‘Is that Gaelic?’
He seemed somewhat disconcerted, as if he had not intended her to hear the words. ‘It means every flood will have an ebb. Your father’s day is coming to an end. It’s not blood that will count in the new age, it’s science, and industry, and people like me who aren’t scared to get their hands dirty.’
Cordelia shivered. ‘Remind me never to get on the wrong side of you.’
‘We are both on the same side. Don’t you want revenge?’
She stared at him, sifting her responses, measuring them carefully. ‘If you had asked me a few hours ago, I would have said revenge was the last thing on my mind,’ she said finally. ‘I went to Cavendish Square today thinking to achieve reconciliation. Foolish of me, but I had to try. One last time. I shouldn’t have bothered, but at least I can be in no doubt of his feelings. Not even I could persuade myself he cared after that.’
Fury, red-hot and vicious, caught her suddenly in its grip. The muscles in the backs of her legs actually trembled from it. Her hands were clenched into painful fists. What had she been thinking of! He would never, ever agree to what she wanted from him because he simply didn’t care. ‘He doesn’t love me.’
There, she had said it out loud. Cordelia looked out of the window. The sky had not fallen down. ‘My father doesn’t love me. My father doesn’t give a damn about me!’ It felt good. It felt very good. There could be no excuses, no mitigating factors. He had been cruel, deliberately so, and malicious too. She forced herself to recall in great detail, every word he had said, determined this time to etch it on to her mind, a sort of memory-prompt should she retract, as she had so often in the past. He didn’t love her, but he thought, he still thought, he owned her, and it was that fact she had until now never truly questioned. Every act of hers had been in defiance. She had never felt entitled to her own life even when she had acted as if she did.
‘My God, what a fool I have been.’ It really was as if she had lifted the shutters on a darkened room, allowing the light to filter in, displaying the murky contents for what they were. She owed him nothing. What she had taken for love had been a sense of duty, a habit, nothing more. She didn’t love her father. Right now, thinking of how he had so nearly managed to manipulate her, she almost hated him.
‘So you’ll do it?’
She had almost forgotten Iain in the heat of her anger. It faded now, replaced by something else. She came back across the room towards him, smiling. Power, that’s what she felt, and it was intoxicating. ‘A double coup,’ she said. It was a very satisfying notion. ‘You know, it is really very liberating, being freed from guilt.’ She stretched her arms wide, laughing as she twirled round, the skirts of her gown whirling around her. ‘I feel quite giddy with it.’
‘I can see that.’ Iain got to his feet, catching her as she stumbled. ‘Mind you don’t fall.’
‘I can mind myself perfectly well. Just because we have an—an alliance doesn’t mean that I can’t fight my own battles.’
She spoke more aggressively than she intended, but Iain merely smiled. ‘I know that fine, and it’s one of the things I like about you.’
‘You mean there’s more than one?’
She meant it simply to deflect the compliment, to distract her from the realisation that it would be very nice indeed to have someone fight her battles for her, just once. But it was a mistake.
‘You know perfectly well there’s more than one,’ Iain said.
He was doing it again. Looking at her with intent. And it was having the same effect as it had before, heating her blood, making her heart beat too fast. ‘Stop that.’
‘It’s your own fault. If you had not reminded me of all the things I like about you—and don’t tell me you’re not thinking of the things you like about me too, for I can see it in your face.’
Cordelia tilted her chin, defying the flush to creep on to her cheeks. ‘One of the things I don’t like about you is the way you make assumptions about what I’m thinking.’
‘You’ve a very speaking face, which is why I’m going to suggest something else you won’t like. Let me handle telling your father our news.’
Instinctively, she wanted to refuse him, but for once Cordelia paused to think. ‘You mean I might give the game away?’
‘He knows you too well.’
Much as she wished to deny it, she could not. ‘Very well, though I should warn you that—’
‘You prefer to make your own decisions. As do I.’ Iain grinned. ‘We’re like to have some interesting clashes, my wee love.’
