In the Heat of the Bite (20 page)

“Almost twenty.”

Damnation. He was a bloody cradle robber. He shook his head. “A special license wouldn’t do us any good, Rhiannon. You’re not of age. We’ll need your father’s permission.”

Matthew’s heart sank a bit. What if Mr. Sinclair wouldn’t grant his blessing? They should probably refrain from mentioning the whole vampyre secret to the man.

“Stupid Sassenach laws,” she grumbled under her breath.

Her frown only endeared her to him more. Matthew tipped her chin up with the crook of one finger. “He won’t refuse me, will he?” Her answer mattered more than his next drop of blood.

Rhiannon shook her head. “If he can be bothered ta read a letter, he’ll give ye his blessin’.”

Matthew would make certain the man read the letter. He’d have someone hand-deliver it within the next two days, and that someone wouldn’t leave Edinburgh without Mr. Sinclair’s reply.

“It’s better this way, lass. We’ll send him a letter. We’ll have the banns read by your Mr. Crawford in your home parish, and after your father sends his permission and the three weeks are up, you’ll be mine ’til death do us part.”

She thrust out her lower lip. “We could ride for the border.”

Matthew sighed. Refusing her was one of the most difficult things he’d ever done. “And ruin your reputation in the process? No, dearest, I won’t have it. We’ll do things the right way.” He rapped on the roof of the carriage and called for the driver to take them to Thorpe House.

“I doona want ta go back yet.” Her hazel eyes beseeched him to reconsider their present course.

“Three weeks isn’t so long, Rhiannon. Not when you’ve lived as long as I have.” Matthew tugged her to his side and smiled when she rested her head on his shoulder. He felt complete with her there. Even without ever having partaken of her body, he knew he couldn’t live without her. Not now.

“It feels like a lifetime,” she complained softly.

And though he protested otherwise, Matthew silently agreed. Three weeks did seem like a lifetime away. “Say you’ll do it for me, lass. I’ve never actually taken a wife, and I’d like to go about it the right way.”

She cocked her head to see him better. “Ye’ve never had a wife before?”

“Until you, I never saw a reason to take one, not a real one anyway. Fictitious Countesses of Blodswell fill Debrett’s, but they were never women of flesh and blood. Figments of my imagination to pull off my ruse.”

She looked a bit relieved to hear his confession. “Ye could take me home with ye, and then I wouldna have ta worry over ye anymore.”

“You believe I could abscond with you and no one would be the wiser?” He chuckled at the very thought. Eynsford’s band of Lycans had their eyes on her, even if she wasn’t aware, as did Alec MacQuarrie. Even if she wasn’t being watched, Matthew’s honor wouldn’t allow him to do what she asked, no matter how much he wanted to.

“Ye will be all right? I mean, ye need ta feed, do ye no’?” She looked so concerned for him. He hadn’t had anyone feel strongly about his needs or his health in a very long time. He chose to use the services at
Brysi
just for that reason, so that no one
would
care. It was a business transaction, his feeding. He traded pleasure for the life-giving essence.

“I will be fine.” He tried to mollify her and hoped his words were true for his own sake.

Suddenly, Rhiannon sat forward, her eyebrows drawing together. “Will ye take from someone else ta tide ye over?” Was that jealously he saw in her pretty hazel orbs? What an unexpected boon that she didn’t want to share him. He had no desire to be shared.

“Oh, lass, even if I could, I wouldn’t,” he admitted as he touched his forehead to hers and kissed her quickly to alleviate her worries.

“So, from now forward, I will be your only source for what ye need?” She looked extraordinarily pleased by that thought, and a quirky grin played around the corners of her mouth. She was so damned adorable.

“Is that all right with you? That I’ll need you so much?” She wasn’t a cow he’d keep in the pasture to provide his milk. She would be his wife. His everything.

“That ye’ll need me?” She gasped and looked at him as though he’d grown two heads. “I think it will be nice ta be needed.” She sighed out the last, leaning more heavily into his side. “I have never even been
wanted
before. Much less needed.”

“I want you. And I need you. And I—” He gasped as pain erupted in the center of his chest.

She was on her knees before him within seconds, her hands clutching his. “What is it, Matthew?” she cried.

“I don’t know,” he grunted out, unable to avoid the pain in his chest. It pulsed and pounded.

