I’m still asleep, Alex decided.
“Good evening, my lord,” came a soft Scottish burr.
Alexander knuckled his eyes and recognized the man as Farquhar, his long-absent steward. “It took you long enough to present yourself, man. Have you waited till I’m totally ape-drunk to show me the estate ledgers?”
“Och, nae, my lord, there’ll be time enough for that after Christmas. But trust me. You’ll find everything in order so far as that’s concerned.”
Farquhar moved to the window with a surprisingly smooth gait for one of his advanced years and looked down into the bailey.
Alex hauled himself up and joined the steward there. Since this dream didn’t seem to be fading or melting into another one like the others had, he figured he might as well become engaged in it. Strange as this night phantom was, with people popping in and out of looking glasses and such, he was grateful that at least the weeping woman was gone.
Below in the bailey, all the denizens of the keep were pouring across the snow-covered courtyard and into the well-lit chapel.
“Midnight service?” Alex asked.
“Aye,” Farquhar said in his papery, thin tone. “To celebrate the birth of Our Lord and to pray a bit for the new laird of Bonniebroch as well.”
“I didn’t ask them to.”
“Aye, lad, ye did. No’ in so many words, o’ course, but yer outburst at the supper was a cry for help, whether ye knew it or no’. ”
Alexander’s ears burned. Once again he was struck by Farquhar’s unservant-like demeanor. He was more like a tutor or an elderly uncle. Or a confessor.
It was time to change the subject.
“If you’re not here to demonstrate the efficacy of your stewardship, why are you in my chambers instead of down there in the kirk with the rest of them?”
When Alexander gazed at the steward full on, he looked like any other aged Scot, wiry and tough, if a bit more diminutive than most. But viewed from the corner of his eye, Farquhar seemed frailer, as if Alex could actually see through his slight frame to the room beyond.
There. Wasn’t that the coal hod showing clearly through the tail of Farquhar’s old-fashioned frock-coat? And didn’t the thistle pattern that framed the wall tapestry continue unabated along the edge of the floor through Farquhar’s white stockings?
Alex closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Drunk and dreaming. A bad combination.
“I may no’ attend services with the rest, but dinna fret about the condition of me soul, my lord,” Farquhar said, his voice so soft, Alex strained to hear it. “The Almighty and I talk with each other plenty. I simply prefer to do it when He and I are alone.”
It had been a long time since Alex had conversed with God. So long he wouldn’t know where to begin. He scrubbed a hand over his face. He didn’t want to think these thoughts. It was as if they weren’t even his, as if Farquhar had planted them in his head.
Even if he hadn’t, the steward had a bad habit of changing the subject when the current one didn’t suit him. Alex turned to Farquhar in irritation.
“You still haven’t answered my question. Why are you here?”
“Och, that’s easy. To make sure ye’re privy to the secrets of the laird’s chamber.”
Something hidden always pricked his interest. Against his will, Alex was intrigued. “What sort of secrets?”
“There are many of them. More than ye can bear at the moment, but for tonight, we’ll start with the privy passages that lead to and from this room.” Farquhar moved smoothly to the fireplace. “Come, yer lordship.”
Alex ambled over, nearly tripping over his own feet. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m in no condition to wander far.”
“Good. We’ll no’ be going far. Now, if ye’d be so kind as to reach up and grasp the statue of Kenneth MacAlpin on the right side of the mantel and pull it toward ye. . . .”
There was only one stone figurine on the thick slab of oak, so Alex reached for it. Surprisingly, he couldn’t lift it off the mantel. Its base was attached at one side so he could only tilt it like a lever. As he did, the faint rasp of stone on stone came from beneath the tapestry that featured a trio of hunting dogs harassing a bristly-backed boar.
“Now, pull back that tapestry,” Farquhar ordered.
