My Seduction

by Connie Brockway

  “Nothing blooms forever.”

  His simple denial touched Kate with melancholy. Time moved on. Roses died. Worlds changed. Winter always came. She reached out from her side and plucked a single blossom from the branch.

  Ah, yes. The magic was fading. Seen close, the satiny petals were lightly rimmed with brown; the dewy center had lost color and was more translucent than gold.

  “It’s sad, isn’t it?”

  He understood. He moved toward her. This time she didn’t shy away from him like some scared sleek little cat. She stood quietly, pensively regarding the flower. He reached over her head and gave the branch a sharp tug, sending cascades of petals down to veil her dark hair and cloak her shoulders. She looked up at him in surprise.

  “Kiss me,” he said.

  She drew back, and he followed her; when she would have darted past him, he reached out, grabbing hold of the trellis and barring her way.

  “You said I would have nothing to be afraid of.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “I think I am.”

  “You needn’t be,” he said, striving for a calm, light tone. He wanted her. He had never wanted anything as much as he wanted to taste her mouth, to bury his hands in her jet hair, and crush her to him. But he wouldn’t. “But I cannot help it if you choose to be afraid of nothing.”

  “You are not nothing.”

  She’d brokered a twisted smile from him after all. “But I am. Nothing to you. Just an anecdote to recall some day when you are bored.”

  She blushed furiously, hating that his words so closely echoed her earlier thoughts. But she had never intended him to be the anecdote. Never that. She couldn’t stand for him to think otherwise.

  “And if I kiss you, you will let me go?”

  “I’ll let you go whether you kiss me or not,” he said. “I am simply pressing my suit.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.” To prove his point, he dropped the arm barring her way. She looked at him, trying to read his heart in his eyes. But that he kept well guarded, secret even from himself, so how could she hope to divine its intent? And that, finally, is what decided her. He was too dangerous, after all.

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured, ducking her head and scooting past him.

  He grabbed her wrist, spun her around, and pulled her into his arms. She had a glimpse of arctic eyes burning with emotion, of his face set in rough and hungry lines.

  “Don’t hurt me.”

  He canted back as if she’d struck him, but then…

  “Christ!” he muttered thickly and seized her head between his big, scarred soldier’s hands. She closed her eyes tightly and waited, unable to control her shaking but perversely wanting this now that the moment was here, now that all choice had been stripped from her.

  “Damn it!” He swore again under his breath, harsh, angry, rough words.

  “Please.”

  He kissed her, at first nothing more than a touch of his lips as soft as the petals under their feet. A whisper caress of his mouth, utterly unexpected, utterly undoing her. With exquisite tenderness he siphoned her breath from her, gently, softly, brushing his lips over hers again and again, sweet… but sinful, each kiss milking her of her will, stealing her thoughts and burying them in sensation. He paused to tease each corner of her mouth, then with shattering delicacy drew the tip of his tongue down her neck in a slow, melting path and… oh, dear God! Deliberately, he licked the pulse fluttering in the hollow at the base of her neck.

  Her knees went then. She flung her arms around his neck to keep herself from slipping to the floor.

  “Kiss me. Once. One kiss,” he muttered urgently, shifting one arm around her waist to support her. With his free hand, he looped her braid around his fist and tugged her head back, making her neck more accessible to him.

  “What can it mean to you?” he demanded hoarsely. “Why wouldn’t you— Please. Don’t make me take. Give.”

  She wanted nothing else.

  Her mouth opened beneath his, hungrily answering the heated demand of his kiss. With a dark sound of want, she gave herself over to his embrace, wrapping her arms more tightly around his neck, her fingers spearing through the cool, silky hair as she returned his kiss. A pleased sound rumbled up in his chest as his mouth slanted across hers, his tongue sweeping deeply into her mouth.

  A riptide of want seized her, surging in her, through her, propelling her toward a crescendo, a crest, long suspected, never quite achieved. She felt his hands race down her back to clasp her hips and pull her abruptly into him. Longing became need, coursing out from and into that apex of her thighs. The sudden, potent pleasure vanquished coherent thought, and she became a creature dedicated to fulfilling her body’s demand for satisfaction.

