The Seduction of Elliot McBride (Mackenzies Series) (9 page)

Elliot came downstairs again fifteen minutes later, dry and fit, feeling better than he had in a long while. He’d put on one of his formal kilts and a jacket, and had jerked a comb through his damp hair.

Juliana emerged from a room below, every sleek hair in place, her gown none the worse for wear after his impromptu
kiss. Stopping to taste her while she’d stood against the wall in the kitchen passage had been impossible to resist.

Elliot reached the bottom of the staircase and held his hand out to her. Juliana looked a bit strained about the eyes as she took it, her face too pale.

Next time Elliot went for a walk, he’d take her with him. Juliana would love the beauty here, and there was so much of it to show her. And if he had to struggle up a riverbank again, he couldn’t think of more enjoyment than getting muddy with her.

As Elliot started with Juliana toward the dining room, Hamish came barreling out of the kitchens. Something that looked like a dead bird dangled from under his arm, its legs swinging. Hamish pushed past Juliana and Elliot, ran up three of the stairs, whisked the dead bird out from under his arm, put one of its spindly legs to his lips, took a deep breath, and blew.

Elliot lunged for him. “Hamish, for God’s sake, no…”

But the lad had already filled the pipes’ bag with air, and it came out again, a groan and a squeal that filled the hall and tore at Elliot’s eardrums.

Juliana clapped her hands over her ears. Hamish went on blowing, his face red, his thick fingers finding the holes in some semblance of a pattern.

Elliot took Juliana’s arm and quickly propelled her down a long passage to the dining room. Hamish came behind them, piping the laird and his lady to their banquet feast.

As soon as they reached the dining room, Hamish threw down the pipes, which died with a squawk, and ran to hold out a giant wooden chair for Juliana.

Elliot made for the other end of the long wooden table, which had been scrubbed until it gleamed. At his place were pewter plates, scrupulously clean; a goblet and tumbler also of pewter; and thick glass decanters of water and whiskey.

Elliot waited until Juliana was seated, Hamish pushing in her chair enthusiastically, then he smoothed his full kilt and sat down on the carved wooden chair at the head of the table. The back of the chair rose well above Elliot’s head, the square cut of the seat hard against his backside.

Hamish retrieved the pipes, which emitted another squawk, and ran out of the room, the spindles of the pipes slapping his kilt. Mahindar came forth bearing a giant bowl, into which he dipped a giant spoon. He ladled food first onto Juliana’s plate then walked down the table to spoon it onto Elliot’s.

Only the two of them dined. Uncle McGregor had made it clear he preferred to eat in the comfort of his room, without the nonsense of formal service. Elliot was happy to let him—dining alone with Juliana was preferable.

Fragrant steam rose from the chicken and vegetables Mahindar put onto Elliot’s plate, which he covered with a piece of flat, teardrop-shaped bread called naan. Mahindar set a little crockery bowl next to Elliot’s plate, which was filled with what looked like oil and smelled like butter—ghee.

Juliana picked up her fork. She moved a small piece of chicken out from under her bread, eyed it suspiciously, and took a bite.

Elliot watched her face change as the spices filled her mouth. He’d approached his first Punjabi meal with the same suspicion, until the savory flavors had made him understand what true beauty was.

He hid his smile and scooped the chicken smothered in garam masala onto his fork, enjoyed a mouthful, then tore off a bit of bread and dipped it into the ghee.

Down the table, Juliana said, “This is wonderful, Mahindar. What is it?”

“We call it tikka, memsahib. It is made with chicken and spices.”

“And this?” She pointed to her crockery bowl.

“Ghee. It is butter that has been boiled down and the fat skimmed from the top. You put it on your bread.”

Juliana took another bite of the tikka. “It is most excellent.” She dabbed her lips. “Highly unusual.” She reached for her goblet of water and took a long drink. “And quite spicy. Elliot, you did not tell me you preferred native food,” she said a little breathlessly.

Elliot shrugged as he swallowed another large mouthful. “Rona’s cook wanted only Scottish food in her kitchen, much to Mahindar’s distress. I told him that here, he and his wife can cook whatever they like.”

“Well.” Juliana drew another breath. “I will be eager to taste what you come up with, Mahindar.”

Mahindar did not look convinced. “Perhaps the memsahib prefers haggis?” His expression said that he’d rather die than have to prepare such a thing, but Mahindar always wanted to please.

“No, no,” Juliana said quickly. “This is lovely.”

“The sahib, he was so kind to us when he had his plantation. He let me tempt him with many a Punjabi dish, and did not insist on boiled mutton and very soft peas. He is so kind, is the sahib. Always kind to everyone.”

Juliana saw Elliot look up from his food, brows drawn, then he went back to shoveling the tikka into his mouth, tearing off pieces of the bread to accompany it. Nothing wrong with Elliot’s appetite.

