“I suppose it’s the least I can do after coming to Glain Tarran as I did,” she said. “Very well, Lord Graymar. All is forgiven.” She extended a gloved hand. He looked at it for a bewildered moment before lifting his own. Sarah grasped it and gave it a firm shake. “There.” She released him. “We can now meet in Society and be perfectly polite.”
“You’re yet angry,” he said, just as the wind grew impatient with being still and began to blow again.
“I’m freezing,” she said loudly, huddling into her coat. “It’s enough to make anyone ill-tempered. I had not intended to stay at Glain Tarran so long, and thought to have a warm horse to ride back to the village.” She looked about and felt a stark sense of disappointment at not seeing Enoch. “Are we to walk, then?” she asked, unable to keep the lack of enthusiasm for such an undertaking from her tone.
He smiled. “Were you not planning on walking back?”
Her spirits dampened even more fully. “Yes,” she admitted. “I was. It’s kind of you to keep me company. I’m sure it will make the miles pass more quickly.”
He stepped in front of her again when she tried to move around him. This time he set both hands on her arms.
“I believe that you are a brave soul, Miss Tamony. Are you afraid of heights?”
Sarah gave him a curious look. “No, not in the least. I can’t abide complete darkness, but heights have never bothered me. Why?”
“Because you’re about to experience a certain kind of magic that I’ve never shared with a mere mortal before, and I wished to make certain that you’d not faint or scream or react with terror. Otherwise I might drop you.”
Her eyes widened. “Drop me?”
“I’d better take these,” he said, pulling her spectacles from her face. “Without a ribbon, they might fall off.”
“Fall off?” she repeated. “But—”
“Make certain your knapsack is secured on your back and your cap fixed on your head,” he instructed, safely tucking the folded spectacles into an inner pocket. “Now, put your arms about me very tightly. About my neck. You will have to go up on your toes.”
Sarah, in the midst of pulling the cap down a bit more, stopped and stared at him. He gazed back calmly.
“Hurry, Miss Tamony. The wind isn’t going to hold back its full force for much longer.”
“But I—” She gave a shake of her head. “My lord, I can’t simply put my arms about you as if I … as if we …” She flung her hands into the air. “I don’t know you that well.”
The smile that touched his lips was more than a little amused. “I’m pleased to know that you possess some sense of propriety, Miss Tamony, despite the penchant for trespassing. But I’m afraid there’s nothing for it. We must hold on to each other quite closely if I’m to carry you into the sky. In fact, I fear I must give you a complete disgust of myself before we arrive at the village, for I do find you very attractive, as I made clear to you before.”
Sarah’s heart gave a thump as she remembered the caress of his warm hands on her skin. But the memory was easily overpowered by what he’d said before.
“Lord Graymar,” she asked, taking a step nearer so that he could hear her over the wind, “did you say that you intend to carry me into the sky?”
He nodded. “If you’re willing for such an adventure, Miss Tamony. We can fly to the village very quickly, and I can keep you warm on the journey.”
A rush of excitement filled Sarah, pushing all other thoughts aside. To fly, like a bird, up into the air … it was a dream come true.
“Oh, my lord,” she said happily. “I’m certainly willing. How wonderful!”
She stepped even nearer and put her arms about his neck, smiling up into his face. His own expression was more sober, but he gave his attention to setting his cloak about her, being careful to envelop the knapsack as well. He murmured a single word, far too low for her to make out, and the heavy garment wrapped itself close to Sarah’s body, cocooning her inside with Lord Graymar and imparting a comforting warmth. Then she felt his arms slide carefully around her waist, pulling her flush against his hard body.
“Oh,” Sarah said, suddenly understanding what he’d meant by giving her a disgust of himself. Not that she was disgusted, but perhaps a bit alarmed. She was not unfamiliar with the sensation of being held against an aroused man, though always before it had been unwillingly and she’d been engaged in pushing said man away. But she’d never before stood like this, of her own volition, and actually felt that arousal for more than a brief moment. “Oh dear.”
