The Passionate One

by Connie Brockway

  He’d wanted her more in that moment than he’d ever wanted anything before. He wanted to be the lover she arched her neck for. Every other consideration had evaporated before that sudden, single-minded intent.

  So he’d set his mouth to the base of her throat and felt the pulse quiver like a wild bird in a trapper’s palm, sealing their fate. Because once he’d touched her, there had been no turning back. Whatever brief prick of conscience had begged him not to deflower a virgin before her marriage had been devastated by the answering ardor of her mouth. Her strong young body had surged upward to meet him with beautiful abandon, wrecking his tepid scruples, a battering ram destroying a straw hut.

  His futile attempt to demonstrate his self-control had never been more than a bluff. She’d only to whisper “please” for every other consideration to burn to cinders before their cumulative need.

  She’d been more honest than he, he thought with a wry smile. For at least she’d known that their pleasuring of each other had been a night-bred thing. Not real. He closed his eyes. She’d said it wasn’t real. He must remember that.

  Indeed, morning would doubtless erase the easy truce she’d made with her conscience. Now it was time to pay. One always paid.

  She would be filled with condemnation, as well she should be, for on her wedding night there would be questions, and Rhiannon, honest, damnable Rhiannon, would answer them and ruin herself in the process.

  He scraped his hair back from his eyes and stared out of the kitchen window. Rhiannon’s big bitch, Stella, lay idly regarding a rabbit munching Edith Fraiser’s comfrey plants. Ash watched her, remembering Rhiannon tenderly stroking the useless monster’s ears. Smiling. Relaxed and happy. She should always be thus. His hands tightened around the mug.

  He would have to stay until after Watt had married her. Because though Ash could offer Rhiannon nothing of himself—having nothing worth offering, not even the decency to resist the bride of a man who considered him a hero—at least he could offer her the protection that fear inspired. That, at least, was one thing he owned: the ability to instill fear. Today he would find opportunity to explain to Phillip in very clear, very explicit terms just how dangerous renouncing Rhiannon Russell would prove—

  “Ash.”

  He closed his eyes a second. He should have known she wouldn’t avoid him, that she would confront her seducer rather than avoid him. These people didn’t understand her at all. They did not understand that though she had been subdued by wounds garnered at Culloden, it was not in her nature to be subdued. He plastered a suitable smile on his face—nothing too intimate, nothing too cavalier. The smile of a lover who didn’t count. He looked around.

  Her satiny skin appeared more delicate than he remembered, and the sunlight revealed violet-tinted stains beneath her eyes. They looked greener today, her hair darker.

  “Rhiannon. Miss Russell.” He held up his hand, offering her the choice of what she would have him call her.

  She frowned and skirted the room, moving to the window and a ceramic vase filled with wild anemones. She touched the rosy petal delicately—like she’d touched him last night.

  “This is so hard,” she murmured.

  In profile her hazel eyes looked glassine and brilliant. Tears? Yes. Of course there’d be tears. He steeled himself because there was nothing else he could do.

  “It was wrong.”

  “Yes.” Wrong, right—when had either made any difference to him? He gazed at her, tired beyond endurance. “It was wrong.”

  “I’ll make him a good wife, you know.” She glanced sideways, to see whether she’d convinced him. “I will. I know what we did last night was a sin and I know that you are Phillip’s friend—” God help him before he laughed or sobbed, the pretty naive wench. Did she not understand even yet? “But I must ask you … no, I must beg you, please do not tell him.”

  He exhaled in relief, tension draining from his body. Good. She’d resolved to hold her tongue, the only thing she could do if there were any chance at all she would escape last night without consequence. She was still intent on marrying Phillip and that was just as it should be—and this odd sense of betrayal? Nothing.

  Phillip could give her so many things and he could only give her—passion. Why, in some twisted greedy corner of his heart, did that seem to him enough when he knew, rationally, logically, it was not? “Yes. I mean, no. I won’t.”

  “Swear it.” A pleading note softened the demand.

  “I swear.”

  She turned toward him, the movement swinging the soft waves of her unbound hair to settle over her shoulder. It was like a cloud of silk, he remembered. But why unbound? Ah yes, she was Queen of the May.

