgot about her own discomfort. She levered herself up onto her elbow, horrified by Marcus’s sudden and mysterious collapse.
A terrible, soul-destroying fear shook her to the core. Marcus was dead and it was all her fault.
Iphiginia scrambled to her knees. Frantically she shook his shoulder. He did not stir.
She leaned over him to see his face, which was turned away from her. His eyes were closed.
She recalled the expression of agony that had twisted his features.
“Dear heaven, what have I done? My lord, are you alive? Speak to me, please speak to me.”
She struggled to pull him into her lap. It was not easy. He was impossibly heavy. She managed to get his face onto her knee. She stroked his hair back from his forehead.
“I am so very sorry, Marcus.” Tears ran down her cheeks. “I never meant to hurt you. That is the last thing I would ever do. Please, Marcus, you must not die. Not now after I have finally found you. I could not bear it. I love you, Marcus.”
Bloody hell.
He’d lost his self-control for the first time since his wedding night.
He’d spilled his seed like some clumsy, untried youth with his first woman, just as he had that first time with Nora. Somewhere in the darkest reaches of his memory he thought he heard her angry, jeering words.
You’ve got the hands of a farmer, you great oaf.
“Marcus, Marcus, please forgive me. Open your eyes. You cannot die.”
Marcus opened one eye.
“You’re alive.” Iphiginia’s face glowed with hope and relief. “Thank God.” She started to ease his head off of her lap. “Wait right here, my lord. Do not move. I shall go back to the house and fetch help.”
Marcus opened his other eye, reached out, and caught her wrist. “No.”
“But it is obvious that you need a doctor. You have suffered some sort of seizure.”
“For better or worse, I do believe that I am going to survive. My compliments, Miss Bright.” Marcus grimaced with self-disgust. “You have the ability to make a thirty-six-year-old man feel like a young blade of twenty again.”
She peered at him anxiously. Her fingertips were astonishingly gentle on his cheek. “Are you quite certain that you are not in need of a doctor?”
“Absolutely certain. I may, however, be requiring a new coat.” He thought of how he had pumped himself ignominiously into the expensive superfine of one of his tailor’s more expensive creations. “I do not know if my valet will be able to salvage this one.”
“I shall pay for a new coat for you,” Iphiginia said very earnestly. “This is all my fault. I am very much aware of that, my lord.”
Marcus swallowed an oath. “I should have guessed that you would prove to be as much of an Original in the role of the outraged innocent as you were in the part of the notorious widow.”
“But Marcus, I