Rather than overtake her and turn back to yell his victory, as he would have when they were children, Max satisfied himself with catching up and loping along beside her, casting sideways glances, and finally holding her hand again.
The grass was knee-deep in the valley, and scattered with wildflowers. Pink, and white, and mauve, and blue, they waved with the grass that swayed this way and that before a busy breeze.
“Smell it,” Kirsty said. “Warm grass and warm flowers, and a breeze that’s stroked the heather. There’s no better place than right here, and right now. I couldna wish for more.”
“Ye couldna?”
She shaded her eyes to see him again. “Ye like t’make fun o’ me,” she said, but without reproach. “I’ll never be a lady. That’s the way o’ it.”
“You are more of a lady than any I ever met, Kirsty Mercer. And there’s no better time and place than this for me, either, but I could wish for more.” He turned to face her and began to run backward. “Now. Through the trees and the last one to the river is slave for . . . slave forever.”
He turned away and ran, and Kirsty ran, too, calling after him, “It used t’be slave for the day, Max Rossmara. Ye’re a greedy one.”
Through the trees they dodged. She would see him, dash to the spot, and he would be gone. “Ye teaser,” she cried. “Ye know ye’re the faster one, but ye taunt me.”
She paused, peering in all directions. Sun pierced the trees, dappling lush turf and last year’s fallen leaves. “Where are ye? Don’t ye dare jump out at me. Ye know I canna bear that.” There was no sign of him.
“Verra well, if it’s a mean game ye’re playin’, I’ll say ye cheated and no’ be yer slave.” Laughing and gasping, she made her way in as straight a line as possible through the trees, pulling her already tattered skirts away from thorny bushes, and not stopping until she broke into full sunlight and the final downward sweep to the willows that lined the river. He would be there, behind the trunk of a willow, ready to pop out and grab her.
At the river’s edge she stopped, panting, and swung around. And she dropped her arms to her sides and felt the tears again, and a lump in her throat.
Max came toward her slowly through the willows, his hands in his pockets, and whistling. She’d never heard him whistle before, and she thought she’d advise him not to make a habit of it.
Raising a hand as he drew near, he said, “You win. One slave reporting for duty, oh fleet one.”
“Ye cheated,” she said. “Ye didna try t’win.”
“Oh, and that’s cheating, miss? I think not. I felt a trifle tired and came as quickly as I could. It wasn’t quick enough to beat you. That’s that. What would you have me do first?”
Kirsty considered him from head to foot. “Just let me look at ye. Ye’re safe, and I’m safe.” She spread her arms and turned her face up to the sky. “And it’s warm and the bad people didn’t win. All’s right in the Lord’s great world.”
“Is it?”
She looked at him sharply. “Isn’t it?”
“Perhaps. Time will tell.”
She couldn’t look into his eyes a moment longer. Dropping to sit on the riverbank, she slipped off her ruined shoes and rolled down what was left of her stockings. Remembering herself, and that she was in the presence of a man, even if they had known each other from childhood, she made sure her skirts were well down before taking her stockings all the way off.
Max came to sit beside her and proceeded to work off his boots.
Gingerly, Kirsty put her feet into clear water tinted the same color as the pale blue blossoms of the tufted forget-me-nots that grew in clumps along the river. “It’s verra cold,” she cried, gasping at first. “But it soon warms, and I’ll ha’ the cleanest feet in the land.”
Hissing, Max pushed his feet beneath the surface, too. “Ow,” he muttered. “Ow, ow. Ooh, good.”
Little swirls of sandy mud rose to cloud the water, but settled quickly.
“Give me your bidding,” Max said, grinning again. “I could wash your feet.”
“Ye’ll do no such thing,” she told him, horrified.
“Am I released for a while, then?”
“Released?”
“From slave duty?”
“O’course ye are, ye daft man.”
How soon she regretted her generosity. Before her eyes Max shed his coat, then undid his shirt and threw it down— his cravat had disappeared hours earlier.
