by Elisa Braden
To be clear, she desired it—desired him—constantly. The mind infection was all-consuming in that regard.
Their conversations meandered from one topic to the next much like a river flowing through flat terrain—easily, lazily, naturally. At first, mindful of Janet’s presence on the opposite seat, she kept to polite subjects. His opinion regarding haggis. His recommendations for the wolf scene in her story. The efficacy of the sgian-dubh as a weapon of last resort.
He answered with patient consideration, as though she were someone of great importance, and he must be thorough in his responses: “I’ve had good haggis and bad. The good is a fair treat. The bad is best avoided. But if ye have no likin’ for it, lass, we’ll nae be servin’ it at our table.”
And, “I dinnae see why ye cannae include a wolf in yer story. ’Tis fiction, aye? A wolf adds a wee bit of danger. Makes yer hero seem more of a legend. Now, if he’s to dispatch a predator, ye might consider addin’ a hound as his companion. Campbell’s would be a good model. I’ll introduce ye when we return home. Also, give him a second dirk. A well-armed Scot lives longer.”
And, “Well, now, a sgian-dubh is more than a wee blade. Dubh means ‘black,’ or, in this case, ‘hidden.’ That’s its purpose. To be tucked away and used when better weapons have failed ye. ’Tis in the name Glenscannadoo, as well. Roughly speaking, ’tis from the Gaelic, gleann an sgàthan dubh, valley of the black mirror. Some say the glen is where our world and the next overlap, a window for ghosties and faeries and such. Dinnae ken about that. More likely, the name refers to Glenscannadoo and Glendasheen being reflections of one another.”
He spoke so freely, she scarcely recognized him as the man she’d married, or even the one who’d awakened her that very morning with erotic commands and thrusting pleasure. The Broderick she knew was far from forthcoming.
But, how well did she know him? Not well enough. With that in mind, she took her next opportunity to remedy the situation.
Four hours into their journey, while changing horses at their second coaching inn, Janet moved outside to sit with Stuart on the coach’s rear bench. And Kate began a campaign to acquaint herself with the man she loved.
“Is it true you play music?” she inquired as he tucked another blanket around her.
He stilled. Sat back. “I did.”
“The bagpipes, yes?”
“Aye.”
“And the fiddle.”
Silence.
“I should love to hear you play,” she offered, noting his tension. “I should also love to know why you haven’t mentioned it before now.”
For a while, he stared out the coach window at the brown hills covered in bare trees. Finally, he looked at her. “Music doesnae live inside me any longer, mo chridhe.”
Her heart cracked in two. “Broderick,” she whispered. “How can that be?”
“The Bridewell changed many things. That’s one.”
“Will you tell me about the Bridewell?”
His gaze darkened. “Ye dinnae want to ken about that.”
“No. I don’t. But I think I must.” Music should be a solace. If even that had been stripped away from him, she must work to restore its place in his heart.
“Very well, I’ll tell ye a wee bit. But ye must agree to tell me about London.”
She blinked. “London?” Her cheeks prickled. “What a silly thing to ask—”
“Kate. Ye’re the worst liar I’ve ever seen.”
“A fine thing to say to your wife.”
“Somethin’ happened in London that ye’re reluctant to tell me.”
She sniffed. “It was nothing. Certainly nothing compared to your experiences in prison.”
“Do we have a bargain?”
She considered his offer. Swallowed her misgivings. “Very well.” Adjusting her blankets and snuggling closer to his heat, she began at the beginning. “First, you must understand my sister Eugenia. She is rather bold. Two years prior to my debut, she landed herself in a delicate position with a footman in full view of gossiping busybodies.”
“A wee bit scandalous for an earl’s daughter, aye?”
She snorted. “Yes. In the same sense that a bonfire is a wee bit warmer than a candle.”
“What was that to do with ye?”
