Questions for a Highlander

by Angeline Fortin

  Naturally, at twelve, Abygail had been as flat as board with no hips to speak of but, despite her own lush figure and renowned dark beauty, Oona knew that she could not compare to the beauty Abygail would become. She had gladly sent the chit off to boarding school without a second thought. And, in all honesty, she had been glad to see Abygail brought down a notch by that dreadful scarring her accident had left her with.

  And she would bring her down another, Oona thought triumphantly. She would have Richard MacKintosh for herself now. She would have both her reward and revenge and enjoy every moment of it, Oona thought with satisfaction.

  Casting a smug smile at her stepdaughter, Oona hugged the captain’s arm even more tightly and led him into the house.

  Abby watched Richard disappear into the house with Oona hanging on his arm and felt her blood chill. She knew Oona’s habits well, though her father might try to turn a blind eye to them. She was like a cat in heat, letting one Tom after another beneath her skirts. When she was on the hunt, she always caught her prey.

  And now she was after Richard.

  Her Richard!

  Richard, who had just the day before confessed how he was aching with desire! It had never occurred to her that he might find another to slake his lust upon. She had never imagined that Oona might be the one to do it.

  A memory popped into her mind of that day years past, when Abby had followed Richard through the crowds at Ascot. He, with another woman upon his arm – just as he had now – and Abby bearing down upon him with the single-minded purpose of bringing such a liaison to a halt. She had failed then, but as Abby felt her blood boil once again with all the righteous anger she had felt that day, she knew she would not fail again.

  Richard was hers, whether he knew it or not!

  Abby silently slipped into the house in the couple’s wake, following to see where they went. It would be a cold day in hell before she watched him walk away from her again. If he needed a woman so badly, he would have one! And it would be her, Abby thought grimly. It would damn well be her!

  Yes, she would be the remedy to his problem, but first she needed to ensure that Richard and Oona engaged in nothing… well, nothing at all in the meantime. She needed something or someone to interrupt whatever they had planned… short of boldly knocking on the door of the drawing room herself, of course.

  An emergency! That’s what was needed. Racing back to the garden party, Abby decided that she was completely willing to set fire to the croquet mallets, if that was what it would take to create one.

  Chapter 26

  It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.

  - Leo Tolstoy, The Kreutzer Sonata

  Richard couldn’t believe Abby’s stepmother was attempting to seduce him. She was, after all, well acquainted with his family as he was with hers, a connection that usually created an unspoken impediment to situations such as this. By the time they reached the library, he’d been certain that he must have misinterpreted her words, but no. If the press of her breasts against his side hadn’t been confirmation enough, having her mouth latch insistently onto his the moment the library doors closed affirmed that it was no mistake.

  With a grimace, Richard pulled away from Oona, placing a large chaise between them. “I fear I must have misinterpreted your words or you mine, my lady. There truly are some words I would like to have with you.”

  Oona laughed lightly but wasn’t immune to the slight sting of his mild rebuke. “Nonsense, Captain, I know a double entendre when I hear one.”

  “It seems not.”

  To his surprise, Oona reacted with immediate bitterness, a sneer marring what was a beautiful, if sour, countenance. “It’s her, isn’t it? How can that be?”

  “It is about Abby,” Richard told her but added, “Though, I think, not for the reason you believe.”

  “Are you truly going to try to convince me that you don’t want her for yourself?” Oona scoffed. “I saw the way you looked at her out there.”

  Shaking his head, Richard refused to be drawn into a discussion of Abby’s personal appeal. Quite frankly, it was none of Oona’s business. “I only wanted to say that I have heard how you speak to Abby, how you belittle her. I must demand that you stop doing so.”

  “I don’t belittle her, I merely tell the truth.”

  “Your version of it.”

  “She’s hideous!

  “Abby is a beautiful woman, both inside and out,” Richard countered simply.

  “Her accident was a social death toll!” Oona cried. “No man could possibly desire to take to wife a woman so obviously flawed without compensation. I’ve taken great pains to cultivate the Marquis of Aylesbury as a suitor for Abygail these past several months. I will be honest, he needed to be bought, Captain. That is how little she is admired!”

  Richard had seen Aylesbury’s face when he looked at Abby and, though it ate at him to admit it, knew that her finances had little to do with the marquis’ interest, no matter what he had told Oona. “Bought with Abby’s own inheritance, isn’t that so?”

  “What of it?” she said. “I married Haddington to become a countess, and I thought, a wealthy one! I never dreamed that he would be such a tight-fisted old cock o’ the walk. Until we have the wealth that those girls will inherit, he’ll give me nothing! We are doing what must be done to save the earldom. Now Catharine is engaged, Sara is soon to be and Abygail will land for us the biggest fish in the ocean that is London without ever knowing how hard I worked to bait the hook!”

  “What else did you bait the hook with, Oona?” Richard asked.

  “You go too far, Captain!” Oona spat out at him. “I saw how you were looking at her out there. Let me just tell you right, now, Captain. You cannot have her. You might be blessed with some level of wealth, but you’re a third son. It will be Aylesbury for Abygail and no other!”

