Too Scot to Handle

by Grace Burrowes

  Maybe Anwen had tried to win his lordship’s favor and failed, poor thing.

  “I’m confused, Win. When a man pays bills he doesn’t owe and keeps silent about his ill-usage, that’s not the done thing?”

  She should not be baiting him, but really, somebody had to save Win from making a complete cake of himself.

  “I don’t expect you to understand the finer points of gentlemanly honor, but no, it’s not the done thing as MacHugh has gone about it. He’s insulted every one of us, and now we’re to contribute to his infernal charity, regardless of whether we can afford such a pointless gesture. I’ve half a mind to let on to the others that MacHugh excused thievery by one of the boys.”

  Win had to pause in his diatribe to watch Mrs. Bellingham drive by. He couldn’t acknowledge such a creature with Rosalyn sitting right beside him, but he could admire her.

  And for what? Because Mrs. Bellingham had pretty ways, and had tossed her virtue into the ditch? Sometimes, Rosalyn wanted to smack all men with her parasol, though that would hardly be ladylike and might ruin a fine article of fashion.

  “Win, I sympathize with your exasperation where Lord Colin is concerned, but you are the director. If one of the boys is committing crimes, might that not have unpleasant consequences for you as well as the other children?”

  “Those boys will be back on the streets by Michaelmas. The sooner the orphanage closes its doors, the better. False hope is cruelty by another name.”

  “I agree entirely. If I didn’t enjoy a good hand of whist above all things, I’d not be going to this card party either.” Bad enough Anwen expected Rosalyn to beg yarn from her friends, bad enough Rosalyn had had to sell her favorite pink muslin from last year to afford the bonnet at her feet.

  Life was full of trials.

  “I confess I have an ulterior motive for being so tolerant where MacHugh is concerned,” Win said as he turned the horses onto the quieter residential streets.

  “Besides your inherent gentlemanly nature?” Which hadn’t stopped Win from complaining at every turn, of course.

  “Besides that. I’m considering offering for Anwen Windham. She has nothing better to do than fret and fuss over that silly orphanage, which has at least given me an opportunity to consider her attributes somewhere other than a ballroom. She’s quiet, not at all troublesome, and not awful looking, if I can ignore that hair and the incessant knitting. I could give her babies, so she’d not be reduced to meddling in doomed charities.”

  Oh, dear. Roslyn herself had suggested this very possibility to him, though half in jest and weeks ago. Dear Winthrop’s financial situation must be desperate.

  “You’d overlook Anwen’s unfortunate hair in the interests of getting your hands on her settlements, Win. I admire your pragmatism, so you needn’t splutter about tender sentiments. You’d be doing Anwen a favor.”

  If Anwen accepted him. If she rejected him and brought Lord Colin up to scratch, war would break out in the clubs on St. James’s Street.

  “She’s already your friend,” Win said, as if Rosalyn didn’t know half the ladies in Mayfair. “Makes strengthening the connection between families that much easier. Too bad Anwen hasn’t any brothers to take an interest in you. You’re good to befriend her, Roz.”

  Because the streets were all but empty of traffic, Rosalyn spoke honestly. “I associate with some women because their company makes my own attributes more obvious. My favor does nothing to hurt the other young lady’s standing, but I choose my acquaintances with a certain practicality. I like Anwen, and I think you would make her a wonderful husband, but one shouldn’t contract marriage as a charitable undertaking, Win. Anwen’s not at all your style.”

  Win would be an adequate husband until the money ran out.

  Rosalyn did not envy a younger son his lot. Much easier to be a daughter, passed from papa to husband for care and cosseting until widowhood gave a lady the freedom to cosset herself.

  And thank God that Winthrop was the sort of brother one could be honest with.

  For the most part.

  “A woman’s lot isn’t easy,” Win said, propping a shiny boot on the fender. “Miss Anwen must be quite impatient to marry, waiting for her older sisters to dodder off to spinsterhood. I think she fancies me, to the extent such a creature is capable of fancying anything save her workbasket and her cat.”

