Read His Lordship's Filly for Free Online Page B

“You’re a lady now, and—”
    “I don’t want to be a lady! I want to be the BridgetI’vealways been!”
    He heaved another, even greater, sigh. She heard it clearly, even over the sounds of the horses’ passage along the road.
    “Nevertheless,” he said in that calm soothing voice she was beginning to loathe, “you are a lady. You are the Marchioness of Haverly.”
    She glared at him. “How can I be a marchioness? I don’t know anything about being a lady.” She looked down at the gown—her wedding gown. “Except that they wear these stupid clothes. I can’t see how they can get any work done in these things. I really can’t.”
    “Ladies don’t work,” Andrew said, his lips twitching as though he were trying not to smile. “They paint in water-colors, they play the pianoforte, they sing a little, and they do needlepoint.”
    This was ridiculous. “Lord love a duck! That’s no life at all.”
    Andrew was looking more and more pained, but he still held to his patience, artificial though she could tell it was. “Most ladies are quite content with their lives,” he went on.
    She barely kept herself from voicing her contempt for such emptiness. “Do they ever go outside? Do they get to ride?”
    “Oh yes.” He seemed pleased to be able to tell her that. “A few even drive carriages. Female Jehus, we call them.” He frowned. “You’ll have Waterloo, and you can ride all you please, so I hope you won’t feel it necessary to drive a carriage, too.”
    Bridget managed a smile.It was time to remember that this man was her husband, that in the eyes of the law he was her legal master. They would probably have a lot of disagreements as it was. It wasn’t smart to raise his hackles over something silly, something that meant so little to her.
    “I won’t drive,” she said. “I promise. I was just feeling restless. Usually by this time of dayI’ve been working the horses for hours.” She squirmed on the hard seat. “I’m not used to sitting still—or riding in a carriage.”
    “I think I understand,” he said, patting her hand. She felt a little twinge of that excitement she’d felt that first time he touched her. Would she feel it every time he touched her?
    He smiled at her, a smile that made him look more like the man she knew. “Why don’t you sit back now and relax a bit? It’s a while yet till we reach home.”
    I’ve left my home, she thought, and my father, but she didn’t say it aloud. Andrew was doing the best he could. After all, he couldn’t help it that he was a lord. They were married and they would have to learn to deal together. Perhaps after tonight . . .
    She had no experience of men, but she understood the act of consummation. She’d seen horses mate. Of course, Papa had said that for people, mating was more gentle, more tender. And he’d assured her that she’d learn to like it.
    She sighed and closed her eyes. She’d always trusted Papa—all her nineteen years. He was her teacher, her best friend, too. And since he’d told her Mama had liked it—well, he’d sort of told her that—she knew she would like it, too.
    * * * *
    On the squabs next to her, Andrew frowned. This marriage looked to be more difficult than he’d thought. The fashionable clothes had not made a lady out of Bridget. In sober fact, she looked odd in them. And she walked as though she still wore boots, which made her look odder still. She’d stripped off her gloves the moment they’d settled in the carriage, throwing them and her bonnet on the opposite seat. Her hands and arms were brown from the sun—her face, too. And a bridge of freckles marched across her nose.
    She looked like a child, a ragamuffin child, washed and dressed up in a lady’s clothes. When he let his gaze wander lower, though, to the swell of bosom that even the shawl didn’t hide, he knew better. This was no child sitting here beside him. This was a woman—a full-grown woman.
    He wasn’t at all sure that marrying