by Eloisa James
“Never,” he said, shaking his head. “Didn’t you know that, lass?”
“No, in fact, now that I—”
“Never. No more than do man and wife wear clothing in bed together. And then I told her that I hoped she knew how to pleasure a man.”
Annabel frowned at him. “That wasn’t a very nice thing to say!”
“I didn’t want to be nice,” he said painstakingly. “I wanted that silly girl to reject the idea of forgetting her husband and risking her soul in the bargain. And then I said something else, and I do think that the last was what changed her mind.”
“What was it?” Annabel demanded.
He looked at her.
“Oh, all right, it’s a question,” she said.
“I told her that I was particularly fond of a coney’s kiss.”
She blinked at him. “A what?”
He shook his head. “So much to learn . . . and only a lifetime to do it in.” He was laughing at her again, but Annabel was possessed by curiosity.
“Imogen knew what this kiss was? I can’t believe it!” Annabel was the one who had talked to women in the village, since she was the one who did all their bargaining. Imogen had stayed at home, mooning over Draven. How could she know what this kiss was, if Annabel had never heard of it?
“Have we done this kiss already?” she demanded.
He laughed even louder. “No. And now I believe you owe me a kiss.”
These days their kisses started as if they had never left off the last one. Their mouths met, hungry, open, seeking each other’s taste . . . he kept his hands to himself though. And she kept her hands tangled in his hair and didn’t try to direct him. Sometimes she still kept her mouth shut, and made him beg and plead silently for entry until he could slip past her guard, into the sweetness. Sometimes she thought those were the best kisses, and sometimes she thought a wild tangling, in which they were both shaking within a second or two . . . sometimes she thought those were the best kisses. And then there were the ones that Ewan didn’t count: the little morning touch on her cheek or an eye, the sweetness of their lips just touching over the bolster at night.
At the end of this kiss, her chest was heaving like that of a heroine in a melodrama and she felt mad, maddened by desire for him. But he sat down on the coach seat opposite her. “Was that a coney’s kiss?” she asked.
He just grinned. “Nope. Want to play cards?” He was teaching her vingt-et-un, so that Uncle Pearce would be able to fleece her without feeling guilty.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said, after beating her in four straight games.
“Really?” she asked sweetly. “You must be wishing for a nap, then.”
“I’ve still got that special license,” he said, watching her. “I’m thinking that perhaps we might ask Father Armailhac to marry us on the very day we arrive. Would you be agreeable, darling?”
There was something about the way darling rolled from his tongue in a Scottish burr that made Annabel think that she could never say no to him, not if he called her that. A fact that must be concealed, obviously. So she pretended to think about it.
“Rafe would be happy to hear that you had followed through on your obligations,” she said.
“Yes, and just imagine. The more time that passes, there’s the more likelihood that I’ll lose interest and run for the hills.”
She had to smile at the look in his eyes. “’Tis a serious consideration,” she agreed.
“Of course, Uncle Pearce would likely step in and marry you, just to save the family name, and given as you’re such a ruthless cardplayer.”
“I’ve always thought maturity was an excellent thing in a spouse.”
“Damn it, Annabel,” he groaned, running his hand through his hair so that it stood straight up. “Will you marry me tomorrow? Please? I’m—I’m dying here.”
“That’s a question,” she whispered, looking at him from under her lashes.
“I’ll ask you a hundred,” he said achingly. “If you’ll marry me tomorrow.”
“Then I shall,” she said. “And that’s an honest answer.”
The smile growing on his face flew straight to her heart. “I’m saving that kiss for tonight,” he said huskily. “And Annabel—I’m giving you warning right here that I’m breaking that foolish rule about our bedchamber.”
She swallowed.
“I’ll be taking a ride now,” Ewan said. “Otherwise I won’t be able to keep my kiss until this evening.”
