Now it was Bliss who groaned, and not from pain. She decided to address him formally; perhaps that would serve to remind him of the proprieties. “We are not alone, Mr. McKenna,” she said.
He chuckled in the darkness, his hand still doing its devilish work. Soon enough he’d be up to real mischief. “Cutter sleeps like the dead,” he told her. “I could have you on the ladder to the loft and he’d never know the difference.”
The very idea made heat throb in Bliss’s face and caused a moist ache between her legs. “You forget yourself, sir,” she insisted, at once desperate and angry. “Furthermore, you’re in no condition for such goings on as—”
His hand left her breast to sweep down over her silken belly and dally dangerously close to the nest of curls where her womanhood was concealed. “As this, for instance?”
Bliss trembled and bit down on her lower lip to stifle a delighted cry as he found what he sought. She could see his grin in the darkness.
“You forget yourself, Mrs. McKenna,” he said.
Bliss’s legs moved apart as he thrust his fingers inside her. The sensation was new and delicious and it was all she could do not to blurt out a lot of silly words of surrender.
Gingerly, Jamie turned so that he could enjoy the breasts he’d bared, while subjecting Bliss to the sweetest torment she could have imagined.
“Oooooh,” she whispered in desperation as he intensified his efforts, driving his fingers deeper and, at the same time, using his thumb to caress her. “Jamie, Jamie—”
He circled one straining nipple with his tongue, made a sound that was half amusement and half misery far down in his throat, and drew from Bliss a comfort that the Scotch whisky waiting on the tabletop could not have given him.
Chapter 8
EVERY PART OF JAMIE’S BODY ACHED, AND NOW THE WANTING OF A woman had been added to the general malaise.
Beside him, Bliss slept soundly, well satisfied. Jamie allowed himself a moment or two of stark envy before letting out a long, ragged sigh. Even if he’d been able to forget the legal and moral requirements for an annulment, there was the little matter of the beating he’d taken. It would be a day or two, at least, before he’d be nimble enough for making love.
In the meanwhile, it was a sweet sort of torture to lie beside Bliss in a warm bed, well aware of the lush contours and silky feel of her flesh. Involuntarily, he recalled her wholehearted surrender to the small pleasures he’d offered her, and he swallowed a groan of need.
She stirred beside him, then lifted her head and asked, through a yawn, “Jamie?”
He closed his eyes for a moment, concentrating all his efforts on speaking normally. “Aye, Duchess.” The words sounded gravelly and harsh. “What’s wrong?”
Bliss yawned again. “I was going to ask you the same question.”
Jamie moistened his dry lips with his tongue. “Go back to sleep,” he said brusquely. “It’s nothing you can do anything about.”
Bliss immediately bristled; inadvertently, Jamie had stepped on her formidable pride. “I’m not so naive as you think, Jamie McKenna,” she told him stiffly. “You’re suffering from more than bruises and cuts.”
Jamie was annoyed. “Is that so? And exactly what malady would I be sufferin’ with, Duchess?”
Beneath the blanket and sheet, her hand touched his bare abdomen lightly, then progressed to the heart of matters. He gasped hoarsely and closed his eyes, and Bliss’s gentle amusement was all around him, like the scent of her and the feel of her skin against his.
“Oh God,” he whispered as she began a rhythmic stroking that must have come to her by instinct.
“Tell me how to please you, Jamie,” she pleaded quietly.
He gave a ragged chuckle. “You’re doing just fine, lass,” he responded. He knew he should push her hand away, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that. The sensations she was creating were too powerful, too exquisite, too compelling to be set aside.
Encouraged, Bliss became more confident—and more aggressive. All of a sudden, the blankets seemed to be crushing Jamie, holding in more heat than he could bear, and he tossed them back. The cool night air played over his sore body, making his desire all the more urgent. On and on the pleasuring went, stripping Jamie of all pretense and, for the moment, all pain.
He rasped Bliss’s name, over and over, when the joy grew almost beyond his tolerance. Then she lowered her head to taste him, and he lost his reason entirely. With a strangled shout, he arched his back in full surrender, and Bliss received him without hesitation or shyness, seeming to revel in his fulfillment, to share it.
