Then she brushed off her skirts and pushed to her feet.
She would find no more answers here tonight.
~ ~ ~
Tinker was waiting for her when she made her way back to the cottage. “Did you see him?”
“Him?”
“The highwayman, of course. He’s been sitting beneath that oak tree on the hill for an hour and more. I thought it was more of those brutes come to carry out their deviltry, but it wasn’t. When I went up to check, I saw it was Luc. He was just staring up at the sky.”
Silver felt a twisting sensation in her chest. “I expect he enjoys the smell of lavender. Or perhaps he merely likes the sight of the sky at night.”
Tinker snorted. “He’s got a night sky of his own, back over the hill at Waldon Hall. No, I reckon the man is just about as cabbage-headed as someone else whose name I could mention.” The old servant shrugged. “No need to frown at me, Silver St. Clair. It’s none of my affair if the pair of you choose to go mooning about. No, it’s none of my affair at all!”
With that the old man stalked down to the storeroom, mumbling loudly to himself with every step.
~ ~ ~
Bram caught up with her five minutes later. “Did you see him?” he asked eagerly.
Silver sighed. “No, I did not see him, although I seem to be given a report every five minutes, first by Tinker, now by you.”
“But what is Luc doing up there? He’s been sitting beneath that tree for over an hour.”
“I expect he likes the view.”
Bram shoved the spectacles higher on his nose. “If you ask me, the man is mad. In fact the pair of you are! If this is the way grownups act, I am not all certain I want to grow up. Perhaps if I am lucky I never shall.” Then he, too, turned and stalked off to his room, leaving Silver alone with her curiosity.
Finally that curiosity overcame her.
Her eyes sought out the great oak on the crest of the hill. After a moment she saw him, just where Tinker had said he was, atop the rise that offered a clear view of the whole farm.
What was the man doing up there? What gave him the right to come bothering her, especially after he’d practically ordered her away from Waldon Hall?
Her shoulders stiffened. She would throw him off her land, that’s what! Then she would forget him. Cloak, hat, and silver fencing foil, she’d put them out of her mind once and for all. And it would happen now.
~ ~ ~
But Silver’s heart was pounding as she stalked to the top of the hill. There were so many things she wanted to say to him, and so many questions she needed to ask. Yet he rebuffed her at every step. She gnawed her lip, studying his silhouette as he sat beside a hedge of honeysuckle, his back propped against the ancient oak.
Before Silver could speak, he raised one hand. “No, don’t tell me,” he said, his voice low and rough. “It’s the mistress of the manor come to order me away. But how do I know who she is?”
Silver heard him draw a deep breath.
“Because here’s the hint of lavender that clings to her like a spring wind. And here’s the scent of roses to add a trace of sweetness. She wears a Kashmir shawl. How do I know? From the dusky smell of patchouli, which the Indian scarves are always packed in.”
His knees were drawn up before him. He stared up at the sky and did not turn to look at her. “Don’t you mean to rate my skill?”
Silver glared down at him, her hands on her hips. “You’ve been drinking!”
“Not much, Sunbeam. Not enough to matter, at least. Certainly not enough to help me forget. But can’t a man drink his way to rack and ruin in peace? First that bad-tempered servant of yours comes pestering me, and then your scapegrace brother. Who’ll y’ send next, Cromwell?”
“Perhaps I shall! You can talk well together, one dog to another!”
But when Silver saw the tension in his shoulders, she felt her anger melt. “Of course they came to check,” she said softly. “They care about you.”
“Don’t want ‘em to,” Luc said hoarsely. “Not a whit. People who care about me … get hurt.”
Tears pressed at Silver’s eyes. She sank down beside him on the ground. “Where is it?”
“Where is what?”
“That wretched bottle you’ve been drinking from.”
“Don’t know what the devil y’re talking about.”
She reached past him, searching in the darkness. Her arm brushed his shoulder. Her hip brushed his thigh.
Luc went dead still. “Bad idea, Sunbeam. Damned bad idea.”
“Oh? And why is that?”
