by Karen Ranney
“Why shouldn’t I? Is there any reason you shouldn’t be consulted as to your opinion?”
“Send ships of food to them,” she said. “Wagonloads. Not for long. The Highlanders are proud. They don’t want to be cosseted, they want only what is necessary.”
He nodded as if he agreed.
Why had she come today? Would it have been better if she’d remained in her cottage? Perhaps he would move back to London or visit Edinburgh extensively, leaving her in peace as she had been before he arrived. Was it peace? Or was it only half living? She wasn’t entirely certain she wanted to know the answer to that question.
Granted, he annoyed her, even infuriated her, but he also incited her curiosity and her compassion. Nor could she, however much she might wish, discount the passion that flared so quickly between them.
“You’ve stopped asking questions about Amelia. Why is that?”
She sighed. “I do not wish to discuss Amelia because I’m not a saint,” she said. “I find being around extreme virtue to be rather tiresome. I am not without faults, McDermott, I know that only too well about myself. Even you know that about me,” she said, recalling her lies about her lovers. “But I do not need to be reminded on a constant basis that Amelia was a paragon of virtue. The woman is dead and can sin no more. She cannot do something foolish or stupid or inattentive. She can only become, as time passes, an even more virtuous figure.”
“I am not speaking of her character, Margaret, but her appearance. Do you not require more information about her appearance?”
“I have all I need at the moment.”
She picked up her brush again and tried to concentrate on her work. To her consternation, however, she was all too aware of the man seated on the other side of the room.
The silence ticked by, one ponderous second at a time. She didn’t speak, and neither did he. This time, it wasn’t a restful quiet. Instead, the air seemed filled with questions, curiosity, and something else, a feeling pulsing between them and almost shouting to be released.
Finally, he stood and approached her, but this time, he wasn’t content to stand at one side of the painting.
“How do you do it?” he asked. “I tell myself to stay away from you, and instead I find myself listening for that damned gun of yours. I tell myself you are a bohemian, an iconoclast, almost a gypsy, but it doesn’t stop me from climbing the damn roof for a sight of you. You annoy me and confuse me, yet I find I enjoy our conversations more than any I can remember in a very long time.”
He circled the easel, took another step toward her, and another. She stood her ground, holding her brush in front of her almost like a knight would a shield.
“I tell myself to have nothing to do with you, but I cannot help but remember your mouth. That damnable mouth of yours. And I want to kiss it again.”
One more step, and he was so close she had no choice but to step backward.
Her hand was squeezing the brush so tightly she was afraid she’d break the handle. She dropped the brush in the tray as he moved closer, his sheer size nearly overwhelming her.
Suddenly, she was against the wall and he was there, so close her bodice brushed the linen of his shirt. Her breasts pressed against his chest.
“Damn you,” he said softly, the words so softly spoken it was almost a caress.
“Damn your martyr’s soul,” she whispered.
“I hate your mouth.”
“No, you don’t.”
She gripped his shirt with both hands and pulled him to her. Without the slightest hesitation, she linked her fingers behind his head and stood on tiptoe, closing her eyes and tilting her head back.
His kiss was like hope to the hopeless, wine to the thirsty, pâté to the starving. Aquamarine, teal blue, crimson, gold, all the bright and brilliant hues of the spectrum swirled beneath her eyelids as she succumbed to the sheer joy of kissing McDermott.
She, who’d always thought herself such a private person, suddenly wanted to be naked in front of him. The morning sun would illuminate all her flaws, but she didn’t care. Let him measure the ugliness of a birthmark low on her abdomen, but let his fingers stray toward the nest of curls guarding her womanhood. If his hands cupped her breasts, marking them as too full for a woman her size, she would not demur, but please let his fingers stray across her nipples, and perhaps his lips. Her knees were particularly bony and were an embarrassment, but she would not protest if his palm strayed upward from ankle to thigh.
A sound emerged from deep in her throat, a sound of such yearning she was instantly embarrassed by it. She pressed one hand against his chest but he didn’t release her. Instead, he deepened the kiss as if the sound she’d made urged him toward seduction.
But, oh, it wouldn’t be seduction, would it? How did you seduce a partner? How do you urge capitulation on a woman who was already envisioning the sheer joy of being taken by you?
She moved her hands up between them and pressed her palms flat against his chest and pushed him away. Just as earlier, he didn’t move. Finally, however, he lifted his mouth from hers and stared down at her, his cheeks bronzed, his eyes glittering darkly. She pressed against his chest again and took one small step away.
“You mustn’t see the painting,” she said in a hoarse voice. When had it become difficult to speak? Reaching out, she covered the painting with the cloth.
“Even now, you think of your painting?”
He was not the first man to ask that question. The answer, however, was one she’d never given before. “One of us must be sensible.”
“Sensible?”
Oh dear God, she didn’t want to be sensible either. The sadness in his eyes had been burned away by passion. She reached up and kissed him again, knowing as she did so it was foolish, knowing it would lead to more because she couldn’t forbid him. Or herself.
He was too much of a temptation. He was like chocolate, or the finest wine, or a French pastry. But overindulgence was always a bad idea, and coupling with McDermott again would be hedonism of the worst kind.