  It had been so long. Too long.

  She pulled his head down, wanting more, more lush tongue mating, and more heated, breath-ending kisses. More of him, big and hard and yearning, straining with desire, a torch to the dry tinder of the years, needs she’d never recognized let alone voiced. She wanted… She wanted…

  “No.” His hands clamped onto her shoulders in a painful grip. Roughly, he pushed her away. She stumbled, and if not for his hands gripping her arms, she would have fallen. Uncomprehendingly, she gazed up into his angry, strained face, still too caught in the web of desire to feel any embarrassment yet, or to feel anything other than confusion and frustration.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, disoriented by the sudden shift, the rent in the fabric of pleasure.

  “I swore you’d find no harm at my hands.”

  “Is this harm, then?” she asked breathlessly, searching his glittering green eyes. She didn’t believe it.

  His face tensed with some inner turmoil, and when he spoke it was through clenched teeth. “Yes.”

  She frowned. Reached out to touch him. He flinched as if her fingertips would burn him. “But—”

  “Damnation!” he exploded. “Ten minutes ago you were begging me not to hurt you, and now, Mrs. Blackburn”—he said her name as if, in calling her by her husband’s surname, he had erected a physical barrier between them—“now I am endeavoring to do as you bid me.”

  Each word was bitten off, hard and rife with control, and he held his body as unyielding as his tone. “I won’t hurt you. I swear it. But, the devil take it”—his voice shook—“it would prove a great deal easier if you would aid rather than hinder that effort!”

  “Oh.”

  Oh. His body felt exposed and raw. The simple kiss he’d thought to use as an antidote against her allure had proved lethal, shattering his intentions and nearly bringing him to his knees with desire for her.

  He’d been deceiving himself, and he’d known it from the first: Kate wasn’t like any other woman. She didn’t taste or feel or move under his hands or mouth like any other woman. No other woman in the world, no matter how many he bedded or what exotic bents he pursued, would ever be her. The knowledge was a torment, and he cursed himself for so willingly being a victim of his self-delusions.

  He stared at her, and his hands dropped abruptly away, knowing that if he held her an instant longer, he’d drag her back into his arms and— He closed his eyes, fighting primal instinct. If only his senses would stop working. If only he couldn’t see the ripe, nearly bruised color of her mouth and hear the breathy catch in her voice. If only he didn’t smell the faint astringent tang of her soap mixing with the heady fragrance of the crushed roses. If only he didn’t still feel the satiny cool fall of her hair between his fingers. But his senses still worked. He still thirsted.

  Kisses only fed the appetite that had been born three years ago in her father’s barren drawing room and that he’d nurtured during long marches in the blasted furnace of the Indian desert. Imagination was supposed to have been better than the reality. That’s what he had always told himself. But it had been a lie. Her mouth, sweet and rich, her body, supple and warm—nothing in his imagination compared to the last few minutes.

 
And all she could say was “Oh.”

  He could either laugh or go mad. So he laughed.

  She blinked up at him, the hazy disconnected glow in her dark eyes slowly growing sharper. The languid, questing expression dissolved, replaced by an unreadable, and therefore utterly feminine, one. She stepped back.

  She regarded him soberly, and one dark winged brow rose for a second before she turned and headed back down the path. He’d be damned if he knew the question that elegant brow had asked.

  But then, he’d probably be damned anyway.

  THIRTEEN

  THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN LOW PLACES AND EXTREMELY LOW PLACES

  “YOU’RE CERTAIN YOU WOULD not like one of us to accompany you?” the abbot asked, studying Kate intently. The good priest had asked her specifically into his offices and just as specifically had asked Kit to wait outside. The door was thick. They could not be overheard.

  “Oh, no,” she answered serenely. “I’m sure your monks would do far more good here rather than chaperoning me.”