“Not made of stone. Drunk as a lord, in fact. Not a fit companion. Not tonight.”
“Because you slur your words? You told me that you always slurred your words.”
“I lied,” Luc said grimly. “Now you’d better go.”
Silver ignored him. She found the bottle and pulled it from his fingers. After studying it for a moment she raised it to her own lips.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m finding out what it feels like to drink oneself to rack and ruin,” she said calmly. The brandy burned pleasantly down her throat. “It feels rather nice, actually.”
“Over my dead body, you will!”
She took another drink.
“Give me that!”
Silver turned away, clutching the bottle between her hands. “In a minute, perhaps. You hardly need it. You’ve drunk enough for a month of Sundays already.” Resolutely she took another drink, then settled herself back against the grass with one hand behind her head.
Luc frowned down at her. “I don’t think I like this. Why don’t you just leave?”
“Can’t a woman be left to drink herself to rack and ruin in peace?”
Luc muttered darkly. “No need for you to. You’ve got friends, family. Life of excitement before you.”
“Maybe … that’s not enough for me.” Silver was amazed at her own boldness. Perhaps the brandy had something to do with it or perhaps it was simply the burning pain in her heart that could no longer be denied.
Sitting up, she took another drink, a substantial one this time, before Luc managed to wrestle the bottle away from her.
“Enough of that, hellion. Not used to the stuff. It’ll make your head swim.”
“It already has. I find the feeling rather pleasant.” Sighing, Silver lay back and slid open a button at her bodice. “I didn’t realize it was so warm, however.” She frowned at the sky. “And why are the stars dancing about like that?”
“Not dancing about.” Luc squinted upward. “Least, I don’t think they are.” He looked at Silver and shook his head. “Too much brandy, my girl. That’s what it is.”
Silver shrugged. “They look rather nice moving in those funny little circles.” She leaned toward Luc. Her hand rose to his cheek. “So do you, highwayman,” she said softly.
She felt the muscles clench at his jaw.
“Shouldn’t be here, Sunbeam. Tinker would have my hide.”
“Tinker told me you were up here. So did Bram. In fact, they both thought me heartless for not coming up sooner.”
“Better heartless that heartbroken,” Luc said harshly. “I’m no good for you. Not even good for myself.” He stared out over the dark hills. “I went after the man who sent me to Algiers tonight, did you know that? Followed him over the marshes to the old mill near Kingsdon Cross. I nearly had him, too, but I was a second too slow and he slipped away. And do you know why I was too slow?” Luc didn’t wait for her answer, fists clenched against his knees. “I was too slow because I smelled the scent of honeysuckle and it made me think of you, damn it. It made me remember, just as you said it would. And I can’t afford that, Silver. I can’t be anything but strong and cold and cruel right now. Not without breaking a vow I made to myself five years ago.”
He came up on one knee, his face hard. “That’s why I’m leaving now. Because of me, not because of you. I want you to understand that.”
“But — the
brandy? How will you make your way back?”
Luc laughed grimly. “Oh, I’m not drunk. That was just a lie to send you running. Silly, of course. I should have known that nothing would frighten you away.”
“How curious,” Silver said softly, “because I’m not drunk either.” Her hand moved lower, freeing the second button at her bodice. “Not in the slightest…”
Luc’s eyes locked on her hand, on the lacy white fabric that swayed in the wind, on the faint V of skin that shimmered beneath. “Don’t, Sunbeam.”
A third button slid free.
Luc’s breath was a strangled groan in his throat. “Damn it, Silver, don’t. I’m not made of stone, after all.”
“I pray that you are not. From what I’ve felt of you, you’re all fire and velvet,” she said huskily.
Heat slammed through Luc at her words. He had to leave. He had to be hard. He had to forget her — all for her own good.
But he couldn’t move. Paralyzed, he watched her fingers slide to a fourth button. “Is it possible,” Luc said hoarsely, “that you are trying to seduce me, Susannah St. Clair?”
