by Eva Devon
“My goodness!” she exclaimed as if somehow amused by his threat. “How very bold.”
“You’re in the highlands now, and in this region, I’m the law.”
“How fortunate for you.” She batted her lashes innocently. “And you are?”
As if she couldn’t surmise from what he’d just told her. She had to take delight in nettling him. “The Duke of Blackburn, madam.”
“Your Grace!” she exclaimed, her breath puffing white in the cold air. She gave the tiniest of curtsies. “What a delight. I’ve been longing to make your acquaintance but you’re never at home when I call.”
He stared silently, hoping she’d realize he’d been deliberately avoiding her.
“Fate clearly meant for us to meet,” she said, nodding.
He drew himself up, squaring his shoulders against her silliness. “Fate madam?”
“What else could it be, what with us colliding quite literally?”
“Deep misfortune,” he observed.
She tsked. “Am I as bad as all that?”
He arched a brow and looked her over from top to bottom. Good god, she was stunning. Voluptuous. Slightly plump. But plump in a way that made him wish to grab her and take handfuls of her tempting body. He humphed.
“I say,” Her blonde brows drew together. “You seem quite young, but are you actually an old man?”
“I beg your pardon?” How was it possible that she said such things to him? It was beyond him. Every rational part of him demanded he turn on his heel and leave, but there was another part of him, a deeper, insidious part that whispered, how bloody refreshing. Clearly, it was a voice that couldn’t be trusted.
She shrugged as if what she was about to say was actually self evident. “Well, I’ve never known a fellow under the age of sixty to scowl so ferociously and make such a grumpy noise.”
“Grumpy?” he echoed.
“Indeed.” She batted her long lashes at him. “Are you a grump?”
Grump? “Are you mad?”
“Oh, a trifle, I daresay.” She pulled the ties of her cloak tighter and adjusted her hood against the breeze. “This life does make us all a little moon merry.”
“I can assure you,” he said tightly. “I have every ounce of sense about me.”
She pursed that gorgeous pink mouth then nodded with an air of exaggerated tragedy, clearly surmising he was a lost cause. “It seems so.”
Her tone gave the decided impression that she felt pity for him. Him! A duke. “Now, look here,” he began, “I’ve put up with your carryings on for some time. But now? Now, I insist you run your house with a bit more decorum.”
“Insist?” She lifted her chin, not giving an inch under his censure. “Sir, you have not the authority to insist anything on my land. Land, which you are standing upon. Now, I will make certain that none of my dukes go on your own dukely land. But I will have you know I don’t approve of shooting animals for sport either. So, we’re in agreement. If one of my guests did behave in such a reprehensible manner, I shall certainly ask him to leave. But beyond that, I haven’t done a jot wrong, so take your judgements and hie off.”
The trail of her discourse slipped through his mind, one word resonating. “Dukes?” he echoed, hardly believing a word she’d said. Except. . . Had she just instructed him to hie off?
She nodded tightly. “Yes, Your Grace. I’ve three dukes to stay at present.”
“English dukes?” he bit out.
She stared at him as if he were the mad person here. “Wouldn’t you know them, if they were not.”
She had a point. But Jesus wept. Three English dukes not a stone’s throw from his own land? It was enough to make him bleed with the agony of English aggression and power. Couldn’t they just have a bit of peace where only the hardiest Scots and sheep dared to tread the bens, and vales.
“Well, madam,” he said, drawing upon his superiority as a Scot. Except. . . Well, except, there was something rather grand about her. Still, she wasna for him. Not even for a moment. “If you keep your guests on your land, we shall have no further problems.”
“Fine then,” she said, her earlier smiles gone.
“Fine,” he agreed and lingered. Now, was the moment. The moment he should turn on his booted heel and march back up the hill and over the frosted heather. But he couldn’t quite force himself to move. There was something aggravatingly captivating about the wee woman who had grown quite indignant under his censor.
She folded her arms beneath her plump breasts. “If that will be all, I shall go back to gathering holly. You did turn my offer of hospitality down, you recall.”
He scowled.
