He set both hands on her inner thighs, pushing them farther, then bent his head and touched her with his tongue. “Ahh!” she cried, the pleasure so intense she wished to shut it out.
“Relax your legs, love.” His voice was but a whisper. “Open for me, Esmée. Let me soothe you.”
Let me soothe you.
She writhed beneath his touch. Oh, God. He could do it; she knew that much instinctively. But what was he offering? His hands pushed firmly on her inner thighs until she relaxed into the mattress, then his thumbs spread wide her flesh. His tongue slid deep, teasing at her wetness, heightening her desire, until it touched her very core and made her body tremble. And still, he tormented her, pleasuring her with light, little flicks, and then long, languorous strokes, until Esmée found herself shaking and shattering, and coming apart.
She returned to awareness in the dimly lit room to see Alasdair rise up on his knees. When she saw the jutting length of his erection, she drew in her breath sharply. His head came up, and with a jerk of his head, he tossed the heavy gold hair from his eyes. His once-hidden gaze burned into her now, and with one hand, he touched himself, easing his fist along the impossible length of his flesh.
Esmée swallowed hard, then held out her hands, inviting him. Instead, he came down beside her, and curled one leg over her body. Sated and uncertain, she rolled onto her side, facing him. She thought he ought to be doing
something
—something more than just staring into her eyes—but she was unsure.
“Alasdair, I…I want…”
“Shush, love,” he whispered, touching one finger to her lips. “I know what you want.” He rolled closer, pushing her onto her back, then covering her body with his.
This was it, then. The moment every woman both craved and feared. But he did not put himself inside her body, as she expected. Instead, he kissed her again, opening his mouth over hers, abrading her face with the stubble of his beard, his nostrils flared wide, his breath coming fast and urgent.
“Touch me,” he groaned, as if the words had been dragged from the pit of his belly. “Esmée, touch me.” Almost roughly, he took her hand and guided it toward his erection.
Esmée did as he asked, sliding her hand between their bodies. The weight of him felt like satin, but hard and warm, pulsing with strength. Tentatively, she stroked him as he had done, drawing her fingers firmly down his length. Alasdair came up on one elbow, and shuddered. “Again,” he rasped, his eyes squeezed shut.
Esmée obliged him, marveling in the barely restrained power of his body. He trembled as if from his very core, then spread his mouth over hers again, kissing her deeply. Esmée felt a growing sense of power, a faith in her ability to give him pleasure.
Alasdair’s long, elegant fingers curled over hers, easing her hand back and forth over his hot flesh as his tongue thrust inside her mouth. Again and again, she repeated the gesture, his hand over hers, his tongue sinuously curling around her own, his shudders deepening, until at last he tore his mouth away on a guttural sound. She stroked him once more, and his beautiful body bowed back, his mouth opening in a silent, triumphant cry. Then Esmée felt his erection spasm, again and again, until the warm wetness of his seed spilt across her belly.
Alasdair’s deep sense of peace was not long-lived. After allowing himself the luxury of drowsing with Esmée in his arms for perhaps an hour, he began to stir, prodded by guilt and worry. Reluctantly, he slid away from the warmth of her body and returned with a damp cloth from the washstand.
She opened her eyes, and stiffened. “Sorcha—?” she rasped, rolling up onto one elbow, and pushing the hair from her face.
“Nothing yet.” He brushed the backs of his fingers along the turn of her jaw. “Rest, Esmée. It’s late. I’ll make sure Reid sends for you if there’s any change.”
She sat fully upright, and let the sheets fall. A less missish sort would have dragged them up to hide her nakedness, but Esmée seemed unconcerned. “Are you leaving me?” she asked, her eyes searching his face.
God knew he did not want to. “I’d best,” he said. “The servants will be wondering.”
“Alasdair—” she began, then halted. “I wish…I wish you to tell me
why.”
She was not referring to his leaving, and he knew it. Christ, it had been hard enough to do. Now he had to explain it? He bent one knee to the mattress, and sat down. “Esmée, you brought me great pleasure,” he answered. “May we leave it at that?”
She shook her head. “No.”
Absently, he tucked a curl behind her ear. “Esmée, you are very young,” he began. She opened her mouth to speak, but he laid a finger to her lips. “And I have seen more of the world than a man ought.”
Esmée’s eyes hardened. “I’m inexperienced, aye, but not ignorant,” she said. “There is a vast difference between the two.”
He leaned across the bed, and lightly kissed her. “Is there indeed?” he said. “Well, we shall speak more of it tomorrow, Esmée, when we are not scared out of our minds.”
She tore her gaze from his, and stared into the darkness of the room. “Did you not want me, then?” she asked. “Was it just me, throwing myself at you? Answer me that, MacLachlan.”
