by Cready, Gwyn
“Bloody hell.”
She took another fortifying sip and then positioned the tip of the blade over the first hole. Her hands were shaking less, but she found it much harder to concentrate on extracting this group of balls. She laid her hand on his hip to steady her work surface. His skin was warm and alive in her grasp.
“How long are you going to prepare for the jab?” he said sharply. “I am not comfortable under this sort of gaze.”
“And yet, this can hardly the first time a woman’s eyes have been upon you.”
He made an imperious harrumph.
“I thought so.”
“Tis not a fair comparison.”
“Isn’t it? Trousers down, bottom warmed, all attention focused on the prick?”
She jabbed the knife in and flicked the first ball free in a single easy movement. Damn, she was getting good at this.
He lifted his shoulder. “You have a very lurid imagination.”
“Too many books. I knew a hunter once who told me— oh, I probably shouldn’t say it.”
“I’m afraid the bounds of propriety have been irretrievably broken at this point. There is no need to be reticent.”
“He told me firing his gun gave him an erection.”
Bridgewater let out a soft chuckle. “I believe I can do you one better. I knew a woman who kept a wooden paddle by her bed into which the outline of a bee had been cut. The strokes would leave a picturesque welt.”
Panna giggled. “On you?”
“Now, why would you assume I had anything to do with this?”
“Bees, huh?”
“She referred to it as the sting of love.”
The second and third balls were just as easy. Panna was starting to like the feel of the blade in her hand. She was also starting to like the feel of his ass. She made the move to cut the flesh on the fifth when something she saw out of the corner of her eye sent the blade tip skittering for several inches across his flesh.
“Ow!” he cried.
“Sorry.”
She hadn’t entirely closed the wardrobe, and over the course of the last few minutes its mirror-covered door had slowly yawned open, putting a most remarkable reflection of Bridgewater directly in her line of sight.
She lowered her eyes to the bedcover instantly, but the damage, if one could call it that, had been done.
The view of his front had been even more engaging than the one of his back. Broad chest, carved belly, and a small mass of brown curls from which a sizable penis, as long as the knife in her hand, hung. Small explosive charges seemed to be going off all over her skin. She felt slightly drunk and very wicked.
“What is it?”
“Er, nothing.” She tried to wipe the image from her mind, but her mind seemed quite intent on holding on to it. He was uncircumcised, which didn’t surprise her, given the era, but Charlie and her other boyfriends had been circumcised, and the alternative seemed more alluring and more dangerous.
I won’t look again. Looking again would be wrong.
She inserted the tip of the blade into the fifth hole.
I’ll only look if the ball comes out smoothly.
The ball rolled down his buttock and into the fold of the towel. He didn’t even make a noise.
She stole a glance. Bridgewater looked like something one would see in a museum—a discus thrower, or the Colossus of Rhodes—only in the living flesh.
Well, I’ve certainly seen what I needed to see. Definitely won’t look again.
The sixth ball came out just as smoothly as the fifth.
She looked again. There was something utterly fascinating about that scant swaying weight. It was . . . well . . . hypnotic.
“Panna?”
She was so startled she nearly dropped the knife. She lowered her gaze instantly to the relative neutrality of his buttocks. “What?”
“Is something wrong? You haven’t moved in a full minute.”
“What? No.”
She vowed she’d do better, and she’d taken out four more balls of lead before she found her eyes drawn inexorably once more to the mirror.
“You know,” he said, turning, “if you wanted this to be fair, you would remove your shift.”
Oh, God, had she been found out? But the look on his face was playful, not accusatory.
“If I wanted this to be fair?” A flush so fiery filled her cheeks that she swore she saw waves of heat rising before her eyes.
“Aye.”
“Fortunately, that desire eludes me.” She positioned the blade to remove the next ball.
“Surely a big, grown-up library keeper like you is not afraid of a little discomfort.”