They were well into Scotland now, and Annabel was startled to feel how much her heart lightened at the sight of long stretches of dark forest. She liked England’s tidy green fields and neat little thickets. But there was something glorious about looking out of the carriage window at a rolling hill thick with towering firs. Great birds—kites? hawks?—flew in wide circles over the deep green treetops, as if they looked for fish in a deep sea. Ewan rode by her window, his hair blowing back in the wind, looking red-haired and brawny and Scots to the bone.
Annabel’s heart sang. “You’re turning into a fool,” she muttered to herself. “He’s making you into a fool.”
But there seemed nothing wrong with foolery, not on a crisp afternoon in May when her near-husband had smiled at her in such a way. He stayed on horseback the whole of that afternoon, and by the time they trundled into the village of Inverurie, she was exhausted and tired of jolting along on pitted roads. England’s roads were better; there was no two ways about it.
So she snapped at Ewan when he handed her from the carriage, and when he kissed her forehead, she insisted that was his last kiss. And then she stamped off to their chamber.
This inn was empty. Clearly they could have separate rooms. Plus, they were deep into Scotland now and there were no Englishmen around to send home tales of how the Earl and Countess of Ardmore behaved at an inn. She wallowed in a zinc bathtub and thought about that for a while.
It would serve him right if she demanded her own chamber. He meant to kiss her in bed. Perhaps even remove the bolster. Perhaps even—
But the thought made her squirm, and that made her self-conscious, so she sat up and vigorously rubbed her arms with almond soap. Annabel had never been very good at ladylike restraint. Nor had she much ability to lie to herself. She wanted those kisses of his. She wanted to know what the coney’s kiss was. She wanted everything he could give her.
So why cut off her nose to spite her face?
“I’d like to wear a dinner gown tonight, rather than my traveling dress,” she said to Elsie, her maid.
Elsie looked a little panicked. “It’ll show the creases,” she objected. “And I haven’t time to press it before you’re expected downstairs.”
“I didn’t think of that,” Annabel said.
“We’ll be at the castle tomorrow,” Elsie said. “And then—”
“The castle?”
Elsie nodded. “Yes, we should be there tomorrow, and then I’ll have everything washed and ironed in a moment. The dust that’s got into the trunk from this trip, well, you simply wouldn’t believe it, my lady. The top layer of clothing is quite brown with dust, and never mind all that paper I . . .”
Annabel wasn’t listening. Her husband lived in a castle. Her husband rode in a coach with four outriders. Her husband . . . her husband didn’t sound like an improvident, penniless Scot like her feckless father. Her husband was something altogether different.
She almost felt ashamed at the rush of pure joy she felt. Shouldn’t it matter less to her that Ewan was rich?
She shook the thought away. Just because she might marry a man who believed in God didn’t mean that she had to start worrying about her soul right and left. She’d never thought of such a thing while in England, and she wasn’t going to turn into a Puritan just because she married one.
But she walked down the stairs with a singing heart, wearing her durable traveling dress of brown that didn’t show the dust or an inch of her bosom either.
He was waiting for her in
their dining room. “The innkeeper has opened a bottle of an excellent claret,” he told her, giving her a glass.
“Thank you,” she murmured, looking at him as she sipped. Of course he was a rich man. It spoke in every movement he made, in the gleam of his boots, in the casual way in which he trusted Mac to handle everything, in the very beauty of his horses. In his castle.
“So tell me about your home,” she said, sitting down by the fire. Spring was just coming to Scotland, this far up, even though it was now nearing June.
“It’s an old pile of stones,” he said easily, sitting down opposite her. “It’s been in my family for ages. Luckily for all of us, my great-grandfather was a bad-tempered old fellow who stayed put when Prince Charles summoned the clans. Apparently he said that he didn’t give a damn who was on the throne, and a Hanoverian would be as witless as a Stuart. If you wished to make some changes, I’d be glad. No one’s touched the furniture since my mother died, and that’s over twenty years ago now. My grandmother’s not a very domestic type of woman.”
