Seducing the Spy

by Sandra Madden

  But as Meggie watched Deirdre and Colm, she wondered. She wondered if the bard was attracted to the shy young lass.

  “Meggie, come,” Niall ordered.

  Without waiting further argument, he took hold of Meggie’s arm and steered her from the hall and out into the keep. In a hasty, parting glance, she saw the poet hoist his tankard. Colm should not be drinking whiskey so soon after his ... accident.

  She dug in her heels. She must return and rescue the bard from himself. “Nay, Niall, I must not leave the hall.”

  “We shall be gone only a moment,” he insisted.

  With a firm stride, Niall guided Meggie to a low stone wall near to the wash house. A full moon and thousands of stars cast the only light. The chill in the summer eve air caused goose bumps to rise on her bare arms. Niall wore a mantle; she did not. Meggie expected he would offer it, but he appeared unaware of her chill.

  After the din of the hall, the night seemed oddly quiet, save for the sounds of nocturnal creatures and the soft lowing of cattle in the distance.

  Meggie looked about her with pride. Dochas had grown from a humble beginning as a round tower house and spread into narrow corridors and spacious, high-ceilinged chambers clustered in wings to the east and west, north and sound. With all its hard angles and unlikely projections, it was not a stately mansion like those built within the protective walls of Dublin. Dochas served as a fortress as well as a home. Stores were filled with, among other necessities, chain mail, spears and pikes, dirks and broadswords.

  The expansive keep held a dairy house, a wash house, a brew house, and a turf house. Workshops, a forge, the stable, and kennels shared space with the thatched roof homes of the residents.

  Only the herds of cattle and sheep roamed the rolling hills outside the walls of the castle, and they were tended through the night by shepherds.

  Thriving Dochas offered a haven to all. Meggie could not imagine leaving the home she had come to love for the safety of Ulster. She could not think of leaving Dochas for any reason.

  “I want to marry ye now, Meggie.” Niall spoke in low, urgent tones.

  Meggie felt frustrated rather than flattered. How many times must they have this discussion? She stifled a sigh and leaned against the wall. “Ye know we must wait until my father returns.”

  “But ye don’t know when that will be.”

  “Most certainly it shall not be long. He’s been gone near six months now.”

  Although she knew Niall to be a good man, and a wealthy one, Meggie never had felt anxious to marry him. A hero in many battles, he had lost an eye during a skirmish near Limerick. But his bearish masculinity neither mystified nor enticed her. She did not miss him between his visits to Dochas. She did not feel the same needling excitement with Niall that she felt in the presence of the bard.

  “Ye cannot know,” Niall protested, pacing before her. “Yer da might be gone another six months.”

  “We can wait another six months.”

  “Nay.” He narrowed his dark blue eyes upon her. “I cannot wait to have ye. I cannot go on fretting because ye are alone here.”

  “Alone?” she repeated, incredulous. “At least one hundred men, women, and children live with me within the walls of Dochas.”

  “They are not warriors. Even with Barra and his men near, I still do not rest easy.”

  Meggie shared his uneasy feeling with Barra near! Still, she could not reveal Barra’s attack on her. Niall might kill the foolish man and take Meggie away from Dochas.

  She offered her impatient suitor a smile of pure sweetness. “Do ye have no faith in me?”

  “’Tis talk the English are preparin’ to push toward Ulster,” he replied brusquely, apparently unmoved by her smile. “’Tis a dangerous time for a woman to be alone.”

  “Talk... or more Irish blarney?” she asked, focusing on a small weed sprouting from between the stones by her feet.

  Except for the soft lowing of cattle, Meggie’s world went silent. She waited for Niall’s response. Instead of answering, he surprised her with an unexpected question.

  “Is it true, ye have taken in a roving poet?”

  “Aye.” She made a reluctant acknowledgment, quickly adding, “But he can do no harm. He is wounded.”

  “Wounded?”

  “The bard suffered an ... accident.”

  “What sort of accident?”

  “I... I shot him.”

  Niall threw back his head and laughed. “And why did ye do such a thing, me heart?”

