Never Been Bit (36 page)

“Well, the fact that your wife just shocked the trousers off Eynsford
was
particularly satisfying,” Kettering said with a wide smile.

“James,” Blodswell chastised and gestured with his head toward Sorcha.

“Not to worry, lass.” Kettering stepped toward her. “Lady Eynsford must have known this was going to happen. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have insisted we all stay here.”

Blodswell pointed to Alec who lay prone in the bed.

“What happened?”

“What
did
ye do to him, lass?” Kettering asked, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. Blodswell punched him in the arm, which knocked the grin from his face but not the teasing tone from his voice.

Heat crept up Sorcha’s face. Alec was naked, and she was wearing nothing more than her chemise. What on earth did they think she’d done to him?
Havers!
She hadn’t hurt him, had she? She hadn’t really done this to him?

“It’s all right,” one of them soothed from across the room.

“You didn’t harm him.” She was too embarrassed to look up and see which one had spoken.

“Is he dead? He willna wake.” They must have heard the quiver in her voice because they both finally approached the bed and looked at her sympathetically.

“He was dead prior to today, lass,” Blodswell reminded her. Then he reached out and put a crooked finger under Alec’s nose. He held it there for a moment and then looked back at Kettering. “Just as we suspected.”

“Indeed?” Kettering’s blue eyes widened in surprise.

Havers!
This was awful. “Oh, Alec,” Sorcha moaned and crawled back onto the bed and lay her face against her husband’s chest. But then she felt it. His chest rose and fell.

She sat up on her hands and knees and looked at him.

“Alec?” she asked. Then she addressed the interlopers. “Is he breathin’?” She put her own finger under his nose and felt his hot breath against her skin and gasped.

“Something like that,” Kettering muttered.

Alec groaned from beside her on the bed. “When I remember how to breathe and talk at the same time, the two of you will be thrashed,” he said quietly, gasping the words out.

“Alec?” Sorcha cried. “Alec, please tell me I dinna harm ye.”

His hand reached out to squeeze hers. “Sorch, if you didn’t, I’ll give you ample opportunity to try it again later,” he said. He finally opened his eyes and looked at his onetime mentors who stood staring at him, both of them obviously holding back hysterical laughter.

Kettering even coughed into his closed fist. “Wonder if I looked just as pathetic when my heart started to beat.”

Alec narrowed his eyes at the pair. “The two of you look awfully satisfied with yourselves.”

“This from the man who said he’d never be human again,” Blodswell reminded him. “Nice to have you back in the land of the living, MacQuarrie.”

Everything was happening so quickly. “Wait,” Sorcha begged. “Ye’re human?” She’d given up that hope so long ago. Was it truly possible?

Alec’s once-again brown eyes twinkled at her, and she knew it was true.

“It would appear so, love,” Alec said with a smile as he brought her hand to his mouth and placed a lingering kiss in her knuckles. Then he held his other hand out to her. “Take off the ring and let’s see.”

Sorcha didn’t waste a moment tugging the signet ring from his finger.

The sun shone brightly through the window, and a beam of light skittered across his face when she moved to look more closely at him. “Aye, human,” he grunted. He didn’t go up in flames. He didn’t burn. He just lay there with the sun on his face.

But it didn’t make any sense. “I doona understand.” She must sound like a ninny. Her gaze shifted to the two former vampyres and then back to Alec. “Ye doona love me,” she reminded him quietly.

“That’s obviously not the case,” Kettering teased.

Alec’s glare speared the intruders. “I think you both have worn out your welcome.”

Kettering and Blodswell looked at one another with mock surprise on their faces. “I don’t remember being invited into his bedchamber, much less being welcomed.”

“Go find your wives and gloat,” Alec ordered. “And take those Lycans with you,” he added. But his eyes were on Sorcha as he reached up and brushed a lock of hair from her face. He wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her gently down until his lips could meet hers.

Then he addressed his former mentors, who still hadn’t moved. “You might want to leave now, because my wife is going to be naked in about three seconds,” he said aloud.

Sorcha gasped and batted at his grasping hands as they moved to the straps of her chemise. Her heart skittered a frantic beat within her chest as he took control and started to tug the soft fabric from her body.

