‘And this.’
Another stroke, more sure, but still slow. And another. He was going to come. He would not come. Not yet. ‘Isabella.’
She stopped at the warning note in his voice. Then she smiled at him again.
‘And this, Finlay?’
Her lips touched the tip of his shaft. He felt her tongue, hot on the most sensitive part of him. With a long, low groan of ecstasy and regret, he pulled himself free of her and laid her down, covering her body with his. ‘You are a sorceress,’ he said. ‘You are the most delightful, delicious, desirable sorceress, and you have me under your spell and I can’t wait any longer. Do you still want this, Isabella? Because if you don’t, now is the time to say so.’
For answer, she put her arms around his neck and kissed him. ‘I want this. I want you. More than anything.’
* * *
Her words were no lie. She ached in a way she had never ached before, her body yearning for him in a new way. She wanted him inside her. She wanted that sleek, silken part of him inside her. She tilted herself towards him in open invitation, worlds beyond modesty or embarrassment, caring nothing for her utter lack of experience, surrendering completely to her body’s instincts. His kiss was hard and deep. His tongue thrust into her mouth. She was hot, fevered, tense, urgent, but he entered her slowly. She opened her eyes to watch him. His gaze locked on hers as his body became part of her until he filled her. There was no pain. There was only delight. And more tension. Her muscles clenched around him. He pushed higher inside her, and she felt an odd fluttering sensation. Then he waited, watching her. She pulled him towards her for another kiss. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes.’ Permission for anything. Everything. She wanted all of him.
‘Yes,’ he whispered. ‘Oh, yes.’
His first thrust was careful. The effort of control was etched on his face. Another thrust, harder this time. She was learning how to hold him and release him. Another thrust, and she felt the tension inside her building. They were finding a common rhythm now. Thrust, cling, release, thrust. Still he watched her. Still she held his gaze, seeing her pleasure reflected on his face, the power of giving that pleasure making her bolder, making her match his thrust with a tilt of her hips, holding him higher, clinging to him tighter, until her climax took her, sending her spiralling higher than she had ever flown, and Finlay cried out, pulling himself free of her to spend himself with an equally hoarse cry that was her name, and something in his native tongue she did not understand.
* * *
Afterwards, she could not sleep. She was afraid to speak. They lay entwined, skin on skin, watching the stars, listening to the whickering of the horses, the gentle burble of a distant stream. Finlay held her as if she was made of glass and he was afraid she might break. She clung to him as if she was afraid she would drown in a sea of emotion. As the waves of pleasure ebbed and the euphoria of their coupling faded, she was left feeling oddly desolate.
She felt the brush of his lips on her hair. His hand tightened possessively around her flank. She moved, burrowing closer. If she could climb inside his skin, she would. If she could live inside his skin, she would. That was when it struck her.
‘Madre de Dios.’
‘What is it?’
‘Nothing.’ Her heart skipped a beat, then began to beat harder, as if she had been running. Madre de Dios. She was in love. Isabella closed her eyes in pain. How could she have been so stupid? How could she have been so blind? Of course she was in love with this man. Had she not just made love to him with her body and her mind, too? She was in love. Of all the foolish things she had done, surely this was the worst.
Finlay’s lips brushed her hair again. She found his hand, twining her fingers in his. Tears stung behind her lids. She could not let them fall. He would think she regretted what they had just done. Her heart began to slow. She did not regret it. She lifted his hand to hers and kissed his knuckles. She would never regret it, but he must never find out. She had already given him enough to feel guilty about. This— No, he must not know this. He cared deeply for her, she did not doubt that, but there was no question, none at all, of any possible future for them.
Despite this, she allowed herself to dream for a few precious moments. To imagine that they could lie like this every night, wrapped in each other’s loving embrace. That he could make love to her every night, spending himself inside her, in the hope of creating a new human life forged by them both. She allowed herself to dream of a little farm—no, croft—in the Highlands. They would attend the church in the longhouse he had described to her. Their children would play with the children of his three sisters. Everyone from the village would dance at their wedding. She would learn to cook, and to weave, and Finlay would...