  “I thought him a werewolf.”

  “Is he excessively hairy?”

  “I could not see clearly.”

  “Meggie, what if he had been a werewolf? The ball of your musket would not have stopped him. Ye might have been killed.”

  “But he is not a werewolf.”

  Niall harumphed. “Likely, he is not even truly a man.”

  “What?”

  “Poets most often have the heart and mind and... desires of a woman.”

  For a long moment she sought to understand the meaning of his words. Meaningless explanations tumbled through her mind like seeds in the wind. Until she caught and held his insinuation.

  “Nay!” The shock rattled Meggie. It could not be true. Colm was a man in every way.

  “Ye need a husband to protect ye, Meggie, me heart. Yer all innocence. Ye need me.”

  “In time, Niall.”

  “Ye’ve been sayin’ so for a year or more. I’ve met all of yer conditions. I’m no longer a fighting man. I’ve wealth to support a large family. I promise to give ye as many children as ye can bear.”

  “But I cannot leave Dochas until my father returns,” she repeated stubbornly. Her mind still stuck on one thought. Could the bard be less than a man?

  “I’ll station me best men to care for your horses and fields and herds,” Niall declared. “You and your grandfather come live with me. Yer father will be glad for it. He will not be angered if ye marry without him. He’ll understand, me heart.”

  “I’ll think on it,” she said, moving past him, eager to return to the great hall. She meant to study Colm more closely.

  But Niall snatched her wrist, clasping it firmly within his callused hand. Meggie looked up to his eyes, one covered by an ominous black patch, the other narrowed and dark as a raven’s eye.

  “Ye have said as much too many times before, me heart. I shall not leave Dochas without a wedding day set.”

  * * * *

  When Cameron lay down, the room spun.

  He had had too much whiskey on this night. He was no better than a besotted Irishman. Hoping to stop the room’s dizzying motion, Cameron drew in a deep breath.

  It could have been worse. If his leg hadn’t throbbed, he would have danced. The rousing music provoked him like a sly trollop.

  Cameron rose from his featherbed. Besieged with unfamiliar restlessness, a sick stomach, and a light head, he sought the outside air as remedy. Holding on to the wall with one hand and his walking stick in the other, he carefully descended the stairway. Skirting the great hall, he made his way outdoors. Falling back against the castle wall, he inhaled deeply of the crisp eve air. In and out. In and out. He breathed, simply breathed.

  He wondered if Meggie and Niall O’Donnell were still out here somewhere. He speculated as to what they were about... as if he could not guess. A toss in the hay.

  After several moments, his stomach settled, and his head seemed less befuddled. Leaning heavily on his walking stick, he started toward the stables. He thought to take a look at the horseflesh and determine which steed he should steal to make his getaway. Nay, nay. Not steal. It was a replacement he sought.

  If his horse hadn’t given out when Meggie shot Cameron, he would still have a mount. The death of his mare from shock clearly was the duchess’s fault.

  Halfway to the stables, a cat darted across his path, causing Cameron to wobble. His stomach lurched. Too late, he realized that leaving his chamber might have been a mistake. Climb
ing back up to the soft featherbed that awaited him there seemed an impossible task. He would sleep off his whiskey in the stable.

  Cameron did not consider meeting Meggie at the open door. She carried a torch. Her head snapped in his direction as he stumbled, hard pressed to stay upright this eve. He kicked a large rock from his path.

  “Who’s there?” Meggie called, peering into the darkness toward him.

  “’Tis I.”

  “Colm?”

  “Aye.” He drew himself up. Forcing a smile, he made a supreme effort to sound and, more importantly, to appear as sober as a Ballymore monk.

  She slipped the small torch into a receptacle on the wall.

  “Why are ye here?” she asked. The way she inclined her head made her suspicions clear.

  To see what prize mare I could steal. Nay. He could not say.

  “I might ask the same of you,” he replied, with a teasing grin. Would she see it that way? A flirtatious twist of his mouth?

  “I came to see to my mare,” she replied, straining to see if anyone lurked behind him. “She caught a stone in her hoof today.”

