Come Midnight (17 page)

As he spoke, his other hand moved over the curve of her derriere, caressing her; then lower, to stroke the backs of her silken thighs. His hand slid slowly upward again, bringing the hem of her shift with it; when he cupped her naked buttocks, he heard her moan his name. "Sweet Caitlin," he breathed, and pulled her up against him. As her feet left the floor, the cradle of her hips met the swollen contours of his erection. "Know how I want you," he whispered. "Know the joy that is your birthright as a woman. A woman who is deeply loved,
macushla
,
a stor
."

Caitlin lost all sense of time and place after that. Her world narrowed to the two of them and the intense pleasure spiraling through her body. To the love pouring from him in heartfelt words and hot, intimate caresses. Lost in a maelstrom of desire, of pleasure she'd scarcely imagined, she surrendered completely to Adam's knowing hands. Ah, God—his hands!

Without knowing how it happened, she found herself entwined with him on the bed. Her shift had twisted about her waist; her breasts were bared to Adam's relentlessly pleasuring mouth. As he teased and suckled the pouting nipples, she squirmed with pleasure. She wondered if someone could die of such pleasure. She was drowning in sensation. Aware of her body as she'd never been before: of breasts aching with pleasure and begging for more; of the pulsing place below her belly invaded by a sweet, curling sensation she couldn't explain; of trembling thighs that.... Mother of God, her naked thighs lay open to his hand, and he was—

"Adam!" she cried, trying to close them to the shocking caress, but she was too late. A moan escaped as his fingers slid along her woman's entrance; then another, even louder, as he slipped one of them inside her.
What was happening to her? When had she grown so slippery and slick? Why?

It was as if he'd heard her. "You're wet for me, sweetheart," he explained, smiling into her bewildered eyes. "See?" he whispered, easing a second finger inside her, gently stretching her. "Your body's made you ready... for me." He claimed her mouth with a kiss that left her mindless and reeling. And all the while, he stroked her sweetly yielding flesh.

Caitlin began to writhe and twist beneath him on the bed as his fingers worked their magic. Now his thumb found the tiny protrusion nestled in her auburn curls. He stroked the sensitive nub; she moaned in ecstasy. Again, he stroked; her nails dug into his shoulders. The third time, she convulsed under his hand and sobbed his name.

"Shh, love." Adam stopped to hold her tight and soothe her. Sweat beaded his brow as he clung to the last tether of his control. Her ardent passion was a siren's call, tempting him to lose patience. He ached to bury himself at once inside her sweetly willing body. But she was untried, and he would die before he hurt her. Yet for a virgin, some pain is unavoidable, he thought as he quickly shed his clothes. The only virgin he'd bedded was his late wife, whom all the love play in the world couldn't arouse. He'd finally tried to ease the way with saliva—but that had so repulsed her, he was forced to give it up. In the end, she'd simply lain there like a dead fish, insisting he "get on with it." Her shrieks when he finally gave in had nearly unmanned him.

The distasteful memory cooled his ardor; fortunately, as it happened, for it gave him a chance to reclaim the control Caitlin deserved. When she called his name, he took her in his arms with a smile. "I'm here, love," he murmured, smoothing back the tiny tendrils of hair clinging damply to her brow. He searched her face to gauge her emotional state; meeting her heavy-lidded gaze, he felt his loins quicken anew. Her eyes were pellucid green pools, their centers dark with desire. Yet even as he watched, passion further dilated the pupils; black eclipsed the green. "I'm here," he repeated thickly, "and I want you,
macushla
."

Caitlin had yet to descend from the pleasurable storm erupting through her body. Myriad feelings, so new she scarcely recognized herself, crowded her thoughts and set them spinning. She only knew she loved this man with every atom of her being. Now, as he held her close and gazed into her eyes, a new realization penetrated the sensual haze: Adam . . . Holy Mother of God—he's naked!

As this registered, another element joined the sensual maelstrom: curiosity. She felt firm, warm skin, so different from hers .... whorls of springy hair on a broad, muscular chest. .. sparser hair along the hard lengths of his thighs. And where they joined, a thicket that covered—"

She swallowed thickly and returned to examining the taut planes of his upper torso. "
Macushla
," she murmured, her voice a throaty contralto, "ye're iver so b-beautifully made." She ran her hands slowly, wonderingly over his chest, testing the crisp, dark curls. Discovering the flat discs of his nipples, she circled them curiously with her fingertips. And when she felt them tighten: "Oh!"