“There, now,” she said, when the glorious storm of satisfaction had passed, leaving Jamie’s mind clear, “wasn’t that what you needed?” At some point before his thoughts had become coherent again, she’d fetched warm water and a cloth, and for a time she bathed his raw flesh, soothing him more with each caressing motion of her hand.
The washing was a kind of lovemaking in and of itself, and the tenderness he found in Bliss’s touch made Jamie want to weep. It wasn’t going to be easy, once they’d seen a magistrate in Auckland, to turn his back on Bliss and walk away. He had never known a woman quite like her.
Presently, she dispensed with the basin and cloth and cuddled close against Jamie’s shoulder, at the same time drawing the blankets up to cover them. Within seconds, Jamie slipped into the sweet, cosseting darkness that was sleep.
Jamie was up and fully dressed when Bliss opened her eyes early the next morning. Recollections of the night just past made her blush and slide beneath the covers to hide.
She heard Jamie’s bootheels striking the stone floor of the cottage as he came toward the bed at a pace only slightly slower than his normal gait. In another moment, he pulled back the blankets, just as far as Bliss’s shoulders, and smiled down at her.
“Hello, Duchess,” he drawled. “Having second thoughts, are you?”
Bliss glared at him, for she despised being teased, especially when she’d just woken up. Her cheeks burned as hot as the embers in the grate. A quick glance around Jamie’s right thigh revealed that they were alone.
“Where’s Cutter?” she asked, ignoring Jamie’s question.
“He and Dog have sheep to look after, love. They’ve been gone for hours.”
Bliss wasn’t sure whether being alone with Jamie McKenna was a plus or a minus, and she didn’t try to decide. Careful to keep herself covered, she sat up, yawning, and ran the fingers of both hands through her tangled russet hair. She started with pleased surprise when Jamie handed her a mug of fragrant coffee.
Milk and sugar had been added, and Bliss wondered idly how Jamie had known how she liked her coffee. He sat down, wincing a little, on the edge of the bed, while Bliss avoided his eyes and took a cautious sip of the hot brew.
“We need to talk,” Jamie said gently.
Bliss still could not look at Jamie; the things they’d done in that very bed the night before were too fresh in her mind. “About what?” she asked, and though she attempted to sound blithe, the effort was fruitless.
Jamie curled an index finger under her chin and lifted, so that Bliss had to choose between meeting his gaze and closing her eyes. She came very near to doing the latter, but in the end, her natural fortitude won out.
“About last night,” he replied. When he smiled, his handsome face all askew from the battering he’d endured, Bliss’s heart clenched painfully in response. Trembling a little, she took a sip of her coffee in an attempt to steady herself.
“Oh,” she said, and again she felt wildly embarrassed. If it hadn’t been for the mug of coffee, she would have burrowed back under the covers.
Jamie spoke with typical bluntness, but with sensitivity, too. “I’ve never known a woman to take hell and single-handedly turn it into heaven,” he said quietly. “Not before you, that is.”
Bliss swallowed. Jamie’s words were high praise, but it wasn’t as if he’d said he loved her, or that he would refuse an annulment.
And she was still not sure herself.
“Tell me how you met Cutter,” she said, when the silence lengthened to the point where she could no longer bear the strain.
Jamie grinned to let her know that she hadn’t fooled him, but his expression turned sober as he set himself to remembering. “When I came to New Zealand, those scars on my back were fresh. I was young and bitter, and though I had a friend who tried to help me, I went back to stealin’. Cutter took me in and taught me everything I’d yet to learn about the trade.”
Bliss closed her gaping mouth. “Cutter is a thief?”
Jamie gave a short, rueful chuckle. “Not anymore. He’s too old for the life. The—uncertainties of it were getting to him.”
“What about you, Jamie McKenna?” Bliss dared to ask, the half-filled mug grasped tight in both her hands. Dorrie’s words about Jamie’s mysterious transformation following a trip to Australia were clear in her mind, and her gaze dropped to the sleeve of his borrowed shirt. Beneath the fabric, she knew, was the scar he bore as a reminder of that journey across the Tasman Sea. “What brought about the change in you?”
