by Barbara Mack
“Kathleen,” he murmured. “Kathleen.”
It was a song, a prayer of thanksgiving when he said her name in that low, rough voice against her skin, and Kathleen shuddered. He nibbled at her ear, his tongue sliding wetly in, and she felt dizzy.
She gripped him tighter, for he was the only stable thing in her universe right now. Her breath came in quick, sharp pants when his hands slid up and touched her breasts. She cried out and arched her back. His hands felt so good against her, so good. He kneaded them urgently in his big hands, and when his clever fingers pinched her nipples it sent a shock of pleasure through her so sharply it felt almost like pain.
Then his hands slid away from her body, and he tore his mouth from hers. She stared at him, bereft, while he gently pulled her hands from him and laid them in her lap. Her mouth was wet and swollen, and Duncan groaned and lay his forehead against hers. He couldn’t meet her passion-glazed eyes for one second longer if he was going to control himself. He closed his eyes. His breathing slowed, and he pulled back to look at her.
“It will be because you want me,” he said finally, staring into the sky blue of her confused eyes. “No other reason. Come to me when you’re ready, Kathleen, and I’ll give you all the pleasure you could ever want.”
Chapter Three
Kathleen stared into the full length mirror and studied her reflection moodily. This was absolutely the last time she let her mother order her a gown. She’d said that before, she knew, but this time she meant it. This gown was scandalous. She tugged ineffectually at the top of the gown, but it did no good. The neck of the sapphire gown was cut perilously low across her full breasts, and when she took a deep breath they threatened to spill from the lace encrusted bodice. And it was so tight that not even a fichu would fit between the surface of the gown and her skin. She was lucky there was room for undergarments beneath it.
Her mother would probably blame the seamstress if she questioned her about it, but Kathleen knew that it was deliberate. Her mother was determined to throw her at Duncan Murdoch’s head, and she’d known that Kathleen wouldn’t bother to check the gown before the party. There was no help for it; she would just have to wear it and hope for the best . . . and not eat too heavily, for fear that she would split these already overworked seams.
It was attractive, she thought grudgingly as she turned a little to get a side view. Her mother had a good eye for color and cut. She always knew what styles would flatter Kathleen’s figure and face, and this one surely did if she could just get over the shock of all that bare skin. The bright blue of the gown was just a shade or two darker than her eyes and the deep, rich color made her blond hair gleam with highlights and her skin seem whiter than white. The bodice was
tight clear to the waist and covered with a lace overlay dyed the same blue of the dress, and the little cap sleeves were made of the same lace with no other material beneath it. Considering the heat, she was glad of that. The lack of a corset certainly added to its comfort. Her mother insisted that she never wear corsets, and the ladies hereabouts were all scandalized, but she did not exactly mind. Lanny said that corsets were the worst contraptions for women ever created; they kept one from moving around as a woman was meant to, and half of the so-called melancholia was just sheer boredom because all those women couldn’t get any exercise.
The wide, bell-shaped skirt of her dress seemed to float around her as Kathleen twirled elegantly and slid into a deep curtsy. The soft cotton spread out in luxurious folds all around her as she came an inch from the floor.
Do that in a corset, she thought complacently. Kathleen grinned as she came gracefully back up again. If she curtsied like that in front of their guests, they would all have fits of apoplexy, because they would see nearly her whole chest.
Lanny had invited half the county and they had all accepted. They should – it was well known that a party at Lanny and Arnold Donaldson’s was well worth attending just for the gossip alone, not to mention the food. Lanny’s chef on these occasions was her cousin, who had prepared food in a grand hotel in New Orleans until he got homesick and took over the restaurant in the one and only hotel Geddes possessed. He could cook like a dream, everything from haute cuisine to fried chicken, and every farm owner’s wife for a hundred miles around had tried to wheedle his recipes away from him, to no avail.
Kathleen was smiling as she meandered downstairs. Her petite dark-haired mother waited at the bottom, an impatient scowl on her pretty face. Lanny was swathed in a cloud of red tulle. Her dress was nearly as low-cut as Kathleen’s, and her figure every bit as magnificent. Only a few strands of gray streaked her black hair, and there were only faint lines around her eyes to give clues to her age, but no one who spent more than ten minutes in her presence ever noticed those clues. They were too busy being charmed by her impudent wit and outspoken ways. She could have passed for Kathleen’s sister, and more than one of Kathleen’s beaus had been smitten with Lanny from their first meeting.
“So there you are. Dawdling down the stairs as if you hadn’t a care in the world, when you know very well that I need your help.”
“I am not dawdling,” Kathleen said calmly. She knew that there was nothing left to do to prepare for the party, and that her mother was just stricken with nerves as she always was before a gathering.
Kathleen looked around with a smile as she descended, and ran her hand down the smooth wood of the staircase. Lord, she loved this old house. They lived in a modest two-story home in the middle of an equally modest farm, but what they lacked in expensive furnishings Lanny made up for in unique taste. The walls were not covered in silk, all the furnishings did not match, and priceless paintings did not hang in each room but still it was a lovely home, because Lanny had made it that way.
