Mr. Gordon clasped his hands behind his back. “Perhaps Mr. Newton might read to you, Charlotte. If you are agreeable, I should like a private word with Lizzie.”
Newton cleared his throat.
“Stand down, sir,” Mr. Gordon said irritably. “I donna intend to whisk her away. I want only a word.”
“It’s all right, Newton,” Lizzie said softly.
Newton didn’t look as if he thought it was all right, but at Charlotte’s nod, he took her chair in hand and quit the small dining room, with Fingal and Red accompanying them.
In the drawing room, Newton rolled Charlotte to the hearth. “There’s trouble brewing,” he muttered.
“Trouble has been brewing for quite some time,” Charlotte said. “Go on, then, Mr. Newton. The last we heard, Cecilia was in London,” she said eagerly.
Newton sighed wearily but took his seat and opened the book to the marked page. “She had met with an object whose character answered all her wishes for him with whom she should entrust her fortune, and whose turn of mind, so similar to her own, promised her the highest domestic felicity; to this object her affections had involuntarily bent….”
Charlotte perched her chin on her fist, watching Newton’s fine lips as he read aloud.
Chapter Twenty-eight
They repaired to the library, where Gavin insisted that the hearth be lit. He went in search of Mr. Kincade and the two of them returned with a block of peat. As he lit the fire, Lizzie perused the shelves. She withdrew one book and was scanning the pages when Gavin walked up behind her and put his hand on her waist and pressed his face to her neck.
“Mr. Gordon! I did no’ hear you behind me!”
The woman had a perfect mouth. “Come and sit,” he said, “I want to speak with you.”
“Of course.” She allowed him to show her to a settee, and sat with her hands folded over the book in her lap.
Gavin flipped his tails and sat beside her. He studied her face a moment until Lizzie smiled self-consciously. “When the snow passes, Newton will send me from Thorntree,” he said abruptly.
“He will no’ do such a thing,” Lizzie tried to assure him.
“He will. When he does, I intend to find a magistrate to help us.”
“But a magistrate will no’ come to Glenalmond before spring.”
“Then I will go to him,” Gavin said. “And while I am gone, you must call someone to you, aye? Mrs. Sorley Beal, perhaps.”
Lizzie’s confusion was evident in her slight frown. “But why?”
“Why?” Gavin echoed incredulously. Must he explain it? “To protect your reputation, of course, Lizzie!”
She colored. “I fear it is too late for that.”
Was she so blind to what was happening here? Or was he? “Perhaps I waited too long to offer for you properly,” he said in a sudden rush of guilt. “If I have no’ made myself entirely clear, Lizzie, I want to marry you. I blame myself for what has happened—I wanted everything to be perfect before I asked for your hand and set a firm date.”
“No, Mr. Gordon, you are no’ to blame.”
“I am,” he insisted. “But I will set everything to rights, Lizzie. You have my word that I will.” He suddenly stood up and paced before the settee. She was lovely. Had he realized how lovely she was? He looked away a moment, then looked at her again. He abruptly sat beside her. “There is something I feel compelled to tell you.”
“Aye?”
“I have long—long—admired you. You know that I have. But I’ve no’ been as attentive as I ought to have been—”
“You’ve been working hard,” she offered kindly.
“Aye, but look what has happened while I was working hard, will you? We can overcome it yet, I am certain of it. But Lizzie…I must know what your feelings are.”
She blushed and smiled uncertainly. “What do you mean?”
“You seem almost solicitous of Lambourne.”
She gasped; her color deepened. “That is no’ so!”
“I must know, Lizzie. Do you still esteem me as you once did? Do you still wish to make this match?”
She gaped at him. Her hands gripped the book tightly. “I would no’ have sent for you otherwise! And I should be asking you that question,” she said in a low voice. “What if this…this catastrophe canna be undone?”
“It can,” he said firmly. He had no doubt of it.
“Carson is determined,” she warned him.