  “You don’t know Phillip as I do and I … it’s not that I think you would purposefully hurt him but if you felt bound by honor to tell him he would feel obligated to call you out. He mustn’t be hurt.” She held out a hand in an impulsive gesture of appeal.

  “Of course.”

  “You must understand, it’s best if I—”

  “You don’t need to say another word,” he broke in softly, unable to listen to more.

  “Thank you.” Her smile was sad and grateful. After what he’d done to her, she gifted him with that wholly beautiful smile because—his eyes widened in shocked recognition—because she believed that he felt the same. That he cared about Phillip Watt! Because he was a gentleman.

  The enormous irony of it, her horrendous mistake, hit him like a blow. He looked away.

  Enough of this, he thought, suddenly savage. I’m sick to death of carrying the weight of her good opinion.

  He would tell her he didn’t give a damn about cuckolding her betrothed. He’d tried to tell her of his true nature last night. Perhaps he should try again, disabuse her of her provincial notions regarding his gentlemanliness, show her just whom she’d lain beneath last night.

  He’d only cared about one thing: spending himself between her thighs. He still only cared about one thing, as evidenced by the hardening of his loins as he looked at her.

  Yet, somehow, this little thing—her wrong-headed belief that he would act chivalrously, that he was, in fact, better than he was—kept him from speaking.

  “You are hurting,” she said. She moved from the window, slowly diminishing the space between them. He held his breath, willing her to stay put. She didn’t. “I can see it in your eyes. I am so sorry.”

  Why was she saying this? What was she doing to him?

  “It was …” Whatever she’d been about to say died on her lips. A sad, lost smile gently turned the corners of her mouth, like an echo of innocence. “Oh, Ash. I know it is wrong, more wrong than anything I have ever done, but I cannot regret last night.”

  Utterly destroying him.

  “I will keep the memory of it,” she went on inexorably, softly singing her way to the very core of him with her lethal words. “It may seem to me now a meager sort of thing, a memory, but in years to come I am sure it will— Please,” she moved a step closer. Uncertainty clouded her expression, a quavering note of abashment colored her voice. “Please, won’t you kiss me goodbye?”

  He stared at her, unable to speak.

  She must have taken his silence for acquiescence. Hesitantly she rose on her tiptoes and brushed her mouth over his. But in forming the word “good-bye” her lips lingered an instant too long. Long enough for the stunned paralysis to leave his limbs, long enough for him to snake his arm around her supple waist and pull her closer, deepening the kiss into something darker, stirring … infinitely more satisfying.

  She kissed so sweetly. So tantalizingly. Her mouth was fruit, delicious and succulent, and he was starving. Had been starving for years. Hungrily he traced her lips with the tip of his tongue, slipping into the sleek, moist interior. Her tongue fluttered against his and he stroked it lavishly, deeply.

  With a sigh of defeat, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, tipped back her head, and surrendered. She kissed him—Lord, how she kissed him—wit
h all the longing of a tragic, final leave-taking: yearningly, tenderly, despairingly. He cupped her delicately molded skull between his palms, combing back her silky, dense hair, mouthing soft, incoherent words of ravishment and seduction. Desire coiled and sprang, confounding him with its power.

  She withdrew from the kiss and he followed her retreat. He lifted his free hand and rubbed the pad of his thumb back and forth against her lower lip. His body shuddered with the restraint he exercised. “Rhiannon …”

  With a sudden, hopeless sound she dropped her hands and pushed against his chest. She broke free of his embrace and twirled. He heard the swish of her hem, the rapid tattoo of her fleeing shoes, and the breathy echo of her sobbed “Good-bye.” By the time he looked she’d disappeared through the kitchen door.

  He slumped against the table, groping for support, realizing what she thought. She thought him her lover, her tender, considerate companion in guilt and that kiss had been his severance pay, a memento. His lips curled back.

  Absurd. Horrifyingly naive. Unendurably so.

  He’d bedded the wench. He’d had what he’d wanted. It was past time he remembered why he was here and where he was going. He should be in London, at the gaming tables, working for Raine’s release, not here, lusting after some wench who had a wrongheaded notion regarding his nobility.