Enough of this schoolgirl fantasy! The cold reality was that it was impossible for her to set foot on British soil. Furthermore, if it were known that he was harbouring El Fantasma, Major Finlay Urquhart would be court-martialled and most likely hanged. No, she had to vanish off the face of the earth and resurface in America under an assumed identity, and Finlay had to return to Britain in order to complete his mission and convince Wellington that El Fantasma had been eliminated. Failure to do that would also likely lead to him being hanged, this time for desertion.
Isabella sighed. If only things were different, he could sail with her to the New World. In America, there would be opportunity for any number of adventures. Stupid! If things were different, she would not have to go to America. If things were different, she would not have met Finlay again, and she would not be lying here under the stars, her body still tingling from his lovemaking. Time to stop dreaming and face facts. She was leaving everything behind, including her country and her family, everything she knew and loved. She had kept the pain of this at bay by simply avoiding thinking of it, but she knew, when she was alone, that it would come. She loved Finlay with all her heart. Which did not mean asking him to give up everything, as she had, and come away with her. No, what it meant was to ensure the exact opposite was the case. For his sake. And she’d better make damned sure she remembered that over the next few days.
The stars were beginning to fade. Isabella turned her face into Finlay’s chest. An errant tear escaped. She rubbed her cheek against the hard wall of muscle, hoping he would not notice.
He pulled her closer. ‘Try to sleep for a bit,’ he said softly. ‘We’ve a long day ahead of us tomorrow.’
And a long, empty future ahead of her after that, Isabella thought. But she was not given to self-pity, and would not indulge in it now. ‘In less than a week, I will be at sea,’ she said with forced cheer. ‘If the boat is still waiting.’
‘It will be there. Jack gave his word,’ Finlay said heavily, unwittingly killing the tiny spark of hope.
‘Good,’ said Isabella bracingly. ‘That is at least one less thing to worry about.’
* * *
They were on their way before dawn had fully broken. The mountains to the east obscured the sunrise, and the dull, tarnished silver clouds above absorbed much of the sun’s light when it finally did make an appearance. Finlay fought the desolation that threatened to envelop him. He was not by nature morose, nor given to railing against fate, but as he looked at the woman riding by his side and tried to imagine life without her, his rage verged on the biblical.
Why the devil had the fates thrown them together like this, if they were so intent on pulling the pair of them asunder? Bloody fates. And bloody Wellington. The man was power mad. And he was a mite too bloody cautious. What did it matter that El Fantasma could tell a few tales that would embarrass him? True, a few of those tales would stir up quite a storm, but the duke was riding so high on the wave of triumph fuelled by the victory at Waterloo that Finlay reckoned even the revelation that Wellington was in the habit of eating bairns for breakfast wouldn’t cost him the political career he was hankering after. Bloody Wellington.
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br /> And while he was at it, bloody Jack, too. Jack could have told Wellington to stick his orders where the sun didn’t shine. Jack wasn’t even in the army anymore. But no, Jack and his principles had to take up El Fantasma’s cause, and Jack knew Finlay a bit too damned well, catching him when he was kicking his heels, desperate for orders. Any orders. Some bloody friend.
Finlay’s hands tightened on his reins, and his horse started. Quick as a flash, Isabella’s hand reached for his rein. ‘It’s fine. I was dwamming,’ he said, getting the horse back under control. ‘It means daydreaming.’
She smiled at him. It was a forced smile. Her big golden eyes were shadowed with something that looked distinctly like unhappiness. ‘You looked angry. I am sorry if...’
He was immediately contrite. ‘Don’t apologise. I’m like a bear with a sore heid, but it’s not your fault, Isabella.’
‘You do not regret last night?’
‘No. Dear heavens, no.’ He pulled up beside her, and she brought her horse to a halt. ‘Isabella, last night was— It was...’ Everything. The urge to tell her was powerful. ‘It was perfect,’ Finlay said. ‘I only hope that you do not...’
