He stood with his legs braced apart, and his brows formed a dark vee above his eyes. “You’d no’ be running from your husband so soon, would you, mo gradh?” he asked hotly. “Having just this night returned to...what was it you said, then...to try our marriage again? Because you have missed me so?” His lips curved into a cool smile.

Aware that several pairs of eyes were on them, Margot forced a light laugh, as if this was friendly banter between husband and wife. “I meant only to freshen a bit. Wash the dust of road from my skin, as it were.”

His smile turned wolfish. “If you wish to wash, I’ll have a bath brought to my chamber, aye? It will be like old times.”

“Oh, that is...” Predictable. Infuriatingly manipulative. “Helpful,” she said. “But, ah...” She shifted forward, standing close so that she could whisper. She laid her hand lightly on his arm, watched his gaze move to her hand, then to her bosom, and whispered, “I have need of a retiring room.”

“Then you shall have one,” he said instantly.

Margot smiled in the way she’d learned at the soirees and dinner parties, where she’d mastered the art of making time pass by testing all the silly things men would do for a mere smile. “Thank you for understanding.” She patted his arm, then slid her hand off it. She bobbed a bit of a curtsy. “I shan’t be long.” Unless he considered all night a long time.

She moved to step around him, but Arran caught her arm once more. Not her hand, but her forearm, and his grip was tight. “No’ a retiring room as you might expect, having come from Norwood Park, but a closet that will suit. There is one in my chambers, you may recall, aye?”

Oh, she remembered. Margot tried to tug her arm free, but he held tight. “I won’t trouble you.”

“You already have,” he said curtly.

She didn’t like the look in his eye. He looked a little as if he intended to carve her up, stuff an apple in her mouth and serve her up on a platter.

“And I thought you bloody well missed me,” he said, his eyes going dark as he squeezed her arm.