“The scandal was deeply damaging. Eugenia was forced to retreat to the country. We delayed my first season by a year, but it scarcely helped. Most gentlemen avoided me. Others were crueler, calling my sister vile names and implying my nature would be similarly wanton. I spent a good deal of that spring sitting with the wallflowers and trying desperately not to let my misery show.”
She smoothed the blanket, expecting him to comment. But he simply waited. Listened.
“Generally, I loathed every minute, but something good did emerge from the rubbish heap.” She smiled, remembering. “I found friends. Clarissa Meadows spent years keeping her grandmother company whilst other ladies danced away with their bridegrooms. She showed me how to survive the wallflower experience with aplomb. Then, Francis came along with witty observations on the ton’s resemblance to a Drury Lane farce. Francis is very amusing.” She chuckled and shook her head. “We became inseparable. They are my dearest friends, particularly since Eugenia married and went to live with her husband in Dorsetshire.” She sighed. “The mind infection, you know.”
“Ye miss her.”
“Yes.” Heart aching, she continued smoothing the folds of the blankets over her knees and shifted the subject back to something less painful. “In my second season, suitors began to find their courage, and one by one, they sought to win my admiration. Yet, no matter how I tried, I could not muster the slightest interest in bearing their children.” She chuckled. “Heavens, I couldn’t even be bothered to kiss any of them more than once or twice.”
Broderick’s arm flexed against her side, and he sat very still, but his expression remained neutral. He was listening. For Kate, being listened to with such careful attention was a refreshing pleasure.
Relaxing into him, she continued, “You must understand, being a Huxley is … well, it comes with certain expectations. I’d watched my sisters make excellent marriages. Annabelle wed a future marquess. Jane married the Duke of Blackmore. Maureen and Eugenia both wed earls. Marrying well and bearing hordes of children is simply what we do. Yet, the longer I searched for a husband, the more dissatisfied I became. Before long, I realized that perhaps marriage itself was the problem—at least, the sort of marriage that required me to mold myself into a duplicate of every other society wife. I found being forced into such a role objectionable, a bit like being cast as the hunchbacked King Richard rather than the lovely Lady Anne.” She paused. “Although, Lady Anne was forced to wed King Richard, who was admittedly the more brilliant and fascinating of the two characters. All in all, I should prefer to play King Richard, I think. So, perhaps my analogy is not as applicable as I—”
“Kate.”
“Yes?”
“Explain what happened in London.”
“Oh, right. Yes. Last spring, I embarked on my third season with a new aim: I would seek a different sort of marriage, one which would permit me to remain myself, rather than becoming another of the white soup wives.”
He quirked a smile. “Ye dinnae care for white soup, I take it.”
She rolled her eyes. “If only the dish were interesting enough to dislike. Alas, it is ubiquitous because it is unobjectionable.”
“I see,” he murmured. “Like a wife who nobody notices any longer.”
“Yes.” She blinked, shocked at how well he’d understood. She gazed up at him, wondering how she’d managed to marry the finest man in Britain while running as far from the marriage mart as possible. By heaven, he was a rare prize. She wondered if anyone would notice if she seduced him before their next stop. She also wondered why they were wasting time talking instead of kissing.
“Lass.”
“Hmm?”
&nbs
p; “Ye were seekin’ a different sort of marriage,” he prompted.
“Indeed.” She licked her lips and squelched her sudden hunger for Scottish fare. “I surmised that if I found an amiable husband who would not demand very much wifeliness, and I avoided succumbing to the mind infection, I might carry on pursuing my own interests whilst satisfying my family’s expectations. Really, it was a perfect plan. I even had a gentleman in mind.”
“Who?” His dark tone made her cautious.
“Oh, someone I’d known for years. A dear man who shared my love of the theatre and music. At society gatherings, I would play the pianoforte, and he would sing. It was … just lovely.”
“Mmm. What was his name?”
She patted his arm and slid her hand over his, which fisted on his thigh. “You mustn’t bother yourself about that. The important thing is I selected him precisely because we were compatible but not a love match.”
