“You don’t mind that we left straight-away?” Sin eyed his wife as the carriage jostled her from side-to-side. She’d spoken hardly a word during their wedding breakfast. Made no complaints when he’d bustled her into his carriage to head for home straight after. Either the events of the day had left her in a mild state of shock or he’d married the most biddable woman in history.
She adjusted her cap. “Not at all. I’m eager to see my new home. How many days until we reach Scotland?”
“We’ll be on the road about ten days.” He quirked his lips. “Not the most comfortable way to begin a marriage.”
“Oh?” She turned her wide blue eyes on him. They were a lovely light color; like the sky on a bright, sunny day. “I wasn’t aware marriage was intended to be comfortable.”
He snorted. She hadn’t intended to by diverting, but he found her amusing all the same. No, he supposed there might be a reason comfort wasn’t mentioned in the vows. Sin shifted on his seat, a damn spring poking into his arse. Something else that wasn’t comfortable. He rarely rode in his carriage, preferring to travel on the back of a horse, and the contraption had become worn down. But he had a wife to consider now. It was time for the carriage to be refurbished or replaced.
“I intend to make you most comfortable.” A particularly deep rut jolted the carriage, and Winnifred bounced. His gaze dropped to her bosom, his groin growing tight. He intended to make her content in many ways. A dutiful husband, should see to all his wife’s needs. He slapped his glove against his thigh. Damn family tradition. Ten days was a long time to wait.
She looked out the window, giving him the profile of a most stubborn-looking chin. But her words were as bland as porridge. “And I you, husband.”
“Sinclair. Or Sin, if you prefer.”
She faced him. “Pardon?”
Sin leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “I have yet to hear you use my Christian name.”
“As you wish, Sinclair.”
He shoved back, feeling disgruntled for no reason he could think of. It was every man’s dream to have a woman so acquiescent as a wife. Picking up his hat, he turned it around in his hands. “You never did tell me about this theory of your father’s. Something about this damned dark summer.” The sun was being a coy bitch this season. When it should have been shining its strongest, making their crops grow tall, it played peekaboo through a haze that seemed to stretch endlessly.
Winnifred linked her gloved fingers together and placed her hands on her lap. “It was more a theory of one of my father’s colleagues. Mr. Raguhram lives in Dutch East Indies. He believes a volcanic eruption in the southern hemisphere it the cause of our current weather.”
“One volcano would disrupt the weather half a globe away?” He arched an eyebrow. That hardly seemed likely, but then, he’d never witnessed such an event. He had no conception of how powerful an eruption could be.
She raised one shoulder. “That was his theory. I have no opinion on the matter.”
Did she have any opinions? She’d asked for no special concessions for their wedding; no preferences on the food served at their breakfast, no concern over which church Sin chose. Her agreeableness was highly irritating.
“And how did drinking half a bottle of wine help prove, excuse me, disprove, that theory?” A muscle in his right thigh cramped, and Sin stretched his leg out, his boot resting on the seat beside Winnifred.
She gave him a reproachful look. “Tasting the wine wouldn’t in itself disprove anything. Mr. Raguhram asked us to taste an 1810 vintage merely for anecdotal reactions.”
Sin tilted his head. “Why 1810?”
“There was another eruption the year before. Not on the scale of this past year’s one, but large enough in Mr. Raguhram’s estimation to provide similar effects, that an episode half a world away could drop ash in Spain.” She played with the lace cuff on her glove. “Environmental effects have been known to alter the flavor of wine. Grapes grown next to a lavender field will display elements of that flower. And grapes grown in an atmosphere of ash, should likewise develop its flavor. My father was to taste the wine, see if he detected any such thing on his palate, and then taste wine made from this year’s harvest. As I said, purely anecdotal evidence.”
Sin pursed his lips. The idea was intriguing. He was more a Scotch drinker, of course, but Summerset and Montague swore they could taste a myriad of flavors in a glass of wine that were undetectable to Sin. He tasted red or white.
“Your father wasn’t the one who tasted the wine.” Why he felt it necessary to poke at her, discover the woman behind the façade, he didn’t know. But they were man and wife now. A married couple shouldn’t be subject to artifice and polite pleasantries. He wouldn’t go through life with only the barest acquaintanceship with the woman bound to him.
A slight stain pinkened her creamy complexion. “I was thirsty.”
Sin huffed. “And? Did you detect traces of ash?”
She stared out the window again. “I wouldn’t know. My familiarity with spirits and wine is limited.”
“Hmph.” Sin glanced out his window and shifted position. Carriages weren’t made for men his size.
Winnifred slid to the side of her seat. “If you’d like, you can stretch your other leg up on the bench.”
Sin did so, his leg muscles singing with relief. “Aren’t you accommodating?”
She blinked. “Shouldn’t I be so?
He pinned her with a look. “I don’t know who you should be. I’m wondering who you are.”
The lace edge of her glove crumpled under her fingers. “I don’t understand. If I’ve displeased you, you only need to tell me how you’d like me to behave.”
