by Karen Ranney
He grabbed her elbow and pulled her farther away from the door to the ballroom.
She went willingly, in an excited, panicked rush of emotion. Was he truly going to kiss her? Was the most handsome man she’d ever seen truly going to kiss her? Did it count if he were soused?
He pressed her up against the wall. If she truly cared about the dress, she would’ve warned him that the wire cage for the panniers was old and easily bent. But she didn’t care about anything but the feel of his body against hers, the wool of his evening jacket gently abrading the exposed flesh above her breasts, and the look in his eyes.
She should have been chilled, but she felt heated from within. Was it his grin, slightly wicked and utterly charming? Or the promise of a kiss? Or was it her own daring, out in a storm with the Duke of Kinross?
He lowered his face slowly, giving her time to move away. Instead, she abandoned her wig and gripped his shoulders, keeping him in place. His lips were as soft as she’d imagined, but there her lack of experience showed. He slanted his head to deepen the kiss and she gasped in wonder.
His mouth tasted of warm whiskey.
She’d never considered that his tongue would sweep in to touch hers, or that he would nibble at her bottom lip as if she were a delectable piece of fruit. Nor did she ever envision that his hand would pull away the tight bodice and cup her bare breast.
Or that she would let him. Yes, and more. Whatever he wished to do, he could. Whisper in her ear, please, what he wanted and she’d allow it. Whatever manner of liberties. Whatever sin for which she’d ask forgiveness tomorrow.
Tonight was a dream come true. Tonight was the culmination of two years of watching and wondering. Tonight she wasn’t just one of the upstairs maids; she was Lorna Gordon and she was kissing the Duke of Kinross.
Her blood was heating, fire racing along her skin. The wind was blowing the rain on them and she didn’t care. The wool of his jacket was beginning to chafe, but she pressed herself closer to him.
Whatever happened, whatever ramifications came from this night, she wouldn’t regret it. How could she? However long she lived, she would recall these moments when the Duke of Kinross kissed her. When he pressed his lips against her neck and nibbled on her earlobe. He pulled the mask free from her face, but she didn’t care. Let him recognize her now, but it would be too late. She’d already had her kiss. She’d already spoken to him, and he’d talked to her as if she was a woman who intrigued him.
Marie Antoinette or Lorna Gordon—did it matter?
In the next instant she was free of the wig. Had the wind pulled it from her or had he done so? Again, it didn’t matter.
He thrust his hands through her hair, holding her head still.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, the words freezing her heart in mid beat. This, too, she would remember forever.
He mustn’t think she believed him. She was not so desperate that she was naive. Nor so foolish that she’d completely lost her wits.
“No,” she said.
“No?” He smiled against her lips. “I think I prefer yes.”
Her body seemed to know what to do in response to his touch and his words, but her mind was adrift in a whirlwind of confusion. Did she push him away? Or draw him closer? Did she protest? Or simply enjoy what was happening?
A warning bell peeled in her mind, but she smothered the sound.
Her lips tingled, her ears were filled with the rhythm of the rain and her own heartbeat. She felt earthy, elemental, alive in a way she’d never before been. Her skin was so sensitive that every place he touched with his lips either trembled or quivered, inciting a moan or a gasp from her.
She’d never once discussed passion with anyone, not even Nan, the only close female friend she’d ever had. The maids teased each other or laughed about a certain male servant and his reputation with women, but none of them had ever talked about desire.
Was that what this was, a feeling making her burn as fiercely as one of the falling stars she saw from the conservatory? She might explode from inside, leaving nothing but ashes where she’d once been.
He jerked on the material of her dress, freeing her other breast. She was nearly naked in the storm now and all she could do was moan when his lips left hers and trailed a rain-slicked path to a nipple. She wanted the taste of whiskey on her tongue at the same time she held his head in place against her breast. When he drew the nipple deep into his mouth, she moaned with pleasure.
She could barely stand for the sensations assaulting her. She was going to fall to her knees on the terrace.
She should break away. She should push him back. Her hands went up to grab his jacket, but her fingers curled around the lapels to pull him closer to her.
“I must have you,” he said, his mouth once more against her lips. “Now.”
His hands raised her skirts, her legs exposed to the blowing rain.
Where were you when you lost your virginity? Not on her wedding night to a man of good virtue and intent. Not laying there clutching the edge of the sheet with trembling hands, biting her lip with worry and barely disguised fear.
No, nothing so proper or expected. Not as a bride, but as an imposter. A woman dissatisfied by what Fate had brought her, evidently willing to trade the one asset she had for something more important. A memory, not simply of the Duke of Kinross, but of a passion so fiery, unexpected, and shocking, that it decreed what happened in those next moments.
Her legs were bared to the rain until it felt like she was being baptized by nature itself. Perhaps washed and readied, an offering to the duke’s ardent nature.
Do you take this virgin to be your sacrifice?
He reached down and with heated fingers found her, cupped her within the slit of her pantaloons. A gasp escaped her when his finger entered her, an invasion she’d never before considered. She wrapped her arms around his neck and moaned into his collar as his palm pressed up against her, teasing and spreading the moisture. Not nature’s rain, but her own.