Juliana knew exactly why Mahindar was emphasizing Elliot’s kindness. Kindness to Mahindar, to Mahindar’s family, to Priti…

“Thank you, Mahindar,” she said. “That will be all for now.”

Mahindar looked from her to Elliot. “But there is more in the kitchen. I can bring more.”

“No, you and your family should enjoy some food and
a time to eat. When we finish, or need anything, I will ring…I mean, Mr. McBride will shout for Hamish.”

Mahindar looked to Elliot for confirmation. Elliot glanced up briefly and gave him a nod. Mahindar, resigned, set down the tray and walked quietly out of the room, shutting the door carefully behind him.

Juliana pushed her fork through the red orange savory sauce and tried to decide how to broach the subject.

Ladies were supposed to expect their husbands to take lovers outside marriage and even to have children with said mistresses. A wife was not supposed to mention this or bring up the fact, even if the children were brought home to be raised in her house.

This situation was different, perhaps, because the lover in question was dead, the affair conducted years before Elliot’s return home or this marriage. Indeed, because the woman had passed away, perhaps Elliot was more to be pitied than censured. But still, a lady was not to notice these things—she was to look the other way at her husband’s goings-on.

But Juliana had never been one for looking the other way at anything. She’d had to keep her eyes firmly open growing up with her kind but distant, ever-so-respectable father and her self-indulgent, rather indolent mother.

“My stepmother,” Juliana said. She had to stop and clear her throat.

Elliot looked up, his black coat and white shirt elegant, yet his skin brown with his outdoors life, his hands blunt and worn from work.

Juliana coughed and took a drink of water.

“I’ll tell Mahindar not to make it so spicy next time,” Elliot said.

“No, no. It’s fine.” She dabbed her lips with her napkin. “As I was saying, my stepmother can be very blunt. Discusses things quite frankly. When she comes to visit, she
will want to know all about Priti, and her history. What shall I tell her?”

Elliot looked faintly surprised. “Tell her anything you like. I’m not ashamed of her.”

“Yes, but, my dear Elliot, I’m not sure myself of the story.”

He frowned. “I’ve told you.”

“No.” Juliana dragged in a breath. “No, you haven’t.”

His frown deepened. “Haven’t I?”

“No.”

“Mmph.” Elliot reached for the whiskey decanter and poured a large measure into the goblet. He took a generous sip then ran his tongue across his lower lip. “Sometimes I can’t remember the things I’ve said or not said.”

“I understand. It must be painful for you.”

Elliot stopped in the act of taking another drink, the goblet halfway to his mouth. “Don’t pity me, Juliana. I’m sick to death of pity.”

Juliana held up her hand. “Not pity. Interest. I’d be quite curious to hear the story.”

Elliot drank the whiskey. He set down the goblet, keeping one hand on it. “It’s not pretty. Not fit for young ladies at a drawing room tea.”

“We’re in the dining room. And I’m a married woman now.” Juliana’s face heated as she remembered the weight of Elliot in the dark last night, the pain-pleasure when he pushed his way inside her for the first time. “In all ways married.”

Elliot’s expression didn’t soften. “There’s a chance she’s not my daughter,” he said. “But a much better chance that she is.”

“Which do you hope?” Juliana held her breath for the answer.

“That she’s mine. But it doesn’t matter. Her mother is dead, Archibald Stacy is dead, and Priti will live with me, no matter what.”

Chapter 9

Juliana let out her breath again, little by little. “Mr. Archibald Stacy was the lady’s husband?”

“Stacy was a Scotsman I helped settle on a plantation. I’d known him in the army, given him some training. Stacy came to me when he resigned his commission, and I helped him find a plantation near mine.”

Juliana knew from Ainsley that after Elliot had left the army, he’d become a planter, and then made a business of showing other Europeans how to live and prosper in India.

“We were friends,” Elliot went on. “Stacy had a Scottish wife, a young woman he’d gone back to Glasgow to marry, but she grew sick and died within a month of their arrival.”

“Oh dear. Poor lady.”

“Illness can take one swiftly in India,” Elliot said, not without feeling. “Stacy grieved, then took a fancy to an Indian woman called Jaya.”

A courtesan
, Juliana supplied silently. She knew that respectable young women in India were ferociously looked
after to prevent them having out-of-wedlock affairs with European men—with any man, for that matter.