  Could it be Meggie thought he had come to the barn for a clandestine meeting of his own? Cameron stifled a chuckle. “The noise of the celebration invades my chamber, making it difficult to sleep.”

  Her lips, like dew-glazed berries, turned up in a wry smile of complicity. “In truth, I left to seek stillness.”

  “Is Niall O’Donnell with ye?”

  “No. He meets with Barra,” she told Cameron as she strolled toward him. “They are longtime friends.”

  “And you are longtime friends with O’Donnell?”

  “Nay. He sought to comfort me after the death of Declan.”

  Thick curls fell forward across her shoulder. Strands of the silken stuff gleamed like golden ribbons beneath the flickering torchlight. A strange yearning took hold of Cameron. He longed to crush a fistful of her wondrous locks in his hand. Her lips were parted as if she would speak again. He would eagerly kiss those lips. If she were not Irish. If he were not an English spy.

  “Will ye marry O’Donnell?” he blurted. “It’s rumored he is a rare rich Irishman.”

  “Deirdre shares secrets with ye.”

  “’Tis no secret given the way the man looks at ye, Meggie.”

  She lifted her chin an infinitesimal degree. Cameron recognized stubborn defiance when he saw it.

  “I must wait until my father returns before I wed,” she said.

  “Do ye not have your father’s blessing?” Cameron hated himself for pressing her, but he could not seem to stop. He blamed the devil whiskey at work.

  She lowered her head. “Aye, I do.”

  “Then, why must ye wait?”

  Meggie raised her eyes to his, large and brilliant blue. They pinned Cameron to the spot. A warm, melting sensation stirred in the center of his chest.

  He vowed never to take another drop of whiskey.

  The hushed tones of Meggie’s reply did not mask the ache in her voice. “I do not love Niall.”

  “Ye desire a husband and love?” Her demands never ceased.

  Cameron vaguely wondered what it would be like to kiss each freckle on Meggie’s fair face.

  “Of all men, ye should understand love ... the meaning of love between a man and a woman.”

  Never. He had never loved a woman. Cameron had no knowledge of what the Irish beauty wanted, but he did not mistake the passion in her breathless entreaty.

  The devil will have me before this mission is over. I’ll be walking through flames of fire. Cameron knew well he had broken every rule. He stood before the enemy, a drunken spy. His thigh ached and his leg trembled and his heart cavorted in his chest, causing Cameron to waver like a hoary old man.

  With her usual alertness, Meggie must have observed the quivering of his wounded leg. “Ah, the excitement of this eve has been too much for ye.”

  Before he could protest, she took his arm, bracing him against her soft, warm body.

  “Aye, excitement,” Cameron repeated. “’Tis been disquieting, ye are right. I have stood too long this night.”

  Another fabrication. He could conjure many excuses, but Cameron knew the true cause of his disquiet. Meggie Fitzgerald. In his debilitated condition, the Irish vixen’s very presence excited him. The fresh, sweet fragrance of her, the furtive glimpses of her cleavage, threw him into an unfamiliar turmoil. “Come,” she urged.

  He had not the will or strength to do other than what she bid.

  Meggie led him slowly into the stable, guiding the bard to a corner where the light barely reached. He held his body stiffly, but the heat and hardness of him brushed against her in an enticing manner. Shivers of warmth skittered down her spine.

  She blamed the unbidden reaction on her weariness and stepped away from the bard as soon as they reached their destination. Closing her eyes, Meggie breathed deeply of the fresh scent of hay, so much more intoxicating than the odor of mead and whiskey which permeated the great hall - and everyone who had dined or danced there. Even the poet smelled of whiskey. He stood very still. Only his dark eyes moved as he surveyed the surroundings.

  “’Tis an unused corner where ye may rest for the night,” she explained.

  He nodded slowly, somberly.

  Meggie took Colm’s walking stick and tossed it aside. As she attempted to ease him down into the pile of hay, he wavered. It all happened quickly after that. Meggie reached out to steady the swaying poet, but before she could blink, he had pulled her down with him. She landed atop the bard, her face against his neck. His warm, male, musky flesh.