His jaw flexed as the ominous air lifted slightly. “Go on.”
She gathered her courage. This was the humiliating part. How to explain one of the worst rejections of her life without him viewing her as a piteous, embarrassing fool? She played with the curls tickling her cheek. A distraction seemed just the thing.
“Firstly, I should like you to kiss me. Perhaps more. Yes, definitely more. If I lift my skirts and climb atop you, nobody will see anything. We’ll make good use of the blankets. They’ll assume you’re keeping me warm. Which is a true yet insufficient description.”
He shifted, his posture stiff, his expression suddenly pained. “Bluidy hell. No. I’ll nae be distracted. Tell me the rest.”
“But, if you kiss me, you’ll recall that you want me. And if I mount you, that will go a very long way—”
“Finish yer story, woman.”
She held him tighter. Squeezed her eyes closed. And pressed forward in a rush. “Very well. Whilst watching an insipid play at the Adelphi Theatre, I suggested to him that we would be an ideal match, and he replied that he couldn’t possibly be a suitable husband for a lady of such grace and loveliness, and so on, etcetera. I assured him I was none of those things, and he was splendid, and I’d thought a good deal about an arrangement between us, and furthermore, he must marry and produce an heir because he is in line for a title and must have a wife. And, in any event, we suited one another well enough, and I shouldn’t be a bother to him, nor him to me, and then I kissed him, and he behaved as if I’d fed him a spoonful of haggis. And so, I tried again, much more diligently this time, and then he very gently explained that he hadn’t those sorts of feelings toward me and that I deserved much more from my husband, and so on, etcetera.”
She took a breath and sallied onward before she lost her nerve. “And then, on the coach ride home, he apologized profusely and reiterated that he’d never wish me to think he didn’t admire me more than any other female of his acquaintance, and I asked if perhaps his feelings might change if he tried a bit harder or ate a hearty meal or improved his sleep. He laughed a bit at that, but I simply didn’t understand, because other men seemed so keen to kiss me. Indeed, I occasionally had trouble persuading them to stop, which is only to say that his response was quite different and unexpected, and so, when I found him kissing his footman behind a hedge several days later, I was quite, quite, quite perplexed.”
Silence.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“I doubt that very much, lass.”
“Certainly, I considered that he might have stumbled and accidentally collided with his footman. Or that his footman was offering assistance, resulting in an unintentional embrace. George is remarkably attentive, as footmen go.”
Broderick sighed. “Kate.”
“But the embrace went on too long. I concluded it must be intentional.” She winced, remembering how both men had turned seven shades of crimson when they’d noticed her gaping at them. “I felt simply dreadful, Broderick.” She braved a glance at her husband’s face. “He assured me that I hadn’t driven him to such a pass, that he’d long had such tendencies. But part of me still wonders: Is my kiss really so revolting?”
He looked out the window for a moment, and her stomach twisted as she saw him calculating his answer. Leaning across, he drew the curtains on each window then removed her bonnet with a few practiced flicks of his fingers.
“Broderick?”
He tossed aside her blankets.
“What—what are you doing?”
He lifted her onto his lap, slid her skirts up to her thighs, and guided her to straddle him. Then, he tucked the blankets around her and cupped her face to hold her gaze with his. “Listen closely. Are ye listenin’?”
She nodded, her breath coming faster as she felt how ready he was for her.
“Some men have a different nature. The reason he declined yer offer is because he wouldnae want any female.” Her husband’s dark eye burned with a molten fever. “And thank God for that. Because I want ye.” His thumb stroked her cheek, brushed her lower lip with a sensual tug. “Do ye hear me? I want ye more than I’ve ever wanted any bluidy thing in my existence. Ye’re a fire in my blood, mo chridhe. These wee curls along yer cheeks. The way ye shine when ye smile. The sweet scent of ye and the sweeter way ye touch me when ye think I’m asleep.”
Her eyes were welling and her throat aching, but she managed to whisper, “You know about that?”