Sucking in his breath, Adam stopped the innocent exploration that nearly undid him, and gave a shaky chuckle. "Any more of that, my lass, and this will be over before it's begun."

"But... I don't understand."

"No ... but you will." His voice had grown thick and husky with desire, yet it held a hint of amusement. Performing the same maneuver on Caitlin's nipples, he saw understanding widen her eyes, even as she shuddered with pleasure.

"A-aye," she managed. And when he continued to fondle and pluck the responsive peaks: "B-but I still don't understand why I mustn't d-do it, while you—"

"Because a passionate woman . .." he whispered as his other hand slid between her thighs, "a woman like you, my darling, may reach fulfillment several times in as many minutes. It's different for a man. If I were to let you continue as you were, I'd require long minutes to, uh, recover, before we could bring this loving to its .. . conclusion."

"B-but, Adam," she said, trying to hold on to her thoughts. Not easy with the things he was doing to her body. "That hardly seems fair! I—"

"Just let me love you,
macushla
, "he whispered, silencing her with a soul-drugging kiss.

And she did. Surrendering completely to his loving, until she lay taut and trembling beneath him. Open to him, her woman's place aching for him. Every nerve ending vibrating with delicious pleasure and primal need. "P-lease, Adam," she begged, "I want—I want..." Her eyes fluttered closed in helpless confusion.

"I know, love," he said thickly, "and so do I. Now look at me, a star. Open your eyes and look at me ... while I take us there." As her eyes met his, their dark pupils entirely eclipsing the green now, he whispered her name with a tender smile. And slid his throbbing shaft slowly, ever so slowly, into her waiting warmth.

Caitlin felt the pressure of him slipping inside her with a surge of elemental joy. "Aye!" she cried, and arched her hips to meet his.

"Caitlin—don't!" Too late, Adam felt the fragile membrane tear, felt her stiffen beneath him. "Hold still, love," he rasped, his body trembling with an effort to do the same. "Hold absolutely still and the pain will pass ... I promise."

"A-aye," she whispered uncertainly. But the pain was already receding. Aware now of how she'd precipitated things, she gave a rueful chuckle. "When—when I was but a wee lass, Crionna was foriver t-tellin' me t' look before I leap. Said I was m-most apt t' forget it when— when I was after f-followin' me heart."

Beads of sweat studding his brow, Adam searched her face with anxious eyes. "And what does your heart say now,
macushla
?"

"That the leap was worth it," she answered with a smile as old as Eve. Gazing deeply into his eyes, she moved her hips—subtly, this time—to tell him her body said the same.

Adam released a quavering breath. He gave her a long, lingering kiss. "Now?" he whispered thickly.

Her reply was a slow rotation of her hips.

"Minx!" he accused with a shaky laugh. Moving his hand to the place where they joined, he found the tiny nub; this, he circled and stroked, and heard her moan something in the Gaelic. Again, and she sobbed it aloud.

On the third pass, she drew her legs about him, begging for completion.

With a groan that was her name, Adam slid deeply home.

Moving on her with care, he felt her melt into him. Now he picked up the pace. Together, they slipped into the age-old rhythm of man and woman. Sweetly rocking, boldly reaching, soaring, soaring to the dreamless stars. Through the magical realm of desire, to the far-flung reaches of the universe itself. Mindless with rapture, they shattered in each other's arms.

And two were one in the name of love.

Chapter 12

Adam lay awake in the bed, Caitlin asleep in his arms. The lovely, satisfied smile she wore sorely tempted him. He'd have liked nothing more than to kiss her awake. And then to kiss her senseless. To take her with him again on that long, sensual glide that swept them, sated and replete, on the dreaming shores of love. But he wouldn't wake her. They'd made love several times through the night, and she had to be exhausted. Mindful of her newly initiated body, he hadn't intended it, but Caitlin had had other ideas. After that first earthshaking joining, she'd slept for a time, then awakened—all sleepy and soft as a kitten—and reached for him with unmistakable intent.

He'd been helpless to resist; the best he could do was to take infinite care with her, and he had. Again and again, throughout the night. She finally fell into a deep slumber about an hour before dawn. Since then, he'd simply held her in his arms. Watching her. Remembering ... cherishing every moment of their loving—cherishing her. But Adam hadn't slept at all.

What kept going round in his head was where they went from here. No matter how he sliced it, he kept returning to one wrenching conclusion: He must send Caitlin away. He made no doubt it would tear him apart. He nonetheless must, must somehow find the strength to do it. The very love he bore her put her in deepest peril, and that he would not do.

