Dangerous As Sin

by Alix Rickloff

  He decided to forget the body for now. From the looks of him, he wasn’t going anywhere. And after casting a quick hope that Amos and Susan had been well out of whatever had happened here tonight, he gathered Morgan into his arms. She needed him now. The rest could wait.

  Ignoring the cloying stench of death that clung to her, he carried her to bed. Undressed her. Tended to her wounded arm, ugly but clean.

  All the while, he spoke to her. Nonsense phrases in the soft Gaelic of his childhood. Endearments any mother would use to soothe a grieving infant.

  A red-hot fury held him at her side long after she’d drifted into a fractious doze. Fury that she’d been alone and vulnerable. Fury that he’d not been here for her. She’d trusted him. And he’d betrayed her trust. Again. It didn’t matter it hadn’t been by choice. The damage had been done. Had it ended with her death, he’d only have had himself to blame. Another death laid at his door.

  Shadows crossed the floor as the moon dropped into the west, and he remained. Her fever rose, peaked, and fell away, and still he remained. By the time he made it back downstairs to deal with the losing half of the battle, it was well past four, his eyes gritty with exhaustion.

  The corpse lay faceup and spread-eagle, blood pooling greasy and brown beneath it. Dark eyes stared unseeing from a long narrow face shadowed by new beard. A face Cam knew he’d seen before. But where? This sense of déjà vu was becoming increasingly annoying.

  Yanking free the sword, Cam wiped it clean. A cavalry saber. Well used, but well cared for. He tossed it back on the floor to be dealt with later.

  Kneeling, he searched the body for any hint of identity. Pockets revealed string, a pocketwatch, loose coins, a much-folded playbill from Drury Lane for a play held three nights previous. His coat held no tags or marks identifying the owner. He wore no rings. Carried no letters. No calling cards. The dead man’s past had been wiped as clean as his sword.

  “Who are you?” Cam whispered to the empty room.

  He didn’t expect an answer. He didn’t receive one.

  Dreams and dreams of dreams.

  These were the foggy images passing like ghosts through Morgan’s mind. “Fada siar air agh-aidh cuain.” A voice singing plaintive and low. “Se mo dhuan-sa cruit-mo-chrith.” Soft words sung in a language that conjured a shimmering winter aurora over Skye. A crash of icy surf. Stolen hours spent tumbled in an Edinburgh bedchamber.

  A steady heartbeat sounded beneath her ear and strong arms wrapped her in a tender embrace as she was carried. The chill of air pebbled her bare skin, and skillful hands tended to the throbbing agony of her arm. “Guth mo luaidh anns gach stuaidh. Ga mo nuall-an gu tir.”

  She swam in and out of these sensations, these pictures, cringing from the staring, accusing eyes of the dead man. A man whose waxen face morphed into Cam’s. Whose muddy eyes lightened to an eagle’s blue. She reached for Cam, needing to feel the safety of his touch. Knowing that if she could only hold on to him, she’d not fall back into the fevered tide pulling her away from shore—away from him.

  But even as she touched him, his face changed again to the flat, challenging arrogance of Doran Buchanan, whose cruel laughter taunted her with failure. Changed again to Scathach’s disappointed black gaze. And on to the cool contempt of the Fey in the park. The shifting sands finally settling into the friendly, grizzled patience of an old man, his piercing blue eyes twinkling with amusement. Of them all, he was the only one who spoke. His words threading their way deep into her heart.

  “Love isn’t a chain, lass. Sometimes ’tis within the arms of a lover we find our greatest freedoms. Our greatest strengths.” He laughed, shaking his head. “Remember, the Fey may hold the wisdom of ages, but in matters of the heart, they ken less than nothing.”

  Like taffy, she felt pulled in all directions. Stretched and thinned until nothing of Morgan Bligh remained. Only an empty shell holding the assumptions and expectations of all of them. Knowing that however she chose, she’d be letting some part of her down.

  She opened her eyes to darkness. Heavy blankets. An ache in her stiff and bandaged arm. The solid weight of Cam lying beside her in bed, still half clothed as if he’d fallen asleep in the midst of undressing.