  His fists clenched at his side, the thick scar tissue glistened like white. He stared about the kitchen as if looking for a means of escape.

  He must think of Raine. He’d promised his mother he would keep him safe, and right now he didn’t even know whether Raine was alive. Abruptly, Ash swept the mug of milk from the table, shattering it. Like the reproachful stain of a maiden’s lost virtue, the sweet milk spread across the tiles and seeped into the earth between. Tainted. Lost. Gone.

  He strode from the kitchen, out into the backyard, and to the stable, calling for the boy to saddle his horse.

  The town square hummed with drowsy activity, the bright streamers bedecking several pink-cheeked lads and lassies attesting to the fact that the maypole dance had recently ended. Watt and his cronies had gathered around a square table in front of The Ploughman.

  Good, Ash thought. With very little effort he should be able to repair the damage done by his ill-advised recitation and St. John’s gossip. They were a provincial, gullible lot.

  A vague sense of self-disgust crawled up Ash’s throat. He swallowed it down, like he had every bit of vileness in his life, accepting it whole. Watt wanted to like him.

  Deliberately he forced his gaze past Rhiannon, sitting on the ground beside Watt, fussing over his splintered leg. Watt covered her hand with his great tanned paw, leaning over to speak earnestly. They were absorbed in each other, deaf to all others, but Ash’s ears were damnably acute.

  “… of course you must ride this afternoon, Rhiannon,” Phillip was saying. “I refuse to allow you to stay back because of my injury. Besides, Father arranged this hunt particularly for you. Really, Rhiannon, you must go. I insist on it!”

  She clashed the back of her free hand across her cheeks, ridding herself of tears. Ash clamped down on his insane impulse to snatch her up into his arms and kiss the tears from her face.

  “—really are too kind, Phillip,” she answered. “I don’t deserve you.”

  Phillip awkwardly patted her cheek. “It’s all right. Nerves. A day before our wedding and all.”

  She colored violently, and pulled her hand from under his. Ash saw the moment in which her honor extinguished her common sense. “Phillip, I have to tell—”

  She mustn’t do it.

  “Watt!” Ash hailed.

  Rhiannon glanced up. Her mouth looked bruised.

  “Miss Russell.” Ash nodded his greeting. “Are you not going to join the delightful game Miss Chapham has arranged?”

  He smiled brilliantly. She needed a few lessons in deception. She’d best learn them soon. Before she entered Phillip’s bed. He swung his glance back to Phillip. The blond giant regarded him sullenly.

  “Watt,” Ash said, “if you don’t take a care to warn visitors of the potency of your village scrumpy, you’ll end up with a great line of dunderheaded knaves queuing up before your magistrate trying to account for their idiocy.”

  The hurt somewhat evaporated from Watt’s expression, but the wariness remained.

  “I barely recall what type of an ass I made of myself last night,” Ash said with winning candor, “but I’m sure it was a large one. I’m liable to lay claim to all sorts of crimes when I’m in that state. And make promises I can’t keep and swear allegiance I have no intention of remaining loyal to. Forgive me?”

  He ignored the hurt in Rhiannon’s eyes. Of course she would think he was addressing her.

  “Pay it no mind, Merrick,” Phillip said, clapping Ash on the shoulder. “And never mind what was said or sung or …” he blundered on, “whatever. Fair Badden’s scrumpy has caused the best of us to make ridiculous claims. And,” he shot a dark look at St. John, “there are those who will always derive pleasure from carrying tales. Whether true or no.”

  “You are too kind,” Ash murmured.

  “Here. Sit by me.” Phillip waved Andrew, the innkeeper’s boy, to bring another chair. Ash sank into it. Rhiannon scuttled away from him.

  “I say, what’s that they’re playing, Miss Russell?” Ash asked pleasantly, needing an excuse to look at her, to examine just how deep he’d driven the spike.

  “Blindman’s Bluff,” she said, eyes lowered. “Would you care to play?”

  He stretched his long legs out in front of him. “Dear me, no. Wouldn’t know how.”

