Duchess of Mine (33 page)

The combination of his talented finger, his
hardness inside her, pleasuring her, his chest against hers was too
much. She clutched onto his shoulders, accidentally digging in her
nails when her orgasm shattered through her body, making her scream
out his name.

Then his thrusts hastened all the more. He
released her clit and gripped her hips, plunging into her until
finally he went very rigid, groaning. Twitching, he ground against
her a few more times. Opening his mouth, he looked like he was
going to say something but captured her mouth to hers, kissing her
in a whirl of passion.

Chapter 28

D
uncan kept kissing her, making it
impossible for his foolish lips to whisper the words he ached to
say. He loved her. Lord, how he loved her.

After many moments of boneless joy, they
settled into the house, sleeping on Fleur’s bed. He briefly
wondered if his mother would mind. But he figured he’d fib to
Helen. Tell her that they were hand-fasting. That Fleur wanted
that. To marry him.

It wasn’t that he wanted to lie to his
mother.

Nay. It was because he wanted the lie to be
the truth.

If the fae or muses had brought her here,
then there must be a reason for it. Why not to wed him? Hadn’t he
had enough hardship in one life? Couldn’t he have this one thing?
Love.

Before he’d gone to bed with Fleur, he’d
checked on his ma who slept like a babe. An incredibly pale bairn,
but it did him good to see she no longer fevered. Her face no
longer pinched in agony. The cancer had stopped. His mother was
recovering.

Mayhap he could now start living. He could
take his mother and Fleur to the Americas, find his brothers,
then...then his life would be happily set, wouldn’t it? He’d have
Fleur at his side. Whether she knew it or not, she was practically
engaged to him after what they’d done. Perhaps it was a bit
manipulative to not tell her that by sleeping together, she was
binding herself to him. But Duncan hoped she would forgive him
eventually.

Especially if they had a child together. In
the dark of the night he held Fleur closer, lightly touching her
belly wondering if she already could be. She nuzzled her nose
against him and wrapped a leg around one of his. Resting one of her
dainty hands against his chest, her head on his shoulder, he
couldn’t believe his luck had changed so completely. His mother was
becoming healthy again. And even if it were a wee bit unscrupulous,
he had love, love that could potentially be his forever more.
Better yet, what if Fleur loved him in return?

He couldn’t help but envision his future with
Fleur and possibly...a daughter. Closing his eyes, his heart found
such peace thinking of a little girl with a vicious temper who
would sass him and fly through the air to land on him and hug him
with powerful small arms. She’d have Fleur’s hair with a few
strands of red glistening in the black. But she’d have his eyes.
His mother’s eyes. What he loved so much about his future daughter
was that she had her mother’s spirit—so wild and brave, virtuous
and fierce, so beautiful. Drifting into the most restful sleep of
his life, Duncan wondered if the fae finally found mercy for
him.

~*~

H
e woke when he heard the squeak of a
door. Opening his eyes, he saw his mother’s shadowed frame in the
doorway. It was still the dead of the night, and he wondered why
she was there, watching him. He tried to get up, but Fleur laid
spread over him. Helen reached out her palms, indicating he stay in
place. She stood there in the dark, where he couldn’t make out her
face to see for himself if the fever had returned. But he felt her
smile from where she stood. He couldn’t help but grin back.

“I’m so proud of ye, my bonny son,” she
whispered.

His throat tightened, his chest pinched.
Lying there with a woman he loved but wasn’t married to yet, he
would have never thought to hear those words from his ma. He’d
marry Fleur, somehow convince her to wed, then his ma would be all
the more proud. And she’d have grandchildren.

“I love ye,” his ma whispered, then
waved.

She started to leave, but Duncan finally
called back, “I love ye too, Ma.”

She wavered, her back to him, but then she
continued walking away. Bah, he couldn’t let her do that. He
struggled to move away from Fleur as delicately as possible. It was
while he did so that he finally woke up.

It had been a dream. Such a vivid
reverie.

Lavender early dawn light poured through the
opened windows, and Fleur’s opened eyes stared at him. She caressed
his cheeks.

