Night of the Highland Dragon (15 page)

Judith laced her fingers through William's and led him out into the hallway. Only years of practice allowed him to note his surroundings in the journey that followed. Otherwise, he would have walked through the hall and up the stairs like a blind man, seeing only the slim curves of Judith's body, hearing only the rustling of her skirts, feeling nothing but the touch of her hand on his and the resulting waves of lust running through his body. The temptation to get lost in such sensations was almost overwhelming as it was.

He did see stonework and tapestries, lamps in brass sconces and pictures on the wall—landscapes, and studies of fruit and objects, but no portraits. He glanced at doors and was reasonably certain that he could find his way back out if he needed to. Even with Judith a scant few inches away, and with the promise of much more to follow, he didn't forget the possibility of danger.

That awareness did nothing to shift his mood. Rather, it heightened his arousal. He'd been to bed with dangerous women before, even with women who might have tried to kill him—best to assume, he'd learned early, that
everyone
might try that—but never had he felt the risk so close at hand. Power walked beside him, and mystery, and those things drew him to Judith just as much as full breasts and bright eyes.

By the time they reached the top of the stairs, he was aching with desire. Several times he quashed the urge to pull Judith into a corner and kiss her. He'd seen no servants, and the halls weren't well lit any longer, but he knew great houses, and he knew people who were adept at not being seen. If Judith was waiting until the bedroom—well, she had to live in the village. He didn't and, knowing that, held himself back.

If Judith didn't go in for public display, neither did she seem worried. She led William onward with a faint smile and a smooth, unhesitant walk, the posture of a woman who'd long since known herself in her own place and capable of commanding anything around her. At that moment, William knew that included him—if not entirely, at least more so than he would have expected. If she'd bade him to kneel at her feet in the dark hallway, he would have done it. As the image came to mind, he drew a deep breath through his teeth and almost wished she would.

She didn't turn, but glancing back, she caught his gaze, and her smile deepened. “Almost there,” she said. Her eyes were the dark green-black of the trees outside, shadowed with desire, and her lips curved, ripe and welcoming. “This place is betimes larger than I'd have it be.”

“I was just thinking,” William said, “that we should have met in a cottage somewhere.”

Or he should have taken her in the drawing room—laid her on the couch and pushed up her skirt—but although the thought made his cock pulse and strain against his flies, he knew it wouldn't have been right. Much as he wanted Judith, and as half-jokingly as she'd said it, this
was
the close of an agreement and the beginning of an alliance. A degree of ritual was appropriate.

Besides, there was a certain torturous pleasure in anticipation.

Judith's bedroom was an island of sea-colored brocade and velvet, with a massive canopied bed that might have come from the century before. The sound of the closing door shut out time as well as the world outside. This was here and now, and the world stilled in anticipation.

“I'll need your assistance,” Judith said, her voice low and silky. Almost touching him, she turned, showing a row of jet buttons down the back of her dress. “Women's clothing these days. 'Tis a wondrous thing that anyone manages to roger a lass.”

“Some of us,” William responded, “are patient men.”

To his surprise, he found that he spoke truth. Yes, he hungered to touch her. Yes, he was breathing quickly by the time his fingers undid the first button. But he waited. He was careful. His awareness narrowed to each small, black oval, and each one undone was a drumbeat in his brain:
one
and
two
and
six
and
seven
, and his heartbeat matched the rhythm.

At the end, he brought his hands upward in one smooth line over Judith's corset, tracing her spine and making her shiver, and then pushed the silk to each side. It fell away from her shoulders, and her body, emerging, shone golden and sleek. She made a throaty sound of appreciation, then took matters into her own hands, stepping unhurriedly out of the cloud of taffeta and linen. A few quick motions at the front of her corset, and it too opened and fell away, leaving her naked save for jewelry and silk stockings.

“My God,” said William, or he thought he did. Sounds definitely came out of his mouth, but he couldn't have sworn they were anything as organized as words. Forgetting gentlemanly behavior, he stared.

Naked, she lost neither dignity nor power. Judith made no move to cover herself. Her breasts, full and round with large dark nipples, were bared to his gaze, as was the triangle of black hair between her thighs. She set one hand on her hip and smiled at him, and William thought of classical statuary, of goddesses and queens, and also that he might actually die of lust.

“You're not very efficient,” she said. “You could have started undressing minutes ago.”

“I was appreciating the moment,” he said, and this time his mouth did manage to shape words. All the same, his hands were quickly about their business. He might have popped a button or two in his haste, but he didn't care.

