Naughton smothered a sigh and added a dribble to Mary’s cup.
“What is it?” Mary asked.
“Whisky,” Malcolm said. “Finest Mackenzie malt. The Scots call it uisge beatha. Water of life.”
Mary sipped her coffee as hesitantly as she’d tried the bannock. A warm tingle rolled over her tongue, followed by a wash of heat as she swallowed.
“Is it like gin?” She’d sneaked a taste of gin once out of curiosity and found it sharp and eye-watering. This was more subtle, like very fine but strong wine.
“Nothing at all the same as gin,” Malcolm said, sounding indignant. “This is Scottish art at its finest. It sits in oak for years to mature—some of what we have in our cellars is older than me.”
Naughton, without being asked, brought over two crystal glasses with nothing but the whisky in them, and handed one to Malcolm and one to Mary. Malcolm clicked his glass against Mary’s, and sipped.
Mary took a very small taste. Once the immediate burn on her tongue receded, the liquid warmed her mouth, spreading down her throat before she’d realized she’d swallowed.
“Take another,” Mal said. “And close your eyes.”
Mary obeyed. Malcolm’s breath was warm as he leaned to her. “It rests in its cask in the heart of the Highlands, overlooking the sea. Ye can taste the sea winds, can’t ye? The crisp air, the openness of the world.”
Mary wasn’t certain she could taste all that in this drop, but she tasted something. Mellow, strong, like Malcolm would be when he aged.
She opened her eyes. “It will make me tipsy.”
“Aye, if ye drink enough of it.” Malcolm looked amused. “But whisky is to be savored, not drowned in. Ale is for getting drunk with, whisky for pure bliss.”
Mary took another tentative sip. While she didn’t hold with spirits, having seen the evils of drink in her charity work with Aunt Danae, she had to agree this uisge beatha was compelling.
Malcolm drank his slowly, like a man savoring his last drop. Mary followed suit, liking the heat that permeated her body. Her skin felt flushed, her corset too tight. She longed to pull her clothes open and exhale in relief.
Naughton took away the tray after they’d enjoyed the hearty bannocks. Malcolm swallowed a final sip of whisky and set his glass on the floor.
“Now, then, Mary.”
His voice was low, rough from his impromptu swim in the sea.
“Now, then?” Mary asked nervously.
“I have you alone, in my bedchamber. Hadn’t planned this tonight, but I’ll seize any opportunity thrust in front of me.”
She should be more worried, Mary thought. Afraid and offended at the same time, but neither fear nor indignation came. She wished she could have the correct reaction to Malcolm, but she never had yet.
“I am betrothed to another,” Mary said, the words lacking conviction.
“For now.”
Malcolm sounded so certain she’d walk away from Halsey without looking back. He’d advised as much from the beginning.
“Breaking an engagement is more than jilting the other party, you know,” Mary said. “There are settlements—my father and Halsey spent months hammering them out with solicitors. If I reject Lord Halsey’s suit now, he can sue for breach of contract.”
“Aye, I know all about settlements.” Mal nodded wisely. “The Mackenzies also have solicitors—extremely practical and tight-fisted Scotsmen, the lot of them. They can squeeze blood from a turnip.”
“They would have to do a lot of squeezing with Halsey,” Mary said dryly.
Malcolm chuckled. “We’ll see. You are a marvel, ye are. Ye can sit so close to me and talk calmly about solicitors and settlements, while all I’m thinking is how much like silk your skin is.”
The skin in question tightened. Malcolm traced Mary’s cheekbone and down across her lips, his fingertips lingering on her chin.
He didn’t demand with this caress. It was gentle, giving. Mary raised her hand, her fingers shaking, and touched his cheek in return.
She felt the burn of whiskers, the twitch of muscle. Mal watched her, his golden eyes giving nothing away.
Mary let her fingers wander down his jaw, brushed with red-gold bristles, to his neck and the sinews there. Daringly, she drew her touch to the hollow of his throat, then across his exposed collarbone to his broad shoulder.
If she’d never seen a man unclothed—other than the very small statues—she’d certainly never touched one. Mal’s skin was warm, despite his swim in the ocean, and smoother than she’d thought a man’s would be. The skin was also tight, covering the steel of muscle.
