Lost in Your Arms (26 page)

He remained still, and she realized his intention. He would not come for her. Without any kind of urging, she would approach him.

His attitude incensed her. He was angry? Well, so was she. She had been betrayed in every way possible by everyone possible—and now her own body had turned traitor. She ought to leave. Now. Before she went any further.

But she couldn’t. She wanted him so much the craving scorched her mind and drove her to take that first, reluctant step.

Immobile on the bed, he watched.

His gaze stripped her bare, scoured her skin, saw inside to the jumble of longing and impatience.

She took another step. Her toes dug into the tightly woven carpet. She wanted to turn and flee, but his will commanded her as surely as words.

How dare he command her?

Why did she obey?

She took another step. Her heart beat heavily. Her breasts ached with tension. She wanted to smile, to soften his severity, but her trembling lips wouldn’t obey her.

She moved toward him, enraged by his ultimatums, furious with herself, yet wanting him with a passion that propelled her forward. The step onto the dais was the highest she’d ever taken. Halting at the edge of the bed, she bided there, expecting him to speak, to stir.

He didn’t. He remained still, his expectations palpable between them.

Tonight, only tonight, she would fulfill those expectations. Unbelting her wrap, she allowed the rich brocade to slither down her arms.

His gaze dropped to her bosom. His nostrils flared.

Her gown was plain, yes, but the cotton was thin and soft, and her nipples lifted the material in small puckers that told him too clearly her state of agonized desire. Hiking up her nightgown, she leaned one knee and both hands on the plush mattress.

His gaze drifted back to her face. Still he displayed no sign of helping her. Of yielding.

She crept to the center of the bed, where he reclined on a tumble of pillows. Seating herself on her hip, she gazed at his body, seeking nerve, seeking inspiration. The muscles and the beautiful, marred skin tempted her to touch, to love. Even the erection that lifted his kilt beckoned.

But she knew that when she looked in his eyes she would see more than simply his desire. Reflected there she would see obsession, a pure passion, a madness of insatiability. She knew, because she suffered from the same insanity that afflicted him.

Filled with trepidation, she extended her hand over his chest, over his heart. Bit by bit she lowered her palm onto the mat of auburn hair, and down to his skin. The texture of his hair, the warmth of his body, the power that hummed through him: they beckoned her. She craved him, needed him, and as much as she hated it, no other man could fulfill her need.

Taking a daring breath, she looked into his face.

His eyes glowed with power. She had surrendered
herself to him, and he wouldn’t allow her to retreat, or to change her mind, or to pretend differently. He held her in his grasp, and he would keep her.

Without further delay, he wrapped her in his arms, rolled her beneath him, and pinned her beneath his weight. He wasted no effort on subtlety; his every movement was aimed at domination.

He had won. She had come to him.

Now he would impress on her that she was his.

She panted with the onset of panic. She had made the decision to come to him, but now, with his body trapping hers, she thought better of her decision. She was afraid . . . no, she was angry.

Looking into her face, he saw the fragments of emotion, but his patience had run out. With a forceful thrust of his knee, he separated her legs.

No, she wanted him so much that no other emotion could exist within her.

With no preliminaries, he placed his hand there, on her most feminine place.

The intimacy . . . too soon. Too much. Too forceful. She was shocked, and when he molded her firmly with his fingers, she gasped and shrank away.

He wouldn’t allow that. The cloth of her nightgown formed no barrier to him. He found the opening to her body and dampened the material with her pleasure. Sliding his thumb up, he stroked her most sensitive bud, and yearning blossomed in her womb. She moaned, the soft, low moan of unexpected desire.

He forced bliss on her with a light hand, stroking her between his fingers, igniting a fire in her loins. The cotton pulled and rubbed, and the material added an earthy texture that hurdled her toward gratification.

She couldn’t believe this was happening. So quickly. Without warning. She tried to twist away.

He gave no quarter. He allowed her no respite.

Climax struck, rendered her blind and insensate to anything but him and his caress. She convulsed in mighty spasms of glory . . . then, slowly, she subsided.

Humiliating, to let him know how much she wanted him, how easily she responded to his touch. She thought he might laugh. She thought he might taunt her. But when she opened her eyes, she saw that he was not amused. He watched her with all the intense passion of a man enthralled, clothed in dark menace and nothing else. He’d rid himself of the kilt, and his cock thrust up at her, blue-veined, softly capped, rigid and demanding. His muscled hips moved against her belly, forewarning her, preparing her.

While he held her weak and captive still, he flicked open the buttons of her gown—all the way down to her toes.