“It was a casual affair,” Elliot said. “And I…had an affair with her too. But Jaya fell for Stacy. She feared he had no true affection for her, was using her to soothe his feelings. So, to move things along, she told him she preferred me, packed her bags, and arrived at my house. Stacy was incensed and came to fetch her back. I don’t think he realized his affection for her until she left him.” He turned the goblet with stiff fingers. “When I returned to the plantation after my capture I found that Stacy had married Jaya, she’d borne a child, and she was dead. Stacy had abandoned Priti, and Mahindar and Channan had taken her in. I paid them for Priti’s upkeep, including what expenses they’d incurred while I’d been gone. Priti was just old enough that the lady could have started her when I was taken.”

Juliana tried to decide what to feel. First, jealousy, her failing—a large, painful dose of jealousy. In her mind, Elliot had always belonged to
her
, ever since the ten-year-old Elliot had kissed her cheek in order to slip a frog into the pocket of her pinafore.

She’d been willing to marry Grant because she’d known it would be useless to pine away for Elliot, who’d preferred India and adventure to this tame side of the world. But the fact that Elliot had gone to this unknown woman, that he’d been willing to do so, burned in her heart.

Second, pity—for Priti, left alone and not understanding, and for Elliot, who’d returned from a horrible ordeal to find the woman he’d had a child with dead. Anger at Mr. Stacy for abandoning the little girl no matter whom she belonged to.

“Is Mr. Stacy still alive?” Juliana asked.

Elliot shook his head. “I don’t think so. He left his plantation and went to Lahore, according to Mahindar, and Mahindar heard that he died in an earthquake there.” Elliot
sloshed more whiskey into his goblet. “I told you, not a pretty story.”

“You are correct. Not for young ladies in a drawing room.”

“It is in the past. Gone.”

“I know.”

Elliot drank the whiskey and returned the glass to the table, obviously intending to say no more.

“Well,” Juliana said briskly. “Priti is a sweet girl, and I’m happy we can provide a home for her. I will have to look into clothes for her, and a governess, and we must make certain a nursery is put in order for her. Nandita is kind to look after her for now, but Priti should not live like a servant.”

“She doesn’t.”

Juliana set down her knife and fork exactly parallel across her plate. “What you mean, my dear Elliot, is that she lives the way you do, which means a bit rough. I don’t intend to break her spirit, if that’s what you fear, but she does need to learn manners, and English, and a good many things.”

“I’ll ask her,” Elliot said with a straight face.

“You should begin acknowledging her as a McBride right away, so that there is no question how you view her as she grows up. I warn you, it will not be easy for her, having an Indian mother, but we will do our best to smooth her way.”

“Thank you.”

The quiet gratitude sent a shiver down Juliana’s spine. Not Priti’s fault at all that she was the daughter of a courtesan two men had loved. The jealousy prickled again. Juliana would have to decide what to do about that—the affair had been so far in the past, after all. That Elliot had planned to take care of Priti no matter whose daughter she turned out to be mitigated the jealousy a bit.

“Yes, there is much to be done.” Juliana took refuge from her emotions, as always, by organizing. Organizing was such a comforting thing. “Not only for Priti, but for us
as well. As soon as we are able, we must pay calls to everyone in the area. It’s our duty, and also our duty to host a gathering, perhaps on Midsummer’s Eve. That will indicate to the neighbors that we plan to settle here, and are not simply city dwellers looking to spend an idle week in the country. We’ll have a fête, and a ball. I shall have to find out what fiddlers to hire and where to obtain the food, which will all have to be local, of course. Perhaps you could…”

She noticed that Elliot had frozen in place, staring at her with an unfathomable look.

“Elliot?” she asked quickly. “Are you all right?”

“I don’t do well around people,” he said in a hard voice. “Not anymore.”

No, he didn’t. She’d seen that already, even with his own family. “That is the beauty of having a wife,” she said. “You have to do nothing but stand looking laird-like and letting the whiskey flow.
I
shall have to greet everyone and make sure they’re entertained. Trust me, much better for us to endure such a thing for a few hours than be talked about up and down the countryside. Don’t worry, Elliot. I will take care of it.”

She had no idea, Elliot thought, how absolutely beautiful she looked at this moment. Her blue eyes were shining under the light of the candles, her hair glistening as she moved her head. She talked rapidly and gestured with her plump hand, so happily dooming him with neighborly calls and a midsummer fête.

Easy to confess to the world, even to gentle and proper Juliana, that he’d sired a child on Jaya, who’d kept him warm when the cold winds came off the wall of mountains separating northern India from the world. Easy to admit he and Stacy had shared her between them at first.

That sin was so far removed from the terrible nightmare of being captured and displayed as a prize. So far removed from what the men of that fierce tribe had done to him, and had taught Elliot to do for them. He’d experienced slavery
firsthand, when a human life was considered less important than an animal’s—when the whole of his history, from birth to present, meant nothing.

Elliot also couldn’t explain to Juliana that when he’d been their prisoner and slave, he’d forgotten all about Jaya. His time with the woman and Stacy, his years at the plantation, his friends there and in the army might have never existed. The only person he could hold on to, the only face he saw, was Juliana’s.

