The Lady Most Willing . . . (15 page)

“I’m not like this,” she said, her breath sounding harsh in her ears. “I don’t do
this. I know I have a terrible reputation, but I’m not . . . I’m not a whore.”

“I would never think that!” he said, quick and fast, and some errant part of her saw
his chest rising and falling as fast as hers and was triumphant and glad. He wasn’t
unmoved by her, by plain Fiona Chisholm.

Even so, she fell back another step. She would
not
allow herself to want him. He wasn’t hers. He could never be hers.

“No,” she repeated. But there was something uncertain in her voice, and his eyes flared,
hot and feverish.

It didn’t matter that he couldn’t be hers; clearly, he was thinking that she could
be . . .

“No,” she said with a gasp, and she almost spoke aloud, but it was too foolish to
even think that the Earl of Oakley would consider a mere Scottish lass to be his.
The possessiveness in his eyes probably meant he was considering making her his mistress.
“I am not a strumpet,” she said, stronger now. “I’m
not
. Even if I am Scottish, and . . . and not beautiful.”

“You
are
beautiful.”

She stared at him blankly for a second, because she had always trusted herself and
her judgment. All her life. She had been a mere six years old when she discovered
that her father was weak. All of ten years old when she realized that Marilla was
always angry—too angry to be a loving sister. Sixteen when she learned that Dugald
was a bully. And what she saw in this man’s face, this almost-stranger’s face, was
trust, desire, and longing. For
her
.

“No,” she whispered. “You mustn’t.”

He reached out for her again. “I already do.” His voice was sure and confident.

Fiona struggled free before his lips could again touch hers and make her fall into
that pool of hot, wild desperation. “This is madness,” she said, putting her hands
on her hips. “You, sir, should have better control of yourself than to exert your
seductive wiles on a—a maiden like myself.” Because she was a maiden, even if no one
believed her. “I am not available to slake your lust,” she added.

“
Slake?
” Laughter shone in his eyes along with that deeply unsettling gleam that spoke of
lust.

She waved her hand impatiently. “Whatever you wish to call it. I am not a strumpet
whom one can tumble just because the door is locked. You are not the first to try
to take advantage of me, you know. And you shall not succeed!”

It was all different from Dugald trying to climb in her window, but it felt good to
shout at him.

The startled look on his face was worth it, too.

“I would not have taken advantage of you,” he said, his brow darkening.

“Then why is the door locked?” she challenged.

“To keep your bloody sister out,” he snapped back. “It had nothing to do with the
two of us being inside.” He walked over to the door and unlocked it.

But when he turned around, he wasn’t irritated any longer. He looked like a gleeful
boy. “Thanks to that lock, I’ve just realized that I
have
ruined your reputation,” he said, sounding pleased with himself. “We’ve been locked
in a room together. We’ll have to marry. It’s what a gentleman would do.” He walked
toward her, his eyes intent.

“Oh!” she cried in frustration, stepping backward. “Why have you changed like this?
I don’t understand you!”

“I decided this afternoon that I wish to make a woman fall in love with me.”

Fiona glared at him. “So I am the subject of an experiment? Are you planning to accost
young ladies on a regular basis?”

He shook his head. “No.”

“Then what on earth are you doing?” she cried, exasperated. “I don’t believe for a
moment that you plan to ruin my reputation and marry me, if only because it’s already
ruined. It’s very unkind of you to make jokes of this sort to a woman like myself,
who has no prospect of marriage.”

“I suspect I have gone a little mad.” Byron lunged and scooped her into his arms.
“Whenever I touch you,” he whispered against her lips, “I feel as if you are the woman
I have been looking for my whole life, though I have denied, even to myself, that
I was looking.”

Despite herself, her lips softened and he took her invitation, embroiling her in a
kiss that made her feel soft and feminine, all those things that she
wasn’t
.