The beat of her heart had begun to subside. Now it picked up again. She wanted to protest his methods, but she didn’t dare. She didn’t fear him; not exactly. But the man who held her so securely was a conqueror, a warrior who had surmounted great obstacles for his lady. He would brook no defiance.

And she . . . she had done nothing but defy him. She had laughed at him, flouted him, scorned him. Tonight nothing remained between them except the struggle of male and female for supremacy.

The conclusion was foregone, but she had to fight . . . with a tender stroke to the scars on his chin and his cheek, or a finger caressing his earlobe.

His eyes half-closed, a creature luxuriating in sensuality.
Lowering his head, he softly bit her lower lip, and when she cried out, he licked the little wound.

His breath smelled of mint and tasted of lust. At his unspoken command, she slid her hands into his hair and opened her mouth to him. He kissed as if he would devour her, slanting his lips to fit hers exactly, thrusting his tongue deep. Tears started to her eyes; given his choice, he would leave her nothing of herself.

He kissed her eyelids, slid his lips over her cheek and slid his tongue into her ear.

She stroked his broad shoulders, soaking up the primitive awareness that this male was intent on subjugating her. And she was willing. Oh, so willing.

Strange. When she thought of herself, she imagined herself to be a strong, upright woman of character. When he touched her, he found all the soft places, the female places, those pieces that disarmed and relaxed her.

His wicked breath thrilled her even as he slid his hand inside her gown and cupped her breast. His thumb rubbed her nipple, over and around, and her breath staggered and caught. She brought her knee up, parting the buttons, baring one side of herself. Rearing above her, he looked at her half-draped form and growled. Actually growled like a beast presented a banquet.

He bent to catch her nipple in his mouth, and the suckling drove her to wrap her leg around his hip, to rub herself against him.

He laughed faintly. Damn him, now he laughed against her skin, and his hand skated down her spine to the cleft of her bottom. He urged her closer, pressing his thigh firmly between her legs and providing delight
with the long, deliberate stroking before and the light, unhurried friction of his fingers behind.

She arched her back. Her head thrashed on the pillows.

He suckled at her other nipple. Rapture built to unbearable proportions. Every part of her body thrummed, demanded, yet when she tried to push his head away, he took her wrist and pressed it against the mattress. Then he licked her palm, and the nerves beneath her skin jumped and rioted. She moaned deep in her throat.

He shushed her.

For a mere moment of sanity, she rose from the deep, sybaritic well and realized that he was right. They couldn’t cry out with enjoyment. No one lingering in the corridor could know that MacLean yet lived, and the sounds of love could never be mistaken for anything else. So except for their hurried breaths and their faint, untutored whimpers, they must skirmish in silence.

One by one, he sucked on her fingers.

This
was the way it felt for him inside her. The warmth, the rasping, the iniquitous motion that brought paradise to earth.

As he assaulted her with pleasure, euphoria built in her mind, in her body. The silence built in the room. Their restraint became almost an aphrodisiac. She wanted him on her, in her. She needed to be filled.

“Now,” she whispered in an agony of need.
“Now.”

He ignored her, the bounder. He wanted her. She knew it, for his cock twitched against her. Yet he held off, tormenting her to prove who held the control. He kissed her lips but didn’t allow her to kiss him back.
He nipped her ear and chuckled when she moaned. He took a breast in each hand and circled the nipples, over and over again. He slid two fingers inside her and imitated coitus. Imitated it so well that she bit his shoulder in animal delight.

His discipline broke. Tossing her onto her back, he spread her legs and mounted her.

There was nothing of elegance in his conquest. He found the entrance to her body and invaded, driving hard against the tender tissues, making a place for himself without regard to her delicacy.

She didn’t care. Her body yielded because he had made her wet for him with the artistry of his touch.

She loved this. The heat, the lust, the desperation. Spreading her legs wide, she wrapped them around his hips and gave herself up to him.

He set a fast rhythm, a glorious motion.

She dug her nails into his bottom, wanting everything he had to offer.

Like a rampaging stallion, he pulled back and plunged, giving everything in a ravishment of the senses, of the will.

She whimpered, a soft, steady whimper that conveyed too clearly her desperation. Climax built and built, always just out of reach. He never slowed enough for her to grasp it, but it was there. So close. So fierce.

Just when she thought she could bear it no longer, he seized her hips, paused, hung above her. For one trembling moment, he stared down at her, his eyes crackling with the golden lightning that seared her with his brand.

She wanted to close her eyes against him. She couldn’t.