“What can I do?” she asked. “Is it because ye need ta feed?” she cried out. She began to unbutton the bodice of her dress, drawing it away from her shoulder. “Take me, Matthew,” she urged. “Please.”

But before he could even respond to tell her that wasn’t the problem, or he didn’t
think
it was the problem, the coach rolled to a stop and the door was flung open. Then one masculine arm wrapped around Rhiannon and tugged her from the coach.

Matthew reached for her, but within seconds, she was gone. Bloody hell, what the devil was happening? He forced the pain to the back of his mind and did nothing more than grunt when two hands jerked him by his jacket lapels and pulled him bodily from the coach as well.

One furious Lycan and one livid vampyre stood outside Thorpe House, sizing each other up. Rhiannon almost giggled at the absurdity of the situation. She took a step toward Matthew but then realized Alec MacQuarrie was holding her arm in a vicelike grip. So
his
hands had hauled her from the coach? No one would ever believe that MacQuarrie and the Marquess of Eynsford would work together. How annoying to have them united in thwarting her.

She raised one finger and pointed it at Alec. Light flared from her fingertips, barely touching him as she warned him with a bolt of energy. He jumped back, releasing her arm.

“If you ever grab her like that again, you won’t have to worry about where you’ll get your next meal. Because you will find yourself with a wooden stake through your chest, Alec,” Matthew said quietly, but they all heard him, even her, when she caught his mumble on a quick breeze and brought it to her ear.

Alec picked at a piece of lint on his sleeve, avoiding his maker’s scolding glance completely. But he almost looked chagrined.

“Ye need no’ worry, for he might find himself blown by the wind to the next county if he ever takes it upon himself ta manhandle me again,” Rhiannon clarified loudly. Then she turned her attention to the infuriating marquess. “And what has come over ye, Dashiel Thorpe?”

But Eynsford paid her no heed; his amber eyes remained trained on Matthew. “March right up the steps, Rhiannon. I’ll deal with you in a minute.”

She gasped at his tone. Did he think he could speak to her in such a fashion?

“And straighten your dress while you’re at it,” the marquess ordered as though she was one of his unruly brothers.

Rhiannon rose to her fullest height, prepared to tell him just that, when she realized her dress hung open at the shoulder, where she’d bared it for Matthew when he was in distress.

Alec reached up one hand as though to cover her shoulder. He obviously was not thinking about his actions, because he braced himself when a blast of wind nearly knocked him from his feet. “I was helping!” he protested loudly. He looked so put out that, if he’d been a two-year-old, she’d have expected him to stomp his feet.

“Keep your hands to yourself,” Matthew warned quietly. “Are you all right, Rhiannon?” he asked again, his eyes focused on Eynsford.

“Of course, I’m all right! I was perfectly fine until these two big oafs who canna even stand the sight of each other took it upon themselves to rip me from your coach.”

“Rhiannon!” Eynsford growled. “In. The. House.”

Alec bent and said quietly in her ear, “We heard you ask him to take you, lass.” He said it with a look of sorrow on his face, as though someone had stolen the last crumpet at teatime.

“Is that all?” she whispered back to him, as though the other supernatural beings couldn’t hear their hushed conversation.

“Well, we heard a lot of grunting from Blodswell first and then your offer,” Alec returned softly.

“And just what are ye doin’ here anyway? Ye despise Eynsford and yet ye banded together with him over
this
?”

Alec winced, and Rhi almost felt sorry for him. “We were concerned for you. I warned you to stay away from Blodswell.”

Rhi’s eyes flashed from Alec to Eynsford and back. Thunder rumbled over head. Did they think she was a featherbrained child who couldn’t make her own decisions? “Ye both were worried for my virtue?”

They nodded in unison, though Eynsford still had his eyes leveled on Matthew. Much ado about nothing, all of it. She couldn’t
give
her virtue to the earl, if she begged him to take it from her. “Well, ye have no need ta worry about me. Lord Blodswell is the most noble of men.” That was dashed inconvenient at the moment. They should have fled London and ridden straight for Gretna Green. She wasn’t part of London society. What did she care what they thought about her? She just wanted to take care of Matthew, and now she had Alec and Eynsford to deal with instead. “Too noble,” she grumbled to herself.

Eynsford raised his brows in question at Blodswell. Or jest. Rhi wasn’t certain which it was. “Too noble, are you?”

Matthew’s dark eyes shot toward Rhiannon. “Perhaps it would be best, dearest, if you did go in the house.”