“Aye. I ken.”
She traced her gloved fingertips over his brow. His ear. The scar along the corner of his mouth. “I want you, too.”
“Then kiss me, my bonnie Kate. Let me show ye why ye were always meant to be mine.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Not until the third morning of their journey did Kate realize Broderick hadn’t told her anything about his time in the Bridewell. Instead, he’d kept her thoroughly distracted by satisfying her every need and fantasy.
He’d read her manuscript without laughing.
He’d listened to story after story about her family, including the time she’d brought home a litter of kittens to make her mother happy—only to instead make her father sneeze.
He’d told her about his boyhood with his brothers spent hunting, farming, raising livestock, and later, building the distillery.
He’d described the day his father had married Annie’s mother and how enchanted they’d all been with the idea of a “wee, red-haired lassie” becoming their new sister.
He’d asked about her favorite plays and why she believed Shakespeare was the finest playwright to ever live. Her answer had taken an entire afternoon.
He’d kissed her and fed her and kept her warm, dry, and contented as a kitten in a pool of sunlight.
After only two days, she was so enthralled, she feared her heart couldn’t survive without his constant presence. Every time he exited the coach to speak with his men or fetch her a flask of ale, she gazed out the window like an absolute ninny, her chest aching. Every time he looked at her with that beautiful, lustful fire in his eye, she craved more of him.
The man was deliberately obsessing her; she was certain of it. He even claimed not to mind her singing. Could there be a clearer sign of sinister intentions? She thought not.
The mind infection had overtaken her soul, rooting deep and binding her to him inexorably. It was everything she’d feared, only worse.
This morning, he awakened her in a now-familiar fashion, and she suffered a moment of panic. His hard, naked body wrapped around her from behind as they lay on their sides in the Lowland inn’s finest bed. One of his hands cupped her breast. The other caressed lightly between her thighs.
She moaned, still emerging from the sensual dream she’d been having. Arousal heated her skin, turning it sensitive to every sensation. The prickle of his chest hair against her back. The tickle of his lips against her neck. The heat of his breath and the hardness of his staff and the coolness of early-morning air.
“Are ye awake yet, lass?”
Her breath hitched on another moan as his fingertips played and swirled. “Broderick.”
“Aye, there ye are.”
Her heart kicked frantically as he drove her pleasure higher. Tighter. He did it effortlessly. By now, he knew her body better than she did. He played her like a stringed instrument, with subtle motions and exquisite pressure. His tongue traced her earlobe and his teeth scraped her neck. The roughness of his unshaven jaw chafed her shoulder.
She arched and reached back for him, wanting his mouth. He granted her a kiss, sliding his tongue inside to duel with hers. Too soon, he pulled away, nuzzling her hair and whispering, “Come for me. I need ye wet and eager.”
Her body needed no further urging. Driven by his fingers and his voice, the power of his arms and the fierce hold he had upon her, her pleasure launched. Soared. Spun out and unwound. Her sheath demanded to be filled even as it wept and seized.
He waited for her to calm. Kissed her neck and slowed his hand. “Good.” His other hand slid from her breast to her hip then down to her thigh, just above her knee. He gripped. Lifted. Hooked her leg over his arm and slid his hot, massive shaft inside her with a long, slow thrust.
She should have been used to him by now. But the way he filled her so completely, stretching her and working his length in deep enough to cause a near-unbearable pressure, made her gasp every time.
“Try to relax,” he murmured, infuriatingly calm. “Let me in.”
She couldn’t. She shook her head, gasping for air.
“Aye.” He raised her knee higher and gave her a harder thrust. The hand that had never left her folds began stroking again. “That’s the way. Easy, now.”
Drawing little circles around the center of her pleasure, he drove her to the brink of madness. The spiraling sensations wound tighter. Tighter. She begged him for mercy, but as usual, he didn’t heed her pleas. Rather, he kept on without a word, pushing her to the edge and sending her flying into the abyss as if that alone were his mission.