More than anything, it was a possessive kiss, the kind of kiss a man gives a woman
whom he is determined to make his, to have and to hold . . . Madness or no, her every
instinct told her that Byron was telling the truth: he wanted to marry her. And he
wanted to bed her. Craving swept her body like a drug, making her sway against him.
He groaned deep in his chest, and pulled her still closer.

“We can’t,” she said, the words emerging in a little sob. “I haven’t told you . . .”

“You will be a wonderful countess.” His hands stroked slowly down her back, leaving
her feeling as if her skin woke only after he touched it.

“No, no, I will not,” she gasped, unable to believe that they were having this discussion.
“We don’t know each other.”

“I didn’t know Opal, either, as is manifestly clear,” he offered, his eyes hot with
desire. His hands—

“You shouldn’t touch me there,” Fiona managed.

His hands tightened on her bottom, and then slid upward to her hips. “I love your
curves,” he said thickly. “I promise to spend at least forty years getting to know
you.”

“I know why you are saying this,” she said, trying to ignore his touch, though she
couldn’t make herself move away from him.

“Because you are delectable?”

“Because you have decided that Lady Opal only staged her affection for the dancing
master. You could tolerate her betrayal when you thought she was in love with another
man, but now you feel bruised.”

“You taste like apples,” he said, ignoring her comment and taking her mouth again.

She allowed the pure pleasure of his kiss to sweep her under. It was bliss, this kissing,
the way their tongues played together, the way he held her, as if she were shy and
precious and beautiful, when she was none of those things.

This time it was he who pulled back. “I know enough about you, Fiona.”

“You know nothing,” she said shakily.

“You are very intelligent and you love to read.” He dropped a kiss on her left eyebrow.
“You are extremely kind, even to your sister, who would strain anyone’s generosity.
You love deeply and you’re very loyal. You don’t suffer fools gladly, but you are
instinctively polite.”

He kissed her right eyebrow, and his hands tightened on her hips. “You have beautiful
curves,” he said, his voice darkening a trifle. “Your hair has red tones that look
like the most precious jewel in the world. I want to drape you in rubies. I want to
see you lying on my bed, wearing nothing but a ruby necklace.”

Fiona felt as if she were caught in some sort of dream. Byron’s eyes were fervent.
He meant every word. And he had no idea, none at all, of what had happened to her.

She squared her shoulders, summoning the courage to crack open the little enchantment
that had bewitched them both, when the library door suddenly opened.

They swung about to find Mr. Garvie standing on the threshold. “Supper is in an hour,”
he told them in his usual surly tone. “So if you two mean to dress, you’d better get
at it.”

“If you’ll excuse me,” Fiona said, and like the coward she was, she fled. She could
feel tears coming as she ran up the stairs. It was so—so unfair. Byron was undoubtedly
suffering from some sort of temporary madness. But he looked at her in such a way
. . . and said those things . . . things she never thought she’d hear from anyone.

It was cruel that she couldn’t marry him. She caught herself thinking a hateful thought
about Dugald before she pulled herself together.

Her chest felt hollow, as if there was a physical reason for the ache there. It was
absurd. She didn’t even know Byron. He may have decided that he knew
her
, but all she knew was that he was an absurdly beautiful man, an English earl who’d
been thrown over by his fiancée, and for some fairly inexplicable reason had decided
on her as a replacement, even though she’d told him at least three times that her
reputation was ruined.

“I’d like a bath, if you please,” she told a stray retainer she encountered in the
hallway.

He put up a protest, but she fixed him with a tiger’s eye and he backed down. “You’ll
miss supper,” he said in a parting shot.

Hopefully, he would be right.

Chapter 14

T
aran was not employing the great hall for dining; a storm this fierce sneaked in through
windows and took over the larger rooms. The wind howled as it rounded the corners,
scouring under the doors, keeping the air frigid and moving.

Instead, supper was to be served in the antechamber where they’d taken all their meals.
It was small and cheery; a boy had been assigned to keep a fire burning there all
day. Its small mullioned windows were so crusted with snow and ice that the wind couldn’t
even make them rattle.