  She shifted positions, expecting a dagger slash of pain. Discomfort definitely, but beneath the taut constraints of bandage, the worst came and went.

  She’d live.

  Cam lay inches away, so close she felt the warmth of his breath, saw the stubbled angle of his jaw. Asleep, he lost the predator watchfulness. Became for a few moments the boy on the loch, racing the geese. Enjoying the swift freedom of the wild birds. Wishing for that same independence to follow the pull of the spirit.

  Reaching out a tentative hand, she traced the dark brows over the deep-set eyes, the long bones of his cheeks, and the sensual curve of his mouth. Felt the familiar tug at her heart that every moment in his presence created within her. A tug that frightened her with all it promised. With all that might be lost.

  She leaned forward, daring to brush her lips against his.

  His mouth opened beneath hers, his tongue dipping within to taste, then devour. His eyes flicked open, the frozen blue of his stare at once both wary and excited.

  “You’re awake,” she accused, feeling suddenly self-conscious. Embarrassed as if he’d caught her at something forbidden.

  He answered with a sly smile. “I am now, but I have to say that’s not how I expected to be roused.”

  The night’s events rushed into her like air to a vacuum. What the hell was she doing simply lying here? Letting the stirring of her body drag her away from her purpose. She fought to sit up. “Susan and Amos…the man…”

  Cam’s smile vanished, the warrior once again. The only remnants of his earlier brilliance, the gleam of his boots, the muscle-sculpting cavalry breeches. Fatigue and worry shrouded his gaze. Rage overlying all. It radiated off him like heat from a stone. “Taken care of.”

  Swinging his legs over the bed, he ploughed a hand through his hair. Scrubbed his face to wake himself up. When next he met her eyes, his gaze held the power to scorch. “Do you know how frightened I was to come home to that…to you…” His jaw hardened to the point she thought she heard his teeth grinding. “Damn it, Morgan. I should never have left you alone.”

  And she understood. His rage wasn’t directed at her. “I’m all right.”

  Her words never sank past his own self-guilt. “You don’t understand. I could have lost you. It could just as easily have been you lying down there.”

  “But it wasn’t, Cam.”

  She pushed out of the blankets. Rolled up on her knees, letting the light-headedness pass. She dropped her eyes. Fumbled with the bedclothes. “I don’t fear death. Or battle.”

  He took her by the shoulders, careful to avoid her arm, but still with an iron grip. “What do you fear, Morgan?”

  She met his hard gaze unflinching, knowing that what Cam asked moved beyond tonight’s attack. “I fear imprisonment. The gilded cage that traps all women if they let it. I yearn for a greater life than bearing children and waiting on my husband’s attentions as a hound waits upon the word of his master.”

  He laughed, though the warmth of it never reached his eyes. “You have a jaded view of marriage if that’s all you see when you look upon it.”

  “And can you tell me it’s otherwise? You who hid from your marriage first in war and then in a mistress’s bed.” She refused to look away, though her eyes burned, and the throbbing in her arm seemed to move to her heart. “You’re right. I have seen another kind of marriage. One where love outweighs all else. My cousin found it. And did I see even half a hope of that kind of love, I might risk the trap.”

  “And you don’t?”

  Her lips curved in a sad smile. “You yearn for freedom. A life without fetters of any kind. I’ve seen it.” Her gaze dropped to the cross around his neck. “And know it’s true.”

  He saw where her eyes rested. Fisted his hand over the cro
ss as if warding her off. “What have you seen?” His grip on the cross tightened until the knuckles turned white. “What have you seen? Did you scry my stone? Is that it? When? When did you do it?”

  She remained silent, too weary to fight. Too confused to argue.

  He leaned in, his body rigid as if he held his temper by the merest thread. “Bloody hell, Morgan. You haven’t answered my questions.”

  His rage was now directed squarely at her. He seethed with it. And like a match to dry tinder, intimacy burned away, leaving naught but ash. “No, but you’ve answered mine.”