  Her body thrummed.

  Merciful Mary! She could not lie so. Gasping, Meggie jerked upright. She straddled Colm’s hips.

  His eyes were closed; a grimace fixed on the dark, rugged planes of his face.

  “Have I hurt ye?” she whispered.

  He did not open his eyes. “Nay,” he replied in a hushed, dreamy tone.

  His lips were dangerously close, his steely body motionless beneath her. Meggie’s heart beat furiously. A feverish warmth, liquid and languorous, invaded her being. She dared not breathe.

  This was her opportunity to discover if what Niall had intimated about a poet’s preference was true. Could Colm not bear to be this close to a woman? Was that why he grimaced?

  If Meggie kissed him now, would she learn the truth? Certainly a kiss would tell. If he responded with passion, she would know the handsome rover might learn to love a country lass.

  It was not a decision to be debated. Action was required.

  Meggie dipped her head and brought her mouth down on the unsuspecting bard’s. She kissed Colm deeply, pouring her soul into her kiss. For a moment she thought she might whimper aloud from the hot, sparky tingling that started between her thighs and raced through her body.

  She tasted his salty lips, sighed as they parted beneath hers. Man, all man. Delicious.

  Meggie’s doubt vanished. Her body roared like a fire in winter. Alive with desire, she waited eagerly for what the rock of a man beneath her would do next.

  Chapter Six

  Cameron dreamed that the wild Irish beauty straddled him. With wanton abandon, she’d kissed him. He tasted lips as warm as sun-kissed clover, berry soft, and sweet as honey from the comb.

  Dipping into his rather experienced past, Cameron could not recall ever partaking of anything quite so delicious. Never before had a woman’s lips triggered a craving for more ... of her. Only her.

  But then, he had heard the Irish women were not so reserved as the English.

  Red-gold tendrils softly grazed his cheeks like a silken web. The scent of her enveloped him as if he lay in fields of lavender. And when she brought her lips down on his, her breasts pressed against his chest, sweet buds taut with arousal strained against her gown.

  A flood of warm pleasure rushed to his loins. It mattered not whether she was Irish or English; the feel of Meggie, her taste and scent, aroused him to an almost
unbearable state of desire. For a suspended moment in time, Cameron came dangerously close to losing his head, his resolve, his sense of purpose. ’Twas an exceptional dream. He had made love to the wild Irish woman. He’d had Meggie.

  But when Cameron awoke the next morning, all he had were fleas.

  Fleas posed a danger to any who slept in hay.

  A dull ache in his head matched the dull throb of his leg.

  Without even knowing he was a spy, Meggie Fitzgerald had contrived to prevent him from seeking information that could be used to the English advantage. She had shot him.

  And when he’d recovered enough to listen, to eavesdrop, and to ask questions during the Lughnasa celebration as was his duty, Meggie had provided him with whiskey. She’d directed Deirdre to serve him enough whiskey and mead to make him pass out before he could learn anything of import.

  With so many in attendance and loose lipped from drinking, Cameron had hoped to learn how the Irish rebels planned to defend Ulster. Instead, he had become annoyed with O’Donnell’s sudden appearance and subsequent dalliance with Meggie.

  When Cameron should have been keeping his ears open for information, he had fallen into a sulk when the duchess and O’Donnell left the great hall. With Deirdre’s help, Cameron had turned to the whiskey for cheer too often. The evening had ended ingloriously when he had collapsed in a pile of hay.

  He was a disgrace to his country. He had failed in the simplest of tasks. Worse, he feared what the Irish harridan might do next. She was a cunning woman.

  She had implanted herself in his mind. He could not seem to banish her.

  Cameron struggled to his feet. His legs wobbled unsteadily; his mouth felt stuffed with wool directly from the sheep’s back.

  Once his legs settled firmly beneath him, and aided by his walking stick, he made for the river just beyond the bailey.

  The dark indigo river wound its way from a small wooded copse of ancient oaks to feed the pond used as a trough by the herds of Fitzgerald cattle and sheep. No fences restrained the livestock. Their survival depended upon the shepherds staying alert, or at least awake.