‘I am not your wee love.’
He slipped his arm around her waist, pulling her up against him. ‘For the time being, that’s exactly what you are.’
Her heart began to beat erratically. She had that feeling, that her corsets were too tightly laced. She wished he would not smile at her like that, because it was nigh on impossible not to smile back at him. ‘What does that make you for the time being,’ she asked, determined not to let him see the effect he was having on her, ‘my great big darling?’
She felt his laugh rumble in his chest. He pulled her tighter against him, sliding his free hand into her hair. ‘Flattering as that is, I think it would be best if you didn’t go bragging to the world about it.’
She felt herself go scarlet. ‘I did not mean great big—I did not mean that!’
‘There now, that’s put me in my place. And yet I seem to remember there were no complaints from you at the time.’
His fingers were stroking the skin at the nape of her neck. His mouth was curved into a smile that was blatantly sensual. It was there again in his eyes, that heat, and she was pretty certain it was there in hers too. ‘Iain, we are just pretending to be engaged.’
‘Aye, but there are other things we’ve no need to pretend about. You know I still want you, Cordelia.’
Corr-dee-lia. ‘Did you have this in mind when you suggested our engagement?’
‘No, and I won’t change my mind if you’re not interested. I think you are though.’
‘I think I’ve already mentioned that you’ve a very high opinion of yourself, Mr Hunter.’
Iain laughed softly. ‘I don’t want to play games, Cordelia. Knowing that you want me as much as I want you—have you any idea what that does to me?’
His voice was low, making the hairs on her skin stand on end. No man had ever been so—so blatant before. ‘You do not subscribe to the belief that men shall hunt and women shall be hunted?’ she asked.
His expression darkened momentarily. ‘I told you, I’m not interested in playing games. I don’t want you subservient to my desires, Cordelia, I want my desires to be yours. Yours to be mine.’
His words were a low stomach-clenching growl. ‘My desires to be yours,’ she repeated, mesmerised.
‘And yours to be mine. Admit it, we have unfinished business.’
‘You think to finish it while we pretend to be engaged?’
‘Yes.’
‘You think proximity will engender indifference?’
‘It always has before.’
This, in Cordelia’s experience was very true. Iain did not ask her about her experience. Thinking back over their earlier conversation, she realised there was a distinct possibility he thought it acquired when she was married to the mythical Mr Williamson. Disabusing him now would raise all sorts of awkward questions that were none of his business, any more than his experience was hers, she told herself firmly. If he asked her directly of course, she would not lie, but he had not asked, nor was he likely to.
‘The point of a betrothal is usually to nurture love rather than breed contempt,’ Cordelia said.
‘Faux betrothal. And our aim is indifference,’ Iain said. ‘I can’t imagine ever holding you in contempt. To be honest, though I’m certain of the outcome, I’m a b
it more interested in the journey, aren’t you?’
‘Even though it’s likely to be anything but smooth. I am after all a—what did you call me—a feisty wee thing?’
‘It’s because you’re a feisty wee thing that I think we’ll both enjoy the journey. You don’t strike me as a woman with much interest in a smooth path, Cordelia.’
She had only to make the tiniest movement and he would let her go, but she didn’t want to. She wanted him every bit as much as he said, and she wanted not to want him every bit as much. ‘You’re right, I’m not in the least bit interested in a smooth path.’ Cordelia smiled, deliberately provocative. And then she kissed him.
Chapter Four
Her lips were warm, soft. She wobbled, put her arms around his neck, pulling herself against him, and kissed him again. Iain sank down on to the sofa, taking her with him. She was splayed across him, her breasts brushing his chest. He slid his arms around her waist and pulled her upright so that she sat astride him, his hands curving over her bottom. Her eyes widened with surprise and she smiled that smouldering smile of hers, and dipped her head, her lips already parted as he kissed her back.