“I apologize,” he said somewhat grimly. “I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do to spare you. If it’s of any help, you might think upon the fact that I find it as irritating as you do. If you feel that you cannot bear such intimacy, we can return to Glain Tarran and saddle Enoch. He is very swift, but I cannot promise that we’ll achieve the village in time to avoid notice.”
“Oh no,” she said at once. “I promise you I don’t mind. Please, Lord Graymar. Please take me into the sky.”
She was like a child being offered a marvelous treat, Malachi thought, gazing into her upturned face. Her eyes sparkled beneath the moonlight, filled with an anticipation that only made his body harden further. Then, to make matters worse, she snuggled closer and wrapped her arms even more tightly about his neck. He stifled a tormented groan.
It took an effort to set his mind to the task at hand. He had never actually held a person while flying before, but he believed the attempt would be successful. Sarah Tamony was not a tiny or delicate female, but she was slender and, he discovered as they began to rise, light to carry.
She uttered a sound when she felt their upward motion, similar to a squeal, and when her feet left the ground her arms squeezed about Malachi so tightly that they nearly cut off his intake of air.
“I have you securely, Miss Tamony,” he promised as they went higher. “You may trust that I’ll keep you safe. Are you warm enough?” The wind, as they rose, blew harder, colder.
“Oh yes,” she assured him, looking from side to side, a wide smile on her lips. “Very warm, thank you.” Then she laughed and gave a shake of her head. “We’re flying!” she cried happily. “I can scarce believe it, but we are!”
Malachi found himself smiling, too. Sarah Tamony was an easy female to please, at least when it came to magic. He wondered what she would do if he performed a truly difficult feat. The idea was a mistake, for it filled his brain with forbidden images again. Having her pressed so intimately against him didn’t help.
He took her up even higher, as he liked to do himself when flying, so that she could see the landscape far off into the moonlit distance, the wild, vast sea to one side and the rolling countryside to the other. She was speechless with wonder, gazing all about and then upward, to the endless stars above.
“Are you all right, Miss Tamony?” Malachi asked, filled with an unusual satisfaction at her reaction. Any other mere mortal female of his acquaintance would likely have been screaming to get down by now.
Sarah looked at him, her expression filled with open happiness. “Can we go higher?” she asked. “Up to the stars?”
“No,” he murmured, thinking that if she truly wished to make the attempt, he’d be willing. “There is a way to get there, but it requires a different kind of magic. If you wish it, we can let the wind blow us to the village.” He hesitated, wondering if she was that brave. “It can be frighteningly wild,” he warned, “but we’ll not be harmed.”
“Yes, let’s!” she cried eagerly. “Please, my lord.”
“Very well, then,” he said. “Hold tight.” To the wind, he shouted, “Chwythu!”
The wind obeyed and sent them twirling in the direction of the village. Sarah Tamony shrieked with delight as they were lifted and dropped and then lifted again, spinning wildly, even tumbling head over feet in great circles. Her hat blew off, falling away unnoticed and uncared for, and her long auburn hair flew free of all bonds. She tilted her head back and
closed her eyes, letting her hair make a banner behind her, shouting out as freely and unashamedly as Malachi had never heard another female do. He laughed, too, feeling foolishly giddy. They were like two children and, indeed, Malachi couldn’t remember being this abandoned since he was a boy. He could scarce open his own eyes for the force of the wind’s play, but enough so that he could look at her, with her head thrown back and her mouth opened, joy exuding from every pore.
He wanted it to go on for hours, to keep her body next to his, so close that they might almost be making love, and not return to the ground or reality until the sun rose and took the choice away. But they neared the village within minutes, and the wind gradually ceased amusing them.
Slowly, carefully, Malachi brought them to earth behind a copse of trees near the village inn, experiencing the usual momentary unsteadiness of being on solid ground again. It passed quickly and they stood grinning at each other and swaying to gain balance.
She was still laughing, and Malachi lifted a finger to touch her lips, warning her to be quiet. Which only made both of them laugh again.
