“He’ll join us at Dundee,” Freya said, trying to sound both certain and happy about it. “He’ll accompany us to Baronsford from there.”
The child yawned. “That’s too bad.”
“I thought you wanted me to marry him.”
“Not anymore,” Ella whispered. “I’ve changed my mind again.”
“Have you?” Freya replied softly, sinking into the bath until the water came up to her chin. The image of Gregory Pennington’s face out on that frozen pond appeared to her. She’d change her mind too, she thought, if she had the chance.
“I’ve decided you should marry a good dancer and a good skater,” Ella said, closing her eyes. “Ask Captain Pennington. Or I can ask him for you. I know he’ll do it.”
* * *
Penn pushed open the shutter and peered out through the darkness. Occasional breaks in the clouds allowed the moon to shed its light over Huntly’s rooftops. Four days they’d been on the road and, in spite of having to make frequent stops for Ella, they were making excellent progress. The unpredictable Highland weather, though cold, had been cooperating, so far.
Tomorrow night they’d stop at Aberdeen, he thought, shuttering the window again and going over to the small fireplace. He had an old friend there, a former officer who’d served with him on the Peninsula and later in the Royal Engineers. John Simpson resigned his captain’s commission a year ago and was now married and advising on plans for road building and other projects in the coastal area. Penn had received many invitations from him, and he knew Simpson and his wife would be happy to put them up for the night.
Washing up and stripping out of his clothes, Penn lay down in the bed. Staring at the firelight flickering on the surfaces of the rafters overhead, he thought of Freya. He wondered if she noticed how relieved he was every time her queries about her cousin produced blank looks from innkeepers. There’d been no sign of Dunbar along the route thus far. Perhaps the stars had aligned and the scoundrel had actually married one heiress or another.
In truth, he had another reason for stopping off at his friend’s home in Aberdeen. Simpson’s last assignment had been at Fort William, where Dunbar’s regiment was posted. His friend was always one to keep in contact with his former colleagues. Perhaps he’d have more information about the colonel.
Freya’s marriage to her cousin was wrong. And Penn was prepared to do whatever was necessary to help her see the grave mistake she’d be making in going through with the ill-advised arrangement. He considered their arrival at Baronsford. Once they got there, he’d insist on speaking with Lady Dacre on Freya and Ella’s behalf. This urgency to marry was nonsense. Freya needed time to settle her future. His thoughts darkened. He hadn’t known the eldest son growing up. He was already an adult when Penn was still a child, but the word was that the new duke, haughty and narrow-minded, wasn’t much of an improvement over his late father. Still, Penn was ready to go to battle with them. He’d seek his brother Hugh’s assistance as to legal proceedings, if need be. Freya didn’t need to face these people alone.
The soft knock on the door caught him in the midst of his mental combat. The next sound had him jumping out of bed and pulling on his trousers and shirt. Someone was trying to come in.
Penn crossed the floor and yanked the door open. Outside, the intruder was jumping up, trying to reach the latch.
“What are you doing out of bed?” he asked, looking down at the shivering little bundle.
“I knew you’d be awake,” Ella said, stepping back and motioning for to him to come with her. “I need your help.”
“With what?” he asked, buttoning his shirt. “Where’s your aunt?”
“That’s what I need help with.” She took his hand and started pulling him toward the door of their room.
“What’s wrong with her?” he asked, suddenly worried.
“She’s fallen asleep in the tub. And I am afraid if she stays there all night she’ll end up looking like one of those old apples we feed to the pigs.”
“That sounds quite serious.” He stopped outside of their bedchamber door. “Why don’t you awaken her?”
The little girl made a shocked face and shook her head from side to side. “No, I need you to do it.”
Penn hid a chuckle behind the pretense of a cough. Beyond this door, Freya was naked and asleep in a tub, and this little matchmaker was mature enough to know he’d be interested in it.
