"They are just returned from Spain," she explained sweetly. "The one on the left, Major Kelmston, served with your cousin at Ciudad Rodrigo, and he tells me your cousin led the first assault into the fort, despite the fact that he had sustained several shrapnel wounds. The other man is Colonel Adamsleigh. He confided to me that he is here on Wellington's behalf to bestow a commission on his lordship."
"A field commission," she stressed, fixing him with a satisfied smile. "One earned for bravery in the face of enemy action. So you see, Mr. Atherton, Lord St. Jerome had no need of my defending him. His actions have already done so; loudly and in a way that should put an end to such ill-bred rumors once and for all. Do you not agree?"
He drew himself up stiffly, enmity fairly dripping from every pore. "Indeed, Miss Terrington, I do," he said, his tone clipped. "If you will pardon me, the music is starting and I must find my partner for this next set. Good evening to you."
Addy watched him stalk away, her eyes narrowing in sudden speculation. Perhaps they'd been going about this the wrong way, she thought. Given the importance of his lordship's mission, it had seemed most logical to assume the attack on his reputation had political implications. But what if there were a simpler, more basic motivation behind the rumors? What if—
Someone touched her arm.
Devil take it! Addy's temper flared to life. Was she not to know even one moment's peace during this blasted night? She firmed her jaw and whirled around, prepared to give whatever poor soul stood there a piece of her mind. Instead her jaw dropped, her eyes widening in incredulity as she gaped at the elegantly dressed man standing before her.
"Ross!" she gasped, his given name slipping from her lips. "Whatever are you doing here?"
Ross glared down at Adalaide in fury. He'd been searching for her the better part of a quarter hour, and when he finally found her she was jawing pleasantly away with his plague of a cousin. Under ordinary circumstances he might have been willing to overlook her questionable choice of companions, but with knowledge of his cousin's perfidy fresh in his mind, he found he could not be so sanguine. Instead, he said the first words to pop into his mind.
"The Good Lord take you for a fool, madam! What the bloody devil do you think you're about talking to that deamhan?"
Her small jaw thrust out at once, her dark blue eyes icing over with displeasure as she boldly met his gaze. "I beg your pardon, Lord St. Jerome," she said in a tone better suited to a dowager three times her young years. "Are you addressing me?"
Lord St. Jerome, he noted, his temper simmering. When she'd first seen him she'd called him by his given name. No matter, he decided darkly; they would resolve that later. In the meanwhile there was something else that needed saying.
"Aye, Miss Terrington, I was," he said, his accent thick with fury. Without stopping to weigh the consequences of his actions, he reached out to capture her slender wrist in his hand.
"A word with you, if I might," he growled, and without waiting for a response he turned and half dragged, half led her away.
The other guests were occupied with dancing and gossiping, so there was no one to notice and whisper. Angry Ross might be, but not so angry he would gleefully leap into the morass of yet another scandal. Seeking privacy for all he had to say, he led her out into the gardens, and when he was certain they were private, he turned to face her.
"Very well," he said, releasing her arm and glaring down at her in displeasure. "I am waiting."
Her response was to shove her glasses back on her nose and angle her chin up at its most pugnacious angle. "Then, sir, you shall wait until Doomsday has come and gone," she informed him in defiant tones. "I've no intention of saying another word." And she folded her arms across her chest.
The situation was as dire as anything he could imagine, but that didn't stop Ross from chuckling at her heated threat. "Don't be foolish, annsachd," he said, resisting the urge to kiss her sulky mouth. "You couldn't remain silent to save your soul."
"Oh!" Her arms dropped and her hands tightened into fists. "Of all the arrogant—"
"There," he interrupted, grinning at her, "you see? Not ten seconds did you let pass before you were after lecturing me. Now stop with your fussing, Adalaide, and tell me why you were talking to my cousin."
She hesitated, and then gave a long-suffering sigh. "I was talking to him because he was talking to me," she said, the patience in her voice making it plain she was but humoring him.
"Was he?" Ross considered that. "About what?"
"You. He said he wished to thank me for last evening. That reminds me"—she gave him another scowl—"why are you here? I thought you and Lord Falconer were bound for Newmarket."
"We were," he replied simply. "Now we're not. Tell me more about my cousin. What else did he say?"
She jerked her shoulders in a shrug, and he noticed her gaze no longer met his. "Nothing. It is just as I told you. He said he wanted to thank me, and that was the end of that."
"Adalaide," he began, his voice gentle, "what is it you're not telling me? I know you, and I know when you're telling the truth and when you're not."
Her head came up in indignation. "That is the truth!"
"A piece of it, perhaps," he agreed, nodding, "but not all. And I need to know all. Tell me precisely what he said."
She chewed her lip, her gaze worried behind the lenses of her spectacles. "He did say he wanted to thank me," she admitted reluctantly, "but there was something in his voice, something that made me wonder if. . ."
"If he was the one behind the rumors," Ross finished, not surprised she'd already tumbled to a truth he and the others had spent the day uncovering. "Aye, I know. I learned of it just as we were getting ready to leave London. That is why we decided to postpone our journey."
"What will you do about it?" She moved closer to him, her hand gentle as it covered his.
"Nothing," he replied with a harsh laugh. "I'd like to call him out and kill him for staining my honor so, but I cannot. 'Twould cause a scandal, I'm told, and heaven knows we mustn't have a scandal."
"I'm sorry, Ross."