“Hey, baby,” she whispered. “You were talking
in your sleep.”

Jesus, was it merely a dream? Panic prickled
through his body.

“Ma?” he hollered.

Fleur swept aside and out of bed faster than
him, her dark eyes so wide. “Helen?”

“Ma?” he yelled as he raced for a plaid to
cover him from the waist down.

No response.

“Ma!” His voice cracked from the strain as he
sprinted down the hallway and into Helen’s chambers.

She lay so still. So still.

Duncan couldn’t move from the doorway,
watching his mother’s chest for any movement. Fleur crashed into
him, forcing him into the room. She flew to his mother.

“Helen? Helen?” Holding fingers over his ma’s
nose and mouth, Fleur closed her eyes, waiting, more than likely,
for his ma to breathe. “Oh...God.” Fleur then traced the thin lines
of his mother’s neck, trying to find a pulse.

Something about the frantic way Fleur moved
finally set him in motion again. “Ma?” he yelled.

“Help me get her on the floor.”

“What?” He could hardly understand Fleur’s
words, her meaning.

“Help me get her on the floor. I can do CPR.
I can revive her.”

He froze.
Revive her
. Lord have mercy,
that meant...

“No,” he shouted. “No, Ma, ye can’t
leave.”

Fleur shoved an arm under his mother’s back,
jostling her too much. She flung aside Helen’s bedding, reaching
under her legs. Carefully, he pushed Fleur away, then cradled his
ma to his chest, picking her up gently. She was as light as a bird.
A bird that had already flown away.

“Oh, Ma.” Tears came from nowhere and blurred
his vision.

“Set her on the floor, Duncan. I can try to
revive her.”

He genuflected, not able to see where he
knelt, still holding his mother in his arms, knowing that this was
the cycle of life—when he’d entered this world his mother had held
him like this, but now he held her as she left it. That knowledge
was of little comfort though. His tears streamed down his face,
enabling him to see for a few seconds. Fleur’s own face held silver
streaks, but she was trying so hard to be brave and calm. She
patted the floor, yet it didn’t seem right to put his mother on the
cold wood.

“Duncan?” Fleur’s voice shook. Then her gaze
widened.

Looking down, his mother’s eyes had popped
open. She stared at Fleur. Against his hands he felt her take a
weak breath, and he sobbed.

“Ma,” he whispered.

She kept gazing at Fleur. Her mouth moved,
and finally her lips opened. “Protect my son.”

Fleur nodded as tears rushed down her
face.

“Ma.”

Helen slowly shifted her gaze. She stared
right through him, her eyes so dead of color.

“Ma, please . . .”

As if it were a Herculean feat, she finally
focused on him.

Neither said a word. Duncan dared not, afraid
if he did, she would stop looking at him. Except he needed to tell
her what was in his heart. He needed her to know. “I love ye, Ma.
Always
have.”

She didn’t say anything. Duncan didn’t expect
her to. But she looked as if she were struggling, trying to find
the words, trying to stay alive. She hadn’t taken a breath since
she’d spoken to Fleur.

Her eyes lost their focus. At first Duncan
didn’t notice, but then his ma, his bonny mother, was no longer
looking at him. He felt her fighting, even if she was so still, so
still.

He knew what he had to do. “I ken ye’re proud
of me,” he whispered. “I ken it. And I ken ye love me. Ma, I
forgive ye. For everything. I forgive ye. And I hope ye’ll forgive
me.”

He realized he really had. He hadn’t thought
he’d held a grudge against her, but the reality was he held a
grudge against everything. Even the town of Durness he’d hated
because...for no other reason than it was where he’d grown up,
where he’d once had dreams and wished upon stars, but then had all
of that dashed away. Durness and the people in it had been the
silent witnesses, whether they knew it or not, of his murdered
dreams, and for that he’d hated it and the folks therein.

He hadn’t thought that he’d held anything
against his ma. After all, he understood why she had done what she
had, marrying Albert. But his heart never had. However, at that
moment he no longer felt the residual bitterness when he thought of
his past. He thought only of the times he and his brothers had
laughed, of when Helen would sneak into the barn with them and
they’d play hide-and-go-seek for hours. He’d been a grown man
almost, thinking he’d been playing for the benefit of his younger
brothers, but he’d played because it was fun, because it had been
filled with love.

