The Highlander (28 page)

Mena writhed helplessly against him, riding his strong thigh as more heat created more friction, which in turn built the flames even higher. What sort of pagan magic was this? How could hands so rough and raw create such smooth, silken sensations against her most tender skin?

Something was … happening. Her muscles contracted and expanded, her body seemed to open, to prepare, to warn her to brace herself against his strength because she wouldn't be able to stand against what he was about to do. Her hands groped at his back, then his shoulders, clutching at him, then pushing him away. He ignored her feeble struggles, silently pressing her higher with his leg until she was forced to lean on his limitless strength as her toes seemed to no longer touch the ground. He held her there, suspended on the exquisite edge of a dark and unknown abyss. She could feel it reaching for her, a pulsing oblivion that knew no limit, that gave no quarter and had no end.

All she needed to do was let it take her away.

“Come for me, lass.” He breathed the order against her throat as he trailed his hot lips down the sensitive column of her neck.

And she would have, had his fingers not tangled in her hair. A thrill of fear pierced her with its icy arrow, and leached the heat from her liquid bones.

Gordon used to pull her hair.

He'd used it as a tool of submission, to lock her head where he wanted, to compel her to be still as he forced himself into her mouth. Sometimes her hair would rip from her scalp, and the sound of it would echo through her ears from the inside.

Whatever desolate, frightened sound she made when she wrenched her mouth away from his and turned her head to the side was enough to pull him out of his aroused stupor.

“Please,” she begged in an uneasy whimper. “I can't.”

She found herself released as abruptly as he'd seized her, and Mena would have fallen if the wall hadn't caught her.

Ravencroft flung himself to the opposite side of the room, where he braced his hands against the far wall. His head hung below his shoulders as his wide back expanded with panting breaths.

Dazed by a maelstrom of fear, lust, and shame, Mena gripped the sagging folds of her robe and wrapped them back over her inflamed body, belting it closed.

“Forgive me,” he finally said. “I've had too much to drink. I wasna thinking.” His voice was thicker than usual, the accent more pronounced. The few seconds of silence between them stretched on for an eternity as Mena desperately groped for the thoughts that had scattered about the darkness of her room like a child's errant marbles.

“Ye canna go, Mena,” he ordered.

She couldn't think of a thing to say. Leaving would be safer in some ways, and utterly dangerous in others. Her husband was still out there, searching for her.

But if she stayed …

“Andrew can keep his beast,” he rumbled, pushing from the wall and moving to the broken door.

Mena remained silent, still trying to catch her own breath. Trying to ignore the pulses of need still throbbing between her legs, and the pulses of fear threatening to stop her heart.

“And…” Ravencroft continued, still refusing to turn around. “I'll not dictate how ye spend yer free time … or with whom.” He said this as though the words cost him a great deal.

Dumbfounded, Mena could still think of no reply until a polite “Thank you,” escaped her out of sheer habit.

“Doona leave.” It had to have been the gentlest command he'd ever issued, as close to a request as she'd ever get from the Demon Highlander. “Doona abandon them as I have, as everyone has.”

He'd used the most devious and effective weapon in his arsenal to get what he wanted. His children. They did need her help and, in truth, she needed them. Needed Ravencroft. Not just the man but the stones of the fortress around them. She remained a fugitive from the crown, and returning to England was simply out of the question.

“Ye'll stay,” he prompted again. “And I'll … leave ye alone.”

That should have made her feel safer, but it didn't.

“I'll stay,” she whispered, and didn't allow herself to slide to the floor until he'd left the room, shutting the splintered door firmly behind him.

*   *   *

Mena dreamed of the
Brollachan
that night.

She tossed and writhed about in her sleep as though afflicted with a fever. Rough, callused hands soothed her until she settled from thrashing to merely fitful.

“Liam?” she whispered through the miasma of dream mist and moonlight.

“Nay, lass,” a dark voice rasped back at her. “Ye should go. Leave this place. If ye stay with the Demon Highlander, it'll mean the end of ye.”