A haunted look came into Jamie’s eyes, and even before he spoke, Bliss knew he was going to hedge. The brogue was further proof of his agitation. “We’ll be leavin’ this place while the sun’s ’igh, lass, so tend to what needs tendin’ and let’s be gone from ’ere.”
Bliss reached out and caught his hand in her own when he would have risen off the bed and walked away. “Jamie,” she insisted.
“I was in a fight,” he confessed, his tone grudging. “I tried to rob a man, and ’e got me knife away and near sliced off me arm.” Jamie paused, lowering his head for a moment. “’Twas an equal match, it was, but when I saw the beggar’s badge ’angin’ round ’is neck, the strength went out of me.”
Bliss touched the medallion Jamie wore. “The man was wearing one of these?”
Jamie nodded, his gaze still fixed on something long ago and far away. “Aye, Duchess—I’d jumped me own brother, Reeve.”
There was a short silence, then Bliss said gently, “I’m sure he’s forgiven you.”
“Aye,” Jamie said doubtfully, taking Bliss’s mug from her and rising from the bed. Even though he turned his back to her, he could not hide the depths of his emotions.
Bliss got up quickly and looked around for her satchel. Her shirtwaist and skirt were ruined, thanks to the bloody battle she’d fought the day before with Jamie’s knife, so she started to put on the only other garment she possessed—her black evening gown.
“The first thing we’re going to do in Auckland, Duchess,” Jamie said as he helped her with the fastenings at the back of the dress, “is get you some decent clothes to wear.”
Bliss felt her throat tighten. “Will that be before or after we have our marriage annulled, Mr. McKenna?”
His fingers hesitated in their husbandly work of hooking buttons. “Before,” he said, in a voice that revealed nothing of his feelings.
“I’ll send money to repay you as soon as I’m settled in America,” Bliss ventured, testing the emotional waters.
Jamie fastened the last button rather more forcibly than he needed to, giving Bliss an eloquent shake in the process. “I’ve told you ’ow I feel about that idea, Duchess. I don’t want to ’ear so much as the mention of that place again.”
Bliss whirled, raising angry eyes to meet Jamie’s. Blast that man, he didn’t want her for his wife, but he expected to dictate her every move all the same. “What place?” she challenged furiously. “America?”
His jawline hardened, but Jamie was too stubborn to rise to the bait. He turned his back on Bliss, struggled awkwardly into his buttonless coat, and stormed out of the cottage, slamming the door behind him.
Bliss muttered a few colorful words herself as she brushed her hair and went looking for something to eat. She was devouring a piece of bread when Cutter came in, nose red with the cold. His mild green eyes widened at the sight of her low-cut evening gown, and before he could stop himself, he’d given a low whistle. Dog, always at Cutter’s side, perked up his ears at the sound.
“No wonder the lad’s half out of his head,” the old man commented when he’d partially recovered from the shock.
Bliss had no idea what to say, given the fact that she didn’t know whether she was being complimented or criticized, so she simply dropped her eyes for a moment. Now that Jamie had told her about Cutter’s teaching him the finer aspects of thievery, she wasn’t sure how she felt toward the shepherd, but she did know that she was grateful to him. He and Dog had saved Jamie’s life the day before, and probably hers as well.
In the next moment, it became evident that Cutter was annoyed, though not with Bliss. “That hardheaded mick,” he muttered. “I tried to tell him he ain’t ready to do any traveling, but he just says to me, ‘Don’t tell me what to do on me own property, old man,’ he says.”
“His property?” Bliss echoed, surprised.
Cutter spread his big, hoary hands and arched one snow-white eyebrow in puzzlement. “He didn’t tell you?”
Bliss shook her head, more aware than ever of how very much she didn’t know about her husband.
“It’s all his, lass—the cottage, the land, the sheep. Me and Dog, here, we just work for Jamie.”
Bliss’s eyes widened. At the inn, she’d heard Jamie referred to as a man of property, but she hadn’t realized he had holdings beyond the place near Auckland. “He’s come by a great deal,” she mused, talking as much to herself as to Cutter. “For a man who was picking pockets a few years ago.”
Cutter grew red in the face in his desire to defend his friend. “Got it all honestlike, he did,” he declared angrily. “Jamie’s a smart lad and all he ever needed was a leg up.”