Her beautiful, full lips pursed again, almost begging for a kiss. “You do that a good deal, Your Grace.”
He couldn’t tear his gaze away from those lips of hers. Och, wouldn’t they feel magnificent beneath his own? “What?”
“Look as if you’ve sucked upon a lemon,” she stated simply. “Which is quite the tragedy as you’ve a remarkably handsome face.”
Her words penetrated his frustrating revery and reignited his decision that she wasna to be trifled with. “Blazes, woman. Must you?”
“What?”
“Have you no sense of decorum?” he challenged, wondering if she’d even try to defend her actions. “You’re complimenting me again.”
“Sin upon sin,” she said with exaggerated shock. “Chapter and verse, the good lord surely has condemned me to the fiery pits for saying pleasant things.”
“Pleasant?” he demanded then felt the need to correct her. Did she not understand the effects she had upon a man? “Incendiary!”
That damn grin of hers suddenly came back brightening her infuriatingly winsome face. Did she no’ know that people shouldn’t brighten under his criticism? They should recant. Then reform. “Why, are you smiling, woman?”
It was her turn to look him up and down, a cheeky glint to her eyes. “I was just wondering which part of you I’d set ablaze.”
Did she now? He drew in a slow breath, trying to think of the cold. Of the frost upon the ground. Of the lowering clouds now speeding in over head. Anything to stop the damn heat of desire her very presence seemed to evoke in his usually proper person. And well, he simply couldn’t allow such a thing. “Good day, madam. Keep your guests on your own property, and we shan’t have the misfortune of each other’s company again.”
“Are you certain you wouldn’t wish to return to my lodge for a cup of hot wine?”
He tensed then peered down at her, determined to make his moral position known. “I’m going to the nearest loch and I’m going to cast myself in it.”
“Why?”
“To put out your damnable blaze.” He could hardly believe he’d blathered such a thing. But he had. Something about her weakened his wits. All the more reason for him to depart.
“If you must, but don’t catch your death.” She gave an full shiver which only caused her beautiful breasts to plump.
He yanked his gaze away from the scandalous sight, turned on his booted heal and strode in her opposite direction. As quickly as possible.
As he gained a bit of distance, his shoulders relaxed and he gave a small sigh.
And then he heard it. A wee, soft, womanly voice on the wind. “Good bye, Your Grace! It was my pleasure to meet you!”
He refused to turn. No matter how much an irrational little whisper urged him. Instead, he humphed. And then he nearly kicked himself.
He wasn’t an old man who humphed at everything. He stopped dead in his tracks over the next hill. Or was he? Was he simply waiting for a stick to pound the ground and call everyone about him whipersnappers?
The thought was an astonishing one. Had he truly gone from being simply a proper duke to a what had she said? Oh, yes. A grump?
Duncan shuddered. Well, it mattered not. He wouldna be seeing her anytime soon again and even if he was a grump, he was a responsible and capable duke. Unlike his father. That was all that mattered.
His land mattered. His people mattered. Not a wee golden haired lass with lips to lure a man into a lifetime of sin.
Chapter 2
It was a miracle Lady Imogen Cavendish wandered back into her own foyer. She’d been rather adrift for the last hour as she’d contemplated her neighbor. In fact, she’d been so deep and lost in thoughts of the towering Scot whose face had delighted her in the most astonishing of ways, that she could have wandered all the way to York for all she knew. But no. She’d only sauntered back to her large hunting lodge, as if after several months, her feet had been trained to the highland paths. And well, hadn’t she decide to make the place home?
Imogen dropped her basket onto the Chippendale table in her entry hall then tugged at the ribbon of her cloak. What a strange occurrence it had been! He’d looked upon her as black as thunder, his dark hair a riot over his stern brow. Oh, but his eyes! Golden, eyes the color of amber had warmed to a whiskey hue.
She was still tingling from the strength of that gaze. She’d asked the locals about the Duke of Blackburn of course, when he’d always been out when she called, but they’d all spoken in such reverent tones of the man she’d assumed he would be a willowy, saintly sort of fellow, all silver haired or bespectacled.