What the …? Sin slammed his boots down to the floor. “I don’t know how ye English ladies like to behave when wed, but in Scotland, we like our women to have minds of yer own. I don’t want to be telling you how to behave. You’re my wife, not my dog.”
“I see,” she said faintly.
He doubted that. “You haven’t asked me one question. Not about the home I’m taking you to, my family who lives there, your duties as marchioness. Aren’t you curious?”
She fiddled with that damn lace, and Sin clenched his fists to keep from ripping the blasted frippery off her gloves.
“Yes,” she finally said. “Yes, I am curious. Tell me about my future home. Please. Where is your estate located?”
Settling back into his seat, Sin crossed one boot over the opposite knee. “About thirty miles north of the English border. Dunkeld lands used to extend all the way down, but”—he cleared his throat—“circumstances changed. We still have roughly three hundred acres, and Castle Kenmore is about midways between Glasgow and Edinburgh. It’s a damn drafty place in the winter but otherwise comfortable enough.”
“Do you spend much time there?” She cocked her head. “Your accent hardly shows. Except when you’re impassioned. It … it showed a bit when you were yelling.” She gave him a tentative smile, a true one this time, and the pressure in his chest eased a bit.
“That wasn’t yelling, wife.” The edge of his lip curled up. “And I’ve spent most of my life in England. First in school, and now with my duties in the House of Lords. But never doubt that I’m a Scot, through and through.”
She scooted forward in her seat. “Does it bother you having an English wife? I had a Scottish friend when I was younger, and he said his parents would have shunned him had he come home with a Sassenach.”
He bit back a grin at her pronunciation of the Scottish word. “English, Scottish, French, it doesn’t matter. You’re mine now.” Something velvety slid through his veins at those words.
Her lips parted. The bottom one was full, plump, and the desire to scrape it between his teeth gripped him.
Winnifred cleared her throat. “What will my duties as marchioness be? Gentlewomen have been raised to be noblemen’s wives, but I have not. I will need some time to learn.”
Sin considered. Between his steward, butler, and his mother, the Dunkeld estate ran smoothly. With very little interference on his part, as he liked. He didn’t rightly know what his wife’s duties would be. “We’ll have to ask my mother.”
She nodded. “What are your major crops and what are their yield? And what type of irrigation system do you have?”
“Trench irrigation, and the usual crops. Barley, wheat, potatoes, that sort of thing.” Had they added the corn his steward had talked about last year? Sin couldn’t remember.
“And your yield?”
He hardened his jaw. Perhaps having her ask questions hadn’t been the best of ideas. He glared at his boots. His father would have known the answer to any question about Kenmore. Would have known which crop was their biggest producer, which tenants perhaps needed a little more help. Sin could help bring in the harvest with the best of them, but he would never have the acumen to run the estate like his father.
Which was why he liked being a spy. Hunting down an enemy was straightforward. Stopping them as easy as a hammer pounding a nail.
Managing an estate of 30,000 acres, with over 600 people, servants, tenants, and their families, all depending upon him, was a wee bit outside of his ken.
Winnifred worried the lace. “I apologize. My father’s work on botany has given me an especial interest in agriculture. I’ve learned a bit about it from him. But your business is your own.”
“It’s fine.” Leaning forward, he captured her hand, stilling her agitated movements. The sleeve of her jacket rucked under his hand, and warm skin met his palm. Her pulse leapt beneath his fingers, and Sin realized this was the first time he’d actually touched her flesh.
He stroked her wrist with his thumb, that small patch of skin an enticing tease.
She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth and let it out with a pop. “You did wish me to ask questions.”
“Aye. Be yourself with me, that’s all I ask.” Unlike the tenants of Dunkeld. Always simpering, bowing, and scraping to their marquess, telling him how great his ideas were, how generous, even though he had nothing to do with them. Even his mother couldn’t be counted on to tell him the truth. She refused to say what Sin had always known.
That he’d never be the marquess his father was.
“I’ve never been married before, either,” he said. “I am as ignorant as you as to the proper form of conduct between husband and wife. But if we’re to make it a success, we’ll need to be honest with each other. Tell each other what our needs; help each other to flourish.”
“A partnership?” She narrowed her eyes, and he could tell she didn’t believe him. Didn’t trust him although he’d given her no reason not to.
But they’d known each other all of eight days. Trust took time to develop. Trust and affection and, if they were fortunate, love.
He slid his fingertips from her skin, missing the contact instantly. Desire for his wife wouldn’t be an issue, at least.
She inhaled, her bosom rising.
Sin averted his eyes.
No, the only problem would be how to keep his hands off his wife until they reached Kenmore. Damn traditions.
He pounded on the ceiling, and the carriage rocked to a halt.
“Why are we stopping?” She leaned toward the window, looking outside. “There’s nothing here.”
“I need to ride horseback.” He pushed open the door and hopped down, avoiding the steps. “Call out if you need anything.” He shut the door on his wife, cutting off the sight of her soft skin and the faintest scent of oranges that surrounded her.
It was going to be a blasted long ten days.