It occurred to Alex that his servant was doing the commanding and he was doing all the obeying. Not what he expected when he became a “by-God Scottish laird,” but he couldn’t come up with a cogent argument against it at the moment. Alexander lifted the heavy tapestry and a blast of cold air whooshed by him, raising a raft of gooseflesh on his bare arms and chest.
It also cleared his head. His vision was honed to knife-edged sharpness, but without benefit of additional light in the dark corridor he couldn’t see beyond ten feet.
“The passage hasna been used in a while. Ye’ll forgive the musty smell. I collect as it’s a mite dim for ye as well. Do ye light the first candle just there, if ye please.”
There was a tin sconce inside the passage with tinder and flint in a wall-mounted container situated a respectable distance away from the sconce. Alex lit the candle, which threw a cheery circle of light. Now he could see that the passage was studded with sconces at intervals as it disappeared into darkness. The candles would banish the black, but did nothing for the cobwebs that draped over his head like lacy bed curtains.
“I take it you didn’t give the previous Lord Bonniebroch this tour?”
“Nae. He wasna the right laird. No heart. No honor. We all kenned it from the start. T’was a mercy when Sir Darren MacMartin decided to lose the estate to the first man daft enough to engage him in a game of poque. Oh!” Farquhar seemed to realize he’d just insulted his new laird and had the grace to look chagrined for a couple blinks before he hurried on. “I do beg yer pardon. We like to think Providence had a hand in ye being the daft man, ye see. All’s well that ends well. At least, that’s the hope. Now, if ye please, let us proceed.”
Alex was too intent on the secret passage to waste time over his servant’s unintentional slight and ham-handed apology. He moved down the narrow way. He didn’t hear the steward’s footfalls behind him but the old man’s voice tickled his ear, admonishing him not to turn off the main passage. A set of stairs going up disappeared to the right.
“Does that lead to the battlements?” Alex asked.
“Aye, in darker days, it was expedient for the laird to be able to show himself on the ramparts at a moment’s notice. I mind the time when . . .”
“When what?”
“’Tis no matter the now, my lord. ’Tis a tale for another night.”
Farther along the passage, another staircase led downward. “I suppose that leads to the deep dark dungeon,” Alex said with a laugh. As if there still were such things in this thoroughly modern Year of Our Lord 1821.
“Aye, it does,” Farquhar confirmed. “But ye dinna need to trouble about that for another few days or so. What bides there is still contained. Mostly.”
Alex jerked to peer over his shoulder at Farquhar, but the passage was too dim, as if someone had guttered the candles behind him so they nearly winked out at that precise moment. Alex couldn’t see the old man clearly. He decided not to ask for an explanation of that cryptic statement. Farquhar wouldn’t tell him any more unless he wanted to in any case.
He stopped before a doorway outlined in faint light seeping through the cracks. “What’s behind this door?”
“Yer treasure, lad.”
Treasure? Alexander had never thought himself the sort to be motivated by gain, but his heart quickened at the adventure of finding a trove. He turned the knob and pushed the door open slowly.
The room was lit only by the banked fire, but his vision had become sharpened even further by his sojourn through the dark passageway. No barrels of coin or upturned, gem-encrusted goblets greeted his eyes. This was no dragon’s hoard, no pirate’s buried treasure.
It was a bedchamber.
He t
ook a few steps into the room, his stockinged feet making no sound. Then there was a soft creak and the latch snicked behind him. He turned to see that the secret doorway had no knob on this side, no visible evidence that it even existed.
And no evidence that Farquhar had followed him into the room either. Which was just as well, because if he had, Alex would have had to toss him out the window.
The sleeping form in the big four-poster belonged to Lucinda. Alexander couldn’t bear the thought of another man being in her chamber while she slept, not even a decrepit old soul like Farquhar.
She was only for him.
Lucinda was buried under a mound of coverlets, but he still knew it was her. Her soft lilac scent teased his nose and set all his senses on edge.