In her dream she was on her bed, but it was not as before. A cold mist billowed inside her room. It fragmented the moonlight and obscured her vision. Her lungs filled with ice and it coursed through her blood blooming with fear.

“Is he going to hurt me?” Mena whispered to the dark, her eyes searching the mist for the frightening demon-red eyes.

“Aye.”
The word came from behind her, but she dare not turn around from where she lay curled on her side. “He takes what he desires, and then he crushes it. He canna help it, lass, it is in his
blood
.” The voice seemed closer now, stronger. “Ye are the object of his desire now, which means ye are in danger. Run before he claims ye, too.”

Mena shook her head in emphatic denial. “He does not mean to claim me. He was drunk and I was weak, but nothing will come of it, I'm only the governess.”

“We both know ye're more than that.”

Panicked tears pricked her eyes and she yearned to run, but in her dream, her muscles didn't seem to be working.

“Who are you?” she whispered, frightened tears springing to her eyes. “How—how do you know what I am?”

Mena thought she felt the whisper of a breath against the tendrils of hair at the nape of her neck. She released a terrified gasp that escaped as a whimper.

“I am the horrible embodiment of the Mackenzie's many sins. The specter of his demon. He'll not escape the promise he made me.”

“What did he promise you?” she couldn't stop herself from asking.

“Everything, lass.
Everything
. And I'll collect what I'm owed.”

 

C
HAPTER
F
IFTEEN

Liam had gone to Andrew's room in the morning and had done what he could to make things right before he left on business that very afternoon. He and his son had traded apologies, something that may have never been done in the Ravencroft household for generations.

He'd left feeling both heavier and more hopeful than he had in a lifetime, and the conflicting emotions set him more on edge than ever.

It took the entire train journey from Strathcarron to Dingwall for Liam to decide upon the woman he'd use to fuck the memory of Philomena Lockhart away. How would he ever make it through the tedium of the Agriculture Council of Highland Lairds as randy and distracted as a pubescent schoolboy? There was no concentrating on late-summer harvest reports, the sowing of winter crops, settling on export prices, or meeting with the Fraser's French cousins to purchase next year's oak sherry casks if he couldn't get his runaway libido under control.

'Twas the reason he left Ravencroft two days early; it would take that long in bed, at least, to erase the memory of her incomparable body, of her slick desire on his skin.

Mary Munroe flung her door open before he had the chance to knock. Her lovely face alight with a welcoming smile, she fanned herself coquettishly and gave him a saucy wink.

“Well, if it isna the Demon Highlander, himself, come to take my virtue.” Twirling a dark ringlet around her finger, Mary laughed at her own joke. It had been many years since Mary Monroe had been a virgin, or virtuous for that matter.

She was the most expensive courtesan in the Highlands. It was rumored she stayed in Dingwall because the lord of Tulloch Castle kept her in these lavish apartments.

But as long as she was at his leisure, she could keep her own appointments, as well.

Mary Munroe only held in reserve the most exclusive clientele, and Liam was lucky enough to be counted among their few numbers. He not only enjoyed her dexterity, he enjoyed her company. He could say that about very few people.

She gave a delighted squeal as he crowded her into her apartments, slammed the door, shoved her against the garishly papered wall, and kissed her.

This was what he wanted, was it not? A bout of hot, sweaty, desperate fucking. She'd let him take his fill. She'd done it before. But even as she bloomed for him, swirling her tongue inside his mouth with expert skill, he suddenly knew hers were not the lips he craved. Her breasts beneath his searching hands felt small and unexciting.

Liam's body was hard and ready, had been since the night before. So why did he have to close his eyes and picture Mena in order to make the idea of bedding one of the most beautiful women in Scotland seem more than passing attractive?

She broke the kiss with no small amount of reluctance and studied him with eyes the color of his rich whisky. “All right, Laird Mackenzie, who is she?”

He stepped back as she pushed at his jacket.