He bore down on her. His penis jerked. His sperm filled her, a mighty splurge of intemperance and dominance. Then he lunged again. Over and over.

Climax, too long delayed, lashed at her.

He pressed his hand over her mouth to stop her betraying scream, all the while thrusting in and out with a pace that prolonged her pleasure beyond reason, beyond temperance, beyond bearing. She rippled and shuddered, every muscle in her body tensing, and deep in her womb the spasms gathered strength until she attained a peak of satisfaction so sublime she would never reach it again.

Except with Kiernan, she knew she could.

The pillows were scattered. The sheets were ripped from the mattress and damp from their exertions. The place between her legs throbbed, and the evidence of his orgasm and hers smeared on their bodies like some ceremonial ointment.

Gradually, the spasms subsided. His motion slowed, then stopped. He caught her chin in his palm, lifted her head toward him.

She hadn’t recovered. Could never recover, but she knew enough to jerk her chin free. She half lifted herself, wanting to escape that piercing gaze, his wordless demand.

He wouldn’t let her rise. Wouldn’t even leave her body.

She searched for some way to end this.

Someone had to say something.

Someone had to break.

Of course, it was her. “I love you,” she whispered. “I love you.”

Chapter 26

In the early morning hours before dawn when the night candles sputtered and dark wrapped the castle in its velvet cloak, Enid made her move. Slowly, so slowly, she slipped out of the sleeping Kiernan’s embrace. Barely breathing, she inched across the bed, lowered first one foot, then the other, to the floor. Slithering off the mattress, she groped for her robe, listening all the while for him to wake, to realize she had escaped him.

But he was exhausted from his efforts, and he imagined he had conquered her beyond all denying.

Creeping along the floor, she pulled on her wrap, and when she came to the door, she reached for the key and prayed that the lock was oiled. Her heart thundered as the tumblers fell into place, but although MacLean tossed for a moment, he settled back into slumber.

For one moment, she wanted to go back to him, crawl in beside him, and let his will guide her. Yet she couldn’t. She just couldn’t.

The corridor was empty. The door opened, then shut behind her, and she scurried to her own bed. Pulling the covers up to her chin, she stared into the darkness. She was still staring, wide-eyed, when morning slid golden sunshine through the gaps in the curtains and brought her to a sitting position.

She knew Kiernan. He was a man of power and strict morals, and he had made his intentions clear. Although she wasn’t expecting his child, he wanted her in his bed. He had forcefully proved that time and again. She didn’t for a moment suppose he offered her a position as mistress. He was so upright he irritated her like a hair shirt. No man had the right to be so honorable, especially not Stephen’s cousin. Yet MacLean wanted her as his wife, and she, who had spent her life looking for a home, a fortune, a family, a mate, could have all those things in him.

The mere offer choked her with panic. She was more frightened now than when the fire had broken out, or when she’d realized he was not her husband, or the train had been stopped. And why? She didn’t even understand herself.

Yet she was. When she thought about his plan to trap the villain and the danger that stalked him, she wished so strongly to be away and safe in London that, like a child, she closed her eyes and imagined she could transport herself there.

Instead Lady Bess herself rapped on her door. “Enid, it’s time to get ready.”

Overcome with resentment, Enid pounded her hand on her pillow.

Lady Bess had come to assure herself that Enid had
not defected. Lady Bess was an intelligent woman. “Enid?” She knocked harder. “You promised you would be the chief mourner. Remember?”

“Yes, my lady,” Enid called, and she marveled at the clarity of her own voice.

Of course, the last time she’d used her voice, she had been clear enough.
“I love you,”
she had told MacLean.

Trying to escape the memory, she tumbled out of bed.
“I love you.”
Could she have said anything more likely to cause herself trouble? MacLean thought he had won all, because he had won her heart.

He had won nothing, and she could only imagine his wrath when he woke this morning and found her gone. She was surprised he hadn’t frightened the whole castle half to death and ruined their plan as he rampaged toward her chamber.

Lady Bess knocked again. “Let me in. I’ll help you prepare.”

Enid unlocked the door, opened it, and ushered Lady Bess inside.

As Lady Bess bustled into the room, Enid saw that she had overcome the austerity of her black clothing to look appallingly cheerful. “I am so glad this farce is almost over. I’m tired of being worried about the lad, and about you.” Peering into Enid’s face, she added, “You look as if you didn’t sleep a wink.”

Enid touched the skin beneath her eyes. Puffy and sore. “No, I didn’t.” Although not for the reasons Lady Bess imagined.