Somewhere along the dark tunnel, Alex had realized he wasn’t dreaming. Starting from Farquhar’s unorthodox entry into his chamber through the mirror, to Alexander’s passage through the strange tunnel with its upward and downward staircases he was admonished not to take, to this moment of indecision in his wife’s bedroom, not much of this benighted night made logical sense.
But he knew clear to his bones that all this was real.
For one thing, if he’d been dreaming, he wouldn’t have hesitated. He’d have joined his phantom Lucinda on the thick feather tick and made sloppy-drunk love to her. He’d have spread her wide and plunged in, wallowing in the mindless animal joy of rutting.
If this were a dream, it wouldn’t have meant anything but a stain on his sheets in the morning and an unexplained smile over his tea at breakfast.
But if he joined Lucinda in her bed now . . . if she allowed him to join her . . . it would change everything.
Slowly, he walked toward the bed. It couldn’t hurt just to look at her.
But it did.
His chest ached at the sight of her, all limp and relaxed. Her mouth was softly parted, her hair spread in waves across her pillow, the peaks and valleys of her form only hinted at beneath the thick counterpane.
He yearned to touch her, to slide his fingers over her satiny skin. Without his conscious volition, he reached toward her cheek, but stopped himself before his fingertips brushed her soft skin.
If I touch her once, there’s no going back.
It would mean surrendering his goal of reaching Lord Liverpool’s inner circle. His father would never realize his younger son wasn’t the wastrel he always took him for. He’d be stuck in Scotland for the foreseeable future. Probably forever.
Lucinda sighed in her sleep. He moved his hand another couple inches and stroked her cheek. Her eyelids fluttered open and she looked up at him wordlessly.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. The words seemed so small, but they were all he could think to say. He’d been nothing but a cad since he first laid eyes on her and discovered he was unexpectedly betrothed to her. She’d done nothing but try to make the best of a bad situation, while he’d hurt and embarrassed her at every turn.
Perhaps the words bore repeating. With emphasis. “I’m so sorry, Lucinda.”
He braced himself for a long-winded lecture. A strongly-worded reproof, at the very least. Instead, she did the last thing he expected.
She lifted her arms to him in silent invitation.
“Contrary to popular belief, love does not manifest itself in hearts and flowers. It does not hang upon the cadence of sonnets or hide with sparkling jewels in black velvet cases. Instead, it is born in the whispered breath of a heartfelt apology. Even then, love doesn’t truly live until it is given substance in the magic of ‘I forgive. ’”
From The Knowledgeable Ladies’ Guide
to Eligible Gentlemen
Chapter Nineteen
Angel woman.
Alexander didn’t wait for more. He shucked out of his trousers and smalls in record time and sank into her embrace, covering her with kisses. Her neck, her chin, her closed eyelids—he lavished his wordless apology on each of the small freckles spattered over her cheeks and nose with a soft, questing mouth. Then he took her lips hard and she gave him absolution.
Lucinda opened to him immediately, receiving his thrusting tongue with a greediness that surprised and delighted him. He knew he’d ought to go slow. He should draw out this first loving till she could bear no more, till she screamed for release.
Unfortunately, he was already at the point where his own impending climax made his ballocks tense and his shaft pulse. To take the edge off the “Center of the Universe” between his legs, he started spelling random words in his mind, anything to ease the building pressure.
Nipples. N-I-P-P-L-E-S. Nipples.
He took the lace at her neckline in his teeth and ripped her night rail to her navel. Her breath hissed in suddenly, but she didn’t complain. He lowered his head and began to suck one of her taut peaks. Oh, the feel of her nipple in his mouth . . . He sucked and sucked and sucked till his eyes rolled back in his head.
He was wrong. His cock wasn’t the Center of the Universe, after all. The woman beneath him was.
When she made little sounds of distress, he switched to the other nipple and gently twisted the one he’d just left with his thumb and forefinger.
Lucinda writhed under him. She clutched his head, holding him close.