His heart skittered to a frenzy as he was enveloped in her scent, her skin, the rustling silk of her gown, as he slid his tongue into the warmth of her mouth, and she shuddered against him with a little moan of pleasure. The kiss deepened. Her hands slid under his jacket to his back. He could feel her fluttering fingers through the silk of his waistcoat and the linen of his shirt. She squirmed, her knees on either side of his thighs to hold her balance. He knew from experience that her underwear made her top half impregnable, and instead pulled at her skirts, his hand fighting with layers of petticoats until he found the softness of her flank, separated from her skin by just one layer of cotton.
She arched her back, rubbing her breasts against his chest. Her tongue touched his, retreated, touched his again in the most tantalising of dances. He was already hard. His hand cupped the delightful curve of her buttock. She lifted herself from him to allow him to slip his hand beneath her, but her voluminous petticoats were getting in the way. He wanted to roll her on to the floor and push up her skirts and bury himself in her. His shaft throbbed in anticipation. He hadn’t allowed himself to remember how she felt around him, hot and wet and tight, gripping him, urging him deeper. Now he could think of nothing else. Though actually, there was plenty he should be thinking about.
‘Cordelia.’ He tried to lift her from him, but she protested, kissing him deeper, her fingers plucking at his hair, at his back, tugging at his shirt.
‘Cordelia, wait.’
She stilled and lifted her head, blinking at him, her skin flushed, her eyelids heavy, her eyes glittering. ‘Too much already, Iain? Or are you having second thoughts?’
‘No! God, no. I’m not having any thoughts, though I should be,’ he said distractedly. ‘There are a million things I should be doing, thinking of, preparing for.’
‘And this is rather far down the list,’ Cordelia said, attempting to clamber from his lap.
He stayed her, putting his hands firmly round her waist. ‘The problem is that this is at the top of my list. In fact, right now, it’s the only thing on my list, and we haven’t even formalised our betrothal.’
‘Faux betrothal. Are you suggesting we wait until there’s a formal announcement?’
He ignored the mocking note in her voice. ‘No, but I am suggesting we wait. I—Cordelia, we’ve waited a year already. It was—the last time, it was...’
‘Extraordinary.’
This, she said without any trace of irony. ‘Yes,’ Iain agreed, relieved. ‘And also—well, frankly rather hurried. I do possess some finesse, you know.’
‘I don’t, but I’d like to.’
That smile again, curling like smoke. His shaft throbbed in response. It took a supreme effort not to kiss her. ‘You shall find out, I promise you.’ He eased her to her feet, getting up from the chair and putting some very necessary distance between them. ‘After...’
‘We are formally betrothed,’ she finished for him.
He had meant to say after he had spoken to her father, but perhaps she was right. There would be so many arrangements to make, and all the blasted formalities that Armstrong was facilitating to be gone through. The promise of Cordelia at the end of it would certainly be an incentive.
‘I don’t mean it that way,’ she said, interrupting his thoughts. ‘As an incentive,’ she explained when he looked at her blankly. ‘That was what you were thinking.’
‘I was, but not in the way you were thinking. You’re not the type to hold a man to ransom.’
He had meant to say it lightly, but the words came out sounding like a threat. Her lips tightened. ‘No, I’m not,’ she said. ‘Perhaps if I had been—but I never have, so what is the point in discussing it?’
Which meant, quite clearly, that she would not discuss whatever it was, Iain realised, at the same time as he also realised that he wanted to know, and that he had no right to ask. How could he have thought her easy to read! Right now, her face was as inscrutable as a cat’s. Odd, this feeling of knowing her so intimately and yet not knowing her at all. He wondered if she felt the same. At the back of his mind, he registered that he was spending rather too much time wondering about Cordelia, when he should be thinking about the problems of building ships in Arabia. Frustration, that’s what it was. That’s all it was. Best cured by action, though sadly not of the sort his body clamoured for.
‘I had best be off.’ He picked up his hat and gloves. ‘I’ll call on your father first thing.’
‘You are sure...’
‘I won’t change my mind.’