‘No, I don’t regret it. For me it was also—perfect. Only today, I think that I am a little sad, knowing that soon I will be saying goodbye to you.’ Her voice wobbled, but she smiled again valiantly. ‘Of course I am very much looking forward to my new life, but I will—I will miss you, Finlay.’
Dear God. There was a sheen of tears in her eyes. She was so brave. He loved her so much. He should thank Jack and Wellington and the fates for throwing them together instead of cursing them for it. If he had not come here to Spain, he would never have known what love was. And if he had not come here to Spain, Isabella would have...
Finlay shuddered. She was safe. They would not get their hands on her, even if he had to die saving her. She was safe and she was getting the chance of a new life. Without him, but a life. He must remember that. He leaned over in the saddle to kiss her softly. ‘I will miss you, too, Isabella. You are a woman like no other. I am glad, and I am honoured, that I have had the chance to know you.’
So much less than he felt, but it was enough, it seemed. She blushed. ‘And I, too, Finlay. Glad and deeply honoured.’
Chapter Twelve
They descended from the heights of La Puebla down a steep zigzag path and into the valley below through which the Zadorra River flowed, the site of the bloody Battle of Vitoria. It was a peaceful place, nature having reclaimed the battlefield, leaving little trace of the countless lives lost and the oceans of blood spilled more than two years before. Peaceful now that was, but Isabella sensed a certain melancholy linger in the air. Perhaps she was being fanciful, but she gave an involuntary shudder as she took in the scene.
‘It is hard to believe that this particular engagement could have been so decisive,’ she said, making a sweeping gesture.
‘There were more than ten thousand casualties in total,’ Finlay said grimly. ‘Our army lost three and a half thousand men. Five hundred Spanish died. Can anything be worth so many lives, so much sacrifice?’
The British and their allies had been positioned on the western banks of the river, he had told her. Isabella stared at the rural scene, trying to imagine the serried ranks of soldiers numbering in the thousands, the field-gun placements firing salvo after merciless salvo, the sound of muskets, the acrid smell of gunpowder as it drifted across the battlefield in a thick pall of smoke. She could not, but Finlay, his eyes blank, staring off into the distance, clearly could. ‘They say it was a pivotal moment, the turning point in the war,’ Isabella offered.
‘Aye. That’s what they always say when the body count climbs that high.’
‘But in this case, surely it is true. Not long after the Battle of Vitoria was won, Napoleon’s army was in retreat. The occupation of Spain was over.’
‘And you were free to build a new world, eh? Remind me how is that working out again.’
The bitterness in Finlay’s voice took Isabella aback. The viciousness of his barb stung. ‘You think it would have been better if the French had won?’
‘I think it would have been better if we had not had to fight at all,’ he said. ‘The French left wagons full of the spoils of war behind as they fled, did you know that? Not just gold, but all sorts. Our men plundered it. They went mad. Discipline broke down entirely. There was no stopping them. Bloodlust, that’s what it was. I hope you never witnessed it, Isabella. War can make a man less than human. I saw it with my own eyes but it is only now, with the benefit of some perspective that I begin to see how distasteful the whole bloody enterprise is. An enterprise that I was proud to be part of.’
‘But you did not behave...’
‘No,’ he said tersely, ‘I did not. Wellington called them the scum of the earth in a dispatch. The common soldier, who had won his precious victory, who had followed orders that took him hundreds of miles from home, tramped hundreds of miles across this country of yours, starving at times, suffering illness at others, frozen to the marrow often enough. Their wives trailing in their wake, too, some with bairns, having to suffer the same privations. And Wellington rewards them by calling them the scum of the earth.’
‘Because they committed atrocities, Finlay.’
He looked at her bleakly. ‘What is war itself, Isabella, if not an atrocity, an affront to humanity?’