“You should go get Shona. She can awaken her mistress.”
Ella again shook her head from side to side, mouthing a big no. “Fie always tells me never to walk into Shona’s room when Dougal is there and the door is closed. It’s inap . . . inapppie . . .”
“Inappropriate?”
She nodded, pushing open the door a little. “You wake her.”
“I think your aunt might consider it inappropriate for me to go into her bedchamber and wake her up.” He took a step back. “No, I think you’re the best person for the job.”
As she bit her lip and stared up at him, Penn started worrying. The water Freya was lying in had to be cold. Was there enough wood in the fireplace? She definitely could catch a chill. He decided he should knock loudly and wake her up. As he raised his hand to do so, the girl stopped him.
“I’ll do it,” Ella announced. “But under one condition.”
He should have guessed this imp would have a secondary motive. “What?”
“I’ll wake her and come back if you’ll play a game of backgammon with me.”
He looked across the sitting room where she was pointing. A game box sat on a table by the fireplace.
“You know how to play?”
“Grandfather taught me.”
“I don’t know. We have a full day tomorrow.”
“I know it’s late and after your bedtime,” she responded. “Only one game.”
The possibility sprang to Penn’s mind that Freya wasn’t in any tub at all, but sound asleep in her bed. This entire thing could be the ploy of the diminutive strategist standing before him.
He pretended a yawn. “It is after my bedtime. Maybe we can play a game tomorrow night when we stop at my friend’s house.”
She crossed her arms, staring up at him. “Fie might not make it till tomorrow, if she sleeps in the tub all night.”
Penn had never found himself at a deadlock with a five-year-old. “My proposition is this: You go and awaken your aunt. If she makes a noise loud enough that I can hear her all the way out here, then I’ll tell you a story.”
“What kind of a story?”
“A good story that I guarantee you’ve never heard from your grandfather.”
She sent him a skeptical look. “I’ve heard lots and lots of stories. Thousands of them.”
“This one was told to me and my brother and sisters by a woman named Ohenewaa. She was like a grandmother to us, and she was from Africa.”
“Tell me the start of it.”
He couldn’t believe this lassie. She wasn’t about to be cheated.
“Lizard shows tortoise a hidden cave filled with yams.” He stopped. “Go awaken her.”
She ran into the bedchamber, leaving the door ajar. Not a moment later, Penn heard a splash and Freya’s loud gasp. Before he could formulate an image of what had just happened, Ella was back out, closing the door.
“Very well,” she said, taking him by the hand and leading him to a settle close to the fire. “I want to hear the rest of it. But what’s a yam?”
Chapter Six
Jolted awake by Ella, Freya stood in the tub, looking dazedly after her escaping niece. She’d fallen asleep in the bath. When had she ever done that? Never, before tonight.
Pulling her nightgown over her head, Freya hurried to the door leading to the sitting room. She opened it and saw them.
Ella, wrapped in a blanket, was already cuddled beside the captain on a settle. She stood still, leaning against the doorway, incapable of intruding on an experience that she knew was a first. Gregory was the only man outs
ide of the family that she’d ever seen Ella warm up to. The child was listening with rapt attention as he related a story of a land of animals and a greedy tortoise. The melodic rise and fall of his voice, the way he made her sigh one moment and gasp the next, was entrancing to witness.
Then he saw Freya and the intensity of his lingering gaze set her body on fire. Her hair was a tangle of wild curls, still dripping from the tub. Her nightgown molded provocatively to her wet skin. It didn’t matter. She stood still, unable to hear the words, feeling naked before him. She couldn’t move. It was as if a chain were being forged between them, each link glowing red with heat she’d never experienced.
When the story was done and Ella stood up, Freya silently backed into the room and pulled a shawl around her. A moment later, her niece skipped in through the door with a happy smile. With a cheerful “good night,” the cherub jumped into the bed.