“Why don’t you just imagine I’ve removed my shift?”
“Too late for that.”
She poked him with her finger and he yelped. He was getting a little too cocky for a guy with buckshot in his ass and a penis the size of a baby eggplant on display.
“I have a thought,” he said.
“Oh, I’m certain of it.”
“How many pieces of shot remain?”
She counted. “Five.”
“I have been inspired by your story about Andrew Carnegie. I should like to build a free library for the people of Cumbria.”
“You would?”
“And I shall provide one hundred books for each piece of shot you remove in the absence of your shift.”
Her heart did a drumroll. When she felt she could control her voice again she said, “How about this instead? You shall provide one hundred books for each piece of shot that does not require extensive knife twisting to remove.”
“Oh.” His shoulders sagged. “Tis another option, I suppose.”
“Think of it as my way of saving you from dying disgraced.”
“You are kind to protect me.”
The last five pieces of lead came out without a hitch. She collected the tiny balls, then washed her hands and the knife with the whisky. Then she washed his back and buttocks one more time. The bleeding had stopped, but he was going to be exceedingly sore for a while. She turned while he redid his breeks and lay down again. The wool was dark, so the bloodstains didn’t show. With his jacket over it, the holes would be invisible as well.
She hid the bloody blanket and the lead shot behind the wardrobe. Her shift was a little bloody, as were the sheets, but that could easily be explained by her period.
By the time she’d finished, Jamie was breathing steadily and she knew he had fallen asleep. Little wonder. She gazed at the set of his mouth as he slept and the way his hand had curled into a ball under his chin. It was the same way Charlie had slept. Bridgewater looked so peaceful. She suspected it was the first time he’d slept since she’d arrived.
So far, Bridgewater’s arrival at Nunquam had inspired both joyous tears and a barrage of gunfire, and they hadn’t even met his grandfather yet. Not a propitious sign. Bridgewater had been blasted with birdshot, which meant the shooter likely hadn’t been one of the guards, whose guns would shoot a single, larger ball. Had it been someone out hunting who’d happened to stumble upon an intruder? Bridgewater said he hadn’t been spotted until he was on the ground, which probably meant the shooter didn’t realize the man he shot had already been in the clan chiefs’ wing rather than attempting to get into it. But the question that most concerned her was whether the shooter would be able to identify Bridgewater as the person he’d fired at.
Unfortunately, all the questions were ones she couldn’t answer.
She sat down on the bed and thought about her own world, so far away. It was Sunday morning. The staff at the library would soon figure out she was missing her shift. Marie would try calling, but if Panna didn’t answer, Marie would probably assume she was ill and asleep. Monday was Panna’s day off. Marie wouldn’t get really worried until Tuesday.
The realization that no one would miss her for days made her feel like crying. They were two of the same sort, she thought, she and Bridgewater. Not lonely, but alone. She, at least, s
till had her brothers and their families. But that was different from having someone who tended to your wounds, worried about you when you were gone, and carried you constantly in his thoughts.
The morning light had intensified, and the gold strands in Bridgewater’s hair gleamed. She slid next to him, smelling the whisky scent that permeated his skin now. The bed was narrow, and she stretched out, eliciting from him a satisfied “Mmmm.” She knew she should wake him so that he could move to his own bed, but the pillows were so soft and her thoughts kept slipping back to that first kiss.
PANNA WAS SO DEEP IN HER dreams, she mistook the knock for the distant boom of a cannon, and it wasn’t until she heard Mrs. Brownlow’s whispered “Miss Kennedy?” that she woke and, still muzzy from sleep, ran to the door and opened it.
Mrs. Brownlow was accompanied by a stooped man with a cane and a pistol.
“There’s been an intruder,” Mrs. Brownlow said.
“Oh, dear.” Panna held the door open only a few inches and blocked as much of it as she could with her body.
“Has anyone bothered you?”
“No.”
“Have you seen anyone?”
