by Eva Devon
A renewed smile upon his lips, he swaggered into the local ale house where he knew Angus would be waiting with his customary mug of dark brew.
“You look most pleased,” she said. “It’s glad I am to find you in such fine humor.”
His smile died. His entire body tensed. Not with anger. Not with annoyance. Not with dismay. . . But with absolute anticipation.
Anticipation of joy.
And that was a damned terrifying thing.
Derek was not accustomed to being terrified. It didn’t sit well. He couldn’t breathe.
“Angus,” he said lowly, without actually looking at said infuriating female person. “You know that young lady?”
Angus was fairly near to hiding behind the bar, his cheeks red and his eyes cast down as if attempting to study his own wiry beard.
“Angus,” Derek prompted again, only this time with a bit of a growl to his voice.
“Aye, Your Grace.”
“Then what the blue blazes are you about letting her be here?”
“Let?” piped Lady Rosamund. “Let?”
A quick look about told him that they were almost entirely alone. In fact, all the usual patrons were crammed into a snug, drinking quickly, silently, staring at him and Lady Rosamund who sat demurely at a table by the fire. Each and every one of them was gaping with delight.
“Yes,” Derek drawled. “Let.”
Angus sidled out of his corner. “She was insistent, Your Grace.”
To his dismay, she was cradling a glass in her hand. A glass. Not a tea cup and he doubted it was lemonade.
“What is she drinking?” Derek demanded.
Then he nearly punched himself. He was not doing this. He wasn’t going to be concerned about her. He wasn’t going to get involved. He was not some old nanny goat determined to keep her on the prim and proper. She could fling herself into the pit of sin if she so desired. . . As long as she didn’t expect him to participate in said flinging.
Holding up a hand, he said, “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
“Whisky,” she declared raising the glass in a mock salute.
Derek snapped his gaze from Rosamund to Angus and he felt a hint of steam under his collar. “You gave her whisky?” he exclaimed, despite his intentions.
“She’s very persuasive, Your Grace,” Angus whispered.
Derek ground his teeth for a moment before he gritted, “I don’t doubt that. But what the devil is Blackburn going to say when he finds out?”
“Oh, he won’t,” she said with shocking confidence. “Duncan has no idea what I do, in any case. Too buried in his own work, you see.”
Somehow she managed to say this without sounding self-pitying.
But it caused him to see her in a new light.
Lady Rosamund was lonely.
Lonely was dangerous.
Loneliness drove one to strange shores from which there was no return. . . All in the hope of just feeling a moment’s peace or joy, or kindness.
He drew in a slow breath, nodded at Angus to serve his usual. Then he approached Lady Rosamund as if she were an animal that might either roll on her back purring or turn vicious, all claws. One never knew, given that she’d taken this extreme step of tracking him down. And he had no doubts that this was what this was about.
There was no other reason for her to be here, perched so excitedly, watching his every move.
He lowered himself into the chair opposite her, sitting in an ungentlemanly way. He allowed his legs to part slightly, his arm to rest on the chair back, and his boot to extend seductively close to her own booted foot.
He needed a new tack. Shoving her away was not working.
“So,” he drawled. “You’re a drunkard.”
“Excuse me?” she exclaimed, her shoulders squaring.
“What else is a fellow to assume?” he asked casually, eyeing her slowly. “A woman in a tavern. Or else are you putting up business?”
“What?” she fairly shouted.
“Ah.” He waggled his brows at her. “You know to what I’m referring. I’m a trifle surprised.”
There it was again. She wiggled slightly on her chair, an air of indignation stiffening her spine. “I am not without some worldly knowledge, mon.”
He leaned forward, bracing his arms on his knees. “Then you know that to be here is a scandal. It’s more than a scandal. It’s a bloody outrage.”
Her indignation vanished, replaced with a sigh of delight.
“Is it?” she asked. A pleased look pinkened her pale features. “I’ve never been an outrage before. Every woman should be at least once in her life I think.”
He groaned. Oh God. Why was this happening to him? It had been years since he’d dealt with a virgin trying to toss herself into sin. Except. . . Except. . . This time, despite everything, the problem was he desperately wanted to assist her in her quest.
But wants and needs were different things and he needed her the hell out of this pub and away from him forever.
“I realize this is all terribly thrilling for you,” he said with as much condescension as he could manage, “innocent that you are.”
She opened her mouth as if to protest but then she nodded firmly. “It’s true. It is thrilling. I am innocent. You’re correct.”
“Good,” he said tightly, unable to come up with a suitable quip, he was so stunned by her reply. “I’m glad you agree. Now, get out.”
She grinned. “No. I find I like a bit of a thrill.”
Angus approached wordlessly and shoved a glass at Derek without his customary chat.
Derek took it and then drained it to the dregs. And whilst he gulped, he contemplated.
Warnings weren’t working. Reason wasn’t working. Disdain wasn’t working.
Rosamund, to absolutely no surprise given their previous meeting, was not behaving as most ladies did.