So he was just
MacLachlan
again. “Aye, Esmée, I wanted you,” he answered. “But wanting, and having the right to take, are far from the same thing.”
She raked her hand back through her hair again. “I have been a fool, haven’t I?” she whispered. “Sometimes I think I haven’t the sense God gave a goose.”
Alasdair didn’t know what to say to that, but he understood the terrible weight of regret. He watched by the fire’s light as she slid from the bed and padded across the carpet to the pile of clothing on the floor. She was so beautiful and so fragile. And yet the word beauty was inadequate, and her fragility was deceptive. He had taken not just pleasure in her arms tonight, but comfort, too. A sense of strength, and of being where he belonged. And yet he did not belong with Esmée. Certainly he did not belong in her bed.
Esmée returned with her drawers and chemise.
“Stay in bed, love,” he urged her. “Try to sleep.”
Again, the stubborn shake of her head, which sent her long, shimmering hair sliding over one shoulder. “I must go to my sister,” she answered. “I shan’t trouble Dr. Reid, I swear it. But I’ll not rest tonight until I’ve seen Sorcha again.”
Shortly after dawn the next morning, Alasdair arose from his own bed, feeling as if the Sword of Damocles hung over his head—two or three of them, actually. He had not slept to speak of. But to appease Ettrick, he’d taken off his clothes and put on his dressing gown. For about the fifth time since midnight, he hastened downstairs to check on Sorcha.
Dr. Reid roused in his chair and unfolded his hands from his belly. “She stirred a bit about an hour ago,” he reported. “Her pupils are responding nicely, and the shoulder looks good. I think we are well out of the woods, Sir Alasdair.”
“Oh, thank God.” He went to the bed, and took Sorcha’s tiny hand in his. The thought of the pain she must have suffered almost unmanned him. But she did indeed look different now, as if she were drowsing naturally.
She really was all right.
Relief began to flood through him.
The doctor rose. “I think she’ll wake by noon. Then we’ll see if we can determine how much discomfort she’s suffering. She’ll likely be fretful for a day or two.”
Alasdair smiled and let his hand play with one of Sorcha’s fine, baby-soft curls. “Oh, Sorcha won’t tolerate discomfort,” he said with an inward smile. “And she’ll communicate that quite forcefully.”
“Hmph!” said the doctor. “Spoilt, is she?”
Alasdair shrugged. “I prefer to say
doted on.”
Upon leaving the doctor, he choked down some dry toast and coffee, then dressed in haste. It was going to be one hell of a day. He knew what had to be done, and it left him a little ill, though whether from dread or anticipation, he was not perfectly certain. He was sorry, though—damned sorry for all of them—that he’d let it come to this.
In the entryway, Wellings handed him his stick and his hat. “Your brother was to take breakfast with you this morning, sir,” he said with a sigh.
Alasdair looked at the butler incredulously. “Tell me, Wellings, is my brother not rich as Croesus?”
The butler inclined his head. “I believe so, sir.”
“Then tell him to build
himself
a house, and hire a bloody cook,” Alasdair suggested, slapping his hat on his head. “Damned clutch-fisted Scot! If there’s an emergency, I’ll be in Oxford Street shopping.”
Wellings’ brows flew aloft.
“Shopping,
sir?”
Alasdair gave him a twisted grin. “Some things, Wellings, cannot wait.”
It was a miracle. Or at least, it felt so to Esmée. By half past nine, Sorcha was wide-awake, raising the rafters and much of the staff. A little frantically, Esmée dandled the child on her knee, mindful of Sorcha’s arm. It was not enough. Sorcha screwed up her small, pink face, and drew another deep breath.
“Porridge!” said Esmée to Lydia over the ensuing din.
“Porridge?” Lydia lifted the cover on the breakfast tray which Hawes had brought up, then hastened toward them with a spoon and bowl.
Esmée lifted the spoon, and the silence was instantaneous.
“Bite!” said the child, opening her mouth.
Esmée and Lydia sighed in unison.
“Spoilt!” grunted the doctor, who was dropping clanking bits of metal into his black leather satchel.
Lydia rolled her eyes.
“Now, nothing but that porridge and a bit of broth today!” Dr. Reid went on, shutting his bag with an efficient snap. “No running. No climbing. And for God’s sake, no bathing. I’ll be back first thing tomorrow. Until then, if she gets fretful, give her two drops of the tincture in that brown bottle, then let her sleep.”
Esmée managed a weak smile. “Thank you, Dr. Reid,” she said. “Lydia will show you out when you’re ready.”
But when the door closed behind them, leaving Esmée with nothing but her remorse and her sister to bear her company, the guilt set in anew. She thought of the ugly sutures in her sister’s scalp, and for a moment, panic seized her breath. An instant’s distraction, and now this! She was lucky the child wasn’t dead.