“Ye can nae do this, Mary,” he said softly.
Mary froze, but she couldn’t lift her fingers. “Why not?”
“Because here I am, bare for ye to touch all ye want. But I can nae do it in return.”
“I know,” she said. “’Twould be improper.”
“As improper as sitting against me while I’m in nothing but a blanket? Ye have strange notions, lass.”
Mary felt giddy. “If you are going to ask me to sit with you in nothing but a blanket, I must refuse.”
Malcolm’s gaze sharpened. “And ye should nae say things like that. My imagination, ’tis an inventive one.”
Mary swallowed. Her imagination was good too, and thinking about being naked in a blanket, the fabric touching her intimately, with Malcolm beside her, scalded her from the inside out. Her breasts felt tight, holding a strange ache.
“Turn around,” Malcolm said.
“What?”
“Just here, on the sofa. Turn your back to me.”
“Why?” Mary asked, her body stiff.
Mal gave her a crooked grin. “I love that ye don’t obey without question. Save me from a meek woman who always does what she’s told.” The smile vanished. “Turn around, because I want to touch ye, that’s why.”
The proper Mary would refuse, offering a rebuke. After all, he was a Highland barbarian and she was a lady.
The proper Mary had been banished to the deepest dungeon tonight. Mary gathered her skirts and moved herself on the small couch so her back was to Malcolm. Her panniers pinched her, but she ignored the discomfort.
Malcolm lifted her hair from her neck with a steady hand. Whitman had dressed Mary’s hair in a modish style tonight, much of it drawn up in pins to the top of her head, with a few curling locks falling to her neck. More strands had come loose from the wind and their adventure, and were now damp from mist and Malcolm.
Mary stilled as Malcolm drew his fingers slowly down her neck to the bare scoop of back her satin gown revealed.
“You’re soft here, Mary, do ye know that?” he asked quietly. “Don’t think I’ve ever seen a lovelier back.”
“You look at many, do you?” Mary’s words were breathy, hardly the teasing admonishment she’d meant them to be.
A laugh, hot against her skin. “When ye grow up in a Scottish castle with five men and a crowd of servants, ye see a lot more backs than ye care to.”
Mal’s laughter drifted away, and Mary felt his lips at the base of her neck. “I still have the lock of hair ye gave me, ye know,” he said. “I put it in the box where I keep my most precious things.”
Mary was melting. His touch sent heat down her spine to the base of it.
This was a man, a stranger, touching her with bare, broad hands, kissing where he had no right to. She was violating every propriety, breaking every rule.
And yet she could not imagine doing anything else. It felt right to let Mal touch her thus, forging a bond between them that was different from any connection she had to any other person.
Mary let her head drop to the side, her eyes closing as Malcolm’s lips moved from her neck to her spine. He slid his hands around her waist, gliding them up her stomacher to her breasts.
“One night this will all come away,” he said. “I’ll be able to touch the whole of ye.”
And on that night, Mary would burn up and die.
Mal continued to explore what her gown bared with his lips, then his tongue, then he pulled her back to him as he lay against the end of the couch. Mary turned her head to see his eyelids drooping, exhaustion finally claiming him.
Mal’s arms grew heavy around her as he relaxed, locking Mary into his embrace. He hooked one blanket-clad leg around hers while his breathing slowed. In a few moments, his hold went slack but didn’t entirely loosen.
Mary studied his face, so near hers. Malcolm’s tightness had melted, his body relaxed in a way she’d never seen it. His cares eased from his face, as well as his arrogance, sleep erasing any sternness and rendering him the young man Mal truly was. After a moment or two, he began to softly snore.
The room was quiet, Naughton and the other servants leaving them alone. The only noise was the pop of the fire and Malcolm’s breathing.
Mary was warm, comfortable lying back against Malcolm, the whisky chasing all fear from her. She felt her eyes growing heavy, but she was determined not to fall asleep. Now that Malcolm was settled, she ought to rise, go home, tell her father and Aunt Danae what had transpired this night.