Problem was, he must convince Caitlin this was their only course. As he was learning, she could be fiercely tenacious when it came to loving him. And she did love him, incredible as it seemed. Of that he'd not a single—

"Ye're frownin',
macushla, a stor
." Warm and muzzy with sleep, Caitlin smiled drowsily up at him. "I don't suppose ye'd be after tellin' me why?"

"A fleabite," Adam lied, quickly summoning a smile. Not yet. Just a little while longer, and then I'll tell her. . . as I must. But for now . . . ah, it's too soon . . . I can't—not yet. "Go back to sleep, love," he murmured, pressing his lips tenderly to her brow.

" Tis not a fleabite," she countered, frowning herself now. "I've come t' read ye too well, Adam Lightfoot, and what I'm seein' in yer eyes speaks o' some great, important matter. I think—" She scrambled to a sitting position, stared at him in disbelief—"ye're after sendin' me away!"

The air left his lungs in a despairing rush: half sigh, half groan. "Caitlin, listen to m—"

"I'll not go."

"Caitlin, I beg you will try to under—"

"We love—that is what I understand. 'Tis all I need to understand!" Tears flooded her eyes as she glared at him, immutable resolve in the set of her mouth. "And unless yer own part in that equation has changed—"

"You know it hasn't."

"Then, 'tis simple: Two people who love—who love as we love, Adam—are blessed! What right have ye t' throw that away?"

He shoved a hand roughly through his hair and heaved a troubled sigh. "We've been through all this bef—"

"Before, aye—before we knew we loved each ither! Before we made love and ..." She paled visibly, and her bottom lip trembled. "P-please...," she whispered, "tell me 'tis not what I—what I'm thinkin'. F-Father O'Malley taught us 'tis a sin t' have c-carnal knowledge w-without bein' wed. That"—she swallowed convulsively against the tears clogging her throat—"that a woman who did so was sure t' be c-cast aside—"

"No, Caitlin—no!" Privately cursing Father O'Malley and all narrow-minded fools like him, Adam reached for her hands and held them tightly in his. "I cannot believe you'd think me capable—Caitlin, disabuse yourself of such thoughts and listen to me. I'm begging you to leave because I love you. You are everything to me . . . my life .. . my heart. The heart I'd sooner cut from my body than risk your—no, hear me out!"

There was a wealth of tenderness in his eyes as he smiled at her, but there was sadness in the smile as well. "Never think I intend to abandon you, my darling. Still, you must leave me. To stay is fraught with such danger, you cannot imagine it. Sending you away will be the hardest thing I've ever done. I'll die inside when you go, my Caitlin. But listen to me. I mean to wed you before we part. You'll have my name and never want for a single—"

"Wed me! Ye'd wed me, then send me away?" Tears streaming down her cheeks, she regarded him with an agony of love and pain in her eyes. "Have ye heard the words o' the marriage vows, Adam? Really, truly heard them? I can't believe they're so very different in the English church. 'Till death do us part.' Isn't that what we'll vow before God's holy altar? And what about the part that goes, 'Whom God hath joined, let no man—' "

"This isn't about God, damn it! It's about His very oppos—" Adam clenched his jaws shut, released her hands, and swung off the bed.

Caitlin stared at the rigid back he turned to her, at the hands he held clenched into fists at his sides. "Isn't about God?" she repeated numbly. "About His very..." The blood went to ice in her veins. For a moment she couldn't move. An image out of nightmare loomed in her mind's eye: of evil incarnate, fanning enormous membranous wings, blood and gore dripping from its rapacious jaws. Swept by a wave of nausea, Caitlin brought a fist to her mouth. She bit down hard, till the pain drove it away.

Then she moved, leaping off the bed, careless of her nudity. "Tell me," she demanded, planting herself before him, arms akimbo. Her green eyes blazed fiercely as they met Adam's tormented gaze. "Tell me about God's opposite and the hold he has on ye—no, don't even try t' deny it! I've seen the hellish creature, d'ye see—aye, with the Sight! In a nightmare, where I played chess"—she pointed to the handsome chess set resting on a table across the room—"upon that very board. 'Twas while I was yet in Ireland, long before I iver learnt the game! Now, tell me all of it—and when ye've done, niver ask me t' leave you again!"