Still, the knee-weakening sense of relief she’d felt this morning when Sorcha’s eyes fluttered open had never fully overcome her dread. Apparently, it wasn’t enough she’d been a fool where her sister’s welfare was concerned. She’d been a fool over Sir Alasdair MacLachlan, too. She had allowed terror—and some nameless emotion she could not comprehend—to get a grip on her heart.
And what now was she to do? How did one go on after such a thing? There was no pretending it hadn’t happened—and no pretending it wouldn’t happen again if she remained here. She had all but begged him to take her to bed. And in so doing, Esmée had been a bigger fool than her mother had been. MacLachlan hadn’t even needed to whisper sweet lies in her ear. She had just clung to him and begged him. What man would have said no?
Well, at least he had learned from his past mistakes. At least she would not be left carrying his child, like Mrs. Crosby and her own mother. For that small mercy, she ought to be grateful. He had also been amazingly tender toward her. He had made her feel desirable, and…almost loved. Those perhaps, were the greater dangers. She was too vulnerable. Too alone.
Oh, she should never have agreed to stay here! Yesterday, she’d proven worse than useless. Lydia was a far more competent caretaker than she would ever be. Lydia would never have let a child go running into the path of a flying phaeton.
It was time, perhaps, that Esmée accepted the awful truth—that she had stayed here with Sorcha out of pure selfishness. She was not qualified to be a nurse or a governess. And as soon as Sorcha recovered from this horrific accident, then…well, Esmée could not quite bear to think of that just now.
As if to remind her of more immediate concerns, Sorcha began to squirm. Esmée bent her head, and gingerly kissed the child’s bruised brow. “Och, my wee trootie!” she whispered. “’Tis a sad, sairie mother I’ve made you!”
Sorcha looked up at her solemnly, and said, “Bite!”
Somehow, Esmée found it inside her to laugh. She dipped the spoon in the porridge, and resumed her task. But almost at once, Lydia returned, her eyes wide.
“Miss, I think you’d best go downstairs,” she said. “There’s a big black coach and four drawn up at the door, and a lady downstairs reading Wellings the riot act.”
Esmée kissed Sorcha again, and passed her to the maid. “Who can it be?”
“No one as I ever saw before,” said the girl, taking up the porridge spoon. “But I heard your name mentioned, miss, and Wellings is as white a shade of pale as ever a man could be.”
“As I was saying, madam,” Wellings voice echoed up the stairs, “Sir Alasdair is not at home. If you can but wait—”
“I certainly will not!” said an affronted female voice. “I have not traveled half the night to wait! Fetch me Miss Hamilton at once! I’ll know the meaning of this scurrilous behavior!”
Esmée stood on the last step, frozen in shock.
“Aunt Rowena?”
The lady’s head swiveled round so fast her lavishly befeathered hat almost took flight. “Esmée!” she cried, rushing toward her. “Oh, Esmée! Dear child! What in God’s name?”
Esmée embraced her aunt tightly. “You have come home!” she said breathlessly. “Oh, I’d begun to fear you never would.”
“Oh, child!” said her ladyship. “Your letter was slow in reaching me, but I left as soon as Anne was well enough. Surely you did not think I would forsake you?”
“No, ma’am, but I did not know if you
could
come, nor how long it might take. And I wrote twice to you in Australia.”
“Oh, the mail is so abysmally slow!” Lips pursed, Lady Tatton set her sharply away. “And I have been just sick with worry. Finch brought your last letter to meet me at Southampton, and I came straight here. Dear girl, we must
talk.
Tell this odious man to go away!”
Esmée looked at the butler. “Och, Aunt Rowena,” she said. “You mustn’t scold Wellings. He has been so very kind to me, and none of this is his fault.”
“No, no!” said Lady Tatton. “I’ve every notion it is all your mother’s fault! If good sense was weighed out in ha’pennies, Rosamund couldn’t have bought herself a hair ribbon.”
Esmée felt her face flush with color. “Come into the parlor, please,” she said, going to the door and opening it. “Wellings, may I impose on you for coffee? Lady Tatton, you may have guessed, is my aunt, newly returned from abroad.”
They were sequestered in the parlor for half an hour, most of that time spent in trying to bring Lady Tatton up to date on the disarray that had been her late sister’s life. Lady Tatton cried most affectedly at the details of Lady Achanalt’s death, but it was clear that her exasperation far exceeded her grief.
Rowena had been ten years her sister Rosamund’s senior, and it had often fallen to her to extract her younger sibling from all manner of ill-thought scrapes. And after burning the candle at both ends through four marriages and twice as many
affaires,
it was not, Lady Tatton said, to be wondered at that the poor woman had succumbed to a fever.