  Cam lay in his bed, one hand behind his head, one fingering his necklace. His first thought had been for whiskey. His second to seek out Rastus and end the traitor’s life. Both impossible. And so he’d been left to stare into the black corners of his room. Feel the oppressive crush of memories. Imagine Morgan’s sickened reaction to seeing his deeds played out before her. Conjured from his cross just as she’d conjured the memories of Traverse at the standing stones.

  He’d played a part in so many killings. So much death. The creature inside him thrilling in the hunt. Glorying in the power that came from being feared.

  And the Serpent Brigade had been feared.

  Almost as much by the English army as the French. Their reputation for cold-blooded brutality mixed with the secrecy and special nature of their missions made them outcasts among the ranks and pariahs among the officers.

  He hadn’t cared at first. In fact, he’d enjoyed the independence of his position. Part of the lure of the brigade. A group of select men with their own rules. Their own standards. It had only been later he’d realized the cost of such freedom.

  And now Morgan knew it too.

  She’d been right to keep her distance. Hadn’t the general come right out and said what Cam had only suspected? That the brigade had been a collection of criminals and madmen? So where did that leave him?

  He closed his eyes, knowing sleep wouldn’t come easily. Disgust soured his stomach. Rose in his throat like bile. Lifting his hands, he studied the calloused palms. The strength in the long fingers. Morgan had witnessed all these hands had done in the name of war. Had used her magic to steal his memories for herself. Betrayed his trust by taking from him a time he wished only to forget. She’d watched the murders he’d committed. Some deserved. Some not. He could imagine her horror—her loathing. Was it any wonder she cringed at giving herself up to him? He was as much a beast as the man tonight. A hired gun. A natural-born killer.

  The dead man’s face swam into view alongside so many others. But this time Cam recognized him. His features clicked into place like so many puzzle pieces.

  Devonshire. Outside Ensign Traverse’s house.

  The scarlet-jacketed officer.

  That connection made, another leapt forward. Stunning him with its implications. Bringing a sheen of cold sweat to his body.

  The man at his uncle’s house with Euna. The man at the Abercrombies’ tonight. He’d been the bawdy drunkard at Mrs. Cabot’s brothel.

  A coincidence? No. Cam didn’t believe in coincidence.

  Doran had upped the ante. He didn’t just seek to destroy Cam and Morgan. He looked to destroy any and all around them.

  That Cam would not let stand.

  He’d bring this fight to Doran. Take his chances against the goddess blade. And immortal or not, if success should be his that day, he’d stick to his plans.

  Finish this last mission and retire to Strathconon.

  Alone.

  Unable to sleep, Morgan found her way to the kitchens. Thankfully, unscarred by the attack and still neat as a pin. Just as Susan had left them.

  Daggerfell’s kitchens had always held the power to soothe, and many an hour she’d spent with Cook, her arms to her elbows covered in flour. Or pounding dough as if she practiced in the tiltyard.

  A cup of tea and a buttered roll later and she’d managed to eat away the worst of her guilt. Cam had been right to be angry. She should never have ventured to scry his cross. To delve into thoughts and memories not freely offered. It had been a break of faith. A lapse in honor.

  So what had prompted her to go against her better judgment? Risk his wrath? Had she done it to convince herself of the Cam she knew? The conniving, lying aristocrat who’d tempted her with everything and brought her nothing but pain and humiliation.

  Perhaps in part.

  But what she’d found had only confused her. Instead of a scion of an ancient house who wielded his wealth and position with the cutting strength of a blade, she’d seen a boy as wild as the Highland mountains. Wanting only to fly from his responsibilities. To feel the wicked pleasure of freedom. A boy who’d become a man. Crushed within a loveless marriage. Trapped by duty and family. And later by war and the guilt that followed.

  She swirled the cold tea around and around in her mug.

  Was it wrong of Morgan to need surety in a mate? To have no what-ifs before she took a step that could end the life she’d carved for herself? Was that kind of confidence in her decision an impossibility? Did anyone truly know the future before they pledged themselves? The questions hurricaned through her head. If nothing else, taking her mind from the biting sting in her arm.