But he’d been nothing like a saint! More like a hell fire preacher who’d been cast by a god who loved a beautiful male form. He’d certainly looked upon her as if she were Mary Magdalen and she couldn’t help nettling him, poor man. She sighed. He’d been quite rude.
But she liked him.
And that was a great misfortune because he almost certainly was going to avoid her at all costs, prude that he seemed to be.
She tugged off her cloak. How on earth did such a man become a prude? In her varied experience, beautiful men were almost always rakes. This handsome devil had barely known how to converse with her. She couldn’t imagine him seducing a lady in a shadowed ballroom, let alone a glen.
“Imogen!” Kathryn, Duchess of Darkwell, called from the top of the wide, oak staircase. “Did you have a good walk?”
Imogen beamed up at her friend. The duchess was positively glowing, her long blond hair fell in splendid curls about her pale face, and the young woman rested a hand atop her round belly.
“I did!” Imogen exclaimed. “I wish you’d come, for I had such a sight!”
Kathryn’s eyes widened. “Did you? I’m dying for a bit of scandal, Ryder has kept me upstairs all day as if I were one of the porcelain shepherdesses so popular these days. Now, I’ve ordered a large tea for the drawing room.”
But from the blush that betrayed Kate’s cheeks, Imogen felt certain that Ryder, the Duke of Darkwell had kept his beloved wife upstairs for an altogether different reason that to put her entirely untouched upon the shelf.
“Come,” she said, politely ignoring her friend’s misplaced blushes. “Let us wait for tea together.”
Imogen grabbed the folds of her skirts and bounded up the stairs. Perhaps it was silly, but she liked to hold Kate’s hand and go down the stairs with her. Imogen was extremely protective of her friends’ delicate state. In fact, Kate couldn’t go anywhere without someone trying to take her arm. Still, her friend took it all in stride, no hint of resentment. It seemed nothing could daunt the young duchess’ new found joy.
Though Imogen would never admit it, not in a life time of Sundays, she was just the tiniest bit jealous of her dearest friend. Kathryn had found love and a husband who worshipped her from the tips of her toes, to the curls upon her head. He was besotted, impassioned, and a complete idiot in his boundless love. And there was very little more marvelous to see. . . Except, at Darkwell’s request, she’d invited the Duke of Hunt and his new wife, Cordelia. Imogen had yet to lay eyes upon them, but according to Kate, the couple was positively, madly in love.
Imogen took her friend’s hand and they descended the slightly steep stairs and sashayed into the blue drawing room, done up in sapphire damask and a stunning blue bell and cream Axminster rug. This was to be the last house party of the hunting season, though she didn’t permit her guests to hunt, and she was going to be surrounded by couples in love.
Well, at least that was better than couples sniping at each other as the last group had done. She didn’t know what she’d been thinking with her last guest list. Perhaps, she’d hoped the beautiful landscape would revitalize her friends as it had done for herself.
She loved London and all that was to be done there. Scandal and bacchanalia had long been her favorite source of amusement, but on her last visit to the highlands, she’d purchased an establishment immediately and stayed. Something about the crisp air, wild mountains, and rushing streams had touched her soul in a way no London party could.
“Do tell me what happened!” Kate demanded, as she lumbered to a chair and lowered herself with that slight, adorable clumsiness that all énciente women had.
Imogen chose a seat just beside her friend overlooking the sea loch. Even from the drawing room, she could see the reflection of the tallest ben in the area on the silvery waves. It struck her suddenly as an image of Blackburn came to mind, dark, muscled, kilted, striding away from her over the heather. He belonged in such a place. Unlike most of the men who came to visit her from England, the Duke of Blackburn had seemed completely at home in the haunting landscape.
She let out a murmur of pleasure.
“You look like the cat that got the cream.”
“Correction.” Imogen laughed ruefully. “I’m the cat that saw the cream. Alas, I didn’t get any.”
“Pardon?”
The tall, gold engraved door swung open and Mairi the upstairs made came in, her chestnut curls rioting out of her cap. She quickly carried a tray laden with several culinary dainties to the carved wood table between Imogen and Kate.