‘I was going to ask if you were sure you would not rather I accompanied you?’
‘I’m sure of that too.’ He risked a very brief kiss, the most fleeting touch of his lips to her cheek.
She caught his arm as he turned to go. ‘I am sure too,’ she said, with a deliberate hint of that smile of hers, ‘on both counts.’
‘Feisty.’ He pulled her back into his arms. ‘Most definitely feisty. I never thought I’d say this, but I’m looking forward to being shackled.’
‘Faux shackled.’ She ran her hand possessively down his back to rest on his behind.
‘Nothing faux about this,’ Iain said, and kissed her once more.
* * *
Cordelia had spent a restless night torn between regretting that she had agreed to allow Iain to see her father alone, and thinking of the thousand-and-one questions she should have asked him to cover on her behalf. At one point, she had almost written everything down and sent Iain a note, for he would assuredly not think to discuss the half of them with her father. In fact, she wouldn’t be surprised if he spent the entire time discussing contracts and permissions and all those things which would facilitate his blasted steamship building and not think about any of the things Cordelia needed to know. The knowledge that he was right, that she was likely to betray herself, kept her back, though it was devilish difficult, to let another manage her fate. Devilish!
It was therefore an enormous relief when the maid informed her, not long after eleven, that a Mr Hunter awaited her convenience downstairs. She selected a walking dress of her favourite powder-blue merino wool with navy frogging which fastened over a white-silk underdress. Twisting her hair into a simple knot, brushing away the maid’s offer of hot irons, she donned a poke-bonnet whose only ornament was an ostrich feather the exact shade of blue as her gown.
Despite the throng of people in the reception area, she spotted Iain immediately. It wasn’t that he looked out of place, rather that something emanated from him which drew the eye. He was plainly dressed as he had been yesterday, in a black coat and trousers, but as yesterday, the austerity of his attire drew attention to the man himself as he stood by the doorway, looking ou
t on to the street.
He turned as she began to make her way towards him, and any illusion a person might have had, that the plainness of his dress betokened a man of the cloth must have been banished, for surely no man of ecclesiastical pursuit would look at a woman in such a way. Blatant desire, washed with—what? Cynicism, scepticism, world-weariness or simple wariness? Whatever the combination, Cordelia wished he would not look at her in that way, and at the same time felt her skin heating as he did.
His greeting, however, was brief and to the point. ‘I’ve seen your father. As you’d expect, he has his terms. I’ve business to attend to in the Isle of Dogs. You can come with me, and I’ll bring you up to date.’
Which was exactly what she wished, but his high-handed manner put her hackles up. ‘And what if I have another engagement?’
He drew her a level look. ‘I thought we agreed we wouldn’t play games?’
‘Actually, you said you didn’t want to play games. I cannot recall that I made any commitment either way—where are you going?’ Cordelia said sharply, as Iain turned away.
‘I told you, I have urgent business. There’s a lot to be done if we’re to make Plymouth in time.’
Her irritation fled. ‘Plymouth?’ Another of those looks, but this time she could see the gleam in his eye. So much for his avowal not to play games. She caught at his sleeve. ‘Iain, why are we going to Plymouth?’
His mouth quivered on the verge of a smile. ‘Actually, we are merely passing through Plymouth. We’re going to...’
‘Arabia?’ She was shaking. Her knees really were turning to jelly. ‘Do you mean it, Iain? I’m going to see Celia?’
He nodded. ‘I do. All being well, you’ll be with your sisters in a matter of weeks.’
Forgetting all about her surroundings, Cordelia threw her arms around his neck and burst into tears.
‘Wheesht, now.’ Totally taken aback by the strength of her reaction, Iain pulled her into the relative privacy of an alcove and put a sheltering arm around her. ‘I thought it would be a nice surprise, not a shock.’
Harlequin Historical May 2014 - Bundle 2 of 2: Unwed and UnrepentantReturn of the Prodigal GilvryA Traitor's Touch Page 6