  Her cousin Conor had wed with the belief that he’d not see another dawn. His bride, Ellery, had agreed with the understanding she’d be a widow within hours—days at most. And yet they’d ignored the future they’d seen and taken that final step. Found a treasure beyond price if the lovesick way they looked on each other was any indication.

  Cam too might be facing such a fate, though Morgan refused to believe it. To imagine Cam struck down would only undermine energy best used for fighting Doran. She’d ignore the niggling fear. Concentrate on what she could change. Not what lay outside her power.

  Love isn’t a chain. It’s our greatest strength.

  The thought once within her head couldn’t be shaken. Where had she heard such before? Gram? Uncle Owen? It sounded like both of them and yet she was almost sure neither one had ever said such a thing to her.

  But the words remained. The force of the truth undeniable.

  And with a flash of insight that burned away all else, she knew what she needed to do.

  Chapter 26

  Cam came awake to the snick of a turning lock. A rush of cool air from the hallway.

  And then she was there.

  Red-gold hair spilled loose over her shoulders. Down her back.

  Her candle’s light silhouetting the dusky flesh of her breasts, the muscled curve of her hips, the determined tilt to her chin, she was his every fantasy. An impossible desire. Inches away and forever out of reach.

  He fought to stay angry. To hold tight to the knot of betrayal that kept the worst of the pain at bay. He struggled to harden his heart against the apology clear in the bronze of her gaze.

  The rest of his body hardened on its own.

  “What the hell do you want?” He slammed to his feet. Winced at the ache of need centered in his groin. He could act as furious as he wanted; Morgan could tell all too clearly how he really felt. “Stooping to your Other tricks again to get in?”

  “Didn’t need to.” She smiled, coming farther into his room. Tossed a knife on the bed beside him. “Compliments of Brodie. He’s a man of many talents, you know.”

  What she did next, he’d never anticipated. Not in his wildest imaginings.

  And he’d had a few over the last weeks.

  She kissed him. Brushed his lips with a touch as weightless as down yet holding the promise of so much more if he let her continue. And why the hell not? It was what he’d wanted, wasn’t it?

  Instead, he grabbed her wrists. Forced her to step away. Saw his coldhearted fury reflected in her eyes.

  This didn’t make sense. She didn’t make sense. And he grew tired of being strung out and reeled back like a child’s toy. “What’s your game?”

  Her face grew shuttered. “No game. Not this time.”

  “And y
ou expect me to believe you? After all that’s gone between us?”

  “I don’t expect. But I hope.”

  What had he said to his grandfather? A fool’s hope?

  She stood so close he saw the rise and fall of her chest. The flicker of caution in the lightning depths of her gaze. Smelled her cool floral fragrance mixed with the earthier scent of desire in her hair, on her skin. His hand came up, touched the bandage wrapped taut around the muscle of her arm. A reminder of how close he’d come to losing her forever.

  She refused to surrender. “Send me away, and I’ll go. Tell me it’s over between us, and I’ll believe you. But if you can’t, I’ll stay. And I’ll make you forgive me.”

  There stood a challenge if he’d ever heard one. He swallowed.

  Uncle Josh’s disapproval. Gran-da’s advice. The dangling uncertainty of Lord Delvish’s warning. There were a million reasons he should push her away. Throw her from his room. Relock the door. And forget her.

  And only one reason to hold her fast.

  He lowered his mouth to hers, her body swaying as she opened to him. His tongue dipping to taste the heat of her as the air left his lungs in a punching rush of emotion.

  That one reason prevailed.

  But damned if he’d make it easy for her.

  Morgan’s hands splayed across the cool marble of Cam’s chest, deliberately avoiding the cross, the reason for his anger. His heart raced beneath her palm, his breathing coming quick and fast. His kiss sent a lightning strike of emotion straight to her center, making her knees buckle, eliciting an involuntary moan.

  He caught her before she fell, rolling her under him as they both crashed onto the bed. Trapping her. Pinning her with his weight and the furious hunger in his gaze. A gaze that singed wherever it lingered. And it lingered just about everywhere. Her breasts, the flat of her stomach, the junction of her legs.