“No.”
“The lock on the door at the end of the hall was broken.”
The bed behind her squeaked, and the man punched the door with his cane, knocking it open far enough to drive the knob against the wall. Jamie had stood, and the bloodied sheet was clearly visible on the bed behind him
“This is how you come to me?” the man said, his brimstone eyes focused in fury on Jamie. “Despoiling a god-fearing woman in my house?”
Despoiling? Then Panna saw the blood on the sheets. Jamie’s mouth fell open.
“Did he rape you, lass?” The man, who Panna realized must be Hector MacIver, stared at her with concern.
“Rape? No, I—”
“Nothing happened,” Jamie said hotly, pulling his shirt over his head.
“Who is your father?” MacIver demanded of Panna. MacIver was nearly as tall as Jamie and looked just as capable of violence.
“I—I—don’t have one. He’s dead.”
The man gave Jamie a disgusted look. “A fatherless woman?”
“You are mistaken, sir.” The cold steel of Jamie’s voice sent a chill down Panna’s back.
“Mistaken?” the man cried. “Mistaken about what? Finding you in her room? The blood of her maidenhead on the sheets? You are a rutting English blackguard just like your father. Go back to him, where you belong, and leave my castle in peace.” He swung around to face Mrs. Brownlow. “Aye, your Jamie has returned. Is he everything you expected?” Then he turned clumsily, his bad leg so twisted beneath him that he nearly fell, and hobbled out the door, slamming the cane against the wall as he left.
Mrs. Brownlow burst into tears.
TWENTY-EIGHT
BRIDGEWATER STRODE UP NUNQUAM’S IMPOSING STAIRCASE, ANGER burning in his belly. He was followed by his companion of the last few moments, a man with pistol drawn who had met him at the entrance to the women’s wing and followed him wordlessly as he made his way through the maze of hallways, offering no suggestions on which way to go.
“I assume this is the way to see MacIver,” Bridgewater said. The man didn’t answer. “Not much for conversation, are you?”
Bridgewater had donned his coat and straightened his clothes before leaving Panna to settle Mrs. Brownlow, who’d wailed, “Your mother’s heart will be breaking.”
Why he’d expected a polite welcome from his grandfather, he didn’t know. Clearly the man was as bitter now as the day his daughter had told him she was with child by an English nobleman.
He reached the top of the stairs and turned to the right, following the path of a servant carrying a tray. “I assume you’ll let me know—or shoot me—if I am proceeding in the wrong direction.”
“Shoot you more’s the likely,” the man with the pistol said.
Bridgewater’s back and buttocks were on fire, and it was all he could manage to keep from limping himself. He’d been shocked by his grandfather’s appearance. The last time he’d seen him, perhaps two years ago, the man had been as straight in his saddle as a ship’s mast. An apoplexy or worse had stolen his vitality, but it seemed he’d hold his venom to the last.
You’re a rutting English blackguard just like your father.
The only good thing about the incident in Panna’s room was that the explanation for the presence of the blood his grandfather had seized upon meant the real explanation had not crossed his mind. For that reason alone, Bridgewater would not correct him.
He wondered what it might have been like to take Panna’s maidenhead, and the thought sent a raw tingle through him: watching the growing pleasure on her face, feeling the grip of her hands as he took her, knowing she depended upon him to guide and protect her. He felt a small stab of jealousy for the man who’d been lucky enough to serve her in that.
Ah, but she was not a maiden. She’d buried a husband. The weight of that loss showed in her eyes and bearing. She was a woman in the full sense of the word.
The servant he’d been following entered a room then did an about-face and nearly ran into Bridgewater, who kept the tray from falling.
“Steady, now.”
The man hurried away.
Bridgewater looked into the room and saw what had caused the servant’s reaction. His grandfather was seated before a cross, head bowed. The room was not a chapel—at least, not the sort Bridgewater could recognize. Other than a plain oak table and chairs, the only furnishings were a few shelves of books. Bridgewater stood quietly, waiting for his grandfather to finish. He could hear the old man’s labored breathing.