Before Bliss could respond to that, Jamie walked into the cottage, gave Cutter a quelling look, and said, “It’s time to leave, Duchess.”
Bliss rose from her chair and donned her coat, while Jamie took up her satchel. She went to Cutter and took both his hands in hers. “Thank you,” she said softly. “For everything.”
Cutter was clearly embarrassed. “ Twas no trouble, lass.” His gaze sliced to Jamie. “It’s nice to know some people is grateful when they gets a hand from a friend,” he added pointedly.
Jamie offered no reply.
“When you get to Auckland,” Cutter forged on, “give my regards to Miss Peony.”
First Eleanor, and now this Peony. Bliss’s curiosity was more than piqued, and she risked a glance at Jamie, who was glaring coldly at the man who had prevented his murder not twenty-four hours before.
“I’ll tell her you’re as windy as you ever were, old man.”
A charge of anger seemed to pass between the two men.
“The truth always comes out, Jamie boy,” Cutter returned, giving as good as he got. “I’d remember that if I were you.”
At this, Jamie turned without another word and opened the door. Cold air rushed into the cottage and made Bliss shiver. She had no choice but to follow Jamie outside; if she didn’t, she knew he would leave her behind.
“What was that all about?” she demanded when she and Jamie were both settled in the wagon seat and the rig was moving toward the main road. Bliss had already noted, with mingled uneasiness and relief, that there was a rifle lying on the floorboard, within easy reach.
Jamie shrugged, his jaw set in a stubborn line that brought out the same obstinacy in Bliss. “I’ve told you all you need to know about Cutter,” he said, after long moments of silence had passed.
Bliss folded her arms across her chest. “I’ll tell you what I think, Jamie McKenna—”
“Oh, I’m sure you will,” Jamie interrupted.
Bliss had been holding her breath, and a stream of words rushed out when she released it. “I think you didn’t want him to tell me any more about this Peony person, whoever she is.”
Jamie’s ice-blue eyes chilled Bliss more deeply than the cold ever could have when he look
ed at her. “You’re wrong there, Duchess,” he said tightly. “Peony is the best friend I ’ave in all the world. She’s closer to me than Cutter or even Reeve. Without ’er, I’d ’ave nothin’, for ’twas Peony that staked me to a new start.”
Bliss swallowed hard, so hurt by the tone and meaning of Jamie’s words that she didn’t trust herself to speak. She averted her eyes, and when she dared to look at him again, he spoke gruffly.
“That’s the way of it, Duchess.”
The brusque words were of no comfort to Bliss. She knew that she had been wrong. After all, she really had no right to question Jamie about his personal business. Her voice came out sounding strangled and hoarse. “Do you think we’ll be safe on the road?” she asked.
“Safe as ever,” he replied, shifting uncomfortably on the seat. It was obvious that Jamie was in severe pain, though he was doing his utmost to hide the fact, and Bliss wondered what had made him so anxious to leave the safety of Cutter’s cottage.
She had no more than completed this thought when the answer occurred to her: Jamie was eager to get to Auckland and rid himself of one unwanted wife.
“You look like your best friend just died,” Jamie commented, his voice so low that Bliss could barely hear it over the clatter of the horses hooves on the hard-frozen road. “Tell me what’s troublin’ you, Duchess.”
Bliss’s temper, always a dependable defense against emotional pain, flared to life. “Why should I, Jamie McKenna?” she fired back at him. “You won’t tell me any of the things that I want to know about you!”
Jamie’s gaze was level, and once again Bliss thought she saw a glimmer of amusement deep in his eyes. “Fair enough,” he said solemnly.
But Bliss hardly heard him. Spreading her hands, she cried, “I know you’re angry because my father made you marry me, but I notice you didn’t fight! You must be tough, or those men who kidnapped me wouldn’t have run off just because I mentioned your name, so I’m sure you could have handled my father. And Alexander—well, Alexander would have been no trouble at all—I think I could have trounced him myself!” She paused to draw a deep breath, then rushed on. “As for those rounders on the road yesterday, well, you wouldn’t have had any difficulty with them, either, I’ll wager, if you hadn’t left your knife with me!”
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