Judith watched, eyes filled with anticipation. When William undid his trousers and his cock finally sprang free, she ran her tongue slowly over her lower lip, and his previous statement about patience almost became a complete lie. With an immense effort of will, he managed to get himself free of his clothing.

She stepped into his arms then, her whole body naked and warm and vibrant against his. William kissed her slowly, learning again the feel of her lips and tongue, the taste of her mouth, and before he was done, he knew that her earlier calm had been at least partly show. Her nipples were hard against his chest, her breasts rubbing against him with every increasingly quick breath, and her hands locked at the middle of his back, holding him tightly against her.

When William finally pulled away, it was only to take the few steps to the bed. He led Judith this time, one arm around her waist, and she went eagerly with him. Side by side they tumbled onto the blankets. Already William was cupping Judith's breasts, and while panting, she was running her hands over his chest and sides, slow movements that nonetheless spoke of restlessness. So did the motions of her body—the small, involuntary circles of her hips and the way she pressed her breasts into his hands.

He was no less overcome. The world had truly narrowed now. He was barely aware of the bed he lay on, only that there was a surface. He did know that his breath was fast and hard, that he groaned as Judith's long fingers skimmed over his nipples and her hot mouth traced a line down his neck, that every time she writhed against him, the friction of her smooth thigh against his erection made him shudder with pleasure.

When Judith reached lower, William found some vestige of willpower and grasped her wrist. For a second, she gave him a puzzled look, black brows slanting together, swollen lips beginning to part in a question.

“My turn this time,” he said.

For once in his experience of women, he knew he didn't need to worry about either hurting or overpowering his partner—even in human form, he knew there was strength enough to Judith—but chivalry still gentled his touch as he nudged her over onto her back and rose above her. He allowed himself only a fleeting and far too tempting moment of lying flush against her, feeling her legs beginning to part around him, and then slid lower, taking one of her nipples in his mouth as he'd wanted to do for, oh, ages now.

Judith moaned, deep and long. Her fingers threaded through William's hair, tugging a little but mostly just urging him onward as her body did, her back arching as he circled his tongue. Her own hair spread out on the coverlet, a black cloud around her flushed face. By the time he switched to the other breast, her head was tossing back and forth, her lower lip between her teeth in some attempt to at least quiet the sounds she was making.

It was not inordinately successful, that effort, which made William smile even as he took a firmer grip on his willpower. He didn't think he'd ever been so hard, so hot and full, so desperate to be inside a woman.

With a last attempt at patience, he stroked up her thighs, feeling the sleek firmness of muscle beneath the smooth skin. Judith parted her legs easily at his touch, and William cupped her sex, relishing the feel of soft hair and then—
ah
—incredible wetness, and the way her hips instantly strained toward him. With his mouth still on her nipple, he felt her chest rise as she sucked in a breath, and felt with all of him the sudden desperate tension of her body.

“Now,” she said, and her hands left his hair to catch his shoulders, urging him back upward. “Now would be good.”

Judith's voice was fierce, but still one step from demanding. Demanding was, William thought, still too close to begging for her tastes. He had a vague idea of testing that particular line, but Judith's hands were insistent, her legs open below him, and he abandoned any thought of playing that game.
Next
time
, he told himself silently.

He'd prepared for many circumstances when he'd dressed. The French letter was in the pocket of his trousers. William made quick work of putting it on, then positioned himself over Judith, the tip of his cock just at the entrance to her sex. Then he thrust forward, Judith wrapped her legs around him as she cried out, and he didn't think any longer about a next time, or about teasing this time, or about anything remotely civilized or abstract. All was sensation. All was urgency and welcome, and Judith's eyes wide and green below him.

He had just enough self-control left to listen to her body, to find the rhythm she'd started and to match it: slow and deep at first, each parting and rejoining like its own separate act, and then faster as Judith arched up against him, taking his rod deeper and rubbing against him at the same time. She'd abandoned any effort to be quiet, and her cries and moans sounded in his ears like rockets, wearing away at his self-control one after another.

When her climax hit, she screamed against his shoulder, and her thighs tightened around his flanks just as her sex tightened around his cock for the first time. She was, William learned, powerful
everywhere
.

He felt himself starting to spend a moment later. He drove hard and deep into Judith, her body still shaking around his and urging him on to greater heights of rapture, until the final waves passed over him and he collapsed.

It had been a long time.

Judith turned on her side and stretched, feeling the pop of muscles in her back and thighs, the faint soreness between her legs. She grinned up at the ceiling. The bed felt softer beneath her, the silk brocade sleeker and cooler. It had started raining sometime during their interlude, and she heard the drops pattering against the windows. Carnality also was a transformation, and the aftermath of all such things made her more aware of her body. She'd missed it.