As if he’d try to leave.
Her helpless little noises grew more urgent as he kissed his way over her ribs to sink his tongue into her belly button. He decided to switch to spelling backward in order to keep himself under control.
Navel. L-E-V-A-N. Navel.
He forced himself to move with exquisite slowness as he pulled up her night rail to expose her sweet mound.
“Spread your legs, Lu,” he said, his voice passion-rough. “I want to look at you.”
“There?” She raised herself on her elbows to meet his gaze as he settled between her legs and slid both hands under her bum.
“God, yes.” She smelled like heaven—a musky, spicy heaven. “And I want you to watch me.”
“Why? What are ye going to—Gracious Sakes!”
Alexander’s mouth at her breasts had sent Lucinda into near delirium. The ache in her nipples shot through her body and settled in the spot she’d always secretly thought of as her ruminella, because no one had ever told her what the proper thing to think of it as was. She’d ruminated over its possible functions and uses and knew there was much more to it than she’d been told. Now she was learning what that part of her body was designed to do.
It was an instrument of torment.
She never thought it possible to want something so badly and not know exactly what it was she wanted. When Alex pressed his mouth on her, she ached. She throbbed. She wept moisture onto his lips.
He licked it up greedily. When he slipped his tongue into her tight channel, her head fell back.
There were no words. No concept for what he was doing to her. Possession was the closest thing that came to her mind. It was a claiming, a declaration that she no longer belonged to herself.
She was his.
Then his tongue found a tight nub that had risen at the top of the little valleys between her legs. He closed his lips over it and sucked.
Lucinda came apart from the inside. She convulsed. She bucked, but he gave no quarter. Bits of her soul were coming undone and floating away. She’d never be whole again.
She didn’t care. She didn’t care a lot.
Before the final pulse contracted her insides, Alexander raised himself over her, his “Much of a Muchness” poised where his blessed mouth had recently been. He kissed her lips and she tasted herself, all salt and musk. Lucinda wrapped her arms around his shoulders as he pushed into her slowly.
“More,” she pleaded.
His eyes glinted wildly. “I’m afraid . . . if I go faster . . . I can’t be gentle,” he said through gritted teeth.
“I dinna want gentle.”
Alexander shredded her then, thrusting his full length in one long stroke. The pain was sharp and quick, but it faded with the joy of ho
lding him inside her. Fully seated, he drew back for another. And another. He hooked his elbows under Lucinda’s knees and nearly folded her in two. He bore down on her. His ballocks slapped her bum with each rutting thrust.
She moved with him, caught up in the heat and friction and grinding joy. Her insides tightened again and this time her release pounded around something.
Him.
This time, she was the possessor. She claimed him, declaring that he belonged to her.
He stiffened and arched his back as he drove into her. The hot flood of his seed erupting inside her in rhythmic pulses. It went on and on and she hooked her ankles behind his back, determined not to release him until he’d given her everything.
She’d earned it.
Finally, he stilled and collapsed a bit onto her, his weight settling on her lower half, while he kept his torso balanced on his elbows. Still, his head sank onto the pillow beside hers.
His chest heaved as if he’d run a mile. Lucinda was more than a little breathless too. She’d thought she was permanently shattered, but, one by one, the little pieces of her that had sheared off while Alexander claimed her returned. They gathered together again, sparking a bit as they reattached themselves inside her. Her entire being was reinvigorated. Whole.
She stroked his hair, letting the world slide past them. Nothing else mattered but this precious moment, this joining, this afterglow of something so holy, she couldn’t wrap her mind around the enormity of it all. When her sisters plied her with questions later, she knew she wouldn’t have words for what had happened inside her, even if she’d been willing to share it with them.
She and her lover—her husband!—were wrapped in the silence of bonding, giving their souls time to separate again after they’d mingled. They needed a few moments to settle back into their own bodies. Everything else seemed to stop.
Then after a little while, the silence became oppressive.
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