But she could not move. Malcolm’s chest rose and fell against her, his even breathing, with the hint of snore, more soothing than a soporific.
Mary’s eyes closed, and she slept.
When she woke, the window was gray with dawn. She was still lying back against Malcolm, her head on his shoulder, his arms securely around her.
The very tall Mackenzie with dark red hair she’d seen at the prince’s ball, his eyes even more wicked than Malcolm’s, was bending down to look Mary in the face.
“Who might you be?” he asked. “And why is my little brother snuggled up to ye so cozy?”
Chapter 15
Malcolm felt Mary start. He woke to find Will curving over both of them, studying Mary with rapt interest.
“Good morning, runt,” Will said with good humor. “Why are ye sleeping with a fully clothed woman on a couch, and where’s Alec?”
“Hell.” The blanket had slipped down Mal’s chest, but he hadn’t noticed, because Mary had been on him, cutting the cold. Damn and blast Will for the interfering bastard he was.
Malcolm carefully released Mary and levered himself to sit upright. “Alec is on a ship to France to find his daughter. His wife passed in childbed, poor lass. This is Lady Mary Lennox. Mary, m’ brother, Will.”
Will kept his gaze on Mary, but he straightened up, blinking. “Did you just say Alec’s wife? And daughter?”
Mal gave him a nod. “Aye. He married her last year, when we were in Paris. A pretty little lass, called Genevieve. A dancer with the opera. They wed, and she soon became quick with child. No surprise, really, the way they were at it, day and night.”
“Alec.” Will spoke slowly and deliberately. “Married.”
“Aye, that’s what I’m tellin’ ye.”
Will stood all the way up to his full height, his face awash with confusion. “And I didn’t know?”
“We kept it a deep, dark secret between us,” Mal said. “Don’t blame yourself. It’s Dad we were keeping it quiet from. An opera dancer, from Paris? He’d go apoplectic. We were going to break it to him gently, after the wee one came along.”
“But I know everything,” Will said. “Whether you want me to or not.”
“You had other things on your mind.” Mal resisted the urge to pat his brother’s giant clenched fist in comfort. “The Jacobite uprising, Duncan running off . . .” He shrugged, not adding the movements of the English troops, the state of politics in France and Ireland.
“But she died?” Will went on, trying to take in the full story. He ran a hand through his unruly hair. “Ah, poor Alec. Poor, poor Alec. No wonder he’s been so unhappy of late. She had the child, you say? It is well?”
“That’s what Alec’s gone to find out,” Mal said. “He had a letter, I had a ship standing ready, and off he went.”
Will blinked again. “You had a . . . Mal, why did you have a ship standing ready? What ship?”
“Gair’s. I had other cargo to send out. Sent Alec with it.”
Will made another pass of his hand through his hair, the thick strands of it standing straight up. “Let that be a lesson to me. I cast my gaze to the wider world, and miss everything at home.” He shot his gaze back to Mary. “Lady Mary Lennox?” When Mary nodded, Will looked accusingly at Malcolm. “She’s the Earl of Halsey’s betrothed. She can’t be here.”
Mary stood up, shaking out her skirts. “You are quite right, Lord William. I must be at home before full light, or the scandal will be all over town.” She gave Mal a stately nod. “Thank you, Lord Malcolm, for all your help.”
As Mal and Will watched, nonplussed, Mary moved to a gilt-framed mirror to briefly smooth her hair, then headed for the door. So caught up was Mal by her feminine movements that she was gone from the room before he realized.
He was up, snatching a shirt and a plaid as the door clicked shut behind her. He yanked it open and rushed out, throwing the clothes onto his body as he went. Will, understanding his alarm, came after him.
Downstairs already, Mary was taking her cloak from Naughton, expressing her thanks at finding it cleaned and dried. Mal charged down the stairs, but too late.
The bearlike figure of his father came out of a chamber into the lower hall. He saw Mary and headed straight for her.
“Who the devil are you?” he shouted. The man was hungover again, his bloodshot eyes glistening in the light from the open front door. His shirt was unlaced, his coat barely shrugged on, his plaids in disarrayed folds.