  The crystal rosary made a delicate clicking sound in the abbot’s hand, his gaze contemplative and remote. “There was a time I would have quite confidently entrusted your welfare to Christian. But I do not know him as I once did.”

  “I do.” She spoke with absolute conviction. Kit hadn’t wanted to stop kissing her, and she… well, she wasn’t ready yet to examine the reasons for her behavior. Suffice to say that she had been quite willing to continue kissing him. Only Kit had stopped it. Because, quite simply, he would not allow injury of any variety, or from any source, to come to her. Including from him.

  No, she had no fears that Kit would make another attempt in that vein. Which ought to make her happy. And did. Mostly. When it was not vexing her with half-realized questions and fully formed, and extravagantly improper, speculations.

  “I am as safe with Christian MacNeill as I am with Brother Martin.” She sounded petulant, even to her own ear.

  The abbot smiled. “As you will.” He raised his hand; the young monk at the door opened it, and Kit came in at once.

  “You’ve adequately warned her of my myriad short-comings, I presume?”

  “I have tried.”

  “But she wouldn’t take your good advice.”

  “Nor my offer to have someone accompany you.”

  “Well, that’s fortuitous, since I wouldn’t allow anyone to come, regardless.”

  “Christian—”

  “No, Father Abbot. She’s mine and mine alone until I—”

  “Fulfill your duty,” Kate interrupted, deciding to put an end to this nonsense. She looked at the abbot. “Believe me, sir. I am in no danger from Mr. MacNeill.”

  “There is more than one type of danger,” the abbot said. “Have you considered that the marquis might find your arrival in the sole company of this man improper?”

  “I am convinced I can explain matters to his satisfaction.”

  Kit grinned at the abbot. “How can he take exception to the lady having a driver?”

  “Father Abbot,” Kate said, ignoring him and rising, “I thank you again most sincerely for your kindness as well as your hospitality.”

  She turned to Kit, her expression inscrutable. What had happened to the breathless siren who’d responded so passionately to him yesterday? He knew, damn her. She had disappeared, replaced by this smooth-faced society beauty who had been recalled to her purpose by the mention of the marquis. His jaw tightened.

  “Now, unless the abbot has further warnings or instruction?” She looked at the abbot. He shook his head. “I think we can leave, Mr. MacNeill.”

  Kit bowed with sardonic grace. “As you will, ma’am.”

  As soon as they left St. Bride’s, snow began to fall from a heavy sky, drifting across the road and glistening from the shadows beneath the trees. Kate fell silent, wrapped in the brown robe the monks had given her. The journey was not going as she’d anticipated.

  Not that she was perfectly clear on what she had anticipated, but it wasn’t this excruciating silence. And yes, it had occurred to her that after yesterday there might be some awkwardness to overcome before they were quite back on friendly terms. Friendly? She wasn’t certain she could call their relationship that—but certainly… communicative. Yet ever since they’d left the abbey, Kit had acted as if she was a stranger, someone whose companionship was to be tolerated, not encouraged.

  “Don’t be afraid of me.” He finally broke the silence.

  “I’m not,” she said. Whatever she had anticipated him saying, it hadn’t been that. Even though he had instigated the kiss, he had also been the one who had ended it. And that is precisely why she had trusted him to take her to Clyth.

  “I would never force myself on you— Damn,” he burst out. “Why should you believe me? I have already committed that offense, haven’t I?”

  “Of course you will not force yourself on me,” she replied calmly. “You are a gentleman.”

  He laughed at that. “I am no gentleman, ma’am. I am the bastard son of a Scottish whore.” His word cracked like a whip, stinging her but laying him open. She saw the wound in his eyes, saw him brace himself against it.

  “I am sorry.”

  He shook his head in angry exasperation. “I don’t want your pity, I want you to see things as they are, not be seduced by the tales of daft old men so long gone from the world that they don’t know truth from fancy.”

  She shook her head. “The abbot isn’t daft, and I think he is well aware of what is real and what is not.”

