This Heart of Mine (73 page)

“For practicality’s sake.” Skye laughed. “All the other bedchambers are filled to overflowing with your sisters and brothers, their spouses, and their offspring. Go along now, my darling, and Alex and I will have a cosy chat.” She smiled brightly at her daughter, and Velvet turned and hurried up the stairs. “Come with me, my lord,” Skye said to her son-in-law. He dutifully followed her into the library where Adam was already waiting.

Once they were all settled, Skye turned to Alex and said, “You have made your decision then, my lord?”

“We have already talked, Velvet and I. She is willing to come back to Scotland wi’ me as I have already told ye.”

“Have you thought over what I wrote to you, Alex? Do you possess the patience to love Velvet?”

“I don’t know,” he answered her honestly. “What I do know is that I want her to come home wi’ me. I am not certain that I love her, but I don’t want to lose her again.”

Skye nodded. She understood his quandary, but Adam was not so open-minded. He glowered at his son-in-law from the depths of his chair and growled, “You’d best not hurt her, my lad. Son of Angus Gordon or no, I’ll kill you if you hurt my child!”

“Adam!” Skye gently admonished her husband.

“Nay, little girl, I mean it. She’s suffered enough. I’d rather he sue for an annulment than give Velvet a moment’s pain,” Adam declared.

Strangely, Alex was not offended by his father-in-law’s vehemence. “I am trying, my lord, but remember that I have suffered also. Still, given time, I believe that Velvet and I can work out the difficulties between us.”

“How long before you leave?” demanded Adam.

“A few days, perhaps a week or more. I don’t want to tear Velvet from her family too quickly after this long separation.”

“Umm.” Adam nodded. “ ’Tis wise.”

“You see,” Skye said, “Alex is indeed going to try to overcome the gulf that divides him from our daughter.” She rose from her own chair and, walking over to Lord Gordon, put a hand on his arm. “I know it will not be easy,” she said, “but I somehow believe that you and Velvet are meant to be together. Hold fast to that thought, Alex! It will aid you in getting over the hard spots.”

He stood and smiled down at her, thinking as he had thought those long years ago when he had first become betrothed to Velvet that his mother-in-law was an incredibly beautiful woman. But then so was his wife, and he wanted to go to her now. “I will try, madame,” he promised.

“I know you will,” she said, reassured. “I will have a servant show you to your apartment, my lord.”

When she had sent him on his way, Skye turned back to Adam. “Let them be, my love. You cannot make this all right for Velvet any more than you could the
other
matter. She must work this out with her husband, and there will be bad times before it is all settled between them. Was it not that way with us?” She settled down into his lap, resting her head upon his shoulder.

“I always hated it when you were hurt as well,” he grumbled.

“I know that, but you and I made a great mistake with Velvet. We spoiled her, and we overprotected her. She is a strong girl, Adam. Away from us she not only survived, but she saw to Pansy’s safety. She will triumph in this matter also if we will but let her.”

“ ’Tis not Velvet I worry about, but Alex,” Adam grumbled.

“He is trying, my love, but he is not you. In his own way he has been sheltered, too. Do not forget that when we first met I had been widowed thrice, and you were a man who had grown up in both the English and French courts. Most of Alex’s life has been spent at
Dun Broc
but for the years of his university schooling. He’s a Highland chieftain, and the thought that his wife has lain with another man must be maddening to him. I am frankly surprised he is being as reasonable as he is.” She leaned over and kissed her husband’s cheek.

Adam turned his head and, finding her loving mouth, kissed it passionately. “The only thing that ever mattered to me, little girl, was that you were finally mine,” he said.

She smiled. “You, my darling, are a very unusual man.”

Adam de Marisco grinned wickedly at his wife and fondled her breasts. “And you, madame, are a
very
unusual woman.”

“Sir!” she teased him with mock outrage, “we are grandparents! Will you ever stop being such a randy old billy goat?”

“Never, madame,” he answered her, and, tipping her from his lap, he moved across the room to lock the library door. “Not as long as I have you, sweet Skye, to warm my bed.”

Their eyes met, and then Skye threw her arms around her husband of nineteen years. “I am so happy with you, my darling! You did not lie to me when you promised to slay all my dragons and keep me safe.”