Mary gave him a calm curtsy then went back to fastening her cloak. “Good morning, Your Grace. I am Lady Mary Lennox. Very sorry to have disturbed you, sir, but my errand is finished, and I am just going.”
“Lennox?” The roar in the duke’s voice died a little as he puzzled this out. “You’re Wilfort’s daughter.”
“Yes,” Mary said, sliding on the gloves Naughton handed her. “Lord Wilfort is my father. Again, I am so sorry to have disturbed you. Good day, Your Grace.”
“Wilfort,” the duke repeated, then he swung his head around and looked up the stairs. “What the hell is the daughter of that bloody Sassenach doing in this house? Will! Damn ye, what have ye—”
Malcolm made it the rest of the way to the ground floor and pushed himself in front of the duke.
“Lady Mary is a guest,” he said. “A guest, if ye please. Keep a civil tongue, Dad.”
The double surprise of finding Mary in his stairwell and Malcolm telling him to be quiet actually silenced the duke for a second or two. By the time he opened his mouth to shout again, Mary had walked out into the morning.
A carriage waited there, summoned by the ever-efficient Naughton. Mal gave an exasperated growl and rushed out after Mary.
He caught her hand before a footman could help her into the coach. Malcolm squeezed her fingers. “Good-bye for now, lass. But not for long. I’ll settle Dad, and then I’ll come for ye. All right? After that, we won’t ever be apart.”
Mary started to speak, but Mal shook his head, glancing back at the house. Mary seemed to understand. She gripped Malcolm’s hand serenely as he assisted her into the coach.
“Good-bye, Mal,” Mary said as he withdrew. “And thank you.”
Mal only gave her a nod, then signaled the coachman to drive on. Malcolm knew he’d stopped her speaking, not for fear of his father, but because he’d not wanted to hear Mary say No.
The duke staggered out of the house. He was in a bad way, his face red, his breathing uneven. “What the devil was she doing here? Is she your doxy now? Are ye mad, runt?”
Will had also emerged, and together he and Mal got the duke back into the safety of the house. Naughton shut the door befor
e curious passersby could look in.
“I asked ye to keep a civil tongue,” Mal said in a hard voice. “Lady Mary is no doxy. She’s a respectable lady, and the woman I intend t’ marry.”
The duke stared at Malcolm for a second or two, then his fist swung out. “Over my dead body will ye marry the daughter of a bloody English earl!”
Mal, adroit by now in dodging his father’s blows, caught his fist and turned it aside. “I’m of age, and can marry whatever woman I damn well please. Go ahead and disown me, if ye have a mind. I have plenty of money, and ye have four other sons to inherit your title before me. God knows I don’t ever want to be duke.”
Mal’s father was unused to being defied. His sons had learned a long time ago how to let him bellow and then do what they wanted on the quiet. Except for Duncan, they rarely told him plainly what they thought.
The duke’s momentary shock let Mal push past him and climb the stairs to his chamber. Not until Mal had shut his bedchamber door did the duke begin shouting again.
Mal stood for a time in the middle of the room, unmoving. His shirt and plaid hung askew, but he made no move to right them and make himself ready for the day.
The chamber was forlorn and empty without the vibrancy of Mary in it. Her scent lingered, as did the remembered sensation of the warm weight of her body against his in the night. Waking up with Mary in his arms had been the best moment of Malcolm’s life.
Mal needed many more moments like that. He’d do anything necessary to bring Mary permanently into his life, notwithstanding his father and hers, and the enmity of two nations. None of that mattered. Only waking to breathe the fragrance of Mary’s hair, seeing her flushed and disheveled and brushed by morning light, had any importance to Malcolm. Which, to his mind, was as things should be.
Mary’s cloak had been dried, brushed, and mended, and now was cleaner than her own maids had ever rendered it. She took a small comfort in the cloak’s warmth, which she fancied carried a hint of Malcolm’s spice, as she descended at the front door of her father’s house.
The carriage stopped so close to the front door that Mary had to take only a few steps to be inside. The coach shielded her from view of the rest of the street. More gratitude for the Mackenzie servants, though she supposed they’d become very good at discretion on behalf of their masters.
The Stolen Mackenzie Bride Page 12