Bridegroom Wore Plaid (26 page)

MacGregor extended the candle toward him, but even an audience of one would be useful for what the baron had in mind. “This will take only a moment, Mr. MacGregor.”

The stupid Scot had no choice but to follow, though when they reached Genie’s door, MacGregor set his candle on a low table and waited, arms crossed, lounging against the far wall.

Gilgallon MacGregor wasn’t very sociable. No matter, his presence alone was sufficient for what would transpire.

“Eugenia?” Altsax rapped lightly on his daughter’s door. There was no need for his nosey sister-in-law to add her presence to what was about to happen—assuming the little slut was even in her room. “Eugenia, come to the door.”

She did, clad in nightgown and wrapper, a thick blond braid over one shoulder. She was a perfectly lovely female confection suitable for any impoverished Scottish earl’s countess.

“Hello, Papa.” Her puzzled glance took in MacGregor, silent in the shadows a few feet away.

“Daughter, are you enjoying your holiday so far?”

“Yes, Papa.”

“Well, I am not.”

“I’m sorry, Papa.” She cast another nervous glance across the hall. Genie was a little brighter than her mother in a simple, animal sense. Thirty-plus years of marriage gave an astute man an instinct for how to correct the women burdening his household. With Genie, threatening to forbid her the company of her vapid, silly friends had usually been adequate to ensure her obedience.

“You
should
be sorry, my girl, for you are the cause of my discontent. You are here to woo your earl, not to tat lace in your sitting room. Do I make myself clear?”

She nodded, her gaze on him now. “Yes, Papa. Very clear.”

He saw wary relief in her eyes that this little lecture was over.

Not
quite, silly girl.
He struck without warning, a solid forehand slap to her pale cheek. Forehand was the way to go with women. Backhand ran the risk that rings would cut open flesh and knuckles would leave bruises. By contrast, the flat of a man’s palm delivered sufficient punishment and made a nice, satisfyingly loud—

MacGregor moved so quickly Altsax had no chance to muster a defense. In the blink of an eye, the baron found himself face-first against the wall, an arm hiked painfully behind his back.

“Strike her again, Altsax, and you will not live to regret it long. Eugenia is a guest in this house and due the protection of my family.
We
do
not
strike
our
women.
”

“Let him go, please.” Genie’s voice was soft, with a hint of tears behind her words. “Gil—Mr. MacGregor, you will please let my father go. This is a family matter.”

The weight threatening to dislocate the baron’s arm eased away. He turned and twitched his smoking jacket into place.

“Your brother will hear about this, MacGregor. All of Polite Society might be hearing about it.” Altsax treated the brute to a fulminating glance then glared at his daughter for good measure. He noted with some satisfaction her cheek was already red, even in the shadowed corridor. “Daughter, I bid you good night and caution you to assiduously heed my guidance. You won’t always have barbarians such as that”—he jerked his chin at MacGregor—“to interfere with your father’s authority.”

He strode off, leaving his chastened daughter to deal with her champion. The earl had to tolerate his brother as a spare, but once Genie had said her vows and dropped a few bull calves in the Balfour pastures, there would be no more need for Gilgallon MacGregor.

None at all. What a cheering thought for a man to take with him to his slumbers.

***

Ian loomed out of the darkness before Augusta, a big, unhappy shadow in the gloom of the terrace. “Eavesdropping, Miss Merrick?”

Miss Merrick, not Augusta. The rebuke hurt, as did the formality with which it was delivered. “You assumed you had privacy out here, your lordship.”

He muttered something that started with “Bloody…” and fell away on sigh.

“Canna sit with you?” He did, taking the place right beside her. “I’m out of sorts and distracted, but I wasn’t ignoring you. You’re not a woman scorned, Augusta, believe me.” He took her hand, wrapping it in both of his. The gesture seemed to comfort him as much as it did her.

“I’m a woman invisible,” she said. “I expect you to eventually marry my cousin, Ian. I’m not trying to interfere with what you and she see as your duty, but it could take months for you get engaged. Aunt will want to make a fuss, to have the wedding in London, and that takes time.”

“You aren’t invisible. Not to me.”

That was good to hear. She ought to feel pathetic—except she didn’t. She felt… determined, which was gratifyingly far from pathetic.

“How are you?” She hadn’t thought to ask, but he seemed weary and somehow without his usual defenses.

The look he gave her was both sad and humorous. “I’m well, thank you, and you, my dear?”

“You’re stubborn, Ian MacGregor. But I’m stubborn too when it comes to what I truly care about.”

His arm came around her shoulders. “Lass, I have noticed this.” He sounded like he was admiring more than he was complaining.

They sat like that, while Augusta slowly teased from him the concerns of his day. Con was flirting with Julia, the kittens in the stables were beginning to stir around and get underfoot, Mary Fran was leading Matthew a dance, and Fee had run across one of the neighbor’s daughters and taught her how to make mud pies and dirtballs.

Prosaic, mundane things, such as a husband might share with his wife, except the feel of him beside her, the feel of his body heat warming her, was anything but prosaic. Her hands ached to learn the contours of him, to map his muscles and tendons, his joints and features. She wanted to know the tastes and sounds and textures of him until she knew them as well as she knew her own body.

She wanted the feel of his arousal, warm and hard against her belly one more time.

When Augusta realized neither of them had spoken for several moments, she wondered if he were imagining the same lovely, intimate things she was. She lifted her head. “You need your rest, sir.”

He smoothed her hair back over her ear. “Let’s not be discussing what I need. You should go in without me.”