Byron changed into an evening coat and returned downstairs far faster than his usual
wont. He walked over to one window and stared at the snowdrift blocking any view of
the storm. He had been making an annual winter trek to Finovair for a decade or more,
and he could not remember seeing the snow piled quite so high in the courtyard before.

Fiona was so different from Opal. She didn’t look away from him; she laughed straight
to his face. She never seemed to be at a loss for words. She just said what she was
thinking. He had a tremendous feeling of
rightness,
even thinking of the way her eyes shone with mischief.

She wouldn’t lie to him. She would mock him, and argue with him, and probably infuriate
him, but she would never lie to him.

And she had told him about Marilla’s theft of her mother’s portrait. Perhaps if Opal
and he had talked, really talked, she would have told him that she didn’t care to
marry him. She wouldn’t have had to stage that scene with the balding dancing master.

If, instead, it had been Fiona who had decided she didn’t care to marry him, she would
tell him face-to-face. Let’s say they were betrothed—a funny shot of heat came under
his breastbone at the notion. He would like to put a ring on her finger. A ring that
would tell other men that everything about her—from her sweet little nose, to those
curved hips, to the perplexed look in her gorgeous eyes—it was all
his
.

Just hypothetically, if he were betrothed to Fiona, and she decided to throw him over,
she wouldn’t do it through a dramatic scene. She would probably glare at him, and
then she would tell him that he was a stupid, jealous . . .

Jealous?

He had never been jealous. Marriage wasn’t about jealousy. It was about respect and
promises. But then he thought for a moment and realized that a seething cauldron lit
in his chest at the very idea of a dancing master approaching Fiona.

This train of thought was insanity.

He leaned his forehead against the icy window, just to see whether he was dreaming.
The glass was just as cold to his forehead as to his fingertips. A feeling of profound
calm cut through with elation swept through him. He would do it: he would marry Fiona
Chisholm, and have a bespectacled, honest, beautiful countess. She would probably
be a good mother, but honestly, he didn’t give a damn.

If she was a bad mother, they could get a nanny. Well, of course they would have a
nanny. He wanted her for
himself
. So he could . . .

So he wouldn’t be alone. So he would have a friend, and a lover, and a wife, all in
one. The elation spread. How could he be so lucky?

He was never lucky.

The door opened and he turned, heart thumping. Not Fiona. It was Marilla, her breasts
barely kept in check by an edging of lace, her eyes lighting up at the sight of him.

“You disappeared this afternoon!” she chided, disapproval softened by forgiving laughter.

“I spent the afternoon in the library,” he said, watching her closely.

She was approaching him, her hips swaying, but she froze for a second. Then her smile
grew wider. “But wasn’t my sister, Fiona, hiding there? She’s
so
reluctant to be in company, you know. I promised her I would have someone send her
tea so that she need not be embarrassed by her lack of social skills.”

He held out a chair for her and then said, “I didn’t notice any shyness.” Happiness
thrummed low in his chest simply because he was talking about Fiona.

This was ridiculous. Preposterous. Like the sort of lovesickness that is visited on
mere boys. He thought he wanted a woman to fall in love with him, but instead he was
the one infected. Just like a giddy boy, he discovered he was grinning at Marilla.

“Fiona has no friends,” Marilla said, waving at the seat beside her. “Since we do
sit on consequence, Byron, I certainly hope that you will remain at my side.” Her
smile was lavish, but then, all of Marilla’s smiles were lavish.

He sat, thinking about what she just said. It didn’t make sense to him. Fiona was
funny and wry and altogether delightful. Of course she had friends. But then, perhaps
she didn’t have friends . . . perhaps she was as profoundly alone as he was.

“Where
is
your sister?” he asked, keeping his tone casual.