“Shhhhh,” he said, still grinning foolishly. “We can’t be heard.”
“Oh, that was wonderful!” she declared, her voice low but no less excited. “I wish it had never stopped. Thank you, my lord, a thousand times over. I shall never be able to repay you for such a boon.”
He wanted to kiss her. Desperately. He wanted to pull her down to the ground and continue what they’d begun in the air. For it had been a seductive intimacy, flying together. It had been passionate and pleasurable and intense, and he knew, with a sense of painful clarity, that he’d never know that same pleasure with another woman.
Sarah came to her senses more quickly than he did, and began to withdraw. Malachi fought the urge to hold her fast, to keep her sheltered within the folds of his cloak. But if he didn’t let her go he would give her that kiss, and nothing would stop him thereafter. And if someone from the village, perhaps the baker or dairyman, happened to step out-of-doors to begin his early day, all of Malachi’s good intentions in sparing Miss Tamony embarrassment would be lost.
Pulling his cloak apart, he let her step back, and the coldness swept in once more. Her arms slid from his neck and her warmth departed, but as she stood away she yet smiled up at him in that enchanting, well-pleased manner. Her unbound hair, he saw, was thick and lovely and hung to the small of her back. She looked like one of his ancestors from the ancient days, a wild, pagan woman far closer to nature and far freer in spirit.
But she was not a pagan woman. She was a lady of good birth, and he was a gentleman by name and the Earl of Graymar, as well. They were no longer tumbling unconstrained by earth’s decrees, high in the cold night sky and unfettered from life’s cares, but standing on the ground and bound by all that such a thing meant. He had always been starkly aware of the difference. Sarah Tamony, by her subtly changing expression, was, too.
“Thank you,” she said again, straightening her coat and running her hands over her hair. “For all that you’ve done, my lord. I’m quite all right now.” She cast a glance at the nearby inn. “I’ll just go and make certain that the horse made its way safely back to the stable and—”
“I’ll take care of it,” he offered quietly. “I can move more silently than you, and will see that the horse is unsaddled and properly stalled. I hope its return woke no one, else there’ll be a search party out looking for you. But I’ll take care of that, as well, if necessary. You need only worry about how to return to the inn without being discovered. Shall I go with you to make certain of it?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I climbed down a tree near the window and can easily scale it again. My cousin, Philistia, is well used to my adventures and will have left it unlatched.”
“Poor Philistia,” Malachi murmured. He reached into his coat and pulled out her spectacles. “Here. They appear to be unharmed from our journey. I’m sorry that your hat was lost. There are some things that the wind will give back, some it will not. I fear the hat is one of its amusements, now.”
“I don’t regret it,” she told him, slipping the eyeglasses over her ears and upon her nose with the skill of long practice. She gazed at him for a moment, blinking as her vision cleared, and smiled. “I would have given away all my hats to have such an experience. I shall never forget it, to the end of my days.”
“I’m glad, if it gave you pleasure.”
“Very much,” she assured him. “I fear my stubbornness in the matter of the book is a poor way to repay such a gift.”
“There is no need to repay,” he said honestly, thinking that she had already given him a far greater gift, one that he would equally treasure. “But I don’t wish to be at enmity with you, Miss Tamony. Can you not reconsider and choose another subject? You are a writer of great skill, after all. Any topic you embark upon is certain to be welcome to your readers.”
“That is good of you to say, my lord,” she replied, “but my heart has fixed upon telling these wonderful stories. I don’t think I can unfix it.”
He took her hand and bowed over it. “I shall hope that you will at least make the attempt.” Rising full height, he released her. “But if not, I beg you to believe that I meant what I said earlier. I shall stop you from writing about the Seymours and any of those families who have given me their trust. It is my duty to them as their guardian, and I can do no less.”
She nodded. “I understand, my lord. But I will write the book, and it will be wonderful. I’ll send you an inscribed copy—or two, perhaps. One to give to Rhys.”