“What are ye about?” she asked him.
“I’m going to take a bath.”
Kirsty frowned. “In the river?”
“Of course, in the river. We used to swim here, didn’t we?”
“Och,” she said in a low voice. “Ye promised ye’d never speak o’that. And it was only a time or two when it was so hot.”
“I promised not to speak to anyone but you about it. And I haven’t, and I’m not now.”
He had such shoulders, such a chest, such a flat stomach and the strongest-looking arms. “Ye’re verra appealin’,” she said.
“Am I now?” He began to unfasten his trousers. “Do you think you ought to say such a thing to me?”
“Only if it’s true, and it is.”
“Appealing is a rather weak word. Lacks passion.”
She rolled her lips in to contain a smile.
“You’re laughing at me now?” he asked.
Kirsty sighed, and said, “Ye’re too well made for your own good. And lookin’ at ye brings me a great deal more pleasure than it ought. Mayhap it brings me passion. Ye steal my breath and make me . . . och, such feelings, Max.”
He considered that, a smug expression on his face. “I don’t think you can use the word passion like that. You could say that looking at me makes you feel passionate.”
She looked down at her hands in her lap. “Lookin’ at ye makes me feel passionate.”
“And a little frightened, perhaps?” he asked softly.
“Perhaps.”
“You never have to be frightened of anything you feel with me—and you don’t have to hide anything you feel, either.”
From the corner of her eye she saw his trousers and his smallclothes land on top of his shirt. Dull heat throbbed in her face. She turned her head away.
A giant splash, followed by whoops and howls followed. “Kirsty,” he called. “Kirsty, I’m drowning, look.”
She looked at once, rising to her feet in the shallows at the same time. He’d always been a strong swimmer, and he’d struck out some distance from the bank until he could stand on the bottom with only his head and shoulders out of the water.
“Get back here, Max,” she said. “Ye’ll freeze.”
“It’s wonderful.” With that he dived, flipping his naked nether regions into full view before disappearing.
Kirsty’s heart thumped harder than it had ever thumped. And she felt one of those feelings inside, in the womanly parts of her.
He surfaced again, slicking back his hair and squinting at her across the sun-scattered ripples of the water. “Paddle a little, at least, my love. It’ll refresh you.”
“Ye’re naked, Max Rossmara.”
“That I am,” he agreed. “Wonderful.” He swam closer and stood again, with the water only reaching his hips.
This time she didn’t look away. She wanted to join him. How long had it been since she’d swum? And she would be clean again. “Look away,” she told him.
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to take off my dress. Ye make me jealous, and I want t’swim, too.”
“Naked?”
“No such thing, sir. I’ll keep on my smalls.”
Assuming a most serious expression, he turned his back. Kirsty shed her filthy dress, and the heavy petticoats. Down to her stays, chemise, and drawers, she considered. The stays were foolish, uncomfortable things and they weren’t made for swimming. She took them off and immediately struck out until she swam past Max—sucking air through her teeth at the chill of it—and
out to the middle of the river. Deliberately keeping her eyes averted from him, she dunked her head and rubbed at her hair. It wouldn’t make it properly clean, but it would be better than before.
With water streaming down her face, she tossed back her sodden locks and squeezed them. They squeaked so they must be clean enough.
A hand behind her neck shocked her into a silent scream, and her eyes flew open.
Max’s face was so close she could see the black flecks in his green eyes. With his free hand he cupped water and set to scrubbing her face and neck.
“What d’ye think you’re doin’?” she protested, batting at him without stopping him for an instant.
“Being your slave. Slaves wash their masters.”
“I’m no’ your master.”
“I respectfully suggest that you remain silent before you get yourself into trouble with that pretty mouth of yours. I imagine you’re in need of a wash all over.”
“No such thing,” she told him at once, but a great many parts of her had those feelings, and she wished she didn’t have to protest the idea.