“Fiona has little regard for the servants. She asked for a bath not long ago, even
though it’s not easy for those old men to carry hot water up the stairs.” Marilla
slid her hand over his, and frowned with a kind of dewy earnestness. “She has no idea
how to run a large household. My father made certain that I was trained in a chatelaine’s
arts. One of the most important rules is that the lady of the household must respect
those in her service. Yet Fiona asks for separate meals, as she did this luncheon,
and baths!” She rolled her eyes. “She bathes every day, and never mind how much work
it is to haul pails of hot water up and down the stairs.”

Byron thought with some satisfaction of the newfangled pipes he’d added to his house
two years ago. And then he thought of Fiona sitting in his bath, steam rising around
her, all that glorious hair curling into smaller ringlets, her creamy skin flushing
. . . He hastily put his napkin in his lap.

The door opened and Bret and his betrothed entered, laughing. He had his hand on Catriona’s
back, and the way he looked down at her was so resonant with desire that . . . well,
the couple was just as improperly intimate as they had been the night before, but
now Byron saw it with a different eye, looking not at Catriona’s face, but at Bret’s.

He wanted to put his hand on the small of Fiona’s back. He’d never thought about the
gesture, but now he perceived the possessiveness in that light touch. He wanted to
hand Fiona into a chair and then sit beside her, a bit too close, and hold hands under
the table, the way Bret and Catriona now were. He wanted to escort her to supper with
lips that had been kissed the color of dark cherries, as Bret had.

Hell, he wanted to join her in the bath and . . .

After making her his bride, of course.

Marilla’s voice cut into his thoughts again. She had curled her fingers around his
forearm, and was leaning forward, saying something to Catriona. “Oh, we feel the same,”
she cooed. “Byron and I were just talking about the arduous duties of running a large
household. This strange little interlude at Finovair has done so much to bring us
all close! I’m thrilled to know that I was there when the Duke and Duchess of Bretton
fell in love. I cannot wait to tell my friends.”

Byron drew his arm away, while Bret threw him a look that said, clear as day, that
Marilla wasn’t going within two miles of the duchy of Bretton. Byron grinned back
and then watched the puzzlement grow in Bret’s eyes.

His old friend hadn’t figured it out yet. Hell,
he
had hardly figured it out. All he knew was that his entire being was tense, waiting
for Fiona to get out of that bath and join them at the supper table.

Taran blew in the door, followed by a train of his retainers carrying platters. “Lady
Cecily dines in her room,” he said briskly. Robin was nowhere in evidence: he was
probably hiding in his room as well. And still there was no Fiona.

The laird sat down and scowled rather unexpectedly at Marilla. “Keep your hands to
yourself, lass. Your father wouldn’t approve.”

Byron realized that Marilla had once again curled her hand around his forearm. She
gave Taran a lofty smile and didn’t move a finger. Instead, she moved even closer
and said in a breathy voice, “Byron, do tell me about your castle.”

“I don’t have one,” he said calmly.

“What a pity,” Marilla said. “But I suppose you could always buy one if you wished.”

“No,” Byron said, catching Bret’s eye. Bret was trying not to laugh and not succeeding
very well. “I could not. Castles are far and few between in England.”

Without even glancing at Marilla, he knew she was pouting. “Such a pity! This is the
first time I’ve stayed in a castle and I find it very, very charming. It’s so grand
. . . so much bigger than most houses.”

Naturally, it’s all about size, Byron thought uncharitably.

“My sister is very retiring,” Marilla informed the company when they reached the second
course and the plate to his left was still empty. “She likely lost her courage, and
will eat in our bedchamber. Of course we must continue without her. In our household,
my father and I often forget that she’s there at all.”

Byron was contemplating what Fiona’s life had been like in company with her relatives,
when she walked into the room and began heading around the table to the open chair.

She looked a bit pale, but her greeting was cordial enough. But he didn’t care for
“Good evening, Lord Oakley.”

He stood and pulled the chair out for her. “I thought we agreed that you would not
address me as Oakley,” he said to her, ignoring the conversations that had started
around the table.

