Stormfire (13 page)

She hesitated, then placed her hand on it and murmured, "Thank you, Lord Culhane."

Across the room, Sean felt the warmth of the radiant look Catherine gave his brother like a twist in his gut. When Liam turned to escort her from the hall, Sean uncoiled to his feet. His voice rang out, "It would be rude, brother, to steal the wench away before she has been introduced. Surely you don't mean to keep so fine a piece to yourself."

Flushing with anger, Liam stopped in his tracks. Feeling Catherine's fingers tighten convulsively on his arm as he altered course, he slowly walked her to the head of the table. "We'll have to brazen it out now," he whispered. "If we don't stay, you will appear to be going to my bed."

"But if they believe I'm your mistress, they might leave me alone!"

"You may yet go home again, my lady. Now, these people can only guess about my brother's relationship with you, but were I to compromise you publicly, your reputation would never be secure." He covered her hand on his arm with his own. "Don't worry. I'll get you out of the room as soon as possible."

Heads craned as the pair made their way through the room. Most of the spectators were merely curious about the irons, but true to Flannery's prophecy, some of the men who had seen the captive's courage on the cliff were angry, and a wave of murmurs rose in her wake.

Sean watched the couple with a grim smile as he thought angrily, Damn it, how does the wench contrive to give irons the effect of a virgin's nightgown? Half the men v would flatten out and let her trip her dainty feet across their backsides!

As Liam started to seat her at the table, Sean stood and raised his wineglass in a mocking toast. "Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Lady Catherine Denise Enderly, comtesse de Vigny. You may have heard of her father, General John Richmond Enderly. As adjutant to the governor general some years ago, he did much to relieve Ireland of her excess population. To your continued good health, my lady!" He drained the glass, flung it to the floor, and ground it under his heel. Aware of her barely controlled panic, he gazed mockingly at the crowd. "You should see yourselves gawk. Have none of you seen an English blue- blood before? Well then, you'll have a eloser look!" His arm swept down the table and Catherine jerked back, thinking he was about to tear at her clothes, but his hand locked around a pitcher of wine and thrust it at her. "Take up your duties, Countess. They want a look at you."

"Lady Enderly has no duties," Liam said firmly. "I've promised her my protection."

"You wasted your breath, brother."

Liam whitened. His hand twitched, then moved for his dagger. Unarmed, Sean tensed, ready to dash the pitcher in Liam's face and relieve him of his weapon. Feeling Liam's convulsive movement, Catherine tightened her grip. "No, please! You must not, my lord." Her voice lifted with defiance. "As your brother says, too much blood has been spilled in Ireland, though he slanders my father as the cause. He shall have no excuse to malign Enderly honor further."

Tucking the ball under an arm, she pulled the pitcher from Sean's grasp with surprising force and surveyed with saccharine mockery the seated men who had not risen in her presence. "Please, don't disturb yourselves, gentlemen." Some of the younger ones had the grace to flush as she sauntered off. Liam dropped into his chair with a furious look at his brother, who returned it unwinkingly.

As Catherine filled the tankards of the silent, fidgeting men at the nearest table, Irene and Milly quickly took her lead and began to joke with their patrons. By the time Catherine had refilled the pitcher a few times from large casks of wine and ale set about the room, the racket had resumed its normal level, much of it caused by lively discussion of the open antagonism between the Culhanes.

At length, although the men were becoming drunk and boisterous and their women acquiescent, she dared not reenter the tinderbox atmosphere of the Culhane table. The men subdued their coarse language in her presence, but their women, who seemed resentful, became more offensive. At first the men were slightly embarrassed, but as drink and nearness of flesh inflamed them, their hands stealthily groped at her flanks as she pressed through the tangle.

Finally, when a hand drove between her thighs, she exploded. Swinging the pitcher in a wide swath, she bashed every head in reach and soaked several innocent bystanders. Abruptly, a hand locked through her iron collar, then jerked her against the bare, hairy chest of Rouge Flannery. His breath reeked of liquor. "So, it's the bad-tempered little wench!" She dropped the ball and pushed away from him, but he lifted until the ring, cutting into the back of her neck, nearly dragged her off her feet. "Oh, no, ye don't. We an't met proper yet!" He smiled mirthlessly, his gray eyes like stone chips, then jerked her head back with his free hand and smashed his mouth down on hers. She arched wildly, stifled and choked. His lips were loose and wet, his thick tongue forcing its way into her mouth. Finally he withdrew, painfully arching her head back as he did so. "That's it . . . keep fightin'. Keep wrigglin' . . ." He thrust his crotch against her and manipulated her hips with his hand. When she stiffened with revulsion, his voice turned venomous. "Think ye're too good to be fucked, eh? Culhane said we could have a look at ye, didn't he?"

He hooked his hand in her neckline. "I'm havin' mine now." He jerked down and she screamed.

