Every Time I Love You

by Graham, Heather

  James had warned him that it would be a trick. The British already had arrest warrants out for a number of men in Boston. This isn't Massachusetts, Percy argued. If and when the colonies chose the path of separation, Virginia would stand hard and firm—it would be the British who would run, the Tories who would be called traitors.

  That time had not yet come, James had told him.

  Percy idly crossed his ankles, and leaned back against the bark of the tree. A wistful smile touched his features, and the night breeze blew a lock of ebony-dark hair across his forehead.

  None of it mattered, Percy knew. If she brought with her the sure promise of hell and damnation, he would be here still, waiting for her.

  There seemed to be a sudden whisper in the wind, a rustling in the foliage. Percy quickly slipped beyond the tree and waited, his heart pounding. Someone in a dark cape and hood moved about in the darkness.

  Katrina had not known that it would be quite so frightening. At night, with the darkness growing and the trees seeming to wave and weave ominously, the town itself seemed very far away. Moving from doorway to doorway, tree to tree, trying to blend with the darkness, she had thought again and again that she should leave. She should run. She should disappear.

  There would be nowhere to run. Nowhere far enough away to run. She had wanted to come closer to Percy Ainsworth. She had wanted to touch him. Like a moth, she'd had to kiss the flame, and now she was doomed to pay. It was a bitter irony.

  A night bird shrieked suddenly in the darkness, and she nearly cried out. She could barely distinguish the horses in the corral. She could hear the distant strains of conversation and laughter coming from the tavern. Inside, she knew, small bands of men met. They talked and they talked. They toiled, wrote, and planned. Rebellion. They were traitors. They were all traitors. And Percy was one of them. She had to remember that.

  She could not see him. The sun had fallen completely; the moon—a half crescent—was making a slow ascent into the night sky. Katrina swallowed briefly, remembering all the old tales she had heard about Indian raids. There were no Indians around here now. They were long gone. She was still afraid of the darkness, of the whisper of the wind, of the skeletal fingers of the trees.

  “Percy?”

  She whispered his name and stepped into the clearing. A sound came from behind her and a hand clamped over her face. She tried to scream, but the hand was too tight, and she was dizzy and weak with the terror of it.

  “Shh! It's me!” She heard his voice, quiet and commanding. He didn't release her though, not until he had taken her back into the shadow of the elms. When they were there, he tossed back the hood of her cape, and he stared down into her eyes.

  They were cobalt by night, a tempest of emotion. He mustn't be fooled, he warned himself. “You are alone?” he asked her.

  She nodded.

  “What are you doing here? You ran rather briskly before, if I recall correctly. You swore that you hated me, and you ran.”

  She tried to lower her head. He caught her chin and raised her eyes back to his. “I am alone!” she told him. “And—and I do not hate you.”

  Her heart seemed to hammer and slam against her chest. She could not go through with this. Her brother and his loyalist friends were fools; they did not know him. They had not encountered ebony eyes that could sparkle with laughter and darken like the devil's own with suspicion and mistrust. He was young, with the passion and aggression of youth, yet full grown to power; and through the fascination, the fear remained.

  “Why have you come, Katrina?” His voice was harsh, uncompromising. Tonight he was not the man who had whispered so eloquently of love.

  “I wished to see you.”

  “Why?”

  She stared at him, then ran from him toward the fence where she stared out into the darkness of the corral. “Mr. Ainsworth,” she said softly, “surely you've room for some compassion and mercy in your heart!”

  He came beside her. “Don't play the flirtatious little coquette with me anymore, Katrina. I am not one of your brother's fool lackeys in a red coat or high-court macaroni fashion. We have played this game too long. You know that I love you and you know that I want you. So tell, simply, why are you here?”

  He caught her shoulders. He slowly turned her around. He ground his jaw down hard, fiercely reminding himself that she was the sister of Henry Seymour. She was a well-bred young lady from a sheltered home. He had moved too quickly with her. He could not bear her playing the flirt, but neither would he tread anything but gently with her. He would take care when he touched her. He would recall the innocence of her eyes and the angel's pale gold of her hair in order to stem the flow of urgency that came from the seductive feel of a woman's form within his arms. But still, he would have the truth from her now.

  He lowered his voice but spoke still with a ruthless command. “Why, Katrina?”

  “Because I am sorry!” she whispered.

  He looked down at her for several long moments. He smoothed his thumbs over her cheeks tenderly. He thought that her skin was like silk. She was so very young and beautiful.

  He looked from her to the darkness of the road beyond them; then he gazed across the corral and pasture to the door of the barn. He looked around them both again and saw nothing but the darkness of the night and the shapes and the forms of the horses and the trees and, in the far distance, the rolling landscape.

  “Come on,” he told her. He slipped the hood back up about her head and face and set his arm around her shoulders. Quickly, he led her across the open space to the barn. Inside, he closed and bolted the door, then fumbled in the darkness to find the lantern. He lit it and raised it high, setting it into the bracket by the door. He wandered on into the barn. In the center of it he paused, drawing his frock coat from his shoulders, folding it neatly over the gate of a stall. He turned back to Katrina, who still hovered in the doorway.

