The Taste of Love

by Platt, Meara

  She felt a big ball of humiliation lodge in her chest. “I know. I’m so sorry. It was all my fault. Please don’t make fun of me.”

  “Blessed saints, lass. Is that what ye think I’m doing?” He swallowed her in his arms, drawing her firmly against his chest. “I’ve dreamed of this moment for months now. How could I possibly dream of anyone else when I’ve loved ye for years?”

  “What?”

  “Ye heard me, lass. I love ye.”

  Was this the laudanum speaking? Or did he truly feel this way?

  “Thad, I’ll forgive you if you remember none of this in the morning. You’re drugged. Your mind is hazy.”

  “It’s clearer than it’s ever been.” He kissed her on the neck again, a perfect kiss with just the right amount of passion and tenderness. “I’ve felt this way all along. But I never intended to act on it, for ye’re an English earl’s daughter and I was a cast-off, forgotten lad. The closest thing I had to a mother was toothless, ill-tempered Fiona.”

  Penelope closed her eyes and stilled against him, soaking in his warmth and the honey richness of his voice.

  “Then I met my schoolmate’s sister. A little girl with the biggest green eyes and a smart mouth who reminded me of a wild strawberry growing amid the hedgerows. A little girl who showed me the only tenderness I’d ever known.” He kissed the top of her head. “That little girl is my heaven, I said to myself. I knew it then and there. When I grow up, I’m going to marry her.”

  Penelope dared not release the breath she had been holding.

  “But as I got older, I realized the impossibility of such a match. A big nobody daring to offer for a little princess?”

  “Thad.” Tears stung her eyes.

  “I’ll love ye till the day I die, Loopy. How can anyone else ever claim my heart?”

  “Oh, Thad.” If only he meant it. But how could she trust his words in this drugged state?

  Tears streamed down her cheeks.

  He turned her to face him and placed his hands on either side of her face. “No tears, lass.” He gently wiped them away with his thumbs.

  She closed her eyes and shuddered. “Please don’t say anything more. You don’t know what you’re saying. Don’t give me hope today and then crush it tomorrow.”

  “I won’t.”

  “This is ridiculous. Look at me?” She glanced down at the front of her gown. “And look at you?” His hair was spiked where she’d run her fingers through it to keep his head at her breast. He still looked magnificent.

  “Ridiculous,” she repeated, for he was not only drugged and feverish, but likely talking in his sleep.

  “Aye, lass. We’ll never be a staid or proper pair. This is the way it will always be for us. Silly. Ridiculous. Passionate. Imperfect.”

  “Embarrassing.”

  “How else can a big, stubborn Scot with enough laudanum in him to fell a horse and a smart-mouthed Sassenach with the most beautiful breasts in all of England ever be? Och, lass. Do ye think I care what anyone thinks? I love ye. All of ye. Yer smart mouth and yer luscious body. Lord, ye have a luscious body. Don’t make me shut off my low brain. I canno’ do it, not around you.”

  He meant to kiss her, but a scratch at the door followed by a high-pitched bark caused them to quickly separate.

  Penelope rushed to the door. “Periwinkle, what are you doing in the hall?” She lifted him into her arms and laughed when he began to slobber her with licks and kisses.

  A minute later, a breathless Emily hurried down the hall toward them. “Oh, m’lady! Thank goodness you’ve found him. Your aunt was so afraid he’d run out of the house. But look, he’s wet the front of your gown. Oh, bad Periwinkle!”

  Thad cast her an innocent look.

  Penelope cleared her throat. “I merely came in here to fetch a new gown for myself. The tea-rose silk. Let’s take it back to Aunt Lavinia’s bedchamber. I’ll change into it there.”

  “Aye, m’lady.” Emily was too busy taking in Thad’s body to think about the gown Penelope was holding out to her.

  “Emily, let’s leave Laird Caithness.” She turned to Thad, trying to maintain a prim expression. “I’m sorry I disturbed your slumber.”

  He leaned his good shoulder lazily against the door frame and cast her a sleepy, utterly devastating smile. “Ye didn’t disturb me, lass. I was dreaming of ye anyway.”

