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you
more in hand, Nola. Perhaps your husband is going to do that. I think that
could only help you." He was serious for a moment, "But if you're telling me
that he takes his fists to you, then we'll definitely have to have a talk."
    She squirmed in
her seat, realizing she couldn't say that without lying, and she wasn't a liar.
She could be an instigator, and sometimes she was a bit too outspoken, but she
wasn't a liar. "Well, he hasn't, yet. He's done worse, though!"
    "Worse?"
    "Yes! He's -
he's..." she wanted to tell him, but the words couldn't make it past her lips.
    "Made love to
you?" Wilde filled in in a bare whisper. "Been free
with his hands and... other parts?"
    He thought she
was going to explode in embarrassment right in front of him, but that was how
he knew he'd struck the right chord.
    "Worse. Much worse. He makes me..."
    Wilde could fill
that sentence in with any number of suggestions, but then he thought of what
might make a woman like Nola so completely incensed, thinking of how flustered
she'd become, and what her new husband might do that would annoy her that much.
When it struck him, he just blurted it out. "You like it."
    "Oh
dear God." The pastry tasted like ash in her mouth as Nola realized that he'd struck on
exactly what she'd been struggling to tell him but mortified that he might
actually realize it. She buried her face in her hands, wishing desperately that
she could disappear.
    "I'm right,
aren't I?"
    Her words were
badly muffled by her hands, but he had leaned so far
forward that he caught every syllable. "I am so ashamed, Wilde. I - why - I
can't stop it! I don't like it - I don't want - "
    Wilde was at a
loss. That she could have been so completely innocent, and yet, apparently,
brought to the heights of ecstasy. Wilde's measurement of the man rose several notches. There were few men of his class that
would have bothered to do much beyond essentially breeding with his wife,
figuring that she wouldn't have been brought up to be interested in any of the
finer points of lovemaking.
    He had to admit
that he had originally been very prejudiced against Sawyer's play for Nola.
He'd seen too many of that type of man - the spoiled only son in a phenomenally
rich family. The tendency for abuse was rife in that type of situation, and he
had worried that Nola would simply have been another trinket for Sawyer to put
in a display case and take out occasionally, when she intrigued him at first,
then ignore as the marriage progressed.
    As her closest
friend - male or not - Wilde had done some digging about the youngest Sawyer,
and had been somewhat befuddled by what he'd found. There could be no doubt
that the man was a playboy - an impressively discreet playboy, but a playboy
none the less. Despite the fact that he was known to be ruthless in his
business dealings, despite the fact that he was much less than the unfailingly
polite gentleman that upper society required of its scions, Wilde couldn't find
anyone to speak a word against him. Although he certainly didn't have to, he
got up every morning and went to work at his father's business - almost without
fail. He didn't spend money lavishly, yet lived a comfortable lifestyle. He
paid his workers well, and didn't take lavish vacations himself, and, it
seemed, treated everyone, from his servants to his peers, with the same general
disdain.
    He'd watched as
Sawyer had maneuvered his way into Nola's parents' good graces - not
necessarily worrying much about how Nola felt about him, or his suit, but
making sure that his parents knew who he was, and how well Nola would be taken
care of, doing all of the right things as far as Mr. and Mrs. Hughes were
concerned, but not spending too much time or lavishing much attention on Nola
at all. From his view, it was almost as if Nola was a guest at her own
engagement party. Wilde knew that the decision had been made for her,
especially since she hadn't been told until a week before the party that that
was what it was for.