As her eyes began to droop, Ella again murmured a few words about the benefits of choosing the captain as a husband over Colonel Richard. Freya wasn’t the only one enthralled with Gregory Pennington, but she couldn’t bring herself to remind the child that she had no choice.
When Ella dropped off to sleep, Freya’s gaze moved to the door that stood slightly ajar. She wondered if Gregory was still out there. Gathering the shawl around her, she tiptoed over, intending to close it. At the last moment, she couldn’t help but look. He was standing by the window, and his gaze immediately lifted to hers.
His feet were bare. His shirt, hanging loose over his trousers, was only buttoned halfway. Freya never imagined she could find the state of a man’s undress so exciting.
She supposed she owed him a word of thanks for making certain Ella didn’t get into any mischief by escaping their bedchamber. Well, that was the fib Freya told herself as she padded into the sitting room, closing the door softly behind her.
Before she could say a word, Gregory strode across the room. His hand reached for hers and whatever she was going to say was lost forever. He never paused as their fingers entwined and he pulled her toward his bedchamber.
It was madness, but she didn’t want it to stop.
He drew her through the door, leaving it slightly open and backing her against the wall.
“I want to kiss you,” he whispered, his smoldering eyes meeting hers. “Tell me you don’t want the same thing and . . . and I’ll behave as I know I should.”
Desire ripped through her, an intense primitive force that left her trembling. A throb low in her belly started to spread. “I’ve never been kissed.”
He caressed the side of her face, his thumb brushing the sensitive skin of her bottom lip. She was aware that her breaths were shallow and quick.
“Let me be your first.” He came closer, his body was a whisper away from hers.
She should stop this, step away from him. She’d never been with any man, but she wasn’t insensible to his meaning. Freya knew he was implying more. She tried desperately to think, but it was as if she’d fallen under a spell. All she could do was nod.
His lips touched hers, and all her worries disappeared in a whirlwind of awareness. He was gentle, patient, his firm lips softly playing with hers as if she were ripe fruit that he feared he might bruise. His fingers slid under the blanket of her hair and he caressed the sensitive skin of her neck. She melted into his touch and heard a soft cry of need spring from her lips.
Gregory deepened the kiss, his tongue teasing the seam of her lips. The throb in her belly became an ache, spreading through her limbs and to her breasts. Her lips parted under his, inviting him in, wanting, needing more of him. She heard his satisfied groan as his tongue slipped into her mouth.
The jolt of passion rushing through her buried the rest of her fears. In the next moment, Freya was kissing him back. Her hands stole around his neck, her tongue mimicking the dance she’d just learned.
Whatever shred of control he was hanging onto suddenly disappeared. His fingers curled into her hair and he pulled her head back, his mouth taking, drinking in what she was willingly offering him.
This man’s body called to her. It was a mystery to be explored. She took her hands from around his neck and trailed her fingers over the linen of his shirt until they found their way inside. The hot skin scorched her. She felt the steely ridge of powerful shoulders and caressed the dusting of hair on his chest.
“You’re driving me mad, Freya,” he whispered against her lips before his hands slid down along her spine and cupped her bottom. He pressed her against his hardness and pushed a thigh between her legs until she gasped.
She was trapped, but there was nowhere else she wanted to be. The feel of her body against his was a miracle.
His lips left her mouth and moved over her face, dropping to her jaw. When they sank to the sensitive skin of her throat, she pressed her back more fully against the wall, willingly offering him her body. All of her.
Every nerve in her body cried for more when his fingers stroked her hard nipple through the nightgown and then tested the heavy fullness of her breast in his hand.
The pressure in her belly continued to build. She couldn’t think or focus. She was robbed of breath, but still she wanted more.
Bringing his mouth back to her lips, he whispered, “Ride me.”