“I am afraid to move any faster for fear of falling out of this bodice. You must have given Mrs. Langley the wrong measurements, Mother . . . and the wrong pattern, since this dress is immodest enough to belong to a prostitute.”
Her mother did not even have the grace to blush. “You look beautiful, Kathleen. That dress is not even remotely sluttish. It is evening, after all, and perfectly acceptable to expose one’s bosom and shoulders.”
“Not all of them, Mother. It is not acceptable to show all of my bosom.”
Lanny had a hurt look on her pretty face. “What? What did I do? Picked out a beautiful dress for you to wear.”
“Don’t give me that innocent act,” Kathleen told her bluntly. “You forget how well I know you, Mother. Don’t waste your play-acting; save it for someone who might actually be fooled.”
The hurt look vanished from her mother’s face as if it never existed, and a self-satisfied grin creased her discreetly painted mouth. “Kathleen, you look absolutely beautiful and it is too late to worry about it now. Our guests will begin arriving any moment and you don’t have time to change. Come with me now and let’s check on the food. I wonder if Henri has made those little dumplings I like so much.”
Kathleen caught Lanny’s arm just as she started to flutter away. “Mother. I hope you haven’t concocted any more schemes to throw me at Dr. Murdoch because if you have, I am telling you right now that I am not going along with it. I will tell the whole world what a liar and a schemer you are before I let you force me into that man’s company again.”
“I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t around to stick a pin in my pretensions once in a while, Kathleen. You keep me almost honest.” She eyed her daughter slyly. “Of course I haven’t been scheming behind your back, Kathleen. I wouldn’t dream of doing such a thing.”
Kathleen snorted.
“Well, maybe I have been scheming a tiny bit.”
Kathleen folded her arms across her chest, causing her cleavage to swell alarmingly over the top of her dress.
“All right, all right!” Lanny said crossly. “I’ll rearrange the seating.”
Kathleen’s foot, clad in a dancing slipper that matched her dress, began to tap the floor.
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��And I won’t tell Duncan you made that basket of goodies I am sending home with him.” Lanny made a sound of exasperation. “For God’s sake, Kathleen, how do you expect to catch the man if you insist on being so bloody honest!”
“Mother,” Kathleen said warningly.
“Oh, all right, I said I’d behave, didn’t I?” Lanny linked her arm with her daughter’s and propelled her toward the dining room. “Now let’s stop this quarrelling and go and check on the food.”
“Slower, Mother,” Kathleen said, dead-pan, when Lanny practically began trotting toward the lavish display of delicacies. “Remember my bosoms.”
“It’s hard to forget them in that dress,” her mother shot back. “They’re going to enter the room minutes before the rest of you does.”
An hour later, Kathleen was standing off to the side of the parlor watching her mother charm the entire room, with the exception of Martha Fawcett, who Lanny detested.
The blond, icily attractive woman was the same age as Kathleen. She’d been weaned on cattiness and had grown worse since her husband had died. Kathleen knew that she was probably lonely, but it was hard to have too much sympathy for Martha; they had grown up together, and they had been fighting since they were ten. Kathleen loathed her. Martha was sneaky and conniving, and Kathleen had been on the wrong end of it one too many times.
“It looks like a lovely party,” a deep voice said behind her.
Kathleen felt a flush of warmth rise up from inside her; she knew she was red as a beet, and she refused to turn her head to look at the handsome doctor. She hadn’t seen him since their return trip from Granny’s house. She’d been purposefully avoiding him since then, and it hadn’t been easy, what with her mother’s stratagems. Her heart fluttered now, and one small fist clenched at her side while she kept her expression perfectly blank. What did one say to a man after you had made it perfectly obvious that you were his for the taking?
He looked marvelous.
Tight black trousers clung to the muscles of his thighs, showing the long lines of his legs in loving detail. A white shirt covered his broad shoulders and flat belly and played up his sun-bronzed complexion. He’d left off a frock coat, probably because of the heat, but Kathleen knew that no woman in her right mind would care. They would be too busy ogling his magnificent physique.
Kathleen felt her heart thump as she examined the perfection of his features. Her fingers fairly itched to touch his skin and see if it was as smooth and supple as it looked. Those eyes, lord, those eyes he’d could talk a nun out of her habit and into his bed without him ever speaking a word. His dark thick eyebrows arched perfectly and emphasized the startling crystal blue orbs, and he’d a set of eyelashes that many a young girl would have killed for. His fine roman nose fit splendidly in his large face. The scar she skipped over as unimportant, for it did not detract from his beauty a whit.
His gorgeous, sensual mouth curled up in a smile while she stared at him, mute and dry-mouthed. His eyes homed in on hers, and everyone else faded away. They could have been alone instead of surrounded by people for all that Kathleen knew in that moment, and it was the same for him, she could tell. He was focused totally on her, and Kathleen felt dizzy all of a sudden. She felt like taking him by the hand and keeping him all to herself for the night, felt like deserting all their guests and losing herself in his arms.