Suddenly, she was free. She looked up at him, bemused, but he didn’t say a word. Instead, he pulled her out from behind the easel and walked to the middle of the room, to a large square patch of golden light on the carpet.
“Now,” he said, and there was no refusing him. Nor did she try, captivated by the feelings that were already spreading through her body.
His hands reached out and began unbuttoning her dress. She returned the favor by doing the same to his shirt, marveling at the expanse of chest she revealed.
He unbuttoned the bodice of her dress, placing small kisses on each inch that was bared. She was wearing too many clothes. She wanted to pull off everything and allow him to see her naked and flawed.
Amelia might have been beautiful. Margaret wasn’t.
Her fingers pressed against the broad expanse of his throat, trailed over his collarbone, and pushed the shirt gently from his shoulders. When the sleeves were caught at his wrists, she unbuttoned his cuffs one by one, smiling up at him when she finished.
He bent down to kiss the upward slope of her cheek at the corner of her eye, a strange caress that had her smiling again.
“Margaret,” he said, and her name was no more substantial than a whisper dancing on a sun mote.
“McDermott,” she said, making him smile.
How like children they were in that instant, silly and amused, yet at the same time intense and passion-filled adults.
It was easier to undress him than her, and he toed off his boots, before helping her with his trousers. In moments he was naked and she was down to her chemise, her hoops tossed in the corner, her corset lying in a jumbled heap at her feet.
She stood on tiptoe and brushed a kiss against his cheek. In seconds, he’d turned and pulled her into his arms, deepening the kiss and the embrace. His hands gripped her bottom, pulling her up against him. It wasn’t the cold that caused her trembling. The look in his eyes, and his harsh breathing as the kiss ended h
ad the power to destroy any poise she might still have possessed.
She laid her head against his chest and felt the most curious sensation, almost as if she were holding back tears.
In Russia, it would have been easy to manage a liaison with any number of devoted admirers. Had she found a man who interested her as much as her art, she would have planned a dalliance, perhaps. Her lover would have been invited to her home, after she’d indulged in a long soaking bath, had the maids change the sheets, placed flowers and beeswax candles in her boudoir, and sprayed the air with perfume from France.
Not once had she ever envisioned that passion would come on the trailing end of amusement on a sunlit winter’s morning in Scotland. Nor did she imagine she would be so impatient to rid herself of her clothes she’d toss them to the other side of the room, uncaring. Not one time did she think she would be laid down on a prettily patterned carpet and be uncaring about her trysting place.
Never did she imagine she would leave her painting for passion and feel as if she’d gained the better of the moment.
He kissed her, and she let him. No, more than let him. She participated, she enjoyed, she savored. Her mouth opened to allow the invasion of his tongue. Her breath mingled with his, her hands smoothed his chest. She felt herself go weak as her blood heated, almost like fire traveling through her body. Her breath escalated, her heart pounded furiously. Her body warmed, readying itself for him.
Suddenly, he was gone.
He stood, leaving her. She felt bereft without him, as if she were not totally whole unless he was there, touching her. How very odd that she’d acquiesced to such dependency. How very unlike her.
When had she begun to rely on McDermott? When had being with him become more enjoyable than being alone?
“What are you doing?” she asked, raising up on one elbow. How very strange that her voice trembled. She wasn’t afraid of him, but her entire body was shivering. Is this what passion did to you?
According to society, she skirted the edges of proper behavior, living just barely within the boundaries of decorum. She’d heard her name whispered by more than one giggling miss. More than once, she’d received a new visitor to her studio and watched as her guest looked around the space, disappointed, as if expecting to see satyrs and nymphs frolicking naked in the corners. More than one woman had asked her, over the course of her career, exactly what it was like to live such a daring life.
They would have all been shocked to learn that in actuality she was chaste, unlike the titled wives in the Russian Imperial Court.
Now, however, she was going to lie with the Earl of Linnet in the middle of the day, and do so without hesitation.
She watched as he unrolled the leather pouch holding her most precious brushes.
“Be careful with those,” she said. “They’re very costly, and it took me months of waiting until they were done.”
He smiled and nodded, but otherwise didn’t respond.
“I am not as wealthy as you, Your Lordship. If you damage one, I will not be able to replace it.”
He looked at her again, and she was pinned by the intensity in his gaze. It wasn’t sadness she saw, only a strength and power that rendered her silent.
“I have no intention of damaging your property, Margaret,” he said softly. “On the contrary, I was marveling at how fine your brushes were. What are they? Sable?”
“Those are. I have a mixture of brushes,” she said, feeling odd about conversing with him while she was lying naked on the floor. “Hog hair for the larger areas, sable for more delicate work. I’ve even experimented with mink.” She sat, pulling her legs up and wrapping her arms around her knees.
“Is this gold?” he asked, pointing to the ferrule, the metal surrounding the joining of the brush to the handle.
“Yes. And the handles are mahogany.”
“They’re very long, but heavier than I expected.”
“Designed especially for me. I like them weighted for my hand. They’re not as long as most,” she said.
