“You know better than that.” He accepted her gloved hand in both of his and shook it with winsome enthusiasm. “You may call me Thomas, please, just like before.”
A dark prickle tuned every hair on Alexandra’s body, and she glanced over at her husband in time to catch a black shadow cross his features.
A sharp jerk at her elbow reminded her of her manners. “Thomas, Your Grace, allow me to introduce Lady Julia Throckmorton, a chum from school.”
“Delighted.” Julia reached out delicate hands, dressed in white lace gloves, to receive her due from both men. “Just what are two cultured gentlemen of your caliber doing on the cargo decks, one must wonder?”
Alexandra’s gaze collided with her husband’s, and she feared he’d admit that he’d spent their wedding night away from her.
Dr. Forsythe gestured to a few of the crates stacked on wide wooden bases while burly sailors folded ropes at their corners securing them with gleaming steel hooks. “I invited His Grace to inspect some of the sundries I’m accompanying out to the dig,” he explained in his lively, cultured accent. “Besides, Redmayne and I found the coffee wasn’t strong enough in first class, isn’t that right, Your Grace?”
Redmayne said nothing as he tossed the last of his tin back, the taut muscles of his neck working over a swallow in a most distracting manner.
Julia abandoned Alexandra’s arm to sidle closer to Dr. Forsythe. “Your brilliant reputation precedes you, Doctor,” she simpered. “I find the subject of your work simply enchanting. Promise me you’ll tell us all about it.”
“Oh, you’ll find it quite tedious, I assure you.” Forsythe directed a polite smile in Julia’s direction before turning back to Alexandra. “But, dear Dr. Lane, you’ll be absorbed to learn that they’ve broken through the ground of an ancient settlement above Le Havre and found a Persian aristocrat buried in the same crypt as what appears to be a Moorish prince and a Viking sailor. I’m aching to take you to the catacombs and show you what we’ve found. If my suspicions are correct, oceanic trading was taking place far earlier than we’ve suspected—”
“Dr. Atherton.” They all turned to stare at the duke as the growled name was familiar to no one, least of all Alexandra.
“Pardon?” Forsythe cocked his head in a rather spaniellike gesture.
“You are addressing Her Grace, Lady Alexandra Atherton, Duchess of Redmayne.” He enunciated every word with abject clarity. “You never mentioned, Forsythe, that you’re acquainted with my wife.”
“I didn’t realize you’d married, Your Grace. I wasn’t aware she was your new duchess.” As though he realized the danger he was in, Forsythe sputtered artlessly, his vigorous color intensifying to ruddy. He retreated maybe two steps before Alexandra felt compelled to jump to his rescue.
“We’re on our honeymoon, Thomas.” Alexandra flinched at her overbright tone. “This jaunt to the archeological dig is my new husband’s indulgence of my voracious obsession with the past.”
“Well.” Forsythe recovered his look of surprise rather deftly, reaching out to reclaim his coffee cup. “May I offer my belated felicitations.” His congratulations sounded genuine, but his earnest brown eyes were touched with a tinge of melancholy. “I see we are about to dock, and I’ve a few things to attend to before we disembark. I will bid you good morning, Your Graces, until we meet in Seasons-sur-Mer. I imagine you’re staying at Hotel Fond du Val in town?”
Lips compressed into a white line, Redmayne nodded curtly.
Once again, Alexandra rushed to be gracious. “I’m looking forward to seeing the catacombs, Thomas,” she said.
“I’ll follow you, Doctor,” Julia offered solicitously, threading her arm through another elbow that had yet to be offered. “You can tell me all about your Persian Vikings.”
Over her golden head, Forsythe and Alexandra shared a wince at Julia’s disgraceful grasp of history. His eyes crinkled before he departed with a good-natured wink, Julia attached to him like a barnacle.
Alexandra turned to her husband, who watched Forsythe’s retreat with a flinty glare. “Tell me, wife, is he a part of your obsession with the past?”
His question evoked a stunned laugh from Alexandra’s throat. “Thomas? Decidedly not. I barely recalled his existence until today.”
“Thomas?” A dark, skeptical brow lifted before he turned away from her to watch seamen throw great ropes overboard, and dock cranes lower to attach to prodigious crates of cargo.
“Dr. Forsythe is a friendly and respected professional colleague.” Alexandra joined him at the railing, not appreciating the undeserved cold shoulder he offered her. “It’s not as though he ever had access to my bedchamber by way of secret tunnels. He’s never had intimate knowledge of me with which you two could compare notes.”
It wasn’t in her nature to throw Rose between them, but Alexandra had never been one to suffer the double standards upon which her sex was expected to castigate themselves.
She wasn’t about to start now.
“Touché.” Redmayne leaned on his elbows, stubbornly keeping his eyes on the distant cliffs past the long golden beaches.
Alexandra studied his strong profile, which concealed the disfigured side of his face. From this vantage, his masculine beauty was startling. The sun heightened the dusky hue of his skin, kissed by many such days beneath its relentless heat. The wind tossed his disobedient hair with abandon, and she longed to reach for it. For him. To cover the cold expanse of his fury and find the warm, tender man he’d so often been with her.
“Piers.” She’d not made use of the intimacy of his first name, and she wished doing so would remind him of the subtle intimacies she’d hoped they’d share as husband and wife. “I can promise you, Dr. Forsythe has never been of any interest to me. He’s not my lover, and I had no idea he’d be here now. Need I remind you it was not I who suggested this voyage, nor did I make the miraculous arrangements to do so—”
“You need remind me of nothing,” he said grimly. “I am aware our situation is entirely of my making. We’ve no need to discuss it further.”
“You say that, but last night—”
“Did you not hear me?” He turned to her, his features forbidding, eyes glinting with disdain. “I don’t wish to discuss last night. Nor are the circumstances of your previous lovers a particular concern of mine.” He spat into the sea, as though he’d a sour taste in his mouth. “I was the fool to have assumed you were virgo intacta in the first place. You are a worldly, educated woman, quite apparently much in the company of men. Since you are lovelier than the usual bluestocking, it doesn’t at all surprise me that you were seduced.”
“I wasn’t—”
“Furthermore,” he cut her off. “As you’ve so judiciously pointed out, I’ve had scores of lovers, myself, and objectively have no real moral reason to begrudge a beautiful spinster her pleasures.”
Alexandra squinted up at him. Had he just insulted her and called her beautiful in the same sentence?
“Unfortunately,” he continued drolly. “The fact remains that my heir needs to be born of your body. And, as impertinent as you might find it, I must be certain any issue of yours belongs to me. Thus, we can forbear each other’s company for ten days or so; I’m certain you won’t find that too much of a chore.”