Not that anyone ignored his statement. Even Marilla’s semiflirtatious conversation
with Taran—the woman seemed incapable of conversation that was not suggestive—halted
in mid-sentence.

Fiona had just seated herself; she froze and turned a little pink. Her hair was slightly
damp from her bath, and enchanting pin curls framed her face. Bret looked swiftly
from her face to Byron’s and then leaned over to whisper something to Catriona. There
was a huge grin on his face.

Byron just wanted to make it all clear. He was possessed of the happiest emotions
of his life, and even though the object of his happiness looked stunned, he was bent
on sharing them. Could she really believe that he would kiss her—the way he had kissed
her—and mean nothing by it?

He bent down and dropped a swift kiss on her lips, and then another on her damp curls
for good measure. She sat as rigid as a statue, not seeming to draw a breath, looking
. . . stricken?

“Well, the tone of this gathering has lowered, has it not?” Marilla said shrilly on
the other side of Byron. Her voice trembled with fury.

“Marilla,” Fiona whispered.

“I gather I have to protect my sister once again from the illicit lust of ne’er-do-well
gentlemen,” Marilla cried, ignoring her plea. “Isn’t it enough that she is branded
a whore the length of all Scotland? Must
you
, Lord Oakley, who has some claim to being a model of propriety, show your contempt
for her so openly? Kissing her in an open gathering? When you know perfectly well
that a man of your noble heritage would never make her his countess? Shame on you,
Lord Oakley, shame on you!”

Byron was so stunned that he stared at Marilla for a moment, registering the cruel
gleam of rage in her eyes.

Then he turned, slowly, back to Fiona. Branded a whore?
Fiona?

She had turned the color of parchment. As their eyes met, she raised her chin. “I
told you repeatedly that I had a reputation. Apparently, you did not believe me.”

“Yes, but did you tell him that your fiancé fell to his death from your bedchamber
window?” Marilla shrilled.

At this, Taran threw back his chair and stumped around the table. He reached out a
hand and jerked Marilla to her feet. “You and I, lassie, are going to have a good
talk, because it’s obvious to all of us that the beauty in your face doesn’t match
your heart. You’re acting like a mean-spirited little horror, you are.”

Before Marilla could say another word, he pulled her over to the door, pushed it open,
and slammed out into the corridor.

“I’m sorry,” Fiona said to Byron, her beautiful green eyes as grave as a monk’s. “I
kept trying to tell you what happened.”

“He fell from your window?” Byron echoed, finally sitting down himself.

He could feel all the joy draining from his body. It felt as if he had turned back
to a brass automaton, to the half-dead man he’d been when he arrived in Scotland.
His father’s double. Obviously, women were as lustful as his father had warned, even
sweet ones from Scotland who smelled like fresh bread and innocence.

There was dead silence around the table. Fiona nodded. “Yes. My fiancé, Dugald, lost
his life in a fall. All Scotland knows it. I am sure that our friends at the table
will be gracious enough to forget the implications of what you said a moment ago.”

Bending her head, she spread her napkin in her lap.

“I never believed it,” Catriona said with a note of ferocity in her voice, “and neither
did my mother. She should know, since she was godmother to Dugald himself. How could
a man who was as fat as a distillery pig think to climb a strand of ivy?”

“The window was there, as was the ivy, and unfortunately, so was Dugald,” Fiona said.
“Yes, I would like some roast, if you please. Catriona, what games did you play this
afternoon?”

Catriona looked as if she wanted to continue her defense, but she succumbed to the
pleading expression on Fiona’s face.

Byron endured three more courses without saying another word. Taran strolled back
in at length, looking pleased with himself, but Marilla never reappeared. Byron was
aware of the warmth of Fiona’s arm next to his, though they never touched, even accidentally.
The conversation stumbled along until finally the subject of Robert Burns’s poetry
was brought up, which provoked a spirited dispute.

“As full of air as a piper’s bag,” Taran shouted, in response to Catriona’s praise
of the poet.