“I believe that’s our cue to exit, my friend,” Blodswell said to Kettering.

“But just so you know, Alec, neither of us fainted like a lass when we received our humanity. You, on the other hand…” They both chuckled.

“Out!” Alec ordered. They were out the door in a flash, closing it solidly behind them. “They’ll never let me live that down,” he said quietly to Sorcha. “I swooned. Good God, what’s the world coming to?”

Sorcha could hear an argument going on outside the door, but Alec was taking all of her attention as he tossed her chemise across the room and flipped the counterpane over them both. He drew her body flush against his, her breasts pushed against his naked chest.

“Are ye really alive?” she whispered, still not quite believing it.

“It would appear so,” he replied as he ran his hand down her side and tugged one leg over his hip. He was hot and hard and pressed at her insistently. But he didn’t seem to want anything more than to be close to her.

“But how can that be?” she asked, sorry to hear the quiver in her own voice. Tears were pricking at the backs of her eyelids, and she had no control at all.

“I never thought I’d be able to fall in love,” he tried to explain.

“So, all it took was tumblin’ ye in the bedchamber ta make ye fall in love with me?” She shoved at his chest. If she’d known that, she would have seduced him at Castle Hythe.

“I’ve been tumbled, as you so indelicately put it, many times in the past, love,” he said quietly.

“Doona remind me,” she sulked.

“And that leads me to believe that it wasn’t the fact that I bedded you that changed me.”

Then what was it? “I dinna do anythin’ else.” She hadn’t done anything out of the ordinary, aside from marrying and making love to her husband.

“I was living in a fog until you, Sorch,” he said quietly. “I was existing from day to day but not living. Not for a moment of it. Then you walked back into my life. And it changed. I became more than I was. It’s all because of you.”

He touched his lips to hers. “You were willing to give up your coven for me. They’re more than family to you. And you would have given them up, along with your powers, for an eternity with
me
.”

“I still would,” she said quietly. He looked so intent. So, thoughtful. It was different looking into his eyes now that they weren’t black as night.

“That’s when it hit me. And it hit me hard.”

Sorcha tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. But it was nearly impossible.

“I love you, Sorcha,” he said quietly. Then he rolled her beneath him and looked deep into her eyes. “I couldn’t live without you. I need you, like the air that I need to breathe.”

A tear trickled a hot path down the side of her face into her hair. He leaned over and kissed it away.

“I want you,” he said softly as he rocked his hips and pressed at her center. “For now and always.”

“I’m yers,” she cried as he slid inside her.

“And I’m yours. Though why you’d have me is beyond my comprehension.”

She giggled beneath him, which made her grip him more tightly. She lowered her voice to a small murmur and said close to his ear, “It’s because ye’re really good in the bedchamber.” Then her mouth fell open and a cry she didn’t even recognize fell from her lips.

“Thank heaven for small favors,” he replied, before his lips dipped toward her breast, and then neither of them had enough air in their lungs to keep talking.

Epilogue

Gu Bràth Manor, Hampstead
June 1824

“Tell me how your heart startin’ beatin’ again, Papa.” Ivy MacQuarrie climbed up into Alec’s lap at his study desk.

He was so engrossed in the Stockton and Darlington Railway papers before him that he hadn’t even heard the door open.

He ruffled the top of the little imp’s head. “I’m certain you could tell me the story since you’ve heard it so many times, lass.”

“But it’s better when you tell it,” she insisted the way only a five-year-old can.

Alec lifted his daughter’s hand to his mouth and placed a kiss on her palm. “After you’ve finished playing with your friends, I’ll tell you the tale again, Ivy. Now run along.”

She tipped her head back to see him better, and her brown curls bobbed over her shoulders. “But Lia keeps tellin’ me what ta do, and I doona want ta play anymore.”

That was hardly surprising. Alec chuckled. Lady Aurelia Thorpe was just as haughty as her mother had been all those years before. Perhaps more so. The future seer was spoiled rotten by her father. “I am sorry, my little sprite. Let’s go see how much longer your mother and the others are going to be, shall we?”