He leaned over, and Augusta was certain he was going to kiss her forehead. She’d take even that, so hungry was she for any affection from him. Shameless, really, but what had years of protecting her dignity gotten her except happy chickens and a tidy garden hundreds of miles to the south?

He brushed his mouth against hers. “Forgive me, Augusta…”

She would
not
forgive him. She would kiss him within an inch of her sanity, rejoicing in each moment their mouths fused. His hand, big and warm, slid down her arm and brushed over her fingers.

He was so careful with her, Augusta almost didn’t comprehend it when that same hand closed gently over her breast. Through her nightgown and wrapper she could feel the heat of him. His touch was intimate and cherishing, and ignited a hot, needy wanting for more of his touches, more of him.

She arched into that heat, wrapping her hand over his to bring him closer. Longing rose up with a sharp, piercing ache. She wanted his hand on her skin, she wanted—

Augusta ceased listing her frustrations, rose up and straddled him where he sat on the bench. His arms came around her with gratifying swiftness, and the kiss resumed with reckless heat. Nightclothes were marvelous attire for plundering kisses from a Highland earl—no stays, no pantalettes, no layers and layers of fashion to thwart a woman’s passionate impulses.

Augusta rose higher on her knees, feeling the secure support of Ian’s arm low on her back. She sank both hands into his hair, intent on kissing him within an inch of his—

The pleasure of plunging her tongue into his welcoming heat distracted her at first, but as Ian gentled the kiss, Augusta became aware of a whisper of night air on her left knee.

Then on her thigh.

Ian’s hand was warm, caressing her leg, shifting her nightclothes then stealing
under
her nightclothes. Augusta went still, hanging over him, waiting and focusing every scintilla of her awareness on his callused palm caressing her thigh.

Mr. Post-Williams hadn’t touched Augusta intimately with his hands. He’d taken himself in his own hand and pushed at her with his erection—his member to her most intimate flesh. That he’d touch himself but not her had struck Augusta as vaguely shaming, as if her most intimate parts were dirty and not to be acknowledged, even as he’d taken his pleasure of her.

Ian had no such reservations. Augusta might have begged, had she the ability to speak, but she didn’t need words. His fingers teased through her curls, a soft, skilled caress that made her breasts feel heavy and her insides weightless.

“Ian—”

“Wheesht, hinney.” His kiss was sweet, his touch sweeter still. With one blunt finger, he traced the creases and folds of Augusta’s sex, until she was damp, panting, and ready to shed every stitch of her clothing.

She was about to tell him as much when his touch shifted, so he cupped her mons. The feel of his hand there, where Augusta rarely touched herself except to wash, was both arousing and comforting. She waited, poised on the precipice of things forbidden, wonderful, and necessary for her soul.

Ian kissed her again, an achingly tender kiss that did nothing to assuage her disappointment at the feel of his hand sliding down her leg then tugging her nightclothes down to cover her knee.

“Into the house with you, Augusta. I’ll not be taking you on a hard bench in the garden.”

In the limited light, she saw when his own words registered with him. He shook his head and scrubbed a hand over his face—the same hand that had just touched her so carefully and intimately. “I’ll not be taking you anywhere at all.”

Ever
again.
He left those words mercifully unsaid.

She’d pushed him as far as he could go, and he was right: This time, they were not far, far from the house, out in the hills with nobody but the birds of the air to see them. Anybody could come along for a bit of fresh night air. There were balconies on this side of the house.

Then too, as a younger woman, Augusta had been coerced into sharing her intimate favors. She had no intention of coercing Ian, ever.

She kissed his cheek and rose, conceding nothing. She was in her room, pondering her latest encounter with the man who was never very far from her thoughts, when another idea intruded:

Augusta had overheard Connor’s confession to Ian, the one about visiting Julia in her bedroom. Connor had started his recitation with the fact that Gil had seen him coming out of Julia’s room. The only other occupied room on that floor belonged to Genie. What had Gilgallon MacGregor been
doing
outside Genie’s room so late the previous night?

***

What was he
doing
, letting his hands wander over Augusta Merrick’s person in unseemly and intimate paths? She’d been so eager for his kisses, so yielding and feminine and warm…

Twelve hours later, and Ian was still reliving the most fleeting caress of a breast he’d executed since he’d been a hesitant boy of fourteen. The most fleeting and the most memorable.

Augusta Merrick was willing to risk her very livelihood just for a chance to share the same intimacies with Ian that Genie Daniels would go a lifetime disdaining. This paradox made Ian’s insides churn and his hand fist around his pen where he sat at his desk. Right and wrong were supposed to be clearly distinguishable, like up and down, Scottish and English, and yet…

He was not engaged to anybody, and at this rate, he wasn’t likely to be soon.

Augusta was not an innocent; she knew what she risked.

And Ian was sure in his bones she hadn’t offered herself to any other man since her feckless beau had deserted her upon learning of her poverty. Ian stared at the letter he’d written to the feckless beau—a man Matthew had sworn was honorable—and signed the damned thing. Before Ian could change his mind, he sanded the signature.

“I beg your pardon.”

The object of Ian’s frustration—and his preoccupation and his delight—stopped just inside the library door, limned in the soft light of early afternoon. “My lord, I wasn’t aware you were still working in here. Shall I leave?”

Yes.

“Come in. I’ve just finished my correspondence for the day.” He rose and came around the desk, lest she see the piles of paper putting the lie to his words. “Can I help you find a book?”

So polite they were, but she seemed amused by it. “Or answer a question.”

He did not allow himself to speculate what manner of question she might ask him. “There’s a tea tray on the sideboard. Mary Fran sends them in when I forget to appear for luncheon. I’d be obliged if you’d share it with me lest my sister get to fretting.”