“Then it appears we’re still at cross-purposes,” Malachi said, sighing wearily.
“Yes,” she agreed. “But I trust that we won’t have to think of each other as enemies, my lord.”
“I hope not, Miss Tamony,” Malachi said, but the whispers at the edges of his thoughts told him that it would be otherwise. She would hate him soon.
With another beguiling smile she bid him good night then hurried through the darkness toward the inn. Malachi stood behind the trees, watching as she nimbly scaled the tree that grew by the old stone building. A time or two he nearly flew—literally—to catch her, certain she was about to fall, but she was as adept at climbing as she was at crossing stubborn boundaries. Sitting on the ledge of the open window, she turned to wave at him. Malachi lifted a hand, as well, though he knew she couldn’t see it.
The next moment she was gone, and Malachi’s heart gave an unexpected lurch of pain. He drew in a breath of cold night air and wondered at what he was feeling. Loss. Sorrow. Longing. And something else that was deeply familiar: a stark aloneness.
Chapter Eight
London, mid-March
“But, Sarah, you can’t possibly go out today,” Philistia said unhappily. “Madame Duget will be coming soon to do fittings for the gowns we ordered, and to discuss the other garments we want made. You’ll wish to choose your own cloth, I’m sure, for you’re always so particular about the colors you wear.”
Sarah set aside the book she’d been examining with some regret—it was the most recent addition to her new collection—and gave her attention to her cousin.
“With hair like mine, it’s a necessity,” she replied. “But I do think that you and Mama have had enough experience ordering garments for me that I might leave the task to you.” She pushed her spectacles higher on her nose. “I have an appointment with Professor Seabolt this afternoon and don’t mean to abandon it because of a few new gowns.”
“I don’t mind taking charge of your wardrobe, Sarah,” her mother said, not looking up from the numerous cards and letters that lay before her upon a small writing desk, “but you must promise not to complain if you end up with a dress made in a color not of your liking. You can be most particular, at times.”
“Avoid yellows and pinks and any shade too pale and we shall all be in charity with one another at the end of the day,” Sarah advised. “And I can’t think that Madame Duget will have any troub
le adorning me with suitable shades, for she did remark upon my hair when we were at her shop.”
“But the fitting,” Philistia said worriedly. “Surely you must stay for that.”
Sarah smiled at the younger woman reassuringly. “I’ll stay for that, I promise. The rest I’ll leave to the two of you, and to Madame Duget, of course. From the samples we saw in her shop, I believe we’re in very capable hands.”
Philistia’s face lit with excitement, and she scooted forward so quickly to the edge of her chair that Sarah thought for an alarming moment she might fall off.
“The gowns in her shop were beautiful, weren’t they?” Philistia said. “Aunt Speakley was perfectly right in sending us there. And how fortunate that Madame Duget and her assistants have all read your books, Sarah! They seemed almost overcome at meeting you. All of London is overcome, just as Aunt Speakley said they would be. We can scarce step out-of-doors without meeting one of your readers. And the invitations we’ve received!” She pressed her hands together and held them to her breast. “It’s far more wonderful than I’d hoped.”
Sarah was glad that her cousin found the attention they’d received since reaching Town to be so pleasant. For her own part, Sarah found it tiresome. She could scarce go about London, doing research or conducting interviews, without being approached by someone who’d read one of her books and had myriad questions or comments. She was glad, of course, that so many people enjoyed reading her work, but she did wish that she weren’t so confoundedly identifiable. It was due to the spectacles and hair color, Sarah knew, for the combination was rare enough in Englishwomen to cause her to stand out in public.
Not that it mattered, she supposed, for many of the interviews she’d planned on while in London had been canceled by the individuals she’d contacted, all of whom had suddenly lost their previous enthusiasm for speaking with Sarah. She’d also discovered that other research sources were mysteriously closed to her, certain bookstores and shops, for instance, where items dealing in the supernatural were secretly sold and private libraries that had been collected and maintained by those who might be considered sympathetics to magic mortals.
Touch of Desire Page 10