He bent, his hands suddenly on her bottom.
The ballroom door opened.
“Alex?”
They froze.
Chapter 4
The duke grabbed her hand and pulled her with him away from the ballroom, through the storm. She ran to keep up with him, her breasts bared to the rain, forgetting about the wig, uncaring if the gold brocade was ruined.
Mary knew her. She paid attention to the maids at Blackhall, if only to criticize their industry to Mrs. McDermott. Mary would have recognized her in a heartbeat.
Evidently, the duke wanted to escape his sister-in-law’s detection as much as Lorna did.
They raced over the terrace and down the stairs. When he led them to the conservatory, she should have been surprised, but it seemed somehow ordained. This was where she’d watched him so often. This was where she’d yearned for him.
Wordlessly, he led her to a crimson velvet upholstered fainting couch tucked among the ferns. She half sat, half reclined, as he bent and kissed the rain from her breasts, paying such close attention to her nipples that she closed her eyes to savor the sensations.
His touch was fire and something more, the ability to weaken her knees and silence any warning. Passion made her a puppet, one without a mind of her own. When he stood and placed her legs up on the couch, she let him. When he slowly peeled back the layers of her skirt, tucking them at her waist, she didn’t say a word.
The lightning illuminated them as he traced a path with both palms from her thighs to her waist, pulling off her pantaloons. He jerked off his jacket, revealing his rain-soaked shirt only seconds before kneeling on the couch above her.
“I’m dreaming this,” he said, twirling his finger into her nest of curls. “Either that or this is a reward of some sort. I must have been very, very good at something.”
He pulled up his kilt.
Although the maids occasionally joked about a footman’s equipment, she’d never before seen a naked man. She reached up with bot
h hands and gripped his penis, marveling at the shape and size of it.
He closed his eyes when she touched him. She squeezed experimentally and his eyes opened, fixed on her.
Now was the time to jump up from the couch, explain that she wasn’t a woman of loose morals. That he had completely misunderstood her reaction to his kisses and his touch.
She didn’t say a word.
Instead, she rose up on her forearms, thinking that she was a decadent picture indeed. She lay before him with her breasts out of her dress, her dress bunched up at her waist, the skirt falling over the side of the couch.
She should have covered herself.
She would be concerned about her lack of maidenly reserve later. Right now she only wanted the ache to ease, and he was making it worse by delicately trailing his fingers along her intimate folds, teasing with a touch.
“Or maybe you’re just a drunken dream. Maybe I’ve imbibed more whiskey than I’ve thought.”
“Is that an effect of whiskey, then? I’ve never heard of it.”
“In this case, yes,” he said. “I wished for a distraction and there you were, standing by the terrace doors, looking as if you’d rather bolt than remain in the ballroom another minute.”
“I was feeling lonely,” she said in lieu of the truth. She’d been afraid he’d found her out, that he’d known she was just a maid at Blackhall.
He’d never seen her in that role, but he was looking at her now.
She would never forget this night. Would he remember?
“There were too many people and they all seemed happy.”
“I doubt one of them is as happy as I am at the moment,” he said, rising over her. “Or as happy as I’m going to make you, Marie.”
He smiled at her, a smile to forever remember.
The storm outside was equaled by the one she was experiencing. Lightning danced along her skin at his touch. Her ears were filled with the sound of her own thunderous heartbeat. Her body was raining as if preparing itself for him.
He lowered himself and suddenly he was inside her, the invasion shocking.
She bit her lip to keep from crying aloud.
He was swearing, a succession of oaths she’d never before heard. But he didn’t withdraw. Nor did he release her.
“You’re a virgin? Why the hell didn’t you tell me you were a virgin?”
She didn’t think she was capable of speech even if she had an answer for him.
He pulled back, and for a second she thought he was going to leave her. But he surged forward, driving her down into the padding of the couch. Again he pulled back before pressing hard against her, so deep she wondered if he meant to punish her for being a virgin.
He was still swearing as he thrust into her, each forward motion accompanied by a new word. When he raised himself up, his eyes pinned her to the couch as ably as his arms or his invasion.
The initial shock of his penetration was being cushioned by the growing moisture. Her hands wound around his neck. Her hips lifted, the discomfort easing slightly with each of his movements.
He seemed determined to brand her with his touch and make sure she never forgot the night she surrendered her virginity. How could she?
Bracing her feet against the velvet, she pushed upward, her assault as single-minded as his.
She never expected this. Nor had she considered that he would seduce her, if this was seduction. She’d never be able to enter the conservatory without envisioning this scene, her nearly naked and him with his kilt up around his waist, buttocks pumping.
They should both be shamed instead of entering wholeheartedly into this act. Not love, surely, but earthy sex, enjoyed for the sheer carnal nature of it.
Her body forgot that it was virginal. The soreness, the strangeness of his invasion, faded beneath more pressing needs. Her breasts ached for his lips, her core for something. He kissed her, his tongue thrusting. His fingers were strumming against her, creating unbelievable sensations. He held himself over her until she lifted her hips, her hands digging into his arms.