His voice was ragged, his breath as short as hers. She didn’t know what he meant and then he pressed his leg against her sex. Her thighs clenched around his muscles as she felt a wetness in her very center. Giving in to some primal instinct, she began to rock against him and he ran his fingers along the neckline of the nightgown, pushing it off her shoulders. She slipped her arms out and it dropped to her waist as his mouth closed around a nipple.
She cried out softly, her fingers delving into his hair, her hands caressing his cheek while he suckled her. She wanted him never to stop. Stormy pressures were building within her. Seeing the dark planes of his face against her pale skin as his mouth moved to bring her pleasure was the most erotic thing she could ever have imagined possible.
She was barely aware of the moment when her world shifted. Wrapped around him, she came apart, burying her cries of release against his chest.
* * *
This was a first for him.
Holding Freya, wrapped around her body as she’d wrapped herself around his heart, Penn felt the pounding in his chest begin to diminish. Never in his life had he felt more protective of a woman than he felt about her right now. Never before had he actually wondered if this woman was the one with whom he was intended to spend his life.
She lifted her head off his shoulder and straightened her nightgown, covering herself. He backed away and picked up the shawl from the floor. Even in the fading light of the fire, he saw the blush spreading across the fair skin of her chest and throat and cheeks. She avoided looking into his eyes.
“I . . . I am . . . I shouldn’t have . . .” Her words trailed off.
He gently lifted her chin, meeting her dark gaze. “You and I have been circling each other from the moment we took to the road. Seeing you come out of that room, I forgot about right and wrong. I wanted you.”
He brushed his lips against hers and was relieved to have her kiss him back, even though she withdrew again too quickly.
“I am the caretaker of a child,” she said, flattening her palm against his chest as he moved to kiss her once more. “It would ruin everything for me and for Ella . . . Here . . . being discovered.”
She was right. He was glad one of them had enough sense to stop and think. Ella could be wandering in here at any moment. Shona and her husband were also close by. How difficult would it be for Freya if she were discovered in his bedroom?
With a feathery touch, she caressed his jaw and pressed a quick kiss to his chin before gathering the shawl tightly around herself and slipping out of his bedroom. A moment later, he heard the door to her room open and close.
Standing in his own doorway, Penn paused and recalled the vision of Freya standing outside of her bedchamber, watc
hing them. Her light-brown hair, darkened with water from the bath, cascaded in waves of curls to her waist. Her eyes were wide and shining in the firelight. Her long white nightgown clung to her body, the wet cloth hugging her breasts and hips provocatively. How he’d ever continued with that story was a mystery, for looking at her there, he’d been a lost man.
The child had returned to Freya in their room after he was done with the fable, but he couldn’t retire. Waiting in the sitting room, pacing from window to fireplace and back again, he’d brooded over the changes that had taken hold of him. He’d needed to touch her. Kiss her. Make her understand the effect she had on him. Sleep had been the furthest thing from his mind. But when she’d emerged once again and then had come willingly into his bedroom, he’d been able to only give her a glimpse of what could be between them.
Now, more than ever, he wanted to make love to her. The intensity of his own desire was terrifying. Never before had he felt such hunger for a woman. He turned and looked back at his bed. He wouldn’t lure her into it. She had too much at stake. He wouldn’t take advantage of her, not while in his own mind he was still trying to decide if she and Ella could be his future.
There was no question that any man who married Freya would find he’d won a prize to be cherished. But that meant settling down. Committing himself. Giving up his plans of moving to Boston and building the cities of that new nation.
Was he ready to rethink his entire future?
He had a great deal he needed to consider before they reached Baronsford.
Chapter Seven
Though the hour was not late, the moon had already risen high in the starry sky by the time they reached Aberdeen and the home of Captain John Simpson and his very pregnant wife, Myrna.
When their carriage rolled to a stop outside the front door, the gray stone house seemed to Freya to sparkle in the moonlight, and every window was ablaze with a warm welcoming light. Her first impressions had not been wrong, either, for the delighted couple could not have been more hospitable in greeting and ushering them into their home.
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