  Emily erupted in a fit of giggles the moment he shut the door behind them. “Oh, m’lady! Did you hear that naughty man?”

  Penelope sighed and hurried down the hall. “I heard him.”

  “And him wearing only his breeches. Nothing but a few buttons between–”

  “Emily!” Penelope stopped to gape at her.

  The girl gave a lusty moan. “If that big Scot were dreaming of me, why I’d have my hands on his buttons so quick, he–”

  “Enough!” She continued down the hall, now at Lavinia’s door.

  Emily was still muttering. “If I had an itch, he’d know how to scratch it proper. I’m just saying, m’lady.”

  “I’m a lady, Emily. I can’t have an itch.” Although there was no other excuse for what she’d allowed Thad to do to her just now. “I’d have to be married to Laird Caithness to allow him to scratch it, wouldn’t I?”

  Her maid shrugged. “Well, what’s to stop you?”

  Penelope shook her head. “What?”

  “What’s to stop you from marrying that big Scot?”

  Nothing, she supposed. But what if his admission of love had only been a drug-induced fantasy that he would not remember in the morning?

  She would find out tomorrow. Thad was in too much of a stupor to dine with them this evening. Would he wake in time to meet her at the pond after breakfast tomorrow?

  Once the drug was out of his system, she doubted she’d get a confession of love out of him.

  Would she have the courage to admit she loved him?

  Chapter Thirteen

  A light mist still lingered over the pond the following morning. Penelope had skipped breakfast and walked down there early, her stomach too tied in knots for her to attempt to eat. She hadn’t slept well either, tossing and turning all night. Periwinkle hadn’t helped, for the dog continued to show his displeasure of her presence in his side of Lavinia’s bed.

  He’d constantly poked his nose where it didn’t belong, sniffing her and then following it up with a snuffle of indignation.

  She patted the faded red leather binding of The Book of Love she’d brought along with her. “Does he truly love me?”

  She set the book aside on the fallen log and began to stroll along the bank. She’d worn her walking boots and a gown of russet cotton with a shawl of matching swirls of russet and gold. Her hair was loosely plaited in one long braid down her back.

  Perhaps she ought to have made herself up more fashionably, but Thad was never one who cared for style, although his casual attire always looked magnificent on him and never out of place, even at the fanciest ton gatherings.

  With his rugged good looks and commanding aspect, he created a style all his own.

  “Loopy, there ye are. I thought ye were still in the house,” he called out, striding toward her like a conquering hero, his saddlebag slung over his good shoulder. As expected, he was not properly attired, merely clad in brown breeches and a white lawn shirt, as well as his tall brown boots.

  She pursed her lips as her gaze settled on the saddlebag. “Are you going somewhere?”

  “No. Just here.” He dropped the bag atop the fallen log under the shade tree where she’d earlier set down her book. “Come, lass. Sit beside me and let’s talk.”

  She nodded and settled on the log. “Thad, I’m so sorry for–”

  “Hush, lass. I’m not.” He sat down beside her. “Ye look beautiful,” he said in a husky rumble, tugging lightly on her braid. “I like yer hair down.”

  She couldn’t help but blush. “So do you. Look handsome, that is.”

  He grinned at her.

  And
continued to grin at her.

  “Why are you looking at me that way?”

  He arched an eyebrow. “I canno’ stop thinking about what ye let me do to ye, was it only yesterday? I’m still picking lint off my tongue.”

  Her cheeks caught fire. “Gad, you’re impossible.”

  “Why? I’m speaking the truth. And do ye hear me complaining? No, not in the least.” His gaze turned smoldering and his voice husky. “But the next time I touch ye like that, it won’t be through layers of clothes. It’s the taste of yer sweet skin I’ll be wanting to feel on my tongue.”

  “Thad!”

  His eyebrow was still quirked upward in that devilishly appealing way she’d come to know well. “There will be a next time, Loopy. A lifetime, I hope.”

  She glanced away to stare across the pond. The mist was melting away, and a mother duck and her ducklings were bobbing along the shimmering water. “You said you loved me.”