  The Monthaven townhouse came into view, one of the few set back from the street enough to allow a shallow curve of a drive where coaches could pull over. All was swept walkways, and cheerful red salvia in symmetrically spaced pots. Rosalyn had made a game of hiding those pots as a girl, putting them where the gardener would never think to look for them.

  The idea still tempted her, though her gloves might get dirty.

  “Anwen hasn’t the confidence to hold aspirations in your direction, Winthrop. I suggested to her the other day that Lord Colin might do for her. He and Anwen already have a familial relationship, and they share that unfortunate red hair.”

  Win sent her a peevish look. “You pushed her at Lord Colin?”

  “I wouldn’t say pushed. A woman in Anwen’s position—without airs and graces, without a title, without much beauty—can’t be choosy.” A woman with those attributes could be choosy—lovely notion. “She wasn’t singing his praises, mind you. I think the appropriate term would be, she is considering settling. Women do, I suppose some men must as well.”

  “Do we ever. Miss Anwen doesn’t have to marry a damned presuming Scot. I can preserve her from that sorry fate.”

  “Very noble of you, though a bit of courtship might be called for. Anwen’s uncle is a duke, and so is Lord Colin’s brother.”

  “Why do you think I’ve bothered to maintain my place on the orphanage board? Why do you think I’ll spend half the card party doting on her? I’ll take her driving a few times, steal a kiss, go down on bended knee, the whole bit. Least I can do for my future wife. Besides, Lord Colin’s brother is only a Scottish duke and they hardly count.”

  Except in the order or precedence, where any duke counted for rather a lot. “You’ll steal from Lord Colin a chance to marry as well as his brother did. Very clever of you, Winthrop.”

  Win brought the horses to a halt before the house. “There is that. Can’t be helped, if the lady prefers the better offer.” He smiled beatifically, bringing out every aspect of his handsome visage—blue eyes, perfect teeth, and the aristocratic bone structure Rosalyn saw echoed in her own mirror.

  “Go carefully,” Rosalyn said as a footman emerged from the house. “I would hate to see anything bad happen to my favorite brother, and Lord Colin has foiled your schemes before.”

  “Fool me once,” Win said as the footman aided Rosalyn to alight. “I’m off to the clubs. See you at supper.”

  How his mood had improved for contemplating holy matrimony—and revenge.

  Rosalyn passed the hatbox to the footman and shooed him into the house. “Wellington will be at the card party, Winthrop. If you can manage it, I’d like a chance to play against him.”

  “I’ve been kept away from the details, sister dear. You be careful. His Grace can be quite competitive.”

  Rosalyn twiddled her fingers at her brother. “So can I. Until supper.” She sashayed up the walk while Win rattled off in his fine equipage, though she spared a prayer for dear Winthrop and his friends.

  They were commoners for the most part, and excessive debt could land any one of them in the sponging houses. Fortunately, Rosalyn’s papa would never allow such a fate to befall her, one of the many benefits of being an earl’s well-cared-for daughter.

  * * *

  In the leafy privacy of the conservatory, Anwen wrapped her arms around Colin and rejoiced.

  This was right. This ultimate intimacy was what came next when two people were in love, committed to each other, and desired each other deeply.

  And yet, Anwen hadn’t a clue how to go on.

  “Does this work like the other times?” she asked,
scooting closer to the man on his knees before her. “You bring me rainbows first?”

  Colin had other names for the pleasure he brought her, names in French, Gaelic, and naughty cant, but Anwen’s description was as close as she could come in English to naming the experience.

  “Ye’ll have rainbows today,” he said, tracing his finger over the swell of her bodice, “and we go on as we please. Perhaps you have a suggestion.”

  The fit with Colin on his knees before the low sofa was comfortable, provided a lady was willing to spread her knees.

  Anwen unknotted Colin’s cravat and used it to tug him closer. “Don’t be nervous. Megan told me it gets better with practice. If my practices with you get any better, I will expire of bliss.”

  One corner of his mouth quirked up. “Thank you for those reassurances. I’d rather neither one of us expired just yet.”

  Anwen was nervous, and clearly Colin knew it. The warmth in his gaze, the way he scooped her closer, said she needn’t be. He’d bring her rainbows, sunrises, and joys without number simply because she’d asked him to.

