Lady Arabella's Scandalous Marriage Read Online Free PDF

consider the matter.’
    ‘How much more time?’ Darius rasped harshly.
    Arabella shrugged slender shoulders. ‘These things cannot be rushed, Your Grace. After all, we are talking of the rest of my life, are we not?’
    ‘And mine,’ he grated between clenched teeth.
    She eyed him knowingly. ‘Perhaps you should have considered that before making love to me earlier?’
    ‘Perhaps I should,’ Darius said tersely. He had never met a young lady more deserving of having her backside paddled than Lady Arabella St Claire did at this moment. In hindsight, that was probably what Darius should have administered earlier this evening in response to her challenge, rather than making love to her!
    She looked down her tiny nose at him. ‘I suggest,Your Grace, that in view of the lateness of the hour I consider your offer overnight and you call on me again tomorrow morning so that I might give you my answer.’
    His mouth thinned. ‘Whilst you are… considering my offer, might I also suggest you consider that any marriage between us would necessarily be of the fullest kind.’
    Arabella gave him a frowning glance, colour warming her cheeks as the mockery in his eyes and the twist to his hard mouth told her exactly what he meant by that comment.
    Was she seriously considering Darius’s marriage proposal? Or was she merely toying with him?
    Just as he had toyed with her earlier when he’d made love to her with such deliberation?
    For that alone Darius Wynter deserved to suffer at least the overnight torment of uncertainty as to whether or not Arabella would accept him.
    She could not deny that becoming a duchess—even the Duchess of the infamous Duke of Carlyne—would be a wonderful matrimonial feather in her bonnet. She was also sure that Darius Wynter was too complex a man ever to bore her. In their marriage bed or out of it.
    She gave a gracious inclination of her head. ‘That sounds perfectly reasonable in the circumstances.’
    His eyes narrowed to icy slits. ‘You understand that I would expect my duchess to be amenable to the idea of producing Carlyne heirs?’
    ‘That is the normal consequence of a full marriage, is it not?’
    In truth, Arabella could not imagine having a marriage without children in it. Having grown up with three older siblings, and with one young nephew already tolove and adore, Arabella looked forward to one day having children of her own to pet and spoil and love.
    Darius Wynter’s children?
    If Arabella were honest with herself—and she usually was—then she would have to acknowledge that she had been completely aware of this man from the moment they’d met. It had been impossible not to notice him as he’d done the rounds of the salons and balls. Arabella also knew herself, along with several of the other young ladies out that year, to have become slightly infatuated with the dangerously handsome Lord Wynter.
    All of them had certainly heaved a sigh of disappointment when he’d announced his betrothal to the heiress Miss Sophie Belling later that year, before marrying her in a private ceremony in the north of England only weeks later.
    To now have him offer for Arabella, for whatever reason, filled her with edgy excitement more than anything else!
    Darius had no idea what Arabella was thinking as she stared at him so intently. He could only hope that she was working out how unsuitable this marriage would be for both of them.
    Aware that he would have to marry again one day, if only to provide the necessary heir, Darius also knew that now was not the right time for him to even be thinking of matrimony. Not when he had learnt earlier this evening that the French spy Arabella had just alluded to was once again at large…
    His mouth tightened. ‘Might I also suggest, Arabella, that you consider the fact that in marrying me youwould be tying yourself to a man you do not love, and who does not love you.’
    Those brown eyes narrowed. ‘Is that not what dalliances outside of marriage are