She glared back at him. She wasn’t about to leave. This was about
her
after all. “And let the three of ye pummel each other in the name of my virtue? I think no’.” She squared her shoulders. “This has gone on quite long enough. Alec MacQuarrie, ye’re a dear friend, and I appreciate yer concern; but there’s no need for it. And as for ye, Dashiel Thorpe, if ye harm one hair on my fiancé’s head, I’ll make sure Cait has ye sleepin’ in a doghouse for a fortnight or longer.”

“Did you say ‘fiancé,’ Rhi?” Alec’s face contorted with unveiled rage.

Thunder crashed in the sky, which had quickly turned to gray. Oh, dear. She was getting even angrier than she’d first thought. How dare they behave as though they knew what was best for her? She stomped her foot, and lightning struck nearby with a loud clap of thunder immediately following. At least it wasn’t raining. She’d be hanged before she’d cry in front of these men.

“Aye, my fiancé, and ye owe him an apology. Both of ye.” She blasted the supernatural meddlers with a gust of wind in warning.

“Rhiannon, this isn’t necessary,” Matthew protested. “They had your best interest at heart, I’m sure.” He turned back to Eynsford. “As you can see, Miss Sinclair is perfectly fine. No harm done.” But he still rubbed at his chest. He still wasn’t himself.

Something was most definitely
wrong
. She just wished she knew what. He had been much too quiet during this whole episode. He was in pain. She could see it in his eyes, and he’d just been jerked from a coach by a wild Lycan and his blood-sucking lackey. That was hardly conducive to Matthew’s health.

She started toward her vampyre. He still looked too pale by half. “What can I do, Matthew?”

“You can get your little witchy derrière inside my house,” Eynsford barked.

The sky darkened even more as she brushed past the marquess. “I am no’ above blastin’ ye with a bolt of lightnin’, Lord Eynsford.” Rhi reached Matthew and tenderly touched his jaw. “Join me in the parlor?”

He shook his head. “I have a letter to write to your father.” He glanced over his shoulder at Alec. “Among other things. I’ll call on you first thing in the morning.”

“Promise?” She knew his logic was sound, but she hated having to wait until the next morning to see him. Still, she had need of Cait’s advice.

“On my honor.”

Rhi cast an indignant look at Eynsford as she started up the steps of Thorpe House. Then she shot one last blast of wind toward Matthew and the marquess, which brought their quietly spoken words to her ear. “Pardon me, Blodswell,” Eynsford growled. “But you
smell
like you did more than ride in your carriage with the lass.”

Lycans could smell…
that
? She’d die of embarrassment. She’d never be able to look Eynsford in the eyes again. Who would have thought
that
had a scent, for heaven’s sake?

“We’ll be married as soon as the banns are read.”

“See that you are.”

The front door opened, and Price held it wide for her to enter. “Miss Sinclair,” the old butler intoned. “Lady Eynsford would like for you to join her in her private study.” Then the ancient man closed the front door, shutting out the conversation of the vampyres and Lycan.

Rhiannon sighed. “Thank ye, Price.” She did need Cait’s advice, but she didn’t appreciate being summoned. Most likely the seer had already seen the events of the afternoon, and Rhi would really rather not discuss the particulars. What had transpired between Rhiannon and Matthew was private, even from the all-seeing eyes of a clairvoyant. Or it should be, at any rate.

Still, there was no getting away from Cait’s summons. Her friend would find her sooner or later, and Rhi would prefer not to stoke Caitrin’s ire. The all-seeing witch didn’t possess any powers that could do harm, but she could sulk like a queen and make everyone around her completely miserable. It was generally better to just do whatever Caitrin asked. So, Rhiannon found her way to the Seer’s private study that was just across the hall from her husband’s.

At her entrance, Cait looked up from her desk and dropped her quill beside a sheath of foolscap. “Ah, there ye are.” Then she sprinkled a bit of sand on the paper.

“Ye wanted ta see me?”

Cait rose from behind her dainty Queen Anne desk and grinned. “Have ye set a date?”

Rhi frowned at her friend. “Ye kent what would happen when ye abandoned me on Bond Street, did ye no’?”

Cait shrugged unrepentantly. “Aye. But ye dinna ken, and that’s all that matters. Now tell me, Rhi, are ye happy?” She towed Rhiannon to a small, golden brocade settee in the far corner and then pulled Rhi down beside her.