“How very convenient,” he said, smiling.
He was up to something, but she wasn’t sure what.
The trembling was back in full force. How could she possibly endure the wicked provocation of his smile? Her nipples tightened, and the rest of her body warmed in preparation for his return or in longing for it.
She lay back down on the floor and stared up at the ceiling, attempting to sound nonchalant. “I didn’t like the mink,” she said. “The hair is different. I didn’t like the effect.”
He came and stood above her, a position of power, one of command or perhaps challenge. But McDermott did not subjugate. Nor did he overpower. Instead, he cozened her along for the adventure, urged her to share what he was feeling. They were conspirators in passion, equally at blame and equally pleasured.
His gaze encompassed her from the top of her head down to the tip of her toes. She returned the look, marveling at the perfection of his body.
Slowly, she raised her arms to him.
Somehow, in the intervening minutes, they’d ceased to be earl and artist. They were simply human, wanting and elemental, like fire and water and the air itself.
Kneeling beside her, he unrolled the leather case. In each of the ten separate pockets was one of her precious brushes, each designed for a different technique.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Anticipation is an integral part of pleasure, don’t you think?”
“I haven’t enough experience at pleasure to answer that question with any intelligence.”
He halted in the act of pulling a brush free from its pocket and looked at her, his eyes suddenly somber. “You haven’t, have you? So all that blather about your many lovers? It was all a lie, wasn’t it? Why?”
She looked up at the ceiling again. A mural should have been painted there, something interesting to study. But then, she doubted if the builders of Glengarrow had envisioned this scene of seduction.
“Does it matter?”
He pulled her fan brush free, his finger trailing across the featherlike hairs forming the semicircular brush.
“What is this used for?” he asked softly.
“Lace, fabric rosettes, anything delicate with a pattern.”
Slowly, he drew the brush across her skin, beginning at her throat. He stopped between her breasts, and twirled the handle, all while his gaze remained on hers.
“Why?” he asked again, and she didn’t bother to avoid the answer this time.
She turned her head to look at him. “Because it’s easier to pretend to be the person someone thinks you are than demand he look at you differently.”
He stroked the brush beneath one breast, then the other. “Because I thought you worldly and shocking?”
“Didn’t you?”
“You’ve confused me from the first moment I met you,” he said, his gaze on the action of his hand. “You’ve been unpredictable and challenging and maddening.”
“So have you,” she said softly.
The look they exchanged in the small yellow room was so intent that if the world had stopped outside, neither of them would have noticed.
She reached out and touched his wrist, then the back of his hand with her fingers. His skin was so warm.
He swept the brush up the slope of one breast, circling a nipple with a tender stroke. His smile was soft and almost predatory, wicked and not a little promising.
How could she possibly resist him?
“Do you like that?” he asked, as the fan gently caressed the very tip of her nipple.
“It’s a very interesting sensation,” she said.
“Is it?”
He moved to lie beside her on the floor, propping himself up on one elbow. He was drawing concentric patterns around each breast, then softly tapping at the nipple with the hairs of the brush.
“Tell me how it feels,” he said, his smile still firmly in place.
“Like air. As if you’re breathing acros
s my skin.”
“Like this?” He blew across one breast and the nipple puckered even harder at the sensation of his warm breath.
“No,” she said, hearing the tremulousness of her own voice. “Even more delicate than that.”
“Barely a touch, then. A whisper of a touch, you might say,” he said.
“Yes.”
She closed her eyes at his smile. Was her body capable of bursting into flames? She felt it might, especially from the inside out. Even though she lacked experience in passion, she suspected she would never feel more wanton and needy than at this moment.
He kissed her, but not as deeply as she wished. When she reached up with both hands to pull his head down, he pulled back and shook his head.
“Not yet,” he said. “I lose myself in your kisses, Margaret. I think it’s your mouth.”
“It’s too large,” she said. Was that her voice? When had it become so husky?
He pulled another brush free of her leather case. This one was more substantial, one she used to apply gesso to a new canvas.
Slowly, he drew a line from below her lips, over her chin, and down her throat to rest in the well there. Her skin was so sensitive and so attuned to his touch that she shivered when he bent his head and replaced the brush with his lips.
When the kiss ended, he didn’t meet her gaze. Instead, his eyes intently followed the path of the brush as it trailed down her skin, following the slope of her breasts and gently beneath them. He circled her navel with the brush, then across her abdomen to touch first one hip, then the other, as if he were planning a painting of her nude and wanted to mark her features on some mental canvas.
He turned to look at her, his eyes filled with heat. “Open your legs for me, Margaret.”
He was erect and hard against her thigh, and instead of answering him, instead of being compliant and meek, she stretched out her hand and touched him.
How very shocking she was supposed to have been and wasn’t, and how very proper he was rumored to be and how shocking in actuality. Something in her nature long suppressed, possibly ever dormant, rose to the surface and curved her lips in a smile as wicked as his.
His penis nestled into her hand like a bird come home to its nest. She stretched her fingers around it, marveling that she couldn’t encompass the whole of the organ in her grip. How very substantial he was. How very manly.
