She nodded.
A deep red flush crept into his cheeks. “My God.”
She sighed, not unsatisfied with his response. He was back to breaking the first commandment, was he?
That had to be a hopeful sign.
“Perhaps. But how I can trust that you won’t become the same type of tyrant my father was to my mother—to us?”She stared up into his eyes. “Especially when I know you fundamentally disapprove of me?”
Chapter Eleven
Neville shook hishead no, even as he turned Millie’s question over in his mind. He would not be a tyrant, but how could he prove he would not have some of her father’s tendencies? He didn’t know exactly what she’d gone through, and he hadn’t known the man. He’d only Harbury’s warning and the occasional comments she’d let slip.
Hecouldtell her he was not usually quick to anger. He could tell her he’d never taken his rage out on anyone else. And that he wasn’t prone to bitterness. But those truths did not provide the whole answer, because Millie was not wrong about his disapproval.
He had disapproved—fundamentallydisapproved—of Millie.
He’d told Asquith and Blackwell his protection was necessary to save her from herself. At the same time, he hadn’t admitted caring for her to the point of distraction and urgently desiring her presence. He’d stared at her outrageous dress at Almack’s with covetous distaste. At the same time, he’d wanted to abscond with her to the privacy of his bedchamber and strip her of that garment—first bodice, then skirts, then stays.
Given that evidence, he could see himself slipping into tyranny where she was concerned.
What if Millie was right?
What if his mother was wrong?
What if even love was not enough of a basis for a happy marriage? What if he could love her as much as he did, and yet still turn into the tyrant he feared becoming?
A tyrant not like Millie’s father, whom he’d never known, but a tyrant like his own.
He sighed roughly, allowing himself the sweet agony of touching her face.
His father never lost his temper, either, as there were “some things gentlemen just didn’t do.” And his father had never treated Neville, or John, with any degree of contempt. But their mother…. She’d been a different story.
His father had been critical of his wife’s clothes, her friends, her passions.
His mother, a duke’s daughter, had not been intimidated. Her sense of worth, her determination to fulfill her place in the world, had not been changed by her marriage. But still, she’d been hurt by his censure.
Something Neville had not fully understood until their conversation the other night.
And, without overtly speaking against his father, she’d let Neville know she feared he might be capable of the same dismissive behavior toward his future wife.
Then, when he’d seen Millie with Asquith in the stables, he’d struggled to suppress a jealous surge. How was he going to act when less scrupulous gentleman of thetonattempted to engage her in games of seduction?
And they would. He knew they would. Because some gentlemen of thetonmade a game out of cuckolding their peers.
Millie, whose every move dripped sensuality, however unconscious, would become their prime target once she was wed. Even now, with that ill-fitting gauzy bit of fluff wrapped around her shoulders,hecould barely keep himself from drawing her into his lap.
Delilah. She was everything his father had warned him against.
And yet, she was also smart. Perceptive. Brave. When she smiled at Neville, everything in life felt like it had a reason. When she laughed, all became right with his world.
He dropped his arm. Her palm stole over his own as she patiently waited for him to argue his part. He released his grip on the chair, turned up his hand, and entwined her warm fingers with his own.
Could a joining be wrong when the partnership felt so right?
“I cannot promise you that I won’t get jealous.” His gaze traveled over those lovely, angled cheekbones, then to the mouth so frequently turned up in mocking sarcasm. “I cannot promise that some sisterly mischief you will doubtless undertake won’t leave me upset.”
“I know,” she said softly.