  “Then I wish he would have taught me that trick of discernment,” Kit replied.

  “He told me about your heritage.”

  Kit sighed. “Did he? Let me guess. He told you we were the sons of the last great Scottish chieftains.”

  She nodded.

  “And even though our births might not have been legitimate, we were still the true heirs of the Highlands. Brave, braw warriors of the old blood.”

  “Yes.” That is exactly what the abbot had said.

  Kit regarded her with something like pity. “He told us the same when we came to him. But it’s just a child’s tale, told to make a bitter world a bit more palatable.”

  No. It wasn’t true. And even he did not fully believe that claim, she could see it. The abbot had seemed not only earnest, but utterly calm, with the sort of calm that only complete conviction can convey. “I don’t believe that,” she said stubbornly.

  “I am not a gentleman, Mrs. Blackburn. I am wholly my mother’s son. You’d do well to remember that next time you ascribe gentlemanly motives to me.”

  “Who are you trying to punish?” she asked. “Me, for believing the abbot? Or you, for not?”

  For a long moment he drove, his body rigid, his jaw squared.

  “Kit,” she said tentatively, not liking the dark and empty expression in his eyes. “You mustn’t—”

  “Mind the road for any travelers. We’re getting closer to the coast.”

  There were no travelers.

  Hours passed one into another with him answering her queries with nods. When he did speak—and that was rare enough—he took pains to address her formally, seeking now, quite openly, to put distance between them.

  The bracing tang of pine and fir replaced the wet, loamy scent of the vale as they drove up into the blue-green stands of pine. Toward dusk, Kit spied a croft and drove to the door. “Hold Doran while I see to the inside.”

  He handed her the reins and disappeared inside. He returned in a few minutes and, with only the most cursory touch, aided her descent. She ducked inside and saw that he’d already set a fire below a cutout hole in the ceiling. He hadn’t followed her in, and when she turned, she saw that he’d unharnessed Doran and was placing a bridle on him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I want to look around,” he answered.

  “Where?” she asked.

  “Up the road a ways. I’m not sure of my bearings anymore. I want to ride about a bit
and see if I recognize anything.”

  It was a palpable lie. How would he have known about the croft if he didn’t know the area? Before she could remark on it, he grabbed a handful of mane and vaulted astride Doran’s bare back. He looked down at her, and she knew that her heart was in her eyes, her old fear of being abandoned filling them.

  With a muttered curse he reached down and cupped her chin roughly in his hand. “Don’t look like that,” he said harshly. “I promise I will be back. I promise you will come to no harm here while I am gone.”

  “If I ask you to stay, will you?”

  His gaze grew tortured. “I promised I would do as you asked, did I not?”

  “Yes. But, would you stay?”

  “I would do anything you ask.”

  “Would you stay?”

  A heartbeat passed. “Yes.”

  She nodded somberly. “Then I won’t ask.”

  He touched his heels to the gelding’s side and rode.

  Only a few dull embers still glowed on the stone hearth when Kate awoke. She peered groggily into the near-perfect darkness of the windowless croft. A horse nickered outside, and she heard a man speak soothingly to it, his voice low and exhausted. MacNeill.

  She hadn’t doubted he would return. Not for a minute. Not even when the fire had burned low and the wind had begun its plaintive whisper and darkness had spilled from the sky like a dead bride’s veil. He’d been near all along, watching over the croft. She hadn’t seen him. She hadn’t needed to. She’d just known.

  She heard the door creak and opened her eyes a little. For a brief instant, he stood silhouetted against the star-strewn sky. Then the door clicked shut and the room fell into a deep darkness. She heard the crackle of the fire as he fed it more fuel, and a few seconds later golden light bathed her. She rolled her head over onto her arm and studied him through half-opened eyes.

  He sat by the fire with his back against the wall, his knees bent, his hand resting on them, the fingers lax. He was watching her, his eyes catching the occasional flare of firelight as the crimson light played fitfully over his face, stark and strong and hard and predatory. Like the ghost of some ancient Celtic king.