  He bowed to her. “May I take your cloak, milady?”

  She shook her head nervously, remaining where she was. Percy did not come to her. He was different tonight. He taunted her, took what he wanted; but always he was eloquent and somehow gentle. Tonight he seemed to prowl with vibrant energy. The air was charged around them and she wondered at herself, incredulous that she had come here with him, alone.

  She knew what he wanted of her. Once she had been so haughty, and now she doubted her own ability to resist him. His kisses were a narcotic that robbed her of strength; his touch was a drug that set fire to her very soul.

  But he did not touch her then. Perhaps he knew her treachery. She feared him if he did.

  He walked on farther, then sat against the high pile of hay stashed in the corner, stretching out his long legs, grinning to her as he selected a piece of the stuff to chew upon.

  “The accommodations are not much, I must admit. But do have a seat.”

  She smiled and he loved her smile. She was shy and nervous here, but it came so quickly to her lips. She stepped into the room, not far yet, but closer. At last she paused where he had done so, and she untied her hooded cloak at the throat. It fell gracefully from her, and she laid it with his coat upon the stall gate. She was so, so beautiful, he thought. Her hair was down, no ties to bind it this night. It was a golden wave that cascaded about her, and he could not help but imagine it spread beneath her or wound around his naked flesh.

  Fool, he warned himself, do not think such thoughts. He could imagine himself going to Lord Henry Seymour—and asking for his sister's hand in marriage. Lord Seymour might well have apoplexy.

  He patted the hay beside him. “Come. Sit. I promise, I am no wolf. I will not bite you.”

  “Ah, but dear sir, I believe that I have been bitten!” She grinned quickly, with a flash of sultry humor touching her eyes, and he wondered fleetingly what she was thinking. He was convinced of her innocence—but maybe all women were born with the ability to seduce.

  Or maybe just a few...

  She set a hand upon the structural pole
and swirled around it. “It is dangerous to come too close.”

  He shrugged, chewing idly on the hay, but watching her more carefully. “Dangerous, Katrina, for which one of us, I wonder?”

  She stood silent, and he thought again that she was so beautiful. She was like a young doe that night. It seemed that she would bolt again, when she had only just come.

  “Katrina!”

  She turned to him.

  “It is done,” he warned her. “The games are over. The teasing and the flirting—they are done. If you have come to taunt me again, I warn you, run now.”

  She lowered her head. “If I have taunted you, I am sorry. But you, Percy, are as guilty as I, for you were first to drag me here.”

  “Aye. But you see, I always knew that I loved you.”

  She looked up, startled at the tenderness in his tone.

  Percy stood, pushing himself up from the hay. He came over to her and took her hands in his own. He wanted to tell her that she must choose her side, and that her choice must lie with him, for he did love her. He looked at her, and all he saw was the liquid beauty of her eyes and the shining, rosy moisture of her slightly parted lips.

  He kissed her.

  He held her fragile chin in his hand, and he kissed her. Her lips were parted and she offered him no protest, and he filled her mouth more fully with the taste and texture of his own, sweeping each sweet crevice with the seduction of his tongue. Her arms were around him too. Hesitantly, she returned the kiss. Her hands fell upon his shoulders; then she grew bolder, and her fingertips raked through his hair. She darted the pink tip of her tongue against his lips and over his teeth.

  He swept his arms around her hard, and he brought her to the hay, still kissing her. And when they fell there his lips continued to know her, to seek, to devour, to savor, and taste. He stroked her throat with the brush of his fingers, and he kissed it. Her breasts, high, young, firm, beautiful, were pressed full against her bodice, and he buried his face within their shadowed seduction. He felt her tremble, and he rose above her and saw that her breath came fast and shallow, that her eyes, wide and dilated, were upon him with the cornflower color of a cloudless day, innocent, and beautiful...

  And trusting.

  His own hands trembled.

  He set them against her bodice, pulling upon the ribbons there and the ties and the bindings. Her breasts spilled free to him, and his caress upon them was the most tender touch he had ever dealt. And then tenderness was lost because a passion unlike any he had ever known seized hold of him, and he meant to seduce her quickly, and with no mercy.

  Tease him, Henry had ordered her. Flirt and cajole, and play the haughty minx, my dear, as you are so very fond of doing. Laugh and smile and bat your lashes, for the fool is falling in love with you. Talk to him, and bring me names and dates and places.

  Talk to him...

  Her brother's words left her mind as quickly as they had come, for Henry was the fool. Percy was different.

  And she was the fool, for she was falling in love with him. She could not flirt; she could not cajole. Henry did not understand; this was no boy, but a man. She could do nothing but follow his lead, and where he led, she ached to go.

  She moistened her lips, staring up at him. She had to stop this now. “Percy!” Her voice was breathless. “No! We mustn't—”

  “Why did you come?” he demanded harshly, his eyes nearly black.

  “Because—”

  “Why?” The single word was snapped so abruptly she felt as if she had been physically struck.