  “Aye, lass. I remember. I meant it. I have no intention of taking it back.”

  She dared herself to turn back to him and look into his eyes, but her cheeks were still on fire and she suddenly felt like the biggest coward ever to exist. “Are you sure, Thad?”

  His grin faded. “More certain than I’ve ever been about anything in my life. This is real, Loopy.” He sighed and shook his head. “Och, I suppose I should stop calling ye that. Ye always hated the name.”

  She placed her hand on his arm as she turned to face him. “It doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t think I’d respond to Penelope if you ever called me that. In truth, I never minded. I just said I did because you were so irksome at times, and sometimes I merely wished to irk you in return.”

  “Perhaps a compromise is in order. How about I call ye mo cridhe?”

  “What does it mean?”

  “My love.” He turned away and began to rummage through his saddlebag.

  “What are you doing?” As her hand slipped off his arm, she placed it over her heart to still its rapid beat. Mo cridhe. My love. Was it possible?

  “Ye need proof that I’m not lying to ye about my feelings.”

  “I know you wouldn’t lie to me.” Her eyes grew wide, for she was startled by the comment. “I trust you.”

  “Verra well, then ye’re afraid I’m lying to myself. Ye think I was dazed and rambling last night. Ye think I told Caithness and Hume I had offered for ye merely to save my own hide.” He leaned forward and cast her an achingly tender smile. “It was to save my heart not my thick Scottish hide. Ye’re the only girl I’ve ever loved or ever will love, and here’s the proof of it.”

  He dug into his pouch and withdrew a handful of what appeared to be letters. “Every one ye ever wrote me, lass. I have them all right here. I carry them with me always. To the Highlands. Into battle. Here with me now.” He handed them to her.

  She took them in her shaky fingers. “You kept them?”

  “Every last one.”

  She opened the top letter and chuckled as she read it. It was one of her first to him and she couldn’t have been more than eight or nine years old. “Dear Thaddius, I hope you are well. We missed you at Easter. I wanted to save you a slice of ham, but Nathaniel ate it. I was so angry I kicked him. Father sent me up to my room without supper. I would do it again because I know you like food. Cook says you eat like a wolf starved through winter. Cook sent up some raisin scones for me. I saved them for you instead. Nathaniel promised to give them to you when he returned to school. I hope you like them. Your friend, Penelope Sherbourne (Nathaniel’s sister).”

  She folded it and opened another one. “Dear Thaddius, I hope you are well.” She glanced up at him and laughed softly. “I was rather a dull writer.”

  He cast her a heartbreakingly tender smile. “No, lass. Ye were perfect.”

  “Oh, this is another early one.” She continued to read. “Mother says I should not have stolen your clothes. She says I must apologize to you and this time mean it sincerely. I told her you deserved it. She sent me up to my room without supper. Cook sent up some raisin scones for me. I saved them for you instead. Do you still eat like a wolf starved through winter? Your friend, Penelope Sherbourne (Nathaniel’s sister).”

  She wiped away a tear that had fallen onto her cheek. “Goodness, I never realized my letters were so silly.”

  His gaze remained achingly tender. “They weren’t silly. They were beautiful.”

  She opened one of the later letters, one sent to him after he, Nathaniel, and Beast had gone off to war. “Dear Thaddius, I hope you are well.” She snorted. “Oh, goodness. I am the worst writer in creation!”

  “No, ye’re not. Read on.”

  “Olivia, Poppy, and I pray for you every day. We pray for Nathaniel and Beast as well. Father won’t talk to me about the war and perhaps it is for the best. He isn’t in good health, but we are doing our best to make him comfortable. Thinking of perils the three of you face daily makes us all very sad. I wish I could do something for you. I don’t like being home and unable to do anything to help. So I had Cook teach me how to bake. I taught Poppy and Olivia. The three of us make cakes and biscuits, but I also always make raisin scones for the regiments that pass through Wellesford. Somehow, it brings me closer to you. The soldiers seem to appreciate the gesture. It is such a small thing. I think of you often and worry that you’re starving. Please keep yourself safe and come back to us. We are your family (your English family) and we love you as our own. If you are not yet sick of raisin scones, I will bake as many as you like upon your return. But don’t tell Father or Aunt Lavinia. They say it isn’t seemly for a gently bred young woman to have her hands covered in flour up to her elbows, and that no young man will marry me if he finds out I’ve been working in the kitchen. I may have responded rudely to the notion. They sent me up to my room without supper. Cook sent up some raisin scones. I wanted to send them to you. I cried because I didn’t know where you were or if you were still alive. Please be alive, Thad. I’ll lose a big piece of my heart forever if you’re not. Your friend, Penelope Sherbourne (Nathaniel’s sister).”