“I devoutly hope so.” Silver’s eyes were tremulous in the soft moonlight. “Am I … succeeding, highwayman?”
Too well, Luc thought desperately, as his manhood strained hotly in a fresh wave of heat. Far too well.
“Not in the slightest,” he growled, praying she wouldn’t hear the hoarseness that proved the lie of his words. “Blackwood’s far too hardened a sinner to fall for such simple tricks.”
Luc saw a tremor run through her and it left him bleeding inside. But he could not afford to be kind. She would thank him for it later, when she had a rich, titled husband and a brood of auburn-haired children playing at her feet.
The thought left Luc cold.
“But maybe it’s not Blackwood I’m seducing,” Silver whispered. “Maybe it’s you, the quiet man who hides his pain deep. The man whose honor makes him feign dishonor.” Her voice broke. “It’s you I want, Luc. Not an image. Not a dream. Just you. Why can’t you understand that?”
Behind him Luc heard the wind rush over the lavender fields and skitter through the rose borders. The sound was echoed in Silver’s low sigh.
And he knew he was betrayed. Woman, wind, and the beauty of the night conspired against him the moment Silver sat up.
White lace fluttered free, baring the ivory curve of her breast to his fevered gaze.
He fought it, he fought her, but he was losing to all that softness and silken honesty.
He decided there was only one way to stop her.
He freed his shirt, his eyes hard on her face. Frightening her was his only hope. “It will hurt you, Silver. Perhaps a great deal. It always hurts the first time.”
“Oh, this is hardly my first,” she said huskily. “I’ve had dozens — yes, scores of men.”
His lip twitched slightly. “Scores, have you?”
“At least. I’m thoroughly, shall we say, broken in. No need to fear hurting me.”
“I see.” Luc’s eyes were unreadable as he slid his hand across the entrancing curves revealed at her lacy bodice. “And they touched you here? Like this?”
Silver gasped as he found the crest of her, already taut and hungry for him. “Of course.”
“And … you liked it? When they touched you like this?”
“It was pleasant enough, I suppose.”
His fingers splayed open and his lips closed over her, pulling wetly.
“Luc!”
“Yes?” He studied her from hooded eyes. “That was also pleasant, I take it?”
Silver swallowed audibly. “Yes. Pleasant, rather…”
Luc toyed with the hungry curves, brushing her with his tongue until she squirmed restlessly beneath him. “And all those scores of men, they did this to you as well?”
“I — of course.” Silver gasped. “All the time.”
“I see,” Luc said darkly. In one lazy movement he caught the full froth of her skirts and tugged them upward.
“What are you doing?”
“What every man does when he pleasures a woman. Surely, being a woman of such vast experience, you must realize that.”
Silver bit her lip. “Well — that is, of course I knew. It’s merely that you surprised me. It was your hands. They are very — big, you know.”
“‘Tis not only my hands that are big, Sunbeam,” Luc said darkly. “But you know all about that, being familiar with those ‘uncontrollable manly passions,’ as you are.”
He didn’t mean to spare her, not for a second. He couldn’t or he’d fail. He trailed his hands over the soft line of her thighs, seeking the heat at her delta.
She bit back a cry when he found her.
But he ignored her breathy moans, he ignored her restless movements, slowly parting the sleek skin that welcomed his intimate caress.
“Look at me,” Luc rasped. “I’m a turncoat, Silver. I’m a traitor to my country, to my name, and to my own heart. Look at me and tell me how it feels to be loved by a traitor. Maybe that will make you change your mind.”
~ 29 ~
Silver didn’t answer. Dear Lord, she couldn’t answer, not with this fire inside her and desire streaking through her in great dark waves.
He was a traitor?
She caught a sharp breath.
“I — don’t believe it.”
Luc laughed grimly. “You will.” He shoved the lace from her other breast, coaxing it roughly with tongue and teeth.
Silver arched against him. Her rib throbbed, but she was too far lost in pleasure to care. She refused to believe he was a traitor!