  “So, you would ruin her life as you did Jack’s?”

  “I didn’t ruin Jack’s life! He ruined it himself!”

  “Only by refusing to sleep with you,” Richard responded with deadly softness. “Ahh, you think he’s never told another the truth? This is naught but your revenge upon Jack for denying you.”

  Oona was nearly choking on her anger. Her face was tight and an unbecoming shade of red as she threw herself at Richard, hitting him with her fists and kicking at him in her anger. “Every man wanted me! I could have had any of them.”

  A knock sounded at the door and Oona snapped for the intruder to enter.

  “Begging your pardon, my lady,” said the red-faced maid who had clearly been privileged to hear Oona’s declaration while standing at the door. “Lady Sara is asking for your presence. I can show you where she’s been put, if you like.”

  “What happened?”

  “It seems she managed to upset the refreshment table, spilling the punch down her dress, my lady.”

  With an aggrieved shriek, Oona strode to the door.

  “No more, Lady Haddington,” Richard demanded one last time. “Leave Abby be.”

  Oona swung back with a snarl. “I’ll see your precious Abby to hell if I like.”

  Chapter 27

  ‘I am not an angel,’ I asserted, ‘and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself. Mr. Rochester, you must neither expect nor exact anything celestial of me – for you will not get it, any more than I shall get it of you; which I do not at all anticipate.’

  - Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

  14 Cavendish Square, London

  That Night

  With a grimace, Richard shrugged out of his jacket as he undressed for bed that evening. That bloody harridan had managed to land a few blows to his still tender wound that afternoon during her ranting. The encounter had done little of benefit and Richard winced for a different reason. He could only hope that he hadn’t made life even more difficult for Abby. Even with all the stories he’d heard about her stepmother, he’d never imagined that Oona Merrill could be such a vicious harpy.

&
nbsp; He’d tried to find Abby afterward but she’d been nowhere in sight. Though he tried to convince himself that he only wanted to warn her, Richard knew he was a fool to even think so. He wanted to see her smile, feel her in his arms once again. To kiss her and hear her whisper his name as softly as she had a few days ago.

  “Richard Keeley MacKintosh!”

  Richard froze, his shirt half over his head. No, that wasn’t the tone he had imagined at all.

  “I want a word with you!”

  That stern, lecturing voice was one he’d heard a thousand times but never had Richard imagined hearing it in his own bedchamber or so late in the evening. Removing the shirt, he looked with some disbelief at the angel who stood just inside his chamber door with her hair loose and hands firmly planted on her rounded hips… or at least they must be, given the way her dark cloak tented about her. This wasn’t the soft, compliant lass he’d last met but rather the one who had berated her brother so soundly on her grandmother’s terrace a week past.

  Pushing aside the compulsion to brace himself for more, Richard jumped in first. “Abby! Sweet Jesus, angel, I need to have more than a word with you, if my eyes and ears aren’t deceiving me. What are you doing sneaking about this house at night?” Richard asked. “Does Jack know you’re here?”

  “Never mind what I’m about,” she responded, becoming more an avenging angel as she swooped in his direction, her hair streaming in loose curls over her shoulders. He hadn’t seen her hair down since she was a child, however she looked not at all childish but womanly, heavenly. Tempting. He almost didn’t hear her next words. “I came here to tell you that I know what you are about and I will not have it!”

  “Truly?” Richard asked, distracted by both her display and her ire. Though she sounded as if she were scolding, Richard suddenly found her rage incredibly erotic. Her face was with flushed with color, her vivid eyes alive with emotion. All Richard could hear was his body’s call to take her in his arms. His palms itched to touch her, but he restrained himself, asking, “Pray tell, what am I about that has you in such a state?”

  “I know what you’re after, Richard. I know it just as I knew it five years ago and I’ll not let it happen again!”

  Five years ago? Distraction fled in the face of confusion.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “When I went to Ascot, all those years ago, looking for you!” Richard looked so confused that in that moment, Abby knew that Jack had never breathed a word about why she had gone to Ascot to Richard. Loyal brother that Jack was, she should have known he would never have embarrassed her with that bit of information. Now it was left for her to explain. “I went there to find you and tell you… never mind that! But I saw you there with that woman, I saw you leave with her! I knew what you were doing. I know enough about men to understand their needs and you said just yesterday that you were a-a-aching with desire. A-and I know how Oona is.”

  Richard just blinked blankly at her, as if he didn’t know what to make of her rant. “I saw you leave the garden party today with Oona,” Abby clarified.

  It took Richard a moment to weave through Abby’s ramblings, but his expression cleared after a moment. “You thought I was going to shag Oona?”

  The words sounded accusatory but Abby nodded. “I won’t have it, Richard.”

  A myriad of expressions crossed Richard’s face, many that Abby couldn’t recognize but she did know it was amusement that ended it all. Amusement that nearly had her seeing red. He thought this was funny? She’d been in a mood all afternoon on his account, wondering what he was about. And that, after she had ranted at her father like a fishwife for him, something she never would have dared if it hadn’t been for Richard – not only for his cause, but because of his faith in her. She loved him, potentially sacrificed herself for him, and he thought it all so amusing enough to destroy that faith in moments? Abby’s hands balled into fists at her sides.