  She was crying in earnest now. “I knew you were still alive. I felt it in my heart.”

  He put his arms around her. “Do you still doubt that I love ye, Loopy? What those letters did for me…to know someone cared. To know you cared. I thought of you every day. I looked forward to receiving your letters.”

  “I wrote like a simpleton. Always mentioning raisin scones, and apparently, I was often sent up to my room without supper. But I continued to sign my letters the way I had when I was a little girl. It was a jest to be shared just between us.”

  He laughed softly. “I know, and it brought a smile to my lips with each letter, knowing it was something you would do. I wouldn’t change who you are. And I like that ye speak yer mind, always blazing yer own trail.”

  His expression sobered. “I know you always prayed for me, but I did the same for you. Especially at the start of each battle. I didn’t know if I would survive, so I worried about who was going to look after ye if I didn’t make it back to England. Not that ye really needed looking after. My concern was for yer happiness. Ye deserve to be loved by someone who understands ye and loves ye for yer stubbornness, yer tenderness. Yer passion and yer smart mouth.”

  He kissed her softly on the mouth. “It’s a beautiful mouth.”

  “Oh, Thad.”

  “I told myself the first thing I was going to do once the blasted war was over was ride to Sherbourne Manor to taste one of yer raisin scones. I like the scones, of course. But what I really wanted was to see the girl who had written me these letters. I may be a Caithness, and now it seems I’m to be a Hume, but I’ve always thought of Wellesford as my home because of you.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her once more. “When I returned a few months ago and saw ye all grown up, my heart soared. I hadn’t seen ye in a few years. I thought ye’d turn out pretty, but I wasn’t prepared for how beautiful ye’d become. Ye were an angel. Ye stole my br
eath away then and there. Ye still do.”

  He glanced at The Book of Love. “The three of ye were so intent on figuring out how to make a man fall in love. Mo cridhe, I was already wildly in love with ye. Only I never would have let ye know. Ye deserved someone as grand as Wycke.”

  “I never cared about rank or title.”

  “But I did. Oh, not for myself. For you, lass.” He shook his head and groaned. “Ironic that Hume, the very man who disowned my mother and never once cared whether I lived or died, should be the one who brought about this miracle for me. I’m his heir. Heir to an earl.” He shook his head and laughed. “I was with Hume and Caithness at Castlereagh’s home when I first learned of this windfall. All I could think of was you, and how I could now offer for yer hand in marriage with my head held high.”

  He gathered the letters and tucked them back in his saddlebag, then bent on one knee before Penelope. He took her trembling hand in his. “Let me ask ye proper this time. Will ye marry me?”

  She was about to accept him, but her response was interrupted as they both turned toward the house, startled by a sudden commotion. They heard shouts and loud, yipping barks mingled with female cries of alarm. “Oh, Thad! It’s Periwinkle. He’s run out of the house.”

  “He’s coming this way. I’ll get him.” He rose to intercept the little spaniel who wasn’t much bigger than the average squirrel.

  Penelope was up on her feet now. “I’ll help.”

  But Periwinkle had other plans. He darted past both of them and leaped into the pond to chase the ducks who were paddling in the water. They quacked in panic and disappeared into the rushes. At the same moment, Periwinkle realized he was in deep water and did not know how to swim.

  Apparently, he did not realize dogs were supposed to know how to paddle with their paws. “Oh, Thad. He’s going under!”

  Penelope jumped into the water, her heart leaping frantically as his little head disappeared below the surface.