Kate clapped her hands together as she eyed the fruited bread. “Thank you. How marvelous.”
Mairi gave a quick curtsy then bustled out.
Without waiting on ceremony, Kate grabbed a slice of the luxurious bread and took a bite. “Now, what’s this about seeing the cream?
Imogen, who could usually eat a whole plate of lemon tarts without even a thought, held back from seizing a slice. “Well, if you must know, I finally met him.”
“Who?”
Imogen rolled her eyes. “The Duke of Blackburn, of course!”
“Oh!” Kathryn took a good sized bite of cake and her eyes fluttered shut with delight. “Is he as saintly as we’ve heard? Does he wear a hair shirt?”
“He wore a a kilt.”
Kathryn’s eyes snapped open. “Oooh! I’ve yet to see a man in a kilt. Though, this one likely didn’t do the garment justice. Saintliness and good legs don’t usually go hand in hand.”
Imogen poured out two cups of tea, heaping in spoonfuls of sugar. “Well. . .”
Kathryn’s gaze widened. “My stars! Imogen, you’re blushing!”
Imogen shifted uncomfortably. She couldn’t be blushing. She’d seen enough sin to keep her pleasantly unshockable. . . And yet, my goodness. The man had fairly smoldered with his displeasure. And he had liked her. Despite his rather acerbic tongue, she was convinced it was because she had somehow shaken him. “He ran into me,”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Quite literally,” Imogen explained before taking a fortifying sip of tea. “We ended up in a delightful heap upon the ground.”
Kathryn waggled her brows. “And his kilt?”
“In absolute disarray,” Imogen confessed with glee. “But alas, he was a gentleman.”
Kathryn gave a little sigh of disappointment. “That’s likely a good thing. Too many men are randy as goats. It’s nice to know there are some who can control themselves.”
“Oh, I’ve a feeling the Duke of Blackburn is all about controlling himself.”
“Indeed?” Kate cradled her tea cup in her palm in a most unladylike fashion, no doubt needing the warmth.
One thing that was difficult, was no matter how
many layers one wore or how many logs were placed upon the fire, the highlands were cold.
Imogen wondered if Blackburn could keep her warm. . .
“Imogen? Imogen!”
“Hmmm?” she murmured, recalling the strength of his thighs beneath her accidental caress.
“You were saying?” Kate prompted.
“Oh.” She shook herself. “Yes. Well, he was most perplexed by our situation. Hardly knew what to do and held me a good deal longer than necessary. He’s exceptionally handsome.” Imogen winked. “So, I didn’t mind terribly.”
“Hmmm.” Kate’s brow furrowed as she mulled the situation over. “Perhaps he has kept a handle on his behavior for sometime and you were just too much to resist.”
“Resist me he did, though,” Imogen said, trying to hide her irritation. “You would have thought I was a bawd of the worst order. In fact, I do think he almost insinuated such a thing.”
“Oh dear. I did hear his father was a terrible scoundrel,” Kate said around another bite of fruited bread. “Never stayed upon his estate and was always with a new mistress or two in wicked old London.”
Imogen sighed. “Clearly those traits were not passed onto his son.”
Kathryn nodded. “Perhaps they frighten him.”
Imogen thought for a moment. What with the burly broad shoulders, wild black hair and scorching eyes, it seemed impossible the Duke of Blackburn was afraid of anything. However, Kate made a good point. Perhaps the poor man was afraid that if he dipped his toe into the lake of sin, like his apparently saucy father, he would toss himself in and drown in the delights of the flesh.
Her gaze blurred. She could only imagine what the duke would look naked in a lake. In truth, she’d caught glimpses of him swimming. But only glimpses. Further imaginings based on her recent encounter suggested he would look very fine. He’d look very, very fine. All sinew and hard lines, dappled with drops of glistening water. And those legs. . .
“Imoooooooogen!”
She blinked. “Yes. What?”
“Whatever were you thinking? Your grip on your tea cup has grown quite tight.”