“You know I’m a bastard, don’t you?” he said, concentrating on her shoulders where the chemise had slipped down. “And that Viscount Hunsingore and his wife adopted Ella and me.”
“I only know the rumors. They were never very clear. And ye didna speak o’ it, and I always thought ye’d tell me your story one day—if ye wanted to.”
“What Countess Grabham talked about was true. As a boy I was with a gang of pickpockets in Covent Garden—that’s a district in London. There are theaters there. But no matter. I came from nothing but the humblest of beginnings. I never had a mother and father I knew as you know yours.”
His hands at her waist supported her. “Ye’re well loved by all,” she told him. “Considered the gentleman ye are by all. And the viscount and Lady Justine love ye.”
“All true. But you and I are not different. We are both survivors who have had good fortune. And the greatest part of that good fortune is that we found each other. Would you like your slave to kiss you?”
It wouldn’t stop with a kiss, but she said, “Yes,” and parted her lips, and raised her chin, and slid her arms around his neck. She felt his Part, hard and insistent against her belly, and sucked in a sharp breath. But she kissed him nevertheless, she kissed him the harder, and he framed her head and rocked their faces together.
They kissed for a long time, the sun growing hotter on their heads.
Max bobbed her high out of the water and gazed up at her, the laugh lines crinkled around his eyes and mouth. Kirsty covered his hands at her waist and dared to look down at herself. If she were naked, she’d be less embarrassed than she was by the sight of transparent cotton layered over her breasts. Her nipples showed pink, and stiff. It was true that there was not so very much of her, but what there was he could not fail to see.
“So pretty,” Max said, and touched the tip of his tongue to a nipple. “So very pretty.” He drew the other into his mouth and the burning darts went their speedy way to her womb, and to the throbbing place between her thighs.
“Can you still float?” he asked, no doubt trying to sound nonchalant, but failing. “We used to float.”
Keeping an arm around her shoulders, he brought up his legs and stretched out on his back.
“Oh, Max,” Kirsty said, but try as she might, she couldn’t look away. That Part of him was long and large and most interesting. “Oh, Max.” She floated up onto her own back. “What are we t’do, then?”
“You think we have to do something?”
“Yes, I do.”
“What would it be?”
“I canna lead t’way. And I canna say it.”
“Then don’t say anything, love. If you want it, I want to make love to you, right here in this river. It’s clean, and we’re clean, and it seems so right to me.” He put a finger on her mouth, and said, “Our new beginning for the rest of our lives. Exactly what we wished for when you were sixteen. To stay as we are, and not allow the precious moments to be stolen from us. Just nod if you agree.”
Her heart hammered so that she could hear it in her head and feel it pulse just beneath her skin.
She nodded.
Max closed his eyes and spun them both upright, upright and pressed close together. He took his time kissing her again, and again, and again. He kissed the hollows above her collarbones, and the shallow cleavage between her breasts, and stripped down the chemise until she could free her arms, and kissed her breasts in tantalizing circles that drew ever closer to her nipples.
Desire blossomed. It buzzed inside her, and demanded, and clamored.
But he was teaching her the ways of leisurely lovemaking. He made no sudden or rapid moves as he gradually took off her drawers and rubbed their bodies together.
His face grew strained and the veins in his neck distended, his teeth ground together and his lips drew back. Kirsty watched each tiny change in him with fascination and a deep awareness of her own growing need.
“D’ye like bairns?” she asked him, never having intended to ask any such thing.
His eyes opened and slowly focused. “Very much. I want lots of them myself.”
“Lots?” She frowned. “Hmm. D’ye think a person o’ very lowly birth could be a good wife to a man who’s learned t’be the gentleman he was intended t’be?”
“I wonder,” Max said, his smile so gentle it tore at her heart. He took hold of her legs and wrapped them around his waist. “I think such a person could, don’t you. I think they’d make a team like no other team.”
She felt suddenly quiet inside. “Ye drink too much, Max.” “Sometimes.”