  “But everyone knows Blindman’s Bluff,” she said.

  “Not me,” he said. “There was no nursery where I grew up. No playroom. No classroom. Not a nanny or a governess. Only a twisted, misshapen old nurse that worked cheap and was for whatever reason loyal to my mother’s family name.”

  As soon as the words had crossed his lips, he regretted them. Rhiannon had gone still, her face numb.

  He glared at her. She’d bewitched him, forced confidences from him that he had not intended to give, brought a ripple of unease to the smooth tableau he’d been working to create. He sought to regain lost ground.

  He shook his head. “By Jingo, one must tread carefully about you and your softhearted bride, Watt. I can understand her frailty, being country bred and lacking wisdom in the ways of the world and worldly men.” He must not look at her. “I didn’t mean to suggest I did not play games as a child. We played aplenty.”

  Desperate games. Feral games. His father had been a master at teaching them.

  “Mostly games of chance. Inveterate gamblers, we Merricks. Same with your people I imagine, eh, Watt?”

  “Yes. Indeed,” Phillip blustered.

  “Now, tell me about this Blindman’s Bluff. Can one bet on the outcome?”

  “I suppose,” Phillip said consideringly.

  “I’ll wager you a shilling to a crown that Margaret Atherton is the first to be caught,” he said to Watt, avoiding Rhiannon’s eye. There was still something to be taken from Fair Badden. Even if it wasn’t the thing he wanted.

  Rhiannon rose to her feet. She hesitated, uncertain of whether she ought to stay, but Phillip had forgotten her and Ash would not look at her. She walked away, silently praying her trembling legs would hold her until she’d rounded The Ploughman’s corner and found the bench set against its sunny outer wall. Her knees did not betray her but the moment she stepped in front of the homely bench they gave out and she sank down, finally finding a moment of privacy in which to try and sort her wild thoughts and indiscreet heart.

  She couldn’t stop shivering, a deep shudder that began inside and worked its way out. She knew its source. She’d betrayed Phillip and the guilt of it was eating her from the inside out.

  She buried her face in her hands. Tears sprang to her eyes and washed down her hot cheeks and she cursed herself roundly for it. Tears did no good; guilt did less, f
or neither could call back last night and let her replay those fateful hours. Even if they could, she was not sure she wanted those hours altered.

  Except he did.

  She saw it in his cool dark eyes this morning in the kitchen and heard it in the veiled warning he’d issued her with his words about “worldly men and naive country lasses.” She scrubbed at her eyes and pressed the heels of her hands against her temples trying to think, to make some decision.

  Clearly she had to tell Phillip what she’d done or she’d become so shaken by the keeping of this secret that she’d fly apart. Twice now she’d tried and twice Phillip had managed to stymie her. It was almost as if he already knew what she would say and feared it and sought to keep her from telling him. She twisted her fingers in her lap.

  Nonsense. It was only her own wishful thinking. How much easier this would be if she could convince herself that Phillip was best off not knowing. And she could, with very little difficulty, convince herself of just that. She knew Phillip had no great love for her, that he’d chosen her as his bride because she was biddable and undemanding. He’d even told her once that his father had quite succinctly pointed out her suitability to be Phillip’s wife because she had no aspirations to live anywhere but Fair Badden, no inclinations to travel, and no social ambitions regarding the London season.

  And the old man had been right. She and Phillip were perfectly suited. She did not want to leave Fair Badden. It was lovely, quiet, and safe. Just the thought of venturing elsewhere added ripples of panic to her shivers of misery. Out there—bad things happened.

  She should have thought of that before she’d risked her future—the lovely, genteel future that even now was still within her grasp—on a night of surrender to her long-buried passionate nature.

  Time to bury that nature again. Deeper this time. So deeply that it would finally die, never again to be resurrected.

  An involuntary sound of anguish escaped her lips. Unsteadily, she stood up. She couldn’t think anymore, each thought circled back onto itself, a snake eating its tail. She felt dazed and frightened. The light glancing off The Ploughman’s whitewashed wall dazzled her eyes and she looked away. She mustn’t think anymore.