Absently, she reached out a hand to William's chest. Considerate, he'd rolled off her a moment after he'd reached his peak, before his elbows could give out under his weight. Now he lay on his back, staring upward in the same contentedly stunned state from which Judith was beginning to emerge.

She hoped so, anyhow. Men weren't exactly
opaque
at moments of passion, and she was fairly sure William had enjoyed himself, but both pride and her own pleasure made her hope she'd done well by him. And it had been a long time.

Judith trailed her fingers through curls of red hair, felt the warm skin and the smooth muscle beneath them. “They keep you in good fettle, your masters,” she said, smiling again. “Or is this all by way of recreation?”

“Hmm?” William chuckled, the vibration thrumming up through Judith's fingertips. “Rather a combination, I suppose. The work requires fitness, and after so many years at it, I can't really imagine being any other way. Though I suppose I'll have to, eventually—once the knees give out and the rheumatism sets in.”

“And what'll you do then?”

“Find a nice rocking chair and a pipe, I suppose. Give young men hell and tell them that hardship's not a patch on what it was in my day.” He looked down at Judith. “I don't suppose you've ever had to worry about it.”

“Not for a century or two more,” she said. “We do get old, in time. We're human enough for that.”

“Oh,” he said. “I hadn't thought to ask—and I certainly don't mean to be impolite—”

“Half,” Judith said, “or less. My mother was human. A witch, but human. And not even my grandfather could remember any of us who was pure dragon. The blood of the other side runs strong, 'tis all, when it's present.” Before he could figure out the implications of what she'd said and go tense and polite, she added, “You're very strategic-minded, and I approve, but I meant what I said in the train. We
can
interbreed, but it takes effort.”

“That must be rather convenient, in its way.”

“Very,” said Judith. “For me, at least.” There was no point pretending she'd been a virgin; he already knew otherwise. “But then, I'm not the heir and don't have to worry about producing one. Fate be praised.”

“And yet,” said William, stroking a hand down her shoulder and over her arm, “you're the one who minds your family's estates.”

“I mind Loch Arach and the castle. My brother handles the finances and the city business. There's more than what you see here, same as with any family like ours.” She smiled against the pillow, letting her eyes drift shut for a second and enjoying his touch. “Though I suppose it's less metaphorical for most.”

“Less physical, certainly. Most of us are more than the face we show.”

“Most of us show different faces for different company. Varied, but perhaps not so layered as you'd like to think,” said Judith. She forced her eyes back open. “I can't be falling asleep like this, you understand. Things still to do tonight.”

In truth, she hadn't expected to find sleep so tempting or so easy. Her mind held no memories of this kind of easy contentment after a tumble, or of the desire to let herself melt into the bed and her lover's arms—but she'd been younger then and had been in ships or army camps or the sort of inn where the mattress made noises independent of any human or half-and-maybe-less-human movement. Different circumstances, Judith told herself, and different results.

William made a languid but affirmative sound. “And they'll be missing me down in the village, I suspect.”

“Oh, I'm afraid the rumors will already have started,” said Judith, forcing herself up and onto her feet. The dinner dress was a lost cause, unless William was a good hand at both buttons and laces—and asking him to dress her seemed too intimate, far more so than the reverse had been—so she took a nightgown and a wrapper from the closet. “I hope you don't mind.”

“I'd resigned myself when I came up here.”

“And yet you did come,” said Judith. She pulled on her clothing and watched William dress, admiring the play of muscles in his arms and back. “Queen and Country, old boy?” she asked, trying to imitate his accent.

He turned, startled, in the process of fastening a cuff link. They watched each other briefly in a silence gone suddenly heavy. Then William smiled. “Among other things,” he said, “at least when I thought you were only offering dinner.”

“I hope someone gives you a medal, then,” said Judith. Dressed, she kissed him quickly and then opened the door. “The rain's stopped now,” she said after a moment's silence to confirm it. “I'll show you out. I told the servants to take the night off after we went to the drawing room. They'll still gossip—but there won't be proof, if that matters to you.”

“It doesn't to you,” he replied, a curious smile on his long, lean face. “Or so you said.”

“No, I said hearsay doesn't,” said Judith, and she didn't answer him further.

In all her years at the castle, she'd been discreet, as much out of habit as from fear of any real consequences. Out in the world, unusual license made people talk, and the last thing she—or any other member of her family—had ever wanted was to become the subject of speculation. Questions in one area too easily led to questions in others.