“Good. A chief mourner should look the part.” With brisk resolve, Lady Bess got Enid into her black, light wool mourning clothes, pinned a black hat to her head, and draped a black veil over her face. She tucked a
black handkerchief up Enid’s sleeve. “Of course you won’t really need a handkerchief, but you can cover your face with it and no one will ever know you’re not crying.”

Enid nodded politely. “Is the MacLean already in his coffin?”

“Indeed he is, wearing the MacLean tartan and his father’s sporran. His father would be proud of him for being so brave, and proud of you, too, for thinking up such a clever plot.” Lady Bess lowered a black veil over her own face and shepherded Enid down the stairs, whispering, “But we have to get this funeral going, because we can’t wait forever. Sooner or later, Kiernan’s going to have to take a piss.”

Enid didn’t suffer even a twinge of amusement at Lady Bess’s plain speaking, nor did she notice Lady Bess’s sharp look.

The chapel was plain and old, and filled with a surfeit of humanity. Everyone was standing, and each person wept softly or sobbed loudly or simply wiped their reddened eyes. The servants stood in the back rows and bobbed curtsies as Lady Bess and Enid walked down the aisle. Donaldina managed to look both grieved and strong.

“That old woman could have gone on the London stage and made her fortune,” Lady Bess murmured to Enid. “Look, to your right. The MacQuarries came in full force. Curtsy to the laird. Ah, he looks upset. Fond of Kiernan, he is, but you’ll see a royal tantrum when he realizes the trick we’ve pulled. There’s Graeme, and Rab beside him. Since the Englishmen are not only our guests but our primary suspects, we put Mr. Kinman in the front pew with Harry and Jackson.”

Enid looked sharply at Harry. He was pale and still wobbly from his gunshot wound, but he was standing beside the other two men.

Mr. Kinman’s cheeks were the color of parchment, and he stared at the coffin and periodically shook his head. His lips moved. She saw the words.
“I don’t believe it.”

Jackson wore a sharply pressed, perfectly proper black suit. His hands were folded before his stomach. His face was arranged in an appropriately somber expression, and he stared at the floor before him.

“And on the other side of the front row with us”—Lady Bess sighed—“Lady Catriona.”

The plump, petite woman wore the same unrelieved black as everyone else, but she managed to make it more dramatic with the addition of acres of heavy lace and a veil that extended from her hat all the way to the floor.

“I don’t suppose you could keep her away,” Enid said dryly.

“I don’t suppose, but in truth, I had hoped she wouldn’t come.” Lady Bess fingered the ebony cross that hung about her neck. “Still, it’s good that she’s here. Our minister’s old. Mr. Hedderwick saw the lads grow up, so he’ll talk about Stephen as well as Kiernan. Everything about Stephen’s character will be whitewashed, of course. Death has a tendency to do that for people.”

Enid stepped into the MacLean family pew ahead of Lady Bess. She nodded politely at Lady Catriona.

Lady Catriona replied with a disdainful sniff.

“My wager’s on Kinman,” Lady Bess whispered.

Startled, Enid glanced at her. “What?”

“Kinman is our villain. He’s too bluff to be real. All that blunt-nosed honesty makes him a suspect.”

Dismayed, Enid protested, “Oh, no. Not Mr. Kinman.”

“Harry took a shot in the shoulder for MacLean.” Lady Bess kept her eyes front as she spoke softly. “The valet is too bland and proper to care for intrigue. So it has to be Kinman.”

Patriotism and exasperation drove Enid to say, “It could be a Scotsman.”

Lady Bess leaned her head on Enid’s shoulder as if overcome with emotion. “I think that may very well be, but an Englishman’s in charge.”

Astonished at Lady Bess’s admission, Enid took a long, measured breath and let it out. Nerves tightened in her gut. It was true. Everything that Lady Bess said was true. For the first time, she was forced to acknowledge that one of the men she knew so well was a murderer. As the stern-faced, black-clad minister tottered in from the side door beside the altar, she looked again at Mr. Kinman, Harry and Jackson. Today she would face the traitor at last and know that, whoever he was, he had tried to kill her and MacLean in three different attempts at cold-blooded slaughter.

The congregation quieted as Mr. Hedderwick began his discourse.

Enid didn’t want to look at MacLean stretched out in his coffin. To see him would recall last night and all its wickedness, all its pleasure. All the anger, the lust . . . her own betrayal of herself.

In that madness of delight, she’d told him,
“I love you.”
Her fingers trembled as she wiped her damp palms on her skirt. If she thought about her impetuous
confession right now she would faint. If she thought about MacLean and how his sporran rested on his body, an enticement to a ruthless killer, her head would burst.