“If I could but slay Velvet’s dragons,” he said, “but that is for Alex to do now.” Then he bent his shaggy dark head and kissed her, far happier with his lot than his son-in-law was with his own right now.

Alex mounted the stairs almost reluctantly. Velvet had agreed to return to Scotland with him, but he fretted as to what kind of marriage they would have now. She had made no secret that she had loved Akbar. Did she love him still? Would she ever love him again? Could he love her again? Or had he never stopped loving her? Alex sighed deeply, hesitated for an instant as the footman opened the door to Velvet’s apartments, then went in. As he closed the door behind him, he could hear voices in the bedchamber.

“May I come in?” he called politely.

Velvet, seated in her oaken tub in the next room, raised her eyebrows delicately. What had come over Alex? He was treating her as if she were made of fine crystal. “Come in, my lord. I am finished.”

“Not until I get the back of your neck, you ain’t,” said Daisy.

Velvet laughed. “This is Pansy’s mother, Alex,” she said when he had entered. “Daisy, my lord of BrocCairn. Your man, Dugald, is now safely wed to my tiring woman, Alex. Pansy wasted no time.”

“Considering the size of me grandson, it was none too soon, and I expect Bran and me will be grandparents again by those two before another year is past,” Daisy said proudly. “Past time for you to have your own babies, Mistress Velvet. Now that you’ve been reunited with your fine husband, I expect you’ll be starting your own family.”

For a moment Alex thought the briefest shadow of sadness clouded Velvet’s eyes, but when she spoke he decided he must
have been mistaken. “Indeed, Daisy, it is past time for us to have a child,” she said. Then she rose and climbed from the tub.

Alex caught his breath. He
had
forgotten how extraordinarily beautiful she was. Her creamy skin and rounded breasts! Her arms and long legs that were, he thought, fuller and fleshier. There was no boldness about her, but she was no longer the skittish child-bride he remembered. She never even gave him so much as a coy glance as Daisy dried her, powdered her, and finally wrapped her in a silken chamber robe of apple-green silk.

“Go along, Daisy. I will see to my own hair now.”

“Pansy will come to dress you for dinner, Mistress Velvet.”

“Nay, let her have her time with her bridegroom, if that is all right with you, my lord.” Alex nodded his assent. “Just send me one of the undermaids to help, Daisy.”

“Very good, Mistress Velvet.” Daisy bobbed a curtsy and departed from the room.

For a long moment Velvet and Alex stood looking at each other, and then she said, “Let us sit by the fire, my lord. The day has grown chill, and the rain I predicted has already begun to fall.” She waved a graceful hand toward the window as she seated herself in a chair. “It only rains in ‘season’ in India, and then it is as if someone had cut a large hole in the sky, so heavy is the downpour.”

“What is it like?” he asked curiously.

“India?” She smiled. “A green, gray, and brown land. The sun would shine for months on end until I thought that if I did not see a cloudy day I would die from the wanting. I never knew that the weather could get so hot. One rarely wore clothing to bed. The heat hovered over the plains so that you could actually see it. It was better when we moved to Lahore. Still hot, but at least there I had gardens and greenery. Still, I missed the green of England.”

“Scotland is green, and the sun will not shine for weeks on end until you will long for those sunny days,” he said quietly.

She nodded. “I will not mind, Alex.”

“Do ye really want to come home wi’ me, lass?” he asked.

“Alex, what else is there for us? We are married. I should like to tell you that nothing has changed, and that we can pick up our lives from where we left them long ago on that snowy February day two and a half years past, but I cannot. I thought you dead. I have loved another man with my whole being. He filled my heart, and his touch made my body ache with joy. I cannot deny these things, and I will not, not even to please
you, my lord. I know that the truth is hurtful to you, but if I lied to you, you would know it, sense it, and there would always be an element of doubt between us.”

“Do ye love me, Velvet?”

“Once I did, Alex.” She made no further promises, and he felt angry and rejected.

“Ye left me, madame,” he said through gritted teeth. “I awoke in a stranger’s house, weak from loss of blood, with yer name upon my lips, but ye were not there, Velvet. When they finally told me that ye had left England to find yer parents, I couldn’t believe it.”