She was skilled at asking questions with her eyes by now.
“She likes to be out and about. Nana’s not the type to sit around the house and think about furnishings. She spends most of her day visiting the cottages.” And then, when she raised an eyebrow: “Quite a few people live and work on my land. They’re the cottagers and crofters, or so we call them. And Nana runs about interfering with their lives and generally making herself a nuisance, but I believe they like her, for all that. She’s very good at birthing babies.”
Annabel imagined a sweet-faced Scottish grandmother, bringing everyone jars of homemade jelly and strengthening broth. “She sounds like a lovely person,” she said. “You were very lucky to have her when your parents died.”
“I was lucky,” Ewan agreed. “Although I’m not quite certain most people would describe her as lovely. She’s—well. She’s just Nana.”
The claret was sliding down her throat and burning a path as it went, urging her to be reckless and brave . . .
“I have a question,” she said, putting down her empty glass. “What are you most afraid of in the world?”
“A facer,” he murmured, filling her glass again. “A true question. And if I say nothing, as you said you had no faults?”
She shrugged.
“Honesty, then. I’m most afraid of losing my soul,” he said. “’Tis easily said, and I hope, easily prevented. And the fear of it certainly doesn’t keep me up at night.”
“What could cause you to lose your soul?” she asked, frowning. She was starting to think that perhaps a more thorough education in the religious doctrine might be helpful in making her way through this marriage.
“Only a terrible fault,” he said, smiling at her. “I shouldn’t lose it for lust, for example.” His eyes lingered on her, and Annabel knew suddenly that it didn’t matter whether she wore her old traveling gown or a burlap sack. Ewan wanted her. He lusted for her.
“Then?” she prompted.
“Oh, something terrible,” he said lightly. “I’m telling you, lass, I don’t worry about it. Perhaps adultery. So the marvelous thing is that by marrying you, I’m saving my immortal soul.” He rose and brought her to her feet. “For I could never sleep with another woman after you, Annabel,” he said. His mouth was so close to hers that their breath mingled.
“Who’s to say that?” Annabel said. “I’ve always thought that adultery was something that gentlemen practiced with some ease. And other types of men as well,” she added.
“Not all gentlemen.” He paused. “Did you think to practice adultery? And that’s a question, Annabel.”
“I thought to marry for practical reasons,” she told him, and only then did she realize that she was going to tell him the truth. “For comfort and ease. I thought to marry a man who desired me, and trade his desire for my security. And then . . . after I had fulfilled the obligations of marriage, I thought that he would likely turn to others and I might, someday, find pleasure for itself.”
“You actually planned to be adulterous,” he said, apparently fascinated.
“It wasn’t like that,” she said crossly. “’Twas only a practical look at the way people truly behave. I spent a great deal of time in the village, you know. I talked to people. Imogen could afford to be romantic, but I never could.”
“Poor love,” he said, and gathered her into his arms. Her arms slipped around his waist now as if they had always belonged there. She leaned her head against his chest and listened to the strong thump of his heart. “Obviously you haven’t been spending your time worrying about things as ephemeral as souls . . . what’s your greatest fear, then?”
“The kisses are piling up,” she murmured.
“Mmmm. . . . tonight,” he said, and she shivered against him with the promise of it. “What does one fear if you don’t believe in the hereafter?” He sounded genuinely curious.
“It’s not that I don’t believe in heaven,” she told him (although she didn’t, not very much). “But I don’t worry about it.”
“What do you worry about?”
“Being poor again,” she admitted. “I would hate that.”
His arms tightened. “Hunger is a terrible thing.”
“We weren’t ever really hungry,” Annabel said. “There was always enough to eat; it was just the same food day after day. No, I’m afraid of the exhaustion of it. The strain of not being able to pay a bill when it comes due. The humiliation of trying to convince someone to wait for his justly earned payment. Of not having a single chemise without a hole in it.”