At the same time she couldn’t tell him the truth. If he knew that he was indeed the first man to touch her so, he’d surely stop. That honor he said he lacked would keep him from her, and then she’d never know the beauty of his touch.
But Silver nearly blurted out the truth when Luc’s thumb eased through her silken curls.
“Frightened, my sweet? Good, for I mean to frighten you.”
Frightened? Not that. But she was feeling most peculiar. The heat. The brandy. The drumming in her blood.
And the man. Oh, yes, the man most of all.
He had her heart, caught well and truly now. And that secret, too, she must keep from him. He wouldn’t want her love nor any other tender feelings.
So Silver locked back the words, hid her heart. “Should I be frightened?”
“You should,” Luc said grimly. “It’s the highwayman you’ve caught tonight, here in your spell. Not the gentleman, not the cool cavalier, but the hardened scoundrel who owes allegiance to no one. Now are you afraid?”
“No.” Silver ran her hand beneath Luc’s shirt and found the faint ridge of the scars at his back. “Not of you. Not of these. They are warrior’s marks, tokens of honor. Why should they frighten me?”
Luc’s eyes closed. No, nothing would frighten her. He should have known.
“Is the pain to come soon?”
Only for me, Luc thought, knowing he could not carry this charade through to its end.
So close. One swift thrust and she would be his, tight and wet and clinging. She’d welcome him, he knew. He’d felt her pleasure once and knew she would grip him sweetly when he came to her.
He bit back a curse, feeling sweat bead his brow.
Not her. He couldn’t do it, not to this woman.
But he couldn’t pull away, not before he’d felt her sweet fire once more. He eased inside her, feeling her tremble against his fingers as he stroked her carefully.
“Oh, Luc, how can I—”
She rose against him then, her eyes dim, her face flushed, her whole body given to the pleasure he’d brought pounding through her.
So beautiful, Luc thought. He could hold her this way forever, with her little husky cries ringing in his ears. In her honesty and giving he felt free, the years swept clean, and for a moment it was almost as if the torments of Algiers had never happened.
At
the sight of her, at the hot, tight tug of her, he felt his control shatter. Never before had he known such need — and such bitter regret.
For Algiers did exist. He had killed men and ignored his conscience. He had had to for survival. And then had come the women. Too young, they’d been. Far too small. When the Dey had seen Luc’s size, he’d cackled and ordered his ferenghi prisoner to a coupling that would punish the women for their disobedience.
And after the whippings Luc had finally complied.
To survive he had done what the Dey had ordered. Now he was a traitor to his country and himself. Nothing could change that.
“Not Luc,” he said grimly. “‘Tis the highwayman you face tonight, and Blackwood’s not a man to play for small stakes. I’ve had to kill men, Silver. I’ve had to take women, even if it hurt them. Too much — too much you don’t even want to know.” Abruptly he pushed to his feet.
“Luc? Where are you going?”
“Home. Where I should have stayed. Anywhere that’s far away from you.”
Silver blinked. “You can’t.”
“Don’t try to stop me. My mind’s made up.”
And then a click came behind him. Luc turned and saw a pistol glinting in the moonlight. “Damn it, what do you mean to do with that?”
“I mean to see the tables turned, felon.” Silver’s eyes slid half closed. “We’ll start with your boots. Take them off,” she ordered curtly.
A vein pulsed at Luc’s temple. “Damned if I will.”
“Suit yourself.” Silver lowered the gun between Luc’s feet. “My aim might not be entirely reliable just now, I warn you. You are a most potent and distracting lover.”
Luc tried to ignore the moonlight playing over her pale curves and how hot and tight she’d felt. “Let it be, Silver. If I stay, if I do the things I want to do, it will only bring you pain.”
The pistol rose higher. “Don’t make me count, highwayman. If I have to count, my aim may grow even worse.”
Luc twisted. In a blur of black he found his rapier, wrenched it high, then brought the point to hover over her throat. “Bloody little fool! Do you think I’d set foot abroad without a weapon of my own?”
Come the Night (The Dangerous Delameres - Book 1) Page 27