“It will take a bit of maneuvering, aye, but I donna believe for a moment that Carson Beal might force you into a handfasting against your will and succeed! He’s no’ God, is he?”
She did not look convinced. “But if it canna be undone, for whatever reason, would…would you wait a year?” she asked.
Gavin hesitated. “It will no’ come to that,” he said flatly.
At the same moment, Fingal began to scratch at the door to go out. “Excuse me, please,” Lizzie said softly, and rose to let the dog out. When she returned to her seat, she said, “I think Jack is right, Mr. Gordon. There is something here that Carson wants.”
“There could no’ possibly be,” he scoffed. He knew these Highlands better than most. If there was something here worth having, he’d know it.
“Aye, but it is worth looking, is it no’?” Lizzie pressed. “For us?”
Us. She said it in a way that put Gavin on firm ground again. “How it fills my heart to hear you say it,” he said, and took her chin in his hand, lifting her face, kissed her. “Diah, Lizzie, I’ve no’ realized until now how much I care for you. And how much I need you.” He moved to kiss her again.
But Lizzie hesitated. Her eyes were shining, full of what he believed was hope—or perhaps convinced himself was hope—and he chalked up her hesitation to maidenly nerves. He would not allow himself to think of any other possibility, not when she was looking at him as she was. He slipped his hand to her nape and touched his mouth to hers, shaping his lips to hers. He caressed the curve of her ear, her neck, and the swell of her breasts above the bodice of her gown. It was a tender, respectful kiss that belied the desire rampaging through him with each touch of her skin. He wanted to have her, all of her, and he thought himself a fool for having waited so long.
His hand slid down her shoulder to her hand, and he laced his fingers through hers, lifting it to his heart, so that she might feel how much he desired her.
When he lifted his head, she stared at her hand, pressed against his beating heart.
Gavin touched his fingers to her cheek. “I give you my word,” he said solemnly, “that I shall see us through this ordeal. I shall honor and defend you as I ought, and we shall be married, and then you will know the true strength of my ardor for you, aye? I shall give you all that you deserve, Lizzie. A comfortable home. Children…all that you need.”
“Aye,” she said softly. “You will never know how grateful I am for your help.”
He smiled. “I look forward to the time you might show me.”
She blushed, kept her gaze down.
The sound of voices reached them; Gavin looked at the open door. The hour was late and there was much to think about, to do. “Shall we retire for the evening?”
“Go ahead if you’d like. I’ll wait a bit longer so that Charlotte might have her reading before I take her up.”
He didn’t like leaving her alone with Lambourne skulking about, but he took Newton at his word that Lambourne would be kept apart from her. “Very good.” He leaned over and possessively kissed her forehead. “Good night, Lizzie.”
“Good night, Mr. Gordon.”
Lizzie watched him walk out of the library. He paused at the open door and smiled at her before walking on. But when he’d gone, Lizzie tossed aside the book she’d clung to, dropped her head against the back of the settee, and stared up at the peeling ceiling.
Funny, she’d dreamed of this for so long now that she could hardly believe it was happening. Gavin Gordon would save her from ruin. He was a gentleman, a stalwart compa
nion, and any woman would be very happy to make a match with him.
She was happy. Aye, she was!
“Please tell me you haven’t swooned with rapture,” a voice rumbled from inside the room. With a squeal of surprise, Lizzie came out of her seat and whirled toward the door.
Jack was leaning against the doorjamb, a lopsided smile on his face. “My, my, Miss Lizzie, you look a wee bit flushed. Gordon’s kiss is that titillating, is it?”
“You were spying on me?” Lizzie exclaimed angrily.
“I was no’ spying,” he said, shoving away from the door and walking into the library. “I was merely passing by.”
“The devil you were! You seem to be constantly passing by one private conversation or another!”
“You should no’ leave your door open.”
“I—” She paused and frowned at the door. “Was it open, then?”
“Wide open,” Jack said. “So very open that all the talk of devotion wafted down the hall to my eager ears.”
Lizzie colored.