‘No. Don’t say that. Don’t talk like that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you are a soldier, and fighting wars is what you do. You have spent your life saving the lives of others, forging peace, making the world a safer place, a better place. The wars you have fought have been just wars, Finlay. You are an honourable man, a brave man. You are Major Urquhart, the Jock Upstart. All your life, you have served your country, done your duty. You should be proud of that legacy.’
She finished in a rush, eyeing him anxiously. Every word she had spoken was true, but this rousing little speech had not the effect she intended. If anything, Finlay looked even more bleak. ‘In England, all anyone wants to talk about is the great victory of Waterloo. Children re-enact the battle with their little toy soldiers. If you tell a woman you were there, you’re guaranteed a grateful embrace. Wellington is toasted at every dinner party in London. Yet the men who won that battle for him, many of them are starving now. So many died or were wounded in all these wars we fought against the French, the country can’t afford to pay the pensions they’re entitled to. They’ll do anything to wriggle out of paying a widow, you know. They’ll tell a man it’s his own fault that he lost his legs, not the army’s. Jack was railing against the injustice of it when we discussed my mission here. I begin to see that he was absolutely right. You are not the only one, Isabella, whose hopes of a better future have been dashed.’
‘If Napoleon had not been defeated, the world would most likely be a worse place.’
He smiled at her wryly. ‘You don’t really believe that, do you? Spain was on the winning side, was it not? And by your own admission, your country has gone backwards and not forward.’
She took his hand in hers, though she doubted the small gesture afforded him a tithe of the comfort she longed to give him. ‘You cannot mean that you wish Wellington had been defeated.’
‘No, of course not. But I wonder, I am truly beginning to wonder, if I have it in me to fight any more wars on his behalf. Or anyone else’s. I am getting tired of taking orders. I’m thinking it might be time I took my life into my own hands.’
‘Come with me to America, then,’ she said, before she could catch the words.
He touched her cheek. ‘They’d execute me for desertion if they caught me, not to mention the shame it would bring to my family and the stain on my character. No, whatever I do, I have to go back.’
‘You are not a man to run away from anyt
hing, are you, Finlay?’
‘You know me very well. Indeed, I am not.’
‘I wasn’t being serious about you coming with me,’ Isabella said, who had actually never been more serious in her whole life. ‘The Duke of Wellington might very well be persuaded that El Fantasma has been killed, since it is what he fervently hopes to hear, but his Jock Upstart leads a charmed life. He would know it was a ruse if you did not return.’
‘Aye, like as not.’ Finlay tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, and kissed her forehead. ‘I’m sorry. This morning I was a bear with a sore heid, and now I’m having a fit of the blue devils. You’ll be glad to see the back of me.’
‘Aye,’ she said, ‘like as not.’
He was forced to laugh. ‘I’m thinking, once we leave Vitoria, it will be a hard and dangerous push to the coast. The boat will be waiting on standby at San Sebastian. She’s a fishing boat. The captain is one of Jack’s connections. A fine sailor, he assures me. He’ll take you on to Lisbon, where you’ll pick up a cargo ship bound for the New World. I’m afraid I don’t know the detail—that has been left in the hands of the fisherman. You can trust him with your life, Jack says...’
‘Finlay, you need not worry about me. I am perfectly capable of looking after myself. Trust me.’
‘I do. I have every faith in you. But I wish...’
‘No.’ Isabella put her finger to his lips. ‘Wheesht, now,’ she said. ‘You have saved my life. You have given me the chance of another life. That is a priceless gift, Finlay. I promise you, I will make the most of it in return.’
‘I know you will.’
‘So let us have no more of it.’ She looked up at the lowering sky. ‘It’s going to rain. We should think about finding somewhere to camp for the night.’
‘We’ll not be camping rough. Tonight you’ll have the bath and the feather bed I promised you.’ He shook his head when she made to protest. ‘It’s the last chance you’ll get for quite some time. Like I said, the authorities are likely to be hot on our tail all the way to the coast.’
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