“I’m a rich man, Annabel.”
She felt ashamed, to the very tips of her toes. But he was asking for honesty—still, she wished she hadn’t told. She felt shabby, and small.
“More to the point, I estimate that we owe each other five kisses,” he said, smiling down at her. There wasn’t an ounce of condemnation in his eyes.
“Don’t you mind?” she asked him.
“Mind what?”
“Mind that I—I wanted to marry a rich man, and now here we are—”
He smiled at her, with just his eyes again. “’Tis an example of God’s gift, isn’t it? Money has never meant much to me; I grew up with lots of it, and without family, and I hadn’t the heart to attach myself to the coins. But for you this money was important, and perhaps that’s the reason I have it.”
She buried her head against his middle and thought about how simple his view of life was, and then with a kindled fire, how easy it would be to love a person like him. Like Ewan. “But if you’re only afraid for your soul,” she asked suddenly, “does that mean you’re not afraid for your person?”
“What do you mean?
“Well, when the robbers were in the hotel room, you looked furious, but you undressed without putting up a fight.”
“I was furious. And I was frightened for you and your sister in particular. But there wasn’t any real reason to start a fight. The likelihood was that they might shoot off one of those guns, and then someone would be hurt. Whereas if I just gave them what they wanted, they would leave without violence.”
“Even though they tried to humiliate you by making you take off your clothing?”
He grinned. “I got to see your eyes widen when you realized what you were looking at. That moment paid back any humiliation. Besides, Annabel, what if I had fought?”
“You were much bigger than either of them.”
“I could have taken one of their guns away,” he said. “And then what would I have done with it?”
“Threatened them?”
“Do I look like someone who would hold a gun to your head and threaten to kill you?”
“Why not?” she asked uncertainly. “Anyone can do that.”
“You have to mean it. I would never point a gun at a person because I would never mean to kill them.” He paused. “And there’s an answer to what would kill my immortal soul: killing a man, and all because I wouldn’t share my mon
ey with him. How many kisses is that?”
She had to laugh. Until he took her breath away with a kiss.
Chapter Eighteen
They had a routine now, like any married couple. Annabel undressed with the help of her maid, and then tucked herself into bed. Sometime later, Ewan came in, all sluiced down from washing at the pump, and took off most of his clothes, and slid into bed. Then he usually got out of bed and found some sort of pillow and put it between them, because he was adamant that it would be a disaster if he woke with her in his arms.
“A man,” Ewan had told her one night, “would be happy to make love morning, noon, or night. But in the morning he’s primed for the exercise, if you take my meaning.”
She had. All those hours spent listening to the women in the village complain about their husbands were truly paying off.
Tonight didn’t feel like the other nights, though. Somehow all the stiffness Annabel usually felt after sitting in a coach all day long had melted away, replaced by a racing excitement and trepidation. For one thing, she couldn’t figure out what Ewan meant to do. Somehow she doubted that he meant to consummate their marriage, because they didn’t have a marriage yet. But—but—
He walked in and Annabel tried to look at him objectively, the way she had back at Lady Feddrington’s ball when she didn’t know him from Adam. He was tall, and powerfully built . . . but checking off those characteristics didn’t work anymore. Because glancing at his chest made her think about their picnic. And—
“Ewan!” she said. “What are you doing?”
“I’m not wearing this shirt to bed,” he said calmly. “I’ll keep on my smalls, to protect us both. But you’ve seen my chest before, lass, and after tomorrow, you’ll see it many a time.”
Annabel swallowed. Ewan pulled his shirt over his head, and his shoulders and arms bunched with muscle, and rather than making her embarrassed, it gave her a peculiar melting feeling in her stomach. His chest tapered to narrow hips, to which his white smalls clung as if they were about to fall down . . . Annabel closed her eyes. Her body felt suddenly all curves and softness, a natural complement to his.