“Who?” He kept the question deceptively mild, as he ran a frustrated hand over the hair he'd tied back for his journey.

“The woman ye've come to me to forget.” She raised a knowing eyebrow at him and sashayed down the hall, her voluminous bustled skirts trailing after her.

Mena's back also arched just thus, and Liam knew she didn't have to employ a bustle to achieve the shape that Miss Munroe and so many women paid good money for. Mena's arse was a thing of beauty. If he could just mold his hands around it, he'd die a happy man.

He scowled, exasperated by the unbidden direction of his thoughts. He followed the courtesan into her receiving room, and grabbed her from behind, turning her to face him. “Doona talk nonsense, woman.”

A painted lip tilted up. “I'm skilled in many things, my laird, but nonsense is not one of them. If ye want a stupid whore, ye'll have to look elsewhere.”

“It's not yer sense I'm paying ye for, lass, now take this off.” His fingers went to the laces of her dress.

She covered his big hands with her dainty ones, and Liam had a hard time meeting the understanding that lurked in her eyes. “I've known ye a long time, Liam Mackenzie. And I've wanted ye since before ye came to me, back when ye were still faithful to yer mad wife.”

“Careful, lass,” he warned, pulling his hands from hers.

“Ye wanted me, too, wanted me something fierce if I remember correctly.” She turned and moved deeper into her sumptuous parlor, draping herself across a soft green chaise that matched the extravagant gold drapes. Even the room was decorated to make her look more fetching. The colors illuminating her own dusky shades and contrasting with the dark bronze of her dress.

Flicking her fan a few times, she made her loose ringlets flutter with a practiced grace. “I knew that when ye finally gave in to come and take me, it would be the kind of encounter that would require recovery. As usual, I was right. I didna walk the same for a week.” Her face glowed with the fond memory.

So why were they wasting time? “Get naked and I'll no let yer feet touch the ground for days.”

She shook her head, her eyes glimmering with regret and a fond sort of pity. “Nay. If ye're not already in love with whoever she is, ye're nigh to falling. I'd have ye off one time and then ye'd be so full of shame and regret that ye'd leave. I doona want us to part like that.”

“Tell me,” he asked acerbically, “does fortune-telling pay as much as prostitution?”

“Don't be cruel because I'm right,” she said sharply.

He glared at her, and she gave as well as she got.

“Sit down, my laird, and have a drink,” she invited. “Ye can tell me about her.”

“No, thank ye.” He was wary of drink at the moment.

“Tea then.” She motioned toward the set at her elbow and Liam acquiesced, settling himself in the lone high-backed leather chair next to the fire, the only furnishing obviously placed for a male visitor.

She poured silently and he watched her, his insides churning with need, disappointment, and, if he was honest, a great deal of relief.

He took the delicate ivory china cup from her when she handed it across the small table, and tried his best not to drink the brew in one sip. He'd never been much for tea, or comfortable with breakable things in his hands.

She was regarding him with shrewd affection when he looked up. “I like that I can never quite figure ye out,” she said. “Ye are Lieutenant Colonel Mackenzie, the Demon Highlander. Ye dash toward the fray, ye charge into the most dangerous situations with not even a blink. But caring for a
woman
 …
that
will frighten ye enough to run?”

Liam said nothing, setting his tea down. It wasn't merely Mena he'd run from. It was himself. The mortification caused by the admissions he'd given her in the dark. He'd shared some of his own secrets with her. Imparted his pain. Unleashed the force of his need …

And it had frightened her.

So he'd promised to leave her be, but even as he'd said it he knew he'd been lying. There was no leaving her alone. Miss Lockhart had somehow become a part of him.

“Is it love?” Mary asked gently.

“It's … complicated.”

“Love is
always
complicated, darling.” She laughed. “That's why I do what I do instead of falling for someone who deserves it. Complications are tedious, unless they're happening to someone else, of course.”

Liam thought it was her casual attitude toward the situation that allowed him to admit to her what he not only feared, but suspected.

“She doesna want the Demon Highlander.”