Ivy nodded and hopped back to the floor. Alec pushed from his seat and took his daughter’s hand.

“Mama’s probably tired anyway.”

Sorcha had been awfully tired as of late. She hadn’t been getting enough sleep and was doting on her plants more than usual. He’d have to find out what that was about, but for now he turned his attention back to his daughter and her five-year-old problems. “Have you ever thought of teaming up with Lucien, Ivy? Aurelia never tells
him
what to do.” At least he’d never seen the little witch dictate orders to her twin brother.

Alec led Ivy toward the orangery where Sorcha and the other witches were convened.

His beautiful daughter looked up at him and wrinkled her nose like she smelled something bad. “He’s a
boy
,” she replied, as though Alec had suggested she throw in her lot with the French.

“That he is,” Alec agreed. “Don’t know what I was thinking.”

They entered the orangery, and immediately the five witches rose to their feet. Only Sorcha was able to meet Alec’s gaze. What was that about? “Hope we’re not disturbing you,” he said, stepping closer to the coven.

“I need ta be on my way anyway.” Cait rushed past him.

“Are Lia and Lucien still in the nursery?”

Alec looked down at his daughter and she nodded.

“Apparently so. Do send our regards to Eynsford.”

“Ye can tell him yerself,” Cait tossed over her shoulder.

“Since ye’ll be our guests at The Park next week.”

Now Alec knew why none of the others had met his eyes.

He glanced at his wife. “Are we headed to Kent, love?”

Sorcha nodded her head. “We have a bit of
Còig
business ta attend ta.”

So everyone was going, were they? Alec shrugged. Truth be told, he’d found a camaraderie with Eynsford, Kettering, Blodswell, and his old friend Westfield somewhere along the way, and he couldn’t imagine his life without all of the witches and their husbands. “Then, I suppose we’ll have a grand time.”

Elspeth, Blaire, and Rhiannon slid past him, muttering their farewells, and Alec and Ivy walked farther into the orangery to where Sorcha still stood rooted to the floor. Her brown eyes sought out Alec’s and she smiled. “Cait gave me a glimpse of the future.”

Alec frowned. “That’s against the rules.”

Ivy dropped his hand and wrapped her arms around Sorcha’s legs. “What did she say, Mama?”

Sorcha winked at their daughter. “She said it’s high time we got ye a governess, lass.”

Ivy’s mouth dropped open. “But, Nurse—” she started to protest.

“Nurse will have her hands full.”

Alec’s mouth went dry. “Her hands will be full?” The meaning of those words touched his soul. “Are you saying you’re expecting, Sorcha?”

“Expectin’ what?” Ivy demanded, and at the same time Sorcha nodded her head.

Alec pulled her into his embrace and buried his face in her apple blossom-scented hair. “Oh, love, are you feeling all right? Is that why you’ve been so tired?”

Sorcha pulled back to looked at him, her radiant smile making him fall in love with her all over again. “A boy.”

“A boy?” Ivy echoed. “A boy what?”

Sorcha looked down at their precocious daughter. “I’m goin’ ta have a bairn, Ivy. Ye’re goin’ ta be a big sister.”

Ivy’s nose scrunched up again. “A boy?”

Alec laughed as he scooped up the tiny lass in his arms.

“Of course, a boy. We already have such a delightful girl.”

Ivy giggled as he tickled her. “Papa!”

“Let’s retire to the nursery, lass, and I’ll tell you that story again.”

Ivy nodded. “Mama, too.”

Sorcha wrapped her arm around Alec’s waist and pressed a kiss to Ivy’s forehead. “What story are we ta hear, lass?”

“The one where ye made Papa’s heart beat again.”

“My favorite of them all.” Then Sorcha rose on her toes and kissed Alec’s chin.

About the Author

Lydia Dare is a pseudonym for the writing team of Tammy Falkner and Jodie Pearson. Both are active members of the Heart of Carolina Romance Writers and Romance Writers of America. Their writing process involves passing a manuscript back and forth, each one writing 1,500 words after editing the other’s previous installment. Jodie specializes in writing the history and Tammy in writing the paranormal. They live near Raleigh, North Carolina.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six