  “But as you said, I was aching with desire,” he drawled, crossing his arms over his chest. “For you, I might add. So it’s rather your fault then if I need relief, isn’t it?”

  “If you need such desperate relief, Richard MacKintosh, I’ll be the one to give it to you, not the likes of Oona,” Abby shot back.

  “Oh, will you now?” Richard responded with interest clear in his voice.

  “Y-yes, I will!” Abby returned, though her hesitation made it clear she only just realized what she was declaring aloud so brazenly. It was one thing to create a bold plan but it was apparently another to voice that plan aloud. Confidence fled, leaving her voice trembling with uncertainty. “Oh, Richard! You don’t truly want her, do you?”

  “Angel, what a little fool you are!” he said with a bark of laughter.

  It was enough to send the anger burning through Abby once more. She wasn’t certain whether Richard was calling her a fool for coming here, declaring her intentions so boldly, or both. Sneaking into his bedchamber was the most forward thing she had ever done. It trumped any and all of her pranks from her boarding school days. She knew that and didn’t need Richard to provide any additional lecture on the matter. What she needed was some assurance that Richard hadn’t already bedded her stepmother. The thought had plagued at her all afternoon. She’d spent hours wavering between anger and tears. Between faith in Richard and the uncertainty that had been her companion in recent years. “Damn you, Richard!” Abby threw her arms around his shoulders and lifted herself up against him, commanding with her nose just inches from his, “Tell me you didn’t do anything.”

  “I didn’t do anything,” he repeated so automatically that Abby’s temper was pushed to the point of desperation.

  “I’m serious!”

  “So am I,” Richard said, wrapping his arms around her waist. “I appreciate seeing how far you’d go to get to the truth when you want it, however. You have my assurances that I didn’t lay a finger on her.”

  “You didn’t? Not one?” Abby asked with surprise, while again the irritation ebbed. As did her desperate grip on him. She eased back to the floor though she didn’t release him. She was becoming very aware of the fact that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. That her arms were, in fact, wrapped about his naked torso.

  “Not one, though I ought to apply all five to your bottom just for being here,” Richard scolded, though the feel of her hands exploring his bared chest robbed the words of their heat. “Tell me, how did you get in here?”

  “Francis had given me his calling card, remember? Though I had to bribe my way inside at quite a steep price,” she admitted sheepishly, though her hands were more bold, caressing his upper arms and measuring the bulge of his biceps against the span of her hand. “Glenrothes’ servants are really quite loyal.”

  “Not loyal enough, it seems,” Richard grumbled, capturing her hands in his to stop their roaming. “No one saw you, I hope?”

  “No one.”

  “Good, then let’s get you home.”

  Abby’s jaw sagged in astonishment. Her hands tightened in his as if that could hold him in place. “Home? No, Richard. I don’t want to go back home,” she insisted, her eyes roving his bare chest with appreciation. “I came here to… I mean, I wanted to…”

  “Wanted to what?”

  Abby flushed with embarrassment, but she gained freedom of her hands and skimmed them up his bare chest once more. The muscles bunched and tensed beneath her hand. Emboldened, she smoothed her palms across his ribs and around his back. “Richard,” she whispered huskily. “You must know why I’m here.”

  “And that’s why you must leave,” he answered, but the conviction fled his voice when her hand dipped over his hard buttock. “I swore to Jack I would not seduce you.”

  “You aren’t,” Abby assured him with a sultry smile. “I’m seducing you.”

  Abby unfastened her cloak at the neck and shrugged it off her shoulders.

  Richard looked down and could hardly swallow back the lump in his throat. Abby was covered from neck to toe in a whit
e linen blouse and green lawn skirt. But it was also very clear that she was very naked beneath the thin garments. Even in the dim light, he could see the outline of her breasts beneath the sheer fabric, the darker nipples. He should have known the moment she walked into the room that it would end this way. Her presence, her jealous rant… even her anger and lecture, had aroused him beyond belief. Richard knew that he should send her away but it had taken all his resolve and will power to do it once. He wasn’t sure he had it in him to voice it again.

  He wanted her. Wanted those breasts filling his palms, wanted her body beneath his. He wanted to lose himself in her. Forget everything but her.

  “Abby…” he groaned, fighting his surrender.

  “Richard,” she cooed softly. He could hear the smile behind the words. The confidence. Even while she tortured him, it pleased him to hear her sounding so sure of herself. This was his Abby, brazen lass cum bold temptress. She was certain of her beauty now, sure of her allure – at least with him – and she was going to use it to push him over the edge. Push him into doing something that he knew was wrong.

  He also knew it would be so completely right to take her, to make her his so that no other might ever have her. The part of him that was left of his conquering ancestors agreed and Richard felt his blood pump hotly. He could see Abby’s skin grow pink with a blush beneath her white blouse as he continued to stare down at her. His silence must have emboldened her even further, because though her fingers trembled slightly, Abby reached up to work the buttons at her neck. She unfastened them one by one until the hollow at the bottom of her throat was exposed, her collarbone… then just the swell of her breast.