Jack chuckled. He glanced at the hearth. “I see that Gordon is allowed a bit of peat.”
Lizzie pressed her lips together.
“Will you marry him?” Jack asked bluntly.
As if she had any other prospects. As if someone like Jack might sweep into Glenalmond and suddenly determine the bucolic life was much more to his liking than the highest reaches of London society. “Aye,” she responded just as bluntly.
“Splendid. Gordon seems a pleasant enough fellow…if you prefer the country type.”
“Is there something wrong with that?”
Jack shrugged and nudged Red with his boot. “No. In truth, he seems a good solution for you, Lizzie. Apparently you want to live a sedate life in the country. A comfortable, safe life.”
Lizzie’s pulse leapt with umbrage. She felt uneasy and cross.
“One lacking in true passion,” Jack added silkily.
She wanted to strike out, to slap those words from his mouth. “Thank you for your unsolicited opinion, Jack. Now that I have it, I may rest easy, aye? I’m going to bed,” she said, and turned away from him.
“To your safe, comfortable bed, then.”
It was more than Lizzie could bear. She didn’t know what made her angrier—that he could be so ill-mannered, or that she feared he was right? She jerked around, her fists clenched at her sides. Honestly, Lizzie didn’t trust herself to keep her hands from his neck. And when she moved—toward him or away from him, she would never really know—a slow, languid smile curved his lips, and a devilish gleam appeared in his eye. He simply put his hand out for hers. Possessively. As if he had a right.
Inexplicably, Lizzie put her hand in his.
He slowly drew her toward him as something palpable flowed between them. Lizzie had felt it before with Jack; it left her feeling light-headed and strangely liquid in her bones. The sensation caused her to panic slightly. “What is it, Jack?” she asked breathlessly. “Feeling a wee bit excluded?”
“No, leannan,” he said again, using the Gaelic endearment that had the power to rile her blood. “I feel a wee bit sorry for you.”
“For me?” she scoffed, trying to disengage from him, but his grip on her only tightened as he put his other hand on her shoulder and caressed her earlobe with his finger. “That’s absurd. I am happy! I will be proud to be his wife while you run from someone or something!”
“You may be proud to be his wife, lass, but if you marry him, you will never know what it is to be with a man who desires you more than the air he breathes.”
“You are unbearably glib,” she said heatedly. “He desires me!”
Jack smiled as if he knew something she did not. “Aye, he desires you, Lizzie. Who could not desire a woman as fresh and alluring as you? But he does no’ know what to do with you. He offers you a home and hearth instead of passion. I saw that kiss. Your man desires to be a husband above a lover.”
It was true, it was true. Lizzie suddenly realized that Mr. Gordon’s kiss had lacked the same passion, the heat, the strength that she felt from Jack each time he touched her. It lacked the knowledge of his ability to rouse her to anything more than a wifely duty. That Jack knew it, too, appalled and alarmed her both. “You think you know so much,” she said angrily, “but you know nothing!”
“I know that a woman like you deserves the passion and love she wants. Lizzie, leannan—” He caught her chin in his hand, forced her to look at him. “You deserve to be kissed.”
“And I suppose you think you are the one to do it! You, who flit about instructing women on the proper way to be kissed, only to leave at dawn’s first light?”
“Me. Donna deny it, Lizzie—you want me to kiss you again. You want to know true, gut-aching passion. You donna want only love, you want it in all her untidy forms. You want to feel the thrill of it coursing through your veins and filling you up and making you cry out in ecstasy. I can give that to you before you bind yourself to the likes of him for all your days.”
“No,” she whispered, but he stopped her weak protest with a kiss.
Lizzie’s mind cried out at her to stop him, but her heart was on another plane entirely. Her yearning to be kissed precisely as Jack described it, precisely as he was kissing her now, seemed to overtake all her common sense and decency and batter them into nothingness.