This was going to be a challenge. He was going to have to shock her from the tips of her, no doubt, perfect toes to her fiery hair. Because at this point, the only way to make her stay away from him had nothing to do with polite discourse.
“Lady Rosamund, are you a fool?” he asked quietly.
Instead of hurt, she batted her lashes and replied as simply as he’d asked, “I don’t think so.”
One last chance. He had to give reason one last chance. After all, he liked her. He didn’t savor the idea of rattling her.
“Then if you are a woman of intelligence, you will put your drink down. You will rise from your chair. You will leave this place and never come back. You will never seek me out again.”
She sat up a little straighter. “I am intelligent but I also have a cause and I shan’t be disloyal to my own cause.”
“And that is?”
She leaned forward and whispered, “Ruination.”
He stared, wishing he had another drink. Had she heard nothing?
Rosamund let out a plaintive sigh and shrugged her shoulders. “If you won’t give me what I seek, I shall be forced to approach the miller’s son, George. He’s a nice boy but I doubt very skilled. But even if you do refuse to participate in my ruin, we could be friends. And as friends, you can, at least, have a nice chat with me and educate me a little so I am no longer ignorant. Surely, you do not approve of ignorance?”
George.
The miller’s son.
The miller’s son was a dead man.
Derek felt himself grow very still, a characteristic he usually avoided by using large gestures and loud intimations. “Let me understand you. You’re going to. . . You’re going to. . .”
“Give my innocence to the miller’s son.”
Derek swung his gaze to Angus then the snug of onlookers. Christ. Was she mad? Or was she in jest? With Lady Rosamund, it was impossible to tell and it hit him then that, in many ways, she was as enigmatic as he.
His own intelligence seemed to desert him in that single moment and instinct took over. Someone had to save her from herself and apparently it was goin
g to be him.
Derek grabbed her hand, yanked her from her seat and started for the stairs.
“What are you doing?” she gasped.
He said nothing when she began tugging on his hand. Apparently, she didn’t like be ordered about. He stopped and faced her.
“You don’t wish to go with me?” he confronted. “Fine. Get out of the pub. But if you stay, you’re going up those stairs.”
She smiled and headed for the indicated stairs of her own accord, tightening her grip on his hand. “If you’d like, you may throw me over your shoulder.”
A strangled sound filled his ears. Had he made that noise? By God, he had.
He should be running away from her, not dragging her up to a private room. But he needed to make her understand that she had to stop this course she seemed set on. He didn’t yet know what he was going to do but he was going to bloody well do something. He was going to terrify her if he had to. Clearly, the only way to get through to her was to show her what she thought she wanted was not actually what she wanted.
That is the last thing he told himself before he headed down the upstairs hallway and pushed her into the first room. Without warning, he slammed the door shut, shoved her up against the door, and seized her mouth with his.
Chapter 6
This! Oh, this! This is what she had been waiting for. The Duke of Aston’s hard body pressed against hers. Between the door and his massive frame, there was nowhere to go. Luckily, she had no desire to be anywhere else.
In fact, the pure delight of his mouth on hers and his hands on either side of her head, placed firmly on the wood paneling was so glorious she felt she might expire on the spot.
No one had ever kissed her like this.
No one had ever evoked such sudden and sheer bliss.
His mouth took. It ravaged. It claimed. And oh how she loved it. She loved it so much, she did all she could to meet his passion and claim right back.
If she could have she would have grabbed hold of him in that moment and never, ever let him go because he felt. . . Well, he felt absolutely perfect.
As it was, she tilted her head, giving him better access to her mouth and she met his searching tongue boldly with her own.
A soft growl rippled from his throat and he nibbled her lower lip.
“What the devil have you done to me?” he asked as his ragged breath puffed softly against her temple.
“I?” She had done nothing. She’d just been herself and asked for what she wanted. Was that so shocking? Yes. She supposed it was.
“Yes, you, woman.” He pressed his forehead to the crown of her head. “You’re going to be my undoing, aren’t you?”
A smile pulled at her lips. “Yes.”
And she knew it was true. For all that she’d pursued him for a fling, she knew that he was meant to be in her life. Somehow. After all, one did not meet men in lochs for absolutely no reason.
Perhaps it wasn’t for love everlasting. But they were meant to change each other. Of that, she was certain.
He shifted his massive and muscled weight against her body. “This doesn’t frighten you, does it?”
A veritable purr of appreciation slipped past her lips as she savored the feel of his hard body against her own. “Should it?”
A pained laugh escaped him. “I was hoping it might.”
“Why?” she asked, genuinely curious.
“So you’d run back to your brother.”
“I’m not the running sort,” she stated. She would have thought that was rather obvious about her, but men could be very silly creatures.
“So I see.”
“Good. Then you can stop trying to set me off my course.”
“I can. . . But I’m not sure I should.”
She lifted a hand and stroked a slightly coarse lock of slightly too long hair back from his sculpted cheek. “Should is such a silly word.”
He tensed at her simple intimacy. “It isn’t. Should is what keeps us from doing unspeakable things.”