An ominously quiet voice-sounded behind him. "I said
you could look, Rouge. Not
touch.
. .
not
ever touch." Long
brown fingers appeared
on
Rouge's
shoulder, jerked him
bodily away
from the girl, then held him for that fraction of a second the sodden giant had left before a hard- clenched fist stretched his length across a table, smashing crockery and glassware, sending women shrieking. "Remember," Sean Culhane warned coldly, towering with bloody knuckles over the dazed brute, "because if you ever forget, I'll hang you!" He caught up the ball by its chain, grasped Catherine's wrist, and dragged her out of the room after him, leaving her to manage the torn blouse with one hand. She had scant time to rejoice over her rescue for he headed straight to the stair.

Guessing his intention, Catherine tried to tear free. "No! Let me go!" He turned so suddenly in midstride that she ran into him. With a muffled curse, he bent and, upending her over his shoulder, carried her like a sack of feed. He kicked open the door to his room and unceremoniously dumped her on his bed.

Instantly, she rolled off. She landed on the carpet at his feet with a bare leg suspended upward by the chain her tormentor held, giving him a fetching view of her naked lower body. Despite her furious grab at her slipping blouse, he glimpsed soft, rose-tipped breasts. With increasing panic, Catherine saw his eyes go hot and clouded, and, cheeks flaming, she tried to cover herself, but her efforts brought the skirts nearly up to her waist. Swaying slightly, he began to reel her in, and she realized with horror he was drunk.

Culhane jerked open his clothing, then crouched and thrust a knee between her thighs. He dragged her wrists over her head, his voice roughened with desire. "You rode my nag until he nearly dropped. Now I'm going to ride you
. . ."
Gasping at his swift, spearing invasion as his body covered hers, Catherine involuntarily arched against him, a movement that only drew his sex deeper into hers and a choked sound from his lips. He began to thud his lean, powerful body into hers with harsh urgency, as if with his release he could exorcise her, but the yielding caress of her warm, tight gloving lured him deeper. She was wild under him, fighting him, but her breasts were soft under his chest and her hair was a silken fan. His desire built into an unbearable tension at the base of his groin, then burst with a flooding warmth.

Slowly his breathing evened and he eased ento his elbows, looking at her with a hint of puzzlement in his eyes.

Catherine, who had experienced nothing but fear and revulsion, found her own satisfaction in an outpouring of contempt. "You're nothing but a disgusting, drunken animal! Less!"

His eyes narrowed coldly. "Despise me all you like, but if you know what's good for you, keep your legs open and your mouth shut!"

Her eyes dilated into a slanting, wicked stare, she slashed at his face. She whitened when his fingers caught and dug cruelly into her wrists, but continued her attempt to throw him off.

"You stubborn little bitch! I'll break you if it's the last thing fever do!" Jamming an arm across her throat, he yanked down the blouse, then tore at the band of her shirt. Grabbing a fistful of both garments, he dragged them off her thrashing body. Only added pressure on her windpipe quieted her. She lay pinned, breasts heaving in a struggle to breath. Suddenly his weight left her, but as she whipped to a defensive crouch, he slipped the chain through an iron qlip bolted to the bed and snapped its padlock shut.

Glaring at the clip, Catherine hissed, "Flannery had a busy day! You even deny me the privacy of my own kennel!"

Culhane began to strip off his shirt. "I've neglected your education," he said coldly. "You're my
cumal,
female chattel no better than a slave." He dragged off his boots. "As for privacy, you lost that when you tried to escape."

"I'll never be your slave . . .
your
anything!" she spat.

Ignoring her, he poured himself a brandy from a desk decanter, then smiled sardonically as he lifted the glass to his lips.

To her discomfiture, he slowly discarded his breeches. Eyes shying from his crotch, she focused on his chest, where she noticed a scar along his left side. Observing the direction of her attention, he said, "Knife. The other was from a bayonet." Her gaze roved his chest until he grinned faintly. "Lower."

And there, next to where she did not want to look, was the faded scar. She grimaced. "A pity your assailant wasn't more to the point."

Culhane's grin grew wicked. "Had he been, you'd shortly be a frustrated young lady." He assessed her body. Defiantly, she eyed him back, but gradually she flushed under his maddeningly minute inspection.

Sean's gaze lingered on small, upthrust breasts, tiny waist and flat belly, along slim, long legs, then returned at last to the curly pelt between his captive's thighs. The girl was fetching enough to tempt a saint, he considered critically, but what was there about her that attracted him? Women were merely an accustomed diversion, but this one was a paradox: innocent, yet seductive; appealing, yet defiant.

Catherine's eyes widened nervously as he knelt over her, his hands on either side of her head. "You've spent your rotten lust. What more do you want?"

"Everything," he murmured. Then, his hands never touching her, his cropped black head lowered. His lips found the delicate curve of a collarbone and lightly moved along her neck to the hollow of her throat. His lips were warm, brushing her flesh as lightly as a butterfly's wings, and Catherine's hands strained against his shoulders, fighting the strange sensation that flushed her skin. She had already learned to her rue that he would and could do as he liked, but her helplessness was galling. His kisses explored the shadowed hollows under her pinioned arms and lingered along the swelling undercurves of her breasts, making her twist in unbearable anticipation. She gasped as his tongue flicked her nipples. Teasing them into hard little points, he lashed them into aching fullness, then took them into his mouth, suckled and nipped them softly. Heat pulsed into her groin. "Stop it," she whimpered. "Damn you, stop
it. . .
oh, stop."