But that was the wider world. Loch Arach was hers and her family's, and different. And soon enough she'd be gone, first to England and then to some imaginary grave in the city, victim of an invented fever. Once word of the evening got around, those future rumors might take on a different hue, might delve into what she'd
really
died of and why she'd truly left, but that wouldn't be so bad. Questions about a living woman were dangerous—gossip about a dead one diverted attention, like a magician's trick.

All the same, she didn't particularly want to answer questions—or even to see them in anyone's eyes—more than necessary. So she said a polite and proper good-bye to William as they approached the castle doors, then let him slip out without risking anyone outside seeing her dressed for bed. Judith locked the door behind him, then turned and considered the things she still had to do.

She couldn't think of any. The tasks existed, she was sure of it—she hadn't been lying to William earlier—but they hovered just out of her memory, irritating and elusive.

The castle was empty. She'd been very thorough about giving the servants the rest of the evening off. Part of her had remembered the train ride and hotly anticipated the possibility of the night progressing as it had, while more tactically, alert to the possibility of danger, she'd wanted to get rid of potential casualties or witnesses. Judith hadn't thought it likely that William would try to kill her—if nothing else, he'd fall under considerable suspicion—but there were other possibilities, and if violence had broken out, at least there would have been no targets save her.

Instead, there'd been talk and pleasure and the growth of the trust that had started building between them back when they'd fought off the robbers together. Judith didn't regret any of it; she also hadn't thought that the aftermath would leave her feeling so much at loose ends.

“Well,” she said to the dark and silent hall. Absently, she twisted her hair into a knot behind her head and began to walk up the dimly lit staircase and back to her bedroom. Whatever she had yet to do would doubtless make itself known to her in time. The evening had gone well. There was no point in fretting.

* * *

“You've been stirring your tea for five minutes together,” said Agnes. “I dinna' think the last three have improved matters any. What's fashin' ye now?”

“I couldn't say,” said Judith, which was the truth on many levels. She shouldn't tell Agnes that she'd taken William to bed. She couldn't tell her about his allegiance or her family's secrets or the negotiations they'd held, nor could she pinpoint just what was troubling her, other than the feeling that she'd taken a step forward and was still waiting for her foot to hit ground. “Sorry. Bad company this morning.”

“Perhaps I'm just no' who you're hoping to see.” Agnes grinned and lifted her eyebrows.

Here it came. There was no point postponing the fatal moment. “You think I'm here after Arundell.”

“Not completely. I'm no' saying you're visiting me under false pretenses. But I know well he came back late last night, and Claire says he'd been up to the castle. 'Tis your own affair, my lady, of course—but if you were here to see him, he's above stairs. Reading a letter, he said.”

“I wish him joy of it,” said Judith, though under the table, her fingers worried little patterns on the wool of her dress. “We had an excellent dinner. I wanted news from London—my brothers are damned poor correspondents—and he was good about providing it.”

“He's fair useful for that purpose,” Agnes agreed, “though what he mentions of concerts and music halls and such is like to drive half the young people here away before too very long.”

“If it wasn't Arundell, it'd be something else. That's how the young are.”

Agnes made a noncommittal sound. Below it, Judith heard a man's footsteps approaching, and her fingers had tightened on the teacup and fabric before the door opened. She turned, made herself smile naturally, and met William's eyes.

He smiled back: quick, polite, discreet. Good. She should have known. He was a professional. She hadn't been his first woman. Both of them knew how to conduct themselves. Judith watched him cross the room, remembered how he'd moved above her the night before, and fought back a shiver. “Mr. Arundell. Good morning. Agnes was just worrying that you'd lead all our youth to perdition.”

“I'll do my best to avoid it, Lady MacAlasdair,” William replied. “If it helps, I give you my word that I've never learned to play a pipe of any sort. Only the piano, and it's rather difficult to lead children under a mountain with one of those.”

Laughing with him warmed her as much as lusting after him did. It was both a relief to Judith's nerves and another sign of danger. It was also not a phenomenon she had the chance to think about for very long.

More footsteps sounded outside. These were light and hurried: Claire, running. There was nothing out of the way about that—sixteen was a running kind of age—but the last few weeks made every sound and flicker of light an omen. Judith was tense, getting ready to rise from the table, even as the door burst open.

“Mother—” Claire's face was white, her blue eyes huge in contrast. If she saw either Judith or William, she gave no sign. Infatuation and awareness of rank were nothing to her right now. She was a child in that moment, and the only person who mattered was the one who'd mattered most from the start. “Mother, the most horrible thing has happened.”