With the realization came a buoyant
sensation, lifting all his muscles, feeling weightless and filled
with happy sunshine. Helen’s eyes dimmed, and he felt her
motionless struggle stop.

Tears leaked down his face, feeling too cold
and wet.

Although his arms hardly heeded the
difference, Helen was even lighter.

“No!” Fleur hollered.

Glancing at up at her, Duncan watched as she
kept shaking her head.

“But she’s recovering.”

Duncan tried to tell her his mother had
taught him how sometimes before a death there is a rush of energy,
enabling the dying to finalize what was needed. He remembered she’d
told him how she’d compared it to the times when a woman was
pregnant. At the end of a pregnancy, the soon-to-be mother was
energized to prepare for her bairn. It was the cycle of life, Helen
had told him, his mother who should have been a physician if it
weren’t for her sex.

He was surprised he’d remembered, remembered
everything she’d ever told him.

Fleur suddenly gasped and reached over his
mother to hold his cheek. “Oh God, Duncan, I’m so sorry. She’s your
ma. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

He let out a choked sob. Then she wrapped her
arms around him and Helen. She held them both.

Duncan refused to release his mother for
hours, and Fleur stubbornly refused to let him go. At one point she
moved to sit behind him, her back against a wall, propping him up,
so he could remain holding his mother. He held his ma, first hoping
she might take one more breath, but when her body cooled, he lost
that hope. Too soon her body began to harden. Duncan couldn’t hold
his ma while her body transformed into a rigid statue.

After Fleur had dressed herself and he, she
sat him on the lumpy couch, the first thing he’d bought his mother,
then told Mrs. McVicar of the news. The village people came and
went, giving him their condolences, food, and flowers, seeing his
dead mother for themselves. He wasn’t too sure what to do with the
flowers, but Fleur placed them in vases here and there around the
house.

When they were alone, she wrapped her arms
around his neck and pulled him down to her chest where he cried. In
his mind he heard Albert berate him for his tears,
men don’t
cry
, but then Fleur would whisper how he needed to cry, to let
go. And he did. Sometimes, though, he let Fleur hold him, wondering
if she would disappear at any second. But by the time the
undertaker took Helen away after dusk, after Duncan had said
goodbye to his mother’s body, as the rusty sky turned midnight blue
and black, he held Fleur because it felt damned good.

He’d thought he couldn’t depend on anyone
ever again. And there Fleur was, proving him wrong. He needed her
now, and she gave to him. She let him cry on her without any
judgment. She held him and cared for him. Although he wasn’t too
sure if the fae would take her away or not, and although he wasn’t
sure how she felt about him, she gave to him when he needed
her.

He found himself in her bed, the bed that
used to be his brothers’. He was somewhat undressed. His plaid was
still on but not much else. And he lay on Fleur’s chest while she
caressed his hair and sang a sad song, the words foreign to him.
But he knew the sentiment. It was a song of missing the people who
left. It was a song for him, for his heart.

Chapter 29

R
ory mingled with the people from
Durness at the impromptu gathering at Mrs. Cameron’s front garden,
even if it was abysmally hot. Lord, would this awful and bizarre
weather ever end?

Apparently, the “earth laid upon the corpse”
rite wasn’t enough for the townsfolk, for they lingered after Mrs.
Cameron was buried. It was as if the dwellers couldn’t get enough
of Duncan and Lady Fleur. They still fretted over the big man. All
of the attention put a mighty stopper on his plans. Still, Rory
wanted to go forward with his strategy.

Jesus Christ, but those wee orphan lads who
fancied Fleur were everywhere. If she asked for just a cup of
water, they’d all race each other to get it for her.

Rory nodded at some of his troops who
gloomily smiled back at him. They were heartbroken for their
lieutenant. And something in Rory snapped a cold warning. Did the
young soldiers care for Duncan enough to ask about him if he went
missing?

Or were they here because he’d ordered them
to be here?