“It’s no’ an easy thing to stop.”
“Not alone and angry. But with someone at your side who means everything to you, not so difficult. Have you seen me in a black humor when I’ve been with you, and I’ve been almost certain I could stay with you?”
“Ye’ve a terrible temper, Max Rossmara. I’ll no’ put up wi’ a bad-tempered person. Not ever.”
He kissed her mouth again. The Part of him that wanted to be inside her pressed into the folds where her thighs joined. She was beginning to open to him, and she hadn’t the will or the desire to stop herself.
She must be herself, impetuous as that frequently might be. “I’m goin’ t’be verra forward, and I’m goin’ t’do it now. Ye may not want me then, but I’m goin’ t’do it.”
His breathing grew heavier and heavier and his eyes took on a glazed quality. He buried his face in her neck. Very deliberately he played the tips of his thumbs along her groin until she jumped, and brought his hardness pushing insistently against her.
“Max, I want ye t’listen t’me so we’ll both know where we stand.”
He groaned against her throat, and bowed to draw a nipple into his mouth again.
She could scarcely think at all.
His long fingers surrounded her bottom and ran down the cleft and beneath her. He took hold of himself and rubbed it against her until her need screamed in her and she writhed.
With his very tip he stroked the hot little place that rendered her helpless in his arms. Harder and harder he stroked until the burning explosion of sensation flowered and made her a limp thing at his mercy. She felt open wide to him and was glad.
He didn’t come into her.
Kirsty shook her head and looked at him. “It’s amazing,” she said, and he smiled a little. “I want to do it for ye. To make ye feel as ye’ve made me feel. If I’ve t’catch up and keep accounts straight between us, I’d best get started.”
Max laughed, and was transformed back to the very young man she’d known. “You will get started soon enough. Ask your forward question before I expire from the want of you.”
She summoned her courage and said, “Ye asked me if I’d go away wi’ ye. Ye spoke o’ marriage, but I said I wouldna do it.”
“I did ask. And, yes, you refused me.”
“Now I’m askin ye.
” She must say it quickly or lose her nerve and the opportunity might never return. “Would ye consider comin’ away wi’ me and marryin’ me? I’ll understand if ye canna say yes, but I wanted t’ask because I love ye, Max Rossmara. I’ll always love ye.”
His eyes closed. He wrapped her tightly in his arms. So tightly she dug her fingertips into the hard muscles in his shoulders.
And he drove into her.
Kirsty cried out. It wasn’t a terrible pain, just an unexpected one.
“Hush,” he said against her lips. “Hush, hush, my love. It will fade soon enough.”
He told the truth, except that when he started to move within her she felt her passage stretching, but she also felt triumph. She had never wanted another man.
Faster and faster he moved, and he raised his face to the sky, and bellowed, and all strain drained from his face. She felt warmth fill her and it soothed the sore skin. And she knew it was his seed entering her body. She reveled in the knowledge.
Shudders racked him, and when they faded he turned onto his back again and pulled her on top of him. Holding her with one arm, he kept them afloat with the other.
“That does it,” Max said. “No choice now.”
“What d’ye mean?” she asked, kissing his wet chest, then reaching to cover his lips with her own.
“I’ll come away with you,” Max said. “And marry you.”
She raised her face and looked at him. “Out o’ duty?”
“Because we’ve proven the heart knows best. So much better than any conventions we think we should follow. And because I love you. I’ve loved you for so long, and I’m going to love you forever.”
Epilogue
“Dashed high-handed if you ask me,” Struan said, shading his eyes against the sun to scan the hills in all directions. The breeze whipped his hair across his brow. “Gone almost two weeks without so much as a by-your-leave, then instructions to await his pleasure as if he was sendin’ out invitations to a ball. Needs taking down a peg or two.”
“Fiddle,” his wife, Lady Justine, said, standing almost as tall as her husband. Her hair was wavy and held similar red highlights to those in the hair of her brother Calum, Duke of Franchot.
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