He caught her up in one arm at her waist and whirled her around, putting her back to the wall. He paused, bracing his arms on either side of her head. “You deserve to know what it is to be wholly seduced,” he said roughly as his gaze moved over the crown of her head. He caressed her hair, tangled his fingers in loose curls. “You deserve to know what it feels like to be aroused to the point of weeping, to be released from that arousal in a manner that leaves you weak and short of breath. You deserve to know the raw intimacy that only a man and a woman can share,” he said, and let his hand drift down her shoulder, to the swell of her breast.
Lizzie could hardly seem to catch her breath. “I think you are mad,” she whispered breathlessly.
“Aye, if I’m mad, then half the world is mad with me,” he said low as his gaze raked over the features of her face, lingering on her lips, sliding to the flesh of her bosom. “I think you want to know what I can teach you, Lizzie. I think you want it more than you are willing to admit even to yourself,” he said, and caressed the swell of her breast with his knuckles.
She was angry, but she was astoundingly aroused by his words. Aye, aye, she did want to know his touch! She wanted it so badly that her body was quivering with a single caress! But how could she succumb to blatant seduction? She was not that sort of woman who would ruin herself for the mere pleasure of it, not when Mr. Gordon had been so good and kind to come and rescue her.
But Jack’s gray gaze seared her with his intent to arouse, seduce, and make love to her, and it was her undoing. A heady feeling swirled inside her, pulsed through every vein, into every finger and every toe, pooling in her groin. Her gaze landed on his moist lips, and Lizzie felt a stirring unlike anything she’d ever felt. She wanted to feel those lips on her mouth, on her body.
Jack leaned in, so that his mouth was almost touching her cheek, his breath warm on Lizzie’s skin, inflaming her even more. “I think you want to be completely and utterly seduced,” he whispered, and brushed his lips across hers.
It sent her reeling. Her skin began to tingle, her breath grew even shorter. Jack kissed her again, nipping at her bottom lip, then splaying his fingers along her jaw, tilting her head back just so, he swept his tongue inside her mouth.
He dropped his arm from the wall and pressed his body against hers, so that she could feel his hard desire against her abdomen, could feel the restrained power of his arms, his torso, his legs. He moved a hand to her hip, squeezing and boldly pushing her into his body to make certain she felt it.
A dangerous conflagration erupted deep inside Lizzie and began to lick at all those places in her that weakened her resolve. She’d never exp
erienced such desperate longing, and never as urgently as this. She felt hot inside her gown, wanted to take it off, to peel it from her body and lay herself bare to his delicious touch.
Aye, she wanted to know what he could teach her, the desire for it as strong as the desire to eat or drink, and she realized that she was pushing into him, wanting to feel every inch of him, every muscle, every hard angle, every hard ridge.
He dug his fingers into her cleavage, pushing deep into her gown until he had freed her breast. Lizzie gasped with apprehension and delight; Jack pressed his mouth against her neck at the same moment he took the tip of her breast in between his thumb and forefinger, rolling it.
She looked wildly at the open door. “The door,” she hissed.
But Jack did not stop. He lifted her off her feet and moved her down the wall, to the corner of the room, where they could not be seen from the corridor. He lowered her until her feet touched the ground, dipped down so that he was eye level with her, and with a sensual smile put a finger to his lips, indicating she should be quiet. How could she possibly? He was moving down her body and brazenly taking her breast into his mouth, nibbling at the peak, lashing across it with his tongue.
She gulped down a sob of pleasure and pressed the back of her head against the wall, holding his head at her breast, submerging herself in the sensation of the damp pressure of his mouth and tongue, the arousing sensation of the stubble of his beard on her tender skin, his hands touching her.
Jack dipped again, sliding his palm down to her ankle, and grabbing the hem of her gown. His hand slipped beneath her gown and moved up her leg, to her knee. Lizzie bent her knee and put her foot against the wall, so that he could easily reach the most intimate part of her.
He made a sound deep in his throat and slowly rose up again, his hand riding up her leg as he sought her mouth with his. He kissed her, pushed her gown up and moved his fingers along the inside of her thigh, brushed against the curls between her legs, then slipped one finger into her flesh.
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