Instead, surreptitiously, she looked about her.

The chapel had been built so long ago that the stone steps onto the altar were worn. Fine stained glass windows rose toward heaven. Tall iron candle stands stood on either side of the podium, a podium so old it had heard centuries of sermons.

And MacLean’s coffin had been placed right in the middle, where morning’s light could shine onto his still form.

He looked amazingly . . . dead.

“I covered his face with powder again this morning,” Lady Bess murmured in Enid’s ear.

Enid glanced away. She had resolved not to think about MacLean right now. Even though she knew the truth, she didn’t like to see MacLean in these circumstances. False though this funeral was, it nevertheless reminded her of all the funerals she had missed.

Less than a month ago, Lady Halifax had died, and Enid had sincerely mourned her . . . for a few hours. Until she had sought comfort in MacLean’s arms, and been chased out by a fire, and been sent to Scotland. Enid had scarcely thought about the old lady since that first night, yet . . . she had loved Lady Halifax. At one time, she had imagined she would have the chance to attend Lady Halifax’s funeral, to listen to the hymns and say a prayer. She could almost hear Lady Halifax’s acerbic voice saying, “Enid, the Lord will listen wherever you choose to pray, so don’t make excuses.”

Bending her head, clasping her hands, Enid said a
prayer for Lady Halifax and tried to ignore the tightness that clutched at her throat.

Tears. The memory of Lady Halifax had brought her close to tears.

Swallowing, she glanced at MacLean, dressed in his crisp white shirt and lacy cravat, draped in a length of his family plaid and clad in a kilt. Oh, Kiernan, how can you conceal your vibrancy in this deathlike pose?

Hastily, before a sob could escape, she turned her thoughts elsewhere.

To her husband. Of course, to Stephen. The minister reminisced about Stephen now, of his bravery and sacrifice for his cousin at the moment of the explosion. The minister remembered that Stephen had been a charming lad who had brought happiness and solace to his widowed mother.

Lady Catriona sobbed aloud.

Stephen had been mischievous, full of laughter, always quick to join in games and lead his team to victory. He had joked about his big ears and had always been a favorite of the ladies, young and old.

As the minister spoke, a portrait of Stephen rose in Enid’s mind. When she’d met him, he
had
been charming. So charming. He’d taken an orphan, a girl living a never-ending nightmare, and taught her to laugh.

That was why she had married him. Because with him, she had learned to laugh.

Ah, the laughter hadn’t lasted long, but for a few brief, glorious weeks, she had lived for the moment and loved with all her heart. Now he could never return. After nine years of loneliness, of days when she’d cursed his name, of nights when she’d refused to remember
that there had indeed been good times . . . he was truly gone forever from this earth. “Oh, God,” she whispered.

“. . . Survived by his beloved mother, Lady Catriona MacLean,” the minister droned in his tremulous voice, “and his faithful wife, Enid MacLean.”

How strange to discover that the death of a delinquent husband was almost as devastating as the death of a beloved mentor.

Enid sniffed, trying to control her errant emotions, but a tear escaped her control and trickled down her cheek. Furtively, she slid her handkerchief under her veil and swiped it away.

Beside her, Lady Catriona elbowed her, and when Enid glanced at her, Lady Catriona shot her such a venomous stare that Enid sidled closer to Lady Bess.

Why was Lady Catriona angry? This was the funeral she had wanted for her son. Enid wore black, she cried for Stephen . . . but of course, Stephen shared this service with MacLean.

MacLean . . . the coffin swam in a blur of tears. She wanted MacLean to rise, to prove he was alive!

In a voice so quiet it scarcely reached Enid, Lady Bess said, “Catriona always wanted all of Stephen. She can’t bear that you had him even for a moment.”

The minister lifted his hands toward the heavens. “Let us pray. We beg that our Father take Stephen to His bosom . . .”

Our father.

Enid’s father.

Another funeral not attended. Another grave never visited. Her father. Ah, now there was a man who deserved nothing in the way of respect or affection. Yes,
he had supported and educated her when he could have left her to the workhouse. She would have died there, of course. Most children did. Instead he had thrust her into a school and abandoned her. The other girls had gone home for Christmas, for months in the summer, but Enid had stayed, month after month, year after year. And although, as she grew, she understood why she was condemned to a life lived in empty, echoing corridors and lonely dormitories, she could never forgive her father for being so weak as to leave his daughter bleakly forlorn when his had been the sin.