“I didn’t leave you, Alex. Not that way. When Padraic told me that you had been killed, I thought I would go mad. All my worst fears had been realized, for I had not wanted you to fight that duel. The pain was so terrible that, like the child I still was, I sought my parents to be comforted. I ran, not from you, Alex, but from the horrible reality of your death. What was left for me here in England without you? We had no children that might comfort me. We had nothing in common but three months of marriage and several months before that time when we fought each other almost constantly.”

“I courted ye in those months before our marriage!”

She laughed. “Nay, Alex. You stormed me like a castle to be taken, and take me you did, but you know nothing of courtship.”

“Did Akbar?”
His look was angry and piercing.

“Yes,” she answered him quietly, “but that has nothing to do with us here and now, Alex. That part of my life is over and done with, and I should as lief not speak of it any longer if we are to rebuild our life together.”

“Are ye afraid, Velvet?”

“Aye,” she said slowly.

“So am I,” he answered her in a burst of candor. “Let us go home to
Dun Broc
in two days,” she said suddenly.

“What?”
He was mightily surprised.

“Queen’s Malvern
is filled to overflowing with my relatives, and as long as we are here they will be here, standing about, looking at us with anxious looks, their children underfoot. Let us reassure my parents that we do not intend to murder one another, and then let us go home to
Dun Broc.
You’re still of a mind to get yourself an heir, aren’t you? We have lost several years, Alex. Why should we wait any longer?”

“But ye do not love me, Velvet. Ye have said it.”

“Ours was an arranged marriage like so many others, Alex.
How many marriages have the luxury of love between the mates? Once we loved, and we may do so again when the strain of our reunion is past, and we learn to know each other once more, but as long as we are surrounded by my well-meaning family, what chance do we have?”

Thinking about it, he was startled to realize that everything she said made perfect sense. “Ye’re far more a woman than when I last knew ye, lass,” he said seriously.

“Aye, Alex, I am,” she answered.

Her reply, he felt, had more meaning than the simplicity of the words she spoke, but her gaze was a steady one as her emerald eyes locked on to his amber ones.

“We’ll leave in two days’ time then, lass. ’Tis a good time of year to go north.”

They announced their decision at the huge family dinner that evening, and, as Velvet had anticipated, her parents and siblings were not anxious for her to go so quickly. She overrode their objections calmly and firmly, and Skye could see that her youngest child meant what she had said to her mother just a few days back.

“If a woman is weak, Mama, then she offers herself as prey to those who feed upon weakness. I shall never be a victim again in this life.
Never!
I shall be strong, for if I am not, the next time I shall shatter completely.”

Adam grumbled, throwing his son-in-law of BrocCairn black looks, but Velvet said, “ ’Tis what I want, Papa. Alex is most willing to abide here, but I am anxious to see
Dun Broc.”

Skye put a gentle hand upon her husband’s arm, and with a sigh Adam ceased his arguments. “I’ll miss you, poppet, but you’re right. Tis past time you went home. Go then and know that you have our blessing and our prayers.”

“Thank you, Papa,” Velvet replied softly.

The air cleared, the family gathering proceeded, beginning with a wonderful feast that almost brought tears to Velvet’s eyes, for it had been a long time since she had seen many of the wonderful dishes. A side of beef had been packed in rock salt and roasted to a turn. It dripped its juices onto the huge charger that contained it as it was carried into the room by four serving men. There was a large pink ham that had been glazed with honey; a roe deer; ducks stuffed with plums and peaches served with a sauce of cherries; and several lovely meat pies with delicate golden crusts, steam rising from the decorative vents in the pastry.

Alex had contributed to the feast in a wonderfully unusual
way. Several of his men had led pack animals all the way from Scotland that had carried small barrels filled with cool water containing two live salmon apiece. Now the beautifully poached salmon, settled decoratively amid beds of cress upon silver platters, were presented to the de Marisco family.

From the manor farm came carrots, spinach, scallions, radishes, and lettuces. There were egg-glazed loaves of soft white bread, sweet butter, Normandy Brie, and a particularly fine pâté of goose liver. The goblets were never empty of the excellent dark Burgundy that came from Velvet’s grandparents’ vineyard at
Archambault
in France.