Then Esmée tried to explain what happened afterward. The part about Lord Achanalt was not difficult, for her anger was still raw. But when she tried to explain why she had come to Sir Alasdair MacLachlan for help, and why she had remained in his home, it sounded perilously like one of her mother’s ill-thought scrapes.
Her aunt was kind enough not to mention it. “Oh, my dear child!” she said, drawing out her handkerchief and dabbing at her eyes. “How could Rosamund have let it come to this?”
“I don’t think she meant to, Aunt Rowena.”
Lady Tatton sniffled pathetically. “I begged her, Esmée, to send you to me when you turned seventeen. But she refused me. She cried, and said you were too young. But you could have been married with a family by now. You could have had a dependable husband to take care of this mess, and dear Papa’s money to ease your path through life. Instead, we have this!” She lifted her hands expansively. “Oh, it breaks my heart to think of you cast out of your home and left to live by your wits.”
Esmée wasn’t sure she had any wits, but she held her tongue.
Lady Tatton let her gaze roam over the small parlor, the very room in which Esmée had struck her devil’s bargain with MacLachlan. She thought of how he had looked that night; haggard, bruised, and unshaven, yet startlingly handsome just the same. She wondered now which of them had been in a greater state of panic. If the memory had not pulled so hard at her heartstrings, she might have been able to laugh.
Her aunt jolted her from her reverie. “Oh, I cannot believe you have been living in this den of iniquity,” she said sharply. “Child, whatever were you thinking? And whatever was Alasdair MacLachlan thinking? Oh, that disgraceful scoundrel! An innocent young woman living under
this
roof? He assuredly knows better, even if you do not!”
“Well, I do know better,” Esmée admitted.
Particularly after last night.
“But what else was I to do? I could think of nothing. And Sir Alasdair
is
Sorcha’s father.”
Lady Tatton sniffed a little pitifully. “Well, we don’t really
know
that, do we, my dear?”
Esmée shook her head. “I heard Mamma throw it in Achanalt’s face,” she said for the second time. “She caught him in bed with one of the maids and flew into an awful rage. Why would she lie?”
“Oh, I don’t know!” said Lady Tatton. “In any case, surely MacLachlan has no wish to raise the poor wee thing? Surely he can be persuaded to give her up? No one would think twice about Achanalt’s having sent his daughter to be brought up by her aunt.”
Esmée thought of the will MacLachlan had had drawn up, and of how he had looked at Sorcha in the schoolroom the afternoon they were bent so intently over his coin collection. And she thought of how he had bowed his head over Sorcha’s limp body in the park, tears streaming down his face. Esmée had seen them, even through her own. Perhaps he
was
a disgraceful scoundrel. But even scoundrels could love their children, could they not?
“I am not at all sure he
can
be persuaded, Aunt,” she finally answered. “Or even that he should be. He has grown rather attached to Sorcha.”
Lady Tatton’s visage darkened. “Well, I hope he hasn’t grown rather attached to you!” she said tartly. “Your remaining here is out of the question. Indeed, we’ll be hard-pressed to explain what you
were
doing here if rumors start to fly.”
Aunt Rowena meant her to leave?
Well, of course she did! Esmée’s last three letters had all but begged for Rowena’s help, had they not? And what reason had Esmée to remain, other than her affection for Sorcha? Still, a small, silly part of her wanted to cry out that she
couldn’t
go; that this was her home. But it wasn’t. Indeed, it was the last place on earth she needed to be. And she was hopeless as a mother.
Worse, she seemed to have inherited her own mother’s lack of common sense where men were concerned. And so she clasped her hands in her lap until her fingers went numb. “I was working here as a governess,” she finally said. “That is the truth, and that is what I shall say.”
“Oh, my dear, naive child!” said Lady Tatton. “Sir Alasdair is so shockingly
outré.
He is the worst sort of womanizer imaginable—when he isn’t stripping young men of their fortunes.”
“Perhaps the young men who are fool enough to sit down with him deserve what they get,” said Esmée quietly, “if his reputation is so widely known.”
Lady Tatton’s shrewd gaze narrowed.
“Besides,” Esmée quickly went on, “I really don’t think anyone
will
ask, for Sir Alasdair does not go about in society very much, and we are quite some distance from Mayfair here. Moreover, I believe his servants are very discreet.”
Lady Tatton sniffed again. “Yes, well, working in a house like this, they are probably required to be,” she remarked. “How long, my dear, will it take you to pack your things? Mr. and Mrs. Finch are airing a suite of rooms for you in Grosvenor Square. I’ve told them to expect you, and the wee child,
if
Sir Alasdair agrees—which
I
think he will. And I hope you will own that I am just a tad more experienced than you in the ways of such gentlemen, using that term loosely, of course.”