Every sensation was centered on his fingers and then his lips as he remained motionless and demanding.
“Damn you,” he said, bending to suck on a nipple. He thrust into her as if he had no choice, as if his body were a prisoner to the act.
Lightning revealed the tableau, erotic and wanton. The Duke of Kinross furious and erect. His maid moaning as pleasure sliced her in two.
He thrust into her once more, cursing as he came.
What had happened to them? Was this how lovemaking normally happened, in a furor of passion? Did you normally lose your mind? Did nothing matter but the taste of a lover’s lips or having him as close as physically possible? If Mary hadn’t interrupted them, they would probably have continued in the midst of the storm. He would’ve taken her there, against a wall, and she wouldn’t have raised her voice in protest.
The duke stood and walked to the windows, putting his hands against the glass and lowering his head between his arms.
Och, she was going to have to clean that in the morning.
He was still fully dressed. She, on the other hand, didn’t see how she could possibly put herself back together again, enough to escape to her room. She’d lost her mask somewhere, and where was the floury wig?
She sat up, pushing her skirt over her bare legs. She still had her shoes on, which was a good thing, since she only owned the one pair. There hadn’t been any slippers in the trunk, nothing that would have matched the once lovely gold dress. Perhaps it was best that no one asked her to dance. She would’ve clomped all over the ballroom floor.
“You picked the wrong fool,” he said, turning to glance at her.
She looked over at him as she struggled to tuck her breasts back in the dress.
“I don’t understand.”
His laughter echoed through the conservatory.
“Come now, of course you do. You and your associate no doubt thought I was ripe for blackmail. I’m a duke. I’m wealthy. Of course I wouldn’t want the scandal of tonight made public. Here I took a virgin without even knowing her name.” He leaned back against the glass and folded his arms. “What is your name?”
She’d seen him every day for the last two years, sometimes more than once. She’d passed him in the hall carrying piles of linens. She’d brought him more than one meal in the library. She’d taken tins of soap to his bathing chamber. She’d fluffed his mattress.
He’d taken her virginity, but he didn’t even know her name. Worse, he was accusing her of blackmail.
What would be more terrible to him, that he’d bedded a maid or that he would be portrayed as a lecher? She doubted either would bother him. His next words verified her thoughts.
“You can go back to your confederate and tell him I don’t give a flying farthing about scandal. Feel free to brag about your actions of this night. Only I doubt you’ll fare as well as I. Women don’t, especially if they’re light-skirts.”
The storm was finally fading; the bursts of lightning moving toward the horizon. He was only a dark shape against the glass.
She was fiercely glad she couldn’t see him; it meant that she, too, was draped in shadow. She needn’t guard her expression or smile falsely.
“Does that statement make any sense?” she asked, grateful her voice sounded so steady. “You admit to bedding a virgin and then, in the next breath, call me a light-skirt. Is your reasoning faulty because of the whiskey, do you think?”
“One is physical. The other is mental or perhaps a moral label. I’ve no doubt you were saving yourself for an episode like tonight. Nor do I doubt that you’ll find your calling soon enough.”
When she didn’t respond, he spoke again. “What? No outraged response? No tears?”
Slowly, she put on her pantaloons, wishing she were alone to dress.
“Would it make any difference what I said?” she asked. To her surprise, her voice still sounded calm. She was anything but. Her heart was racing and her
breath was tight.
“I suppose not,” he said. “I wouldn’t believe you.”
“I don’t think you believe anyone, do you? Do you imagine the world is out to take advantage of the mighty Duke of Kinross? How sad a life you must live to think that. How narrow and restricted.”
He didn’t answer her, but then she hadn’t expected a response.
She wished she knew where the towering white wig was, but it had probably been blown halfway to Inverness. She would just have to return the dress without the wig.
Standing, she faced his shadow.
“I always thought you were a prince among men,” she said. “Now I know you aren’t. You’re less than that. I’m not even sure you’re what I consider a man. Perhaps a mouse. A prancing, prattling mouse who’s afraid someone is going to step on his tail.”
As an insult, it had a lot to be desired. But she wasn’t going to stand there until she thought of something better.
He was more adept at wounding than she. She couldn’t even think of another thing to say to protect herself. She had acted the part of light-skirt, hadn’t she? She’d fallen into his arms without a word of protest. She’d let him kiss her and touch her. She’d not only capitulated, she’d enthusiastically participated.
She wasn’t a hypocrite. She hadn’t felt anything but pleasure in his arms. Once the deed was over, she wasn’t going to claim a maidenly reserve. The guilt she was experiencing was for not taking better care of the costume she’d borrowed, not for bedding the duke.
“I enjoyed it,” she said. “Whatever word you call me. I have no confederate. I have no intention of mentioning tonight to anyone. I’ll let you feel regret. I have no intention of doing so.”
She left before he could say another word.
Chapter 5
Wittan Village, Scotland
February, 1862
“You did what?”
Lorna stared at her friend, the words Nan had just spoken taking a moment to register.