  When she might have started babbling, he kissed her. This kiss was different, both carnal and solemn, an odd combination that unsettled Anwen’s insides. She worked at unbuttoning Colin’s shirt, though one or two buttons might have got the worst of her haste.

  “Ye’ll not be rushing this,” he said, untying the bow at the top of her bodice. “We’ll make a race of it if ye like some other day, but I want this time to savor you.”

  Anwen had worn two shifts rather than jumps or stays, and both shifts tied at the front. Colin eased both bows open but made no move to touch her breasts. Instead, he wrapped a hand around each ankle, and nudged her skirts up with a caress to her calves.

  The quiet became profound, as if the very trees were keeping silent in honor of the moment. Cloth whispered against skin as Colin kissed Anwen’s shoulder, and a feeling close to panic gripped her.

  “Hurry, please.”

  He cupped her jaw and kissed her, another open-mouthed, possessive intimacy that gave Anwen a focus for the urgency uncoiling inside her. She kissed him back, tangling her tongue with his, fisting her hands in his hair.

  “Enough of that now. Lie back, Anwen.”

  “I can’t kiss you if I’m lying—”

  Colin shoved a pillow behind her. “Please.”

  Anwen flopped back, out of breath, out of sorts, out of patience. “I want rainbows, Colin MacHugh, big, colorful, rainbows with sparkly—”

  He peeled aside the layers of silk and cotton covering her breasts.

  “With my body,” he whispered, “and with all the rainbows you can withstand, I thee worship.”

  With his mouth, he drove her barmy, kissing, nuzzling, drawing on her gently, caressing with a maddening sense of what was not quite enough, then not quite too much. These pleasures were new for Anwen, though she also sensed Colin was enjoying himself, indulging in fantasies long anticipated, and so she mustered the ability to relax into his caresses.

  “That’s better,” he said, resting his cheek against the slope her of breast. “I didn’t want to neglect the color pink, ye see. Part of every self-respecting rainbow.”

  Anwen flexed her hips in response to that nonsense and Colin drew in a sharp breath.

  “Right,” he said, straightening. “Now comes the sparkly part.” He unbuttoned his falls and Anwen sat up enough to watch him.

  “More pink,” she said, glossing her finger over intimate male flesh. “Maybe this is where the color maiden’s blush truly originates.”

  Colin’s hands fell to his sides, and for a few quiet moments, Anwen explored his contours.

  “If ye keep that up, lass, ye’ll make me blush.”

  “I’ll bring you rainbows.” That her touch pleased Colin was a heady realization, for all the strangeness Anwen yet felt to see him aroused. “I’ve seen a replica of the Apollo Belvedere, and your proportions and his are very close—except here.”

  “Apollo didn’t have you to inspire him, poor sod.”

  Anwen wrapped her hand around Colin’s shaft. “Let’s inspire each other.” Wasn’t that what a strong marriage should be? A source of mutual inspiration?

  Colin kissed her back onto the pillow, and she let go of him. The next part was curious, sweet, and breath-stealing. Colin took himself in hand and teased at her sex. The sensations were similar to what he’d inspired on previous occasions, but…more.

  “We’ll take this slowly,” he said. “Your word on it, Anwen.”

  “Slowly,” she said, “and soon.”

  He pushed inside her, and her body eased around him. She was slick with desire, though Colin was maddeningly—excruciatingly—patient. Tendrils of yearning wrapped Anwen more tightly the more deeply he joined them, until she cast off into a pleasure so profound it nearly replaced consciousness.

  “You’ve a short fuse,” he panted, going still.

  Anwen assembled his words into a fragment of meaning. “That was marvelous.” More marvelous than anything they’d done previously. “Are we finished?”

  “No, love. We’re barely getting started.”

  Oh, my. “I’m not sure I have another rainbow in me.” She felt as if light had burst through every part of her, as if she’d found a small piece of the sun to carry in her heart forevermore. The tenderness was as overwhelming as the joy and the pleasure.

  “You’ve endless rainbows left,” Colin said, moving as if to withdraw. “I’ll prove it to you.”