Juliana kept on chattering about the fête and jumble sales and conferring with the minister’s wife, but Elliot couldn’t hear her words. He was aware only of her voice, clear like a fall of rain.

He pushed aside the whiskey he drank too much of these days and rose from his chair. Juliana looked up at him in surprise, because of course a gentleman never left the table until the lady decided it was time for the women to retire to the drawing room.

Elliot reached the end of the table and pulled Juliana’s chair back. As she looked up at him in astonishment, he lifted her out of the ridiculous throne-like chair and set her down on a vast blank area of the table.

“Elliot, I don’t think…”

Elliot silenced her by kissing her. He drew his hands up under her heavy coil of hair, fingers loosening the silk of it.

In the dark cells he’d imagined this, remembering the soft of her hair when he’d touched it the night of her debut ball, before he’d shipped off the next day to join his regiment. He’d recalled he exact shape and touch of her lips from that brief kiss, the scent of her rose-soft breath.

She’d sustained him in the dark, and now he needed sustenance again.

Elliot drew his tongue across her lips, touching the moisture behind them when they parted. Juliana’s hands came up to cup his elbows, fingers sinking into his biceps through his coat.

He kissed across her lips, every inch of them, then moved to her cheek, kissing the skin he had the privilege to touch. In the darkness, in the pain, the memory of her kiss had wound comfort through the agony. She’d never know—he never would find the words to explain—how many times she’d saved his life.

I need you.

Elliot moved to the shell of her ear, brushing it with the tip of his tongue. Juliana made a soft noise in her throat as he closed his teeth on her earlobe.

He was seducing her again, but she’d seduced him every night of those months he’d been lost. He’d longed each day for the torture to cease, for his captors to ignore him for stretches of time, because then he could sink into a stupor and be with his visions of Juliana.

They never could make Elliot forget her, because they didn’t know about her. Her name had never crossed his lips. Juliana was his secret, his soul.

And now she was real.

He sucked her earlobe gently into his mouth, liking the way she shivered under his touch. He loved the scent of her, the taste of her, and he’d never be able to have enough.

Elliot kissed his way back to her mouth, one tiny kiss at a time, until he opened her lips and stroked across her tongue. He loved her tongue. He trapped it with his teeth, then he gently suckled it.

Juliana made another quiet noise of pleasure, and Elliot kept suckling, liking the friction, taste, and heat of her mouth. He let her go and reached for the whiskey decanter, pouring more into his goblet.

He touched the goblet to her lips until she took a little into her mouth, then he plunged his mouth across hers and scooped up the whiskey with his tongue.

Her eyes were soft when Elliot drew back. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“Savoring you.”

“Oh.” Her flush, the little word, made his body tighten.

Elliot touched the goblet to her lips again. This time Juliana sipped then closed her eyes as Elliot imbibed the whiskey from her.

Again and again he slid the best McGregor single malt into her mouth; again and again, he drank from her. He was a man dying of thirst, and Juliana was his vessel.

When the goblet was empty, Juliana smiled up at him, her blue eyes warm, her hair mussed. “You’re going to get me tipsy.”

Elliot kissed her one more time without answering. He skimmed his fingers down her throat, bare for evening, the creamy silk bodice hugging her shoulders and bosom. Female fashion had always baffled him—ladies were buttoned up to their chins during the day but décolletages might barely cover their nipples at night.

All the better for him. Elliot unhooked her bodice in the back and took the half sleeves down her arms, revealing the bow at the top of her corset, the coy lace of chemise beneath that.

Juliana’s father was a wealthy man, and Juliana wore rich clothing, all the way down to her skin. The silk of the bodice he parted caught on the rough tips of Elliot’s fingers, the lawn of the corset cover smooth and embroidered with silk flowers.

Elliot loosened the corset’s laces and pulled them out, opening the cage and lifting it away. The chemise beneath billowed free, its lawn folds as soft as the gown’s silk.

Easy to untie the ribbon holding the chemise closed and slide it down, bunching the fabrics of chemise and bodice at her waist.

Juliana watched him more in curiosity than trepidation as Elliot poured another measure of single malt into the goblet. He lifted it to her and trickled whiskey across her collarbone, the amber liquid trailing down to her bared breasts and abdomen.

Juliana gasped. “Elliot, my gown…”

Elliot barely heard her. He leaned down to her, licking the whiskey from her skin, following it to the heat between her breasts. He tasted and drank, closing his mouth over her breast to suck.

He left marks where his teeth and tongue had been, decorating Juliana’s bosom. She’d have to wear higher-necked gowns now, but Elliot didn’t care. She could wrap herself in a sedate package that she unwrapped only for him.