“Not quite the ostentation of the library in MacIver Castle, is it?” his grandfather said after a long moment, head still bowed.
Bridgewater flushed. Criticized for ostentation by a man who’d built not one but two castles? He bit his tongue.
“Why are you still here?”
“I told you,” Bridgewater said, “I have a matter of importance to speak to you about.”
The man was nearly prostrate on the ground. How with a cane and a crippled leg he’d managed to get to his knees, Bridgewater could not imagine. His grandfather turned to his side and, with evident effort, lifted himself onto a stool.
“There are many who wish to speak with me, including a dozen men under my roof right now whose wishes are more important than yours. What makes you think I would waste my time with you?”
“It concerns what may or may not happen between the clans and the English army in the next three days.”
The chief of Clan MacIver’s eyes widened for an instant, but he buried his interest in a look of cool detachment. “You are aware an intruder was shot attempting to scale the castle wall?”
Bridgewater froze. “I heard there was an intruder.”
“Tis a dangerous time in the borderlands. I dinna think even an English spy would be brazen enough to try that. Twould be sure death.”
“If an English spy had tried it, he would have succeeded, and you would never have known.” If a well-trained one had, in any case.
His grandfather snorted. “If we find the man, I promise you, his death will dissuade anyone from attempting the same thing for many years to come.”
The hair on Bridgewater’s neck stood on end. The last spy who’d tried to infiltrate the clans had been a lieutenant in a Northumberland regiment whose head still sat on a spike on a bridge over the river in Dumfries.
“Where is your uniform, Captain?”
Bridgewater shifted. “I am not here on behalf of the army.”
“Are you telling me your father is not aware of your appearance here?”
His choice of “your father” instead of “commanding officer” or even “the earl” was like a parry at the start of a swordfight, designed to provoke his opponent. It took all of Bridgewater’s fortitude, whose levels were already perilously low, to hold his tongue. “No.”
�
�I see. And what would happen were he to learn of your ill-timed appearance here?”
It was a barely veiled threat, though Bridgewater had understood what he would be risking before he came. “I would prefer he did not.”
His grandfather gave a little chuckle and dragged his leg up under him. “I doubt he would be quite so concerned about your defilement of the girl, though. Tis rather a tradition in your family, is it not?”
Bridgewater’s ears started to buzz. “Let us not venture down that road, MacIver. His treatment of my mother was hardly worse than yours.”
The old man’s eyes blazed. “Your mother abandoned the teachings of her god—”
“You abandoned the teachings of her god,” Bridgewater cried. “My father broke her heart, but you killed her. Slash the blossom from the stem and it dies. When you threw her out of your heart and home, you destroyed her—just as surely as if you’d wrung her neck.”
“Your mother . . .” MacIver shook his head and pressed his lips together, his eyes shut tight. “Your mother broke my heart,” he cried, his face suddenly streaked with tears. He rocked forward with a furious growl, planted his cane on the floor, and dragged himself to a standing position. He jabbed the gnarled stick at his grandson. “Dinna speak your mother’s name to me. Ever.”
Bridgewater vibrated with fury. He wanted to take the man by the neck and fling him onto the floor. But he knew he could no more take those fragile bones into his hands than he could a child’s. It was heartbreakingly cruel that his first meeting with the man had to come when it was too late to kill him.
“I will never share any part of my mother with you,” Bridgewater said. “Of that you can be certain. But that does not change the reason I have come. Let us get to it, shall we, and bring this ill-conceived reunion to an end.”
MacIver’s gaze bore a hole in him. “Speak.”
“Does your word still carry the force of law with the clan chiefs here?”
MacIver’s eyes betrayed nothing. “One man, one vote has always been the way of the borderlands, Captain. Surely your father told you that.”