A Marriage Most Scandalous (Scandalous Ballroom Encounters Book 2) by Victoria Vale Page A

across from them, shifted uncomfortably and cleared his throat. They were alone in the carriage, as James and Cecily’s maid followed in a separate conveyance.
    “Ah, well … I suppose it didn’t differ much from those of the other lads of the ton. I had every comfort in the world, and was cared for by a nanny, then a governess. Of course, then came my years at Eton, then university at Cambridge—”
    “Yes, yes,” Petra said, a sound much like an annoyed snort cutting between the words. “I am hardly interested in the years you spent being cultivated for life as a viscount. If we are going to discuss your problem, you must delve deeper. I have no concern with the superficial layers that have been wrapped around you to turn Sheridan Cranfield into the Viscount of Perth. Peel them back, and show us the man within. Tell me about your relationship with your father.”
    He visibly tensed, his jaw grinding and his eyes growing shuttered and guarded. He turned to gaze out the window, avoiding both their gazes.
    Cecily frowned, reaching across the vehicle to touch his knee. “Sherry?”
    He flinched, then glanced up at her. Her heart broke at the lines of anguish crossing his face. In all the time she’d known her husband, she’d never seen his eyes so shadowed, or his mouth so pinched. The carefree, amiable man she’d married had vanished. Or … had it all been a façade? Was this the real Sheridan, then? This brooding, sulking man who couldn’t even talk about his father?
    He placed a hand on top of hers and patted it reassuringly, then cast Petra a dark glare. “I don’t wish to speak of him.”
    Petra nodded. “I suppose not. I suspect he is the crux of your little problem.”
    “I do not have a problem!” he snapped, his voice raising a bit.
    Unlike her, Petra did not become ruffled by his sudden shift in mood.
    “Of course you do,” she insisted, her voice remaining level and calm. “Before your wife hired me, you could only make love to her in one way—in the dark, on top of her, in the most basic and chaste of ways—denying yourself and her the pleasure you both so desperately wanted.”
    Pursing his lips, he quirked one blond brow. “In the past week, I have licked her cunt, fucked her from behind in a brothel while you looked on, let her ride my cock while she whispered fantasies of the three of us together in my ear, shared her with you on my dining room table, and helped you bathe her body in an inn’s bathtub before taking her to bed. I do believe the problem has been solved, to everyone’s satisfaction.”
    Her cheeks heated when he gave voice to every salacious act she had committed with both him and Petra. A slow throb began between her legs, and the memories made her long for more. Yet, it quickly faded as she took in Sheridan’s guarded posture.
    He hid something, and she wanted to know what.
    “You had to be blindfolded in the brothel,” Petra pointed out. “You had to be cajoled in the dining room, and last night when Cecily tried to take you into her mouth, you refused her and took me, instead.”
    “You noticed it, too?” she asked, glancing back and forth between them both. “I … I thought I had overreacted. He assured me that it was only because …” she turned back to her husband, her brow furrowing in confusion. “Did you lie to me last night?”
    His Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed. His hands trembled in his lap.
    “I don’t think—”
    “That now is the time?” Petra finished for him. “We have another long day’s ride to Brighton and we’ve only been in this carriage an hour. There is nothing but time.”
    “Sherry,” she said, moving to sit beside him on the carriage. She took his hand and held fast. “I love you. Nothing you tell me about your past will ever change that.”
    He shook his head. “Yes, it will. I’ve done things … you shouldn’t have to hear about them.”
    Exasperation filled her, turning quickly to anger. “Why? Because