Thoroughly shaken, Adam stared at her in wordless horror. It sickened him even to think of Caitlin in connection with that monstrous evil. It could only mean she was already somehow mixed up in his fate. Slowly, with haunted eyes, he began to tell her about a visit in early April. About Appleby.

"That pretty well covers it," he finished wearily, long minutes later. They sat together on the edge of the bed, Caitlin clasping his hand as if she'd never let go. Dawn had broken, spearing fingers of pale light between the draperies. The ticking of the mantel clock seemed to punctuate Adam's words as, with a twist of his lips, he recounted: "My unsuspecting vow that summoned Appleby ... that hellish pact ... the fiend's treachery in saving Andrew's life without restoring his leg. I'd say that sums it up rather tidily," he added bitterly.

"It explains the darkness I've seen inside ye, Adam,
a stor
," Caitlin said, suppressing a shudder. The desperation to save Andrew's life, aye, that she could well understand. Didn't she love Adam precisely because he was such a man? An honorable man, one who didn't love easily, but when he loved, gave his all? But the price he'd paid was worse than anything she'd imagined. She felt sickened and terrified by what he'd revealed.

And yet—ach, what did any of it matter? She loved him. She'd travel to the ends of the earth to save him. Aye, to the gates of hell itself!

"Now I understand why the Sight drew me here," she went on, nodding. "I needed t' know, d'ye see. T' learn what it is we must face if I'm t' help ye find the Light."

Adam gaped at her in dread. "We? Oh, no—never! Caitlin, what I just described—all the brutal and frightening detail of it—was meant to convince you of one thing, and one thing only. You must flee this evil. Run, Caitlin—as far and as fast as you can!"

Slowly, she shook her head. " 'Tis useless t' run, Adam, as I should know. Aye, I played the coward at

first. Only t' discover ye cannot run from what's meant t' be. I ran from it—and the runnin' only led me here."

"You ran ... the nightmare?"

She nodded. "Though Crionna warned me I must deal with it. I saw a stranger, a man with a scar." With a tender smile, she reached out to touch the scar on his face. " 'Twas you, only I hadn't yet met ye, didn't know who ye were, then. Ye were just a dark, handsome stranger with a scar... who watched me play chess with the divil."

His face went chalk white. "Caitlin, as you love me— leave before you're further drawn in! He'll—he'll try to use you against me—or worse." He'll try to win your soul as well!

Again, she shook her head. " Tis too late,
macushla,
even if the dreams had niver been. By lovin' ye, d'ye see, I'm already involved. Ach, don't fash yerself, a stor. The dreams and visions always have a purpose. They brought me here, I'm thinkin'—no, I'm past certain of it—t' help ye defeat the fiend."

He gave a bark of mirthless laughter. "Defeat him! I can't even find him." Briefly, he described his useless efforts to locate Appleby in London. "For the deceit he practiced with Andrew's leg, I'd like nothing better than to confront the slimy toad. He won't be found, Caitlin, because he doesn't wish to be found. Of a certainty, he'll avoid affording me an opportunity to get round him and that blasted contract! No, I'm hopelessly damned, no matter what I do. And the wretched fiend knows it."

Caitlin stared pensively at the floor for a moment "Adam," she said, brightening as she raised her head and met his eyes. "The church teaches that every sinner has a chance t' be saved from perdition. All we need do is pray for it with a sincere heart! Ye must ask God— ach, why are ye shakin' yer head?"

"I can't, Caitlin." He regarded her with a dull bleakness in his eyes, a look she'd never seen before. "I'm ... unable to. Haven't prayed, haven't had the ability to pray, since ... the Peninsula. I'm without faith, do you see—and therefore doubly damned."

Caitlin stared at him, appalled, but also deeply frightened. Of all the things he'd told her, this was the most troubling. She'd readily seen him as a man willing to sacrifice himself for his child. As a helpless victim of the sly archfiend, who'd used that nobility of character against him. Now he was telling her that at least part of what had brought him to this pass lay within Adam himself. Ach, what gross atrocities, what evils, had he witnessed in those distant battlefields to strip him of his faith?

She tried to offer him a reassuring smile, failed, and settled for a simple nod. "Then, ye must work at regainin' yer faith,
a stor
. I'll not give up on ye, and I won't leave. I'm committed, d'ye see, no matter what. And in the meantime, I'll pray for ye."

"Ever the Irish Angel," he said, smiling crookedly as he lightly touched her hair. His eyes blazed with love, but in his heart of hearts, Adam fought despair.