  “Not for this—”

  “So you do play the tart, the tease, the whore—”

  She slapped him with all her strength. Startled, he brought his hand to his face. Katrina shoved against him, struggling from beneath him. “Don't you ever—”

  “No!” She was upon her knees. He caught her wrists. He dragged her back to him, holding her close. “Damn you, Katrina Seymour! It is over, haven't you understood? If you come to me as a woman, then so help me, I will have you as one!”

  “Damn you!” She cried out to him. “Damn you for being a bastard and a traitor!” She was close to tears. Her breasts were bare and forced to his chest, and the air sizzled with the fierce crackling color of his eyes, with the tension in his words.

  “Let me go!” She demanded. She could feel him with her bare flesh, and she longed to tear away his shirt. She wanted to run, yet with an ever-growing desire she wanted this to go on, to go on forever and forever. She wanted to discover the path where he would take her. “Let me go!” She pleaded again. “I swear that I hate you!”

  “Bitch!” He swore. But his fingers threaded into her hair. Harshly he lowered his face to hers and he kissed her. He kissed her until her lips were swollen, until he and she were both breathless. Until the sizzling tension taken from the air entered into them and began a molten fire that swept through their limbs.

  He moved his lips just slightly from hers. “I love you, Katrina Seymour. Deny that you love me too, and I will let you leave.”

  She opened her mouth. She wanted to deny him. No words came to her. She shook her head desperately.

  He pressed her back into the hay. He kissed her lips and her forehead and her throat. Then his mouth fell against her breasts. He laved and suckled and grazed his teeth over her nipples, and the wildfire seized her. She clutched his head against her and she whispered to him and she didn't know what she said herself.

  He stared at her then, watching her eyes as he removed her shoes and her stockings. His fingers teased her abdomen as he worked at the drawstrings of her pantalettes and petticoats. She began a tremendous trembling as she felt his fingers against her bare abdomen.

  He kissed her again and then maneuvered her to free her hooks, to pull her muslin gown over her head. He tossed aside her stays and laces, and she suddenly realized that she lay before him completely naked in the hay.

  With a soft cry, she came to him, needing his arms around her to hide that nakedness. “No,” he whispered to her, and he laid her back in the hay and spread her hair against it.

  Upon his knees he hastily shed his waistcoat and his shirt. Supple muscle rippled in the darkness. He shifted to free himself of his boots and hose and then his breeches. She closed her eyes and then opened them and she shivered, but even as she did so, her eyes widened and she thought that he was beautiful. Truly beautiful.

  His hands scorched a path of silk and fire against her flesh. He kissed her and kissed her and was so fevered himself that should she speak, he could probably give no mind to her...

  He was glorious. As fine and sleek as a puma, as muscled and powerful as a bear, as sure and swift as a hawk. Mindlessly she touched his shoulders and luxuriated in the ripple of sinew and tendon and muscle. His belly was drum-taut, and the ebony hair that crowned his head dusted his chest and created a rich nest for that forbidden part of his body that so fascinated her now. It pulsed; it lived; it was his fire. She shouldn't be there. It was wrong. No decent young woman would dare to do as he said, dare to stretch out her fingers and touch and wind them around him...

  And no decent woman would let him touch her as he did. But oh, there was no denying him. His kisses were surely depraved, but she could not halt them; she could not force herself to want to halt them; she could not command her own body. She could only feel...

  “Oh, Percy! This is—not right!” she cried to him once.

  But he told her, “Nay, sweet, for when it is love that brings us together, then God has commanded that a man should worship his woman, and, sweet Jesus, I do love you.”

  She believed him...she believed that he loved her. And she believed that anything so intense, so intimate, and so natural between a man and a woman had to be right. Her fingers curled around his, and his lips touched upon hers. His touch...Her head began to thrash against the hay. She whimpered as he moved upon her; she gasped, then nearly screamed out as the first, sudden burst of ecstasy exploded within her. Percy caught her cry wi
th a kiss, murmuring against her lips. “Shh! love, take care...”

  She could not care about the rest of the world. Damp and delirious, she twisted in his arms and her words formed against his cheek. “Oh, Percy...”

  He chuckled softly, rakishly, and promised her, “We've just begun, love, we've just begun.” He went on to fill her with himself, with sweet, burning flames that engulfed and consumed her and brought her again and again to a shuddering awe. Then he kissed her again, held her again...and kept her close, close to his heart. She loved that as much, nuzzling against the damp hair on his chest, feeling the protective tenderness in him as he kissed her forehead and smoothed back the curling, wet tendrils of her hair that clung there.

  Only then did she feel the hay beneath her back and become aware of the flickering light of the lantern upon her circumstances. She had never meant to give herself completely—even if Henry had not cared how she sought her information. She had cared herself. But this had not been for Henry. None of it had been for Henry. She had been falling in love with Percy since she had first set eyes on him.

  And this had been brewing between them since that very first time.

  She should be sorry now. She was “ruined”—as people would say—fallen, lost. She should feel the shame and the horror of it, but she did not. She bowed her head against him, and he held her tighter and he whispered to her, “I love you.”

  “Percy...I love you too.”