“Kathleen,” he said quietly, and his whiskey voice sent a thrill through her whole body. She put a trembling hand up to the pulse in her throat, still unable to speak, still gawking at him like a child in a candy store.
“Duncan,” she said stiffly, finally. “Glad you could make it to the party. Lanny would have been unhappy if you hadn’t been able to come.”
"That is a very nice dress,” he said, keeping his eyes locked on hers.
She flushed again, and cursed her mother inwardly. “Thank you.”
“You’ll have to forgive my attire. I had a last minute patient and I had to rush to get cleaned up. I was halfway here before I remembered my jacket, and I refused to turn around and go back. I was afraid I wasn’t going to make it in time for dinner.”
“Doctor Murdoch!” a glad voice cried out, and Kathleen closed her eyes. Lord, it was her
mother. As if she hadn’t humiliated herself enough, now her mother had to get in on the act and make her mortification complete.
“Come and meet the rest of my family. You can’t hide over here in the corner all night like some people I know,” she said, looking daggers at Kathleen.
Kathleen merely smiled, and Lanny looked away. The tension between Kathleen and Duncan had dissipated, and Kathleen felt almost giddy with relief. Lanny had just saved her from making a total fool of herself in front of this crowd of people. Lanny was determined to punish her for making her give up all her fine plans for the two of them tonight, but Kathleen knew it wouldn’t be long before her mother had thought of some new way to fling them together.
When everyone crowded into the dining room, Kathleen noted with an internal grimace that her mother hadn’t changed the seating arrangements as she’d promised; Duncan’s name was written on the card next to hers at one of the long tables they had brought here for this occasion. And just her luck – Martha Fawcett was on her other side. That was intended as punishment, no doubt, for refusing to go along with Lanny’s well-laid plans. Martha inclined her blond head coldly at Kathleen as they sat down, and Kathleen let a smile curve her lips as she murmured a greeting. The smile lacked its usual warmth, however, and Duncan thought that she looked furious as he seated himself next to her. The tension between the two women seemed to almost shimmer in the air around them, and it was obvious that neither was pleased with their seating arrangements.
“Where’d you get that dress, Kathleen?” Martha’s tone was sickly sweet, and her ruby lips puckered into a moue of distaste as she fluttered her gaze over the bodice that Kathleen was currently popping out of. “It’s very . . . interesting.”
Kathleen bared her teeth in a caricature of a smile. “Like it? I could get my mother’s seamstress to give you the pattern.”
“No, thank you. Your little dress is quite . . . charming, but it wouldn’t suit me, I think.”
Because your bosom consists of rows of lace sewn into that expensive bodice, Kathleen thought viciously. She let a real smile light up her face as she stared quite pointedly at Martha’s lack of up-front attributes. “I am sure it wouldn’t,” she drawled. Martha flushed a dull red.
Duncan turned a laugh into a cough as the attractive woman with the petulant expression turned her head with a huff and began talking to the older man on her right. Kathleen turned to grin at him, her good humor restored. He smiled into her eyes, and Kathleen forgot that they were enemies, forgot that she was angry at him and embarrassed by her own behavior. He bent closer to her and whispered huskily.
“Remind me to stop making you angry. You’re vicious when you’re cornered.”
Kathleen felt a wave of devilment ripple through her, and she was suddenly sloe-eyed, her eyelids seeming almost too heavy to stay open all the way.
“I wouldn’t think that you’d let yourself be cornered, a great big man like you.” She took a dainty sip of the sweet wine her mother had ordered especially for the party, squeezing one of his hard biceps. He flinched just slightly, and she bit back her smile. Her slow, southern-tinted accent became suddenly thicker, and Duncan thought that her voice was sweeter than wild honey. “You’d just bust right through any barrier, I would think.”
Duncan was thrown off course by her manner. Her eyelashes fluttered, and she looked down demurely. Kathleen had never acted this way before, and it took him a moment to catch on. Heat burst in his stomach when he realized what she was doing. A slow smile crossed his face, and a rumble of a laugh came up from his stomach.
“Even I know better than to tangle with a wildcat. A man could get all scratched up.”
Kathleen eyed him archly. “I’d hate for you to get hurt.” She leaned her
elbows on the table and peered up at him with big eyes. She scraped her fingernails lightly over the skin of his hand and was rewarded when it trembled just slightly. “Of course, if the prize was right, a few little scratches wouldn’t mean anything, would they?”
Duncan was mesmerized by the sultry light in her eyes as she stared up at him almost tauntingly.
“Oh, dear, I scraped your hand.” Kathleen smoothed her palm over the marks she’d left on him, and Duncan felt a jolt of sensation shoot through his whole body. He was hard as a rock, and she’d done nothing more than touch his hand.