  Anwen locked her ankles at the small of his back, certain that unjoining from him would kill her, but there was no need. He eased forward in a slow, sure thrust that made her want to laugh and weep—and move.

  “Oh, you…” Colin whispered, as Anwen caught his rhythm.

  She lost track of time, place, everything except Colin, and making love with him in her favorite place in the world. He was patient, inventive, and devious, and when he finally withdrew from her, Anwen wanted to call him back, rather than endure the sense of being parted from him.

  He produced a handkerchief, rested his cheek against her thigh, and in a few strokes, spent his seed. While Anwen sprawled in a heap on the sofa, Colin’s breath warmed her leg, and green branches stirred minutely in the conservatory’s unseen breezes.

  He patted her knee. “All right, then?”

  Anwen stroked her fingers over his hair, the only place she could reach him without moving.

  “I feel different.” Changed, exposed, enlightened, a trifle sore, but something lay beneath even those emotions.

  Colin knelt up, righted his clothes, and joined her on the sofa, cuddling her against his side. “Tell me.”

  “How do you feel?” she asked.

  “Like I could conquer the world for you, after a good nap. Thank you, Anwen. Under Scottish law, we’d be married by now, and in my heart, we are.”

  Oh, what a lovely man he was. “Mine too. Maybe that’s part of how I feel—married.”

  “Is there more?”

  This resting in each other’s arms, talking quietly, marveling together, was so precious, and yet, Anwen still had to hedge her bets.

  “You won’t laugh?”

  “I might laugh with you, never at you, at least not until we’re married.”

  She smacked his arm. “I feel healthy.”

  He kissed her temple. “How d’ye mean?”

  “What we did was physical, vigorous, wonderful. I made love with you. As your wife, I’ll do that with you a lot, and bear your children, I hope. I feel ready for all of it, eager for it. I’m in excellent health and ready to enjoy being married to you.”

  She was doing a poor job of explaining to him the sense of bodily joy that making love had brought her. Irrespective of rainbows and cuddling, she felt good in her bones, and glad to be alive in a way she hadn’t since early childhood.

  That was her last waking thought, until Colin roused her from her nap by brushing a violet across her lips, and bidding her a r
eluctant and very affectionate farewell.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Old Hooky’s to be at this damned card party?” Rudolph, Baron Twillinger cried—and he nearly was in tears. “Wellington himself? I could have pled a last-minute bilious stomach and sent along a few genteel shillings, but not if…Wellington, himself?”

  Men who’d risk snubbing a duchess, even the Duchess of Moreland, could never treat the Duke of Wellington to the same slight.

  “Can’t be helped,” Pierpont said. “If Wellington’s attending, we’re attending. I could call MacHugh out for this.”

  “Why don’t you?” Twillinger countered, though he kept his voice down.

  Win had tracked them to one of the more modest gentlemen’s establishments—one of the cheaper ones—and found them both swilling ale rather than port or brandy.

  One always drank ale near the end of the quarter, though that was a good six weeks away.

  “Dueling’s illegal,” Pierpont rejoined, nose in the air. “I am a father, and must think of my progeny when the demands of honor weigh heavily upon me. Wouldn’t do to make an orphan of the children so early in life. Not considering who they have for a mama.”

  “No orphans, please,” Win said. “I cannot think of a drearier topic. Orphans are why we’ll all flirt with penury tomorrow evening.”

  Though Twillinger’s new phaeton had to have cost a pretty penny.

  “I’m not above passin’ a few farthings to the less fortunate,” Pierpont said, “but Colin MacHugh is a problem. Just because his flamin’ brother’s a duke all of a sudden doesn’t mean he’s good ton. Quite the opposite, in fact.”

  “Hear, hear,” Twillinger said, rapping on the table as if they were in the corner pub. “The next time some presuming Scot is plucked from obscurity and given a lofty title, his whole family will expect vouchers from Almack’s delivered to their very doorstep. What is the world coming to?”

  Pierpont licked the ale foam from his upper lip. “A bloody sad pass, I can tell you. ‘Scottish duke’ ought to be one of those what-do-you-call-’ems. Contradiction whatevers. I’m as titled as MacHugh is, and a damned sight better bred.”