She licked her lips, her breath coming in short takes at the very thought of him making love to her. She had no frame of reference for what it would be like but she felt certain it would be celestial. “Making love to me would be unspeakable?”
“Ruining you would be unspeakable.”
“Why unspeakable?”
“My God, woman,” he groaned. “Do you not know the world? You’re not married. You’ve no protection but your brother or me if I choose to give it.”
“Nonsense,” she countered with a measure of pride in her voice. In this, he was mistaken.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I’ve got a very large portion of funds of my own. I need not rely on anyone but myself.”
He was silent for a moment. “Explain further, if you please?”
“My grandmother,” she said, very proud of the older lady who had such wonderful foresight. “She left me money that no one can touch but me and it has been released to me already. It was not contingent upon marriage. I can do whatever I please and there will be no horrendous consequences.”
“Oh, Ros,” he said, his voice rough. “Such a comment only sharpens the innocence of your life.”
“How so?” she asked, still completely aware of his body pressed to hers covered only by a few layers of fabric.
“Society will cast you out,” he informed her.
She drew in a breath and leaned into him, wishing to drive him as mad as he drove her. “Bugger society.”
A groan tore from his throat and he cupped her cheek with his broad hand, stroking her lower lip with his thumb. “You say that now, for a moment in the sun. Wouldn’t you rather marry? Then you can do what you please.”
To her own amazement, she bit the pad of his thumb then queried, “Are you offering?”
There was another long silence as if he were gathering himself. “No.”
“I want you,” she said simply, finding words she’d never used before. “I want you to be the one that shows me freedom.”
“What you think is freedom could very well end up as a prison.”
“I don’t think so.”
“So, this is how you want it?” he asked suddenly. “Hard and fast in some public house?”
“No. Not exactly.” It was hard to describe what she’d wanted or thought but she didn’t want to lose her chance with him. That she knew for sure.
“Then what did you think would happen here when you sought me out? Many men—”
“You’re not many men,” she pointed out. It wasn’t a compliment. It was a fact.
“You’re right,” he agreed firmly. “I’m worse.”
She shook her head. “Not true.”
He leaned back and gazed down at her. “Why say so?”
“My instincts.”
His eyes closed and a pained expression darkened his features before he said, “Your instincts are very bad, Lady Ros.”
“My instincts are excellent.”
He let out a suffering sigh then opened his eyes. “Then what is it that you want if not a quick go here?”
She swallowed. Here was her chance. Her chance to convince him. “I want to run away with you for a week. Just one. One week of unbridled freedom. Where you show me the wildness of passion and we speak freely and simply enjoy each other. Spend Christmas with me.”
Seemingly unmoved, he said, “Spend it with your brother.”
“We never spend it together. Oh, we’re in the same abode, but we’re like two ghosts wandering around a cold, abandoned palace.” She forced a smile, not wanting him to see the suffering that the years in such an unfeeling affair had caused her. “It’s a terrible affair. For once, I’d like to spend Christmas in the arms of someone rather than staring warily over the massive dinner table at my brother.”
“I spend Christmas with my son.”
“Oh.” She gulped. Here it was. Blatant admission of a secret child. She was stunned, to say the least, and suddenly she felt as if she’d inva
ded some sort of sacred territory. After all, most people spent Christmas with their families. Her Christmases had always been torture. She’d imagined a warm family Christmas but it seemed a distant dream and at last, upon meeting him she’d just thought how marvelous it might be to spend Christmas with someone who didn’t see the same miserable ghosts that she did in the same, bleak castle. “Oh. . . I. . .”
“Alright then,” he cut in suddenly, his sensual eyes roving her face as if attempting to read her thoughts. “Come spend it with us.”
“But your son?”
He gave her a rueful look. “We are a pair of misfits. You’ll fit in splendidly. Besides, he’s no stranger to a doxy.”
Doxy? Well, that was exactly the position she sought. “I beg your pardon?”
A proud yet mischievous grin curved his lips. “My son, dear lady, may be a shock to you. He frequently shocks me. And I am not easily shocked. He’s no boy. In many ways, he’s already a man.”
“I see.”
“I doubt it.” He leaned back ever so slightly and traced his fingers over her jaw. “I don’t promise you abject ruin. . . But I will promise you the education you so ardently seek.”
“Marvelous,” she said. Then before she could think, she added, “Thank you!”
“Don’t thank me yet,” he warned softly. “In fact, I’ll have you cursing me by the end. I always do.”
“I do like a few well-placed curses.”
“Oh Lady Ros, you’ve no idea. No idea at all.”
Chapter 7
Rosamund stepped down from the coach into the beautifully appointed stone courtyard which protected the surprisingly small manor house from the buffeting western wind. She hadn’t realized that the journey would be so far. Days. Days to her sublime ruin. Days to fantasize. The Duke of Aston had promised that he would follow soon and that traveling together was simply an impossibility. This she had agreed with. Because while she sought a life beyond the hallowed halls of the ton, she didn’t wish to be a total idiot and announce it loudly to the world.