Her soft tones soothed, almost enough to heal the bitterness bubbling up inside him. "As am I," he said, covering her hand with his own. "I was even willing to compromise, and would have been content to beat him to a bloody pulp and make him eat every one of his foul lies, but Falconer said even that would not do. In the end it came down to a choice between my name and my duty, and I knew which one must take precedence. So I am to remain a branded coward." He laughed again to keep from cursing. "Well, no matter. I've been called worse and lived to tell the tale."
"You're not a coward!" Her fingers tightened on his arm, her expression turning sweetly fierce in his defense. "No one who matters thinks so! Why, you're even to be offered a field commission! If that isn't enough to satisfy the gossip-mongers, then to the devil with them. You' re ten times more a man than any of them could ever hope to be!"
The passionate declaration made Ross's heart stop, and when it started beating again, it was with an intensity that had the pulses pounding through his body. "Am I?"
"Of course you are!" she insisted, her creamy cheeks flushed with emotion. Above the prim decolletage of her gray silk ball gown, the soft swell of her breasts rose and fell with her breathing, and the sight of them put paid to Ross's resolve.
"Then why don't you treat me as a man?" he asked, tracing a gentle finger across the lush bow of her lip.
"I—I do," she stammered, her lip trembling beneath his touch. "I treat you exactly as I treat the others."
"Aye," he agreed, slipping his arm about her waist and drawing her against him. "Like a wee lad in short pants to be told yes or no, to do this and not to do that. You scold me, you lecture me, but you never treat me as a man would be treated by a woman."
Her gaze fell from his, and Ross steeled himself to be pushed away. Instead, Adalaide raised her head, her eyes meeting his with a directness that was both bold and shy at the same time.
&nb
sp; "Perhaps that is because you never treat me as a man would treat a woman," she said, her voice so soft he had to bend his head to catch the whispered words.
He froze for an instant, and then his hand slipped down to cup her chin, turning her face up to his. "Are you saying that is how you wish to be treated?" he asked, knowing that by asking the question he would be stepping over a line from which there could be no retreat.
Her gaze continued holding his, resolution shimmering in her jewel-colored depths. "Yes," she said, sounding as certain of herself as she did when issuing her orders. "Yes, that is what I am saying."
He gazed down into her face for several more seconds, and then he felt a warm glow of delight spreading through him. "Very well, Miss Terrington," he drawled, his lips curving into a smile as he drew her further into his arms. "As you wish." And with that he lowered his head, his mouth covering hers in a kiss of ardent demand.
Nine
The taste of Adalaide's lips was sweeter than any wine Ross had ever drunk, and every bit as intoxicating. He drank from them thirstily, his senses swimming with drunken pleasure. Her mouth was as lush and soft as he'd dreamed it would be, and when his tongue flicked over her lips in hungry demand, she responded with a soft moan of wonder.
"Adalaide." He raised his mouth from hers to breathe her name in a voice made hoarse from passion. "Annsachd, open your lips for me. Let me kiss you as I have longed to kiss you."
He lowered his mouth to hers once more, and was delighted when her lips parted beneath the onslaught of his own. His tongue surged eagerly into her mouth, and his body hardened in response to the warmth and the sweetness he found there. He longed for more, for so much more from her, but even in the heat of his hunger he knew he could not have it. Shuddering, he drew back, his breath ragged in his chest as he fought for a control that had never seemed so far away.
"We must stop, leannan," he whispered, laying his forehead against hers. "Else I fear we'll not be able to stop."
She gazed up at him, her eyes dazed and her lips moist and red from the heat of his kisses. "Ross, I—"
"Hush." He laid his finger over her lips, knowing if she should say even one word in remorse for what they had shared, it would shatter what remained of his heart. "'Tis but a kiss, Adalaide," he added, forcing a note of lightness into his voice. "A kiss between a man and a woman under the moonlight, and nothing else. Now let us return to the ballroom, or it will be another scandal we're making out here amongst the roses. Come."
To his relief she did as he asked, slipping her hand into his arm and walking at his side as coolly as if they were strolling down Bond Street in the bright light of day. They'd almost reached the doors to the ballroom before she spoke again.
"You never did say, my lord, how you discovered your cousin was behind the rumors," she said, flicking him a curious look.
"Actually 'twas Elliott who uncovered the truth for us," Ross answered, annoyed she should turn so primly formal so easily. "He was up the better part of the night, poking about and asking questions of all he could before learning those spreading the rumors could trace the source back to one man."
"Mr. Atherton." She nodded, her mouth firming in distaste. She was silent another moment before shooting him another quizzing look. "Who is Elliott, if I may ask? Another friend from your days in the Army?"
"'Tis Hixworth," he said, drawing her to a halt. "Do you not know your own students' names?" he asked, unable to resist the urge to tease her. "For shame, Miss Terrington. I thought you a far better instructress than that."
To his delight, her eyes flashed with immediate temper. "Of course I knew his Christian name was Elliott," she said, her tone so starchy he was hard-pressed not to kiss her again. "But it would have been most improper for me to address him in so casual a manner."
"Aye, and so it would," he said, chuckling. They were at the door now, and through it he could hear the sound of laughter and music. He knew he should let her go, but he was loath to do so. Eager to delay the inevitable if only for a few minutes, he said something he'd been wanting to say for a very long while. Turning to her, he flashed her a teasing smile.
"Do you know, Miss Terrington, what I thought the very first time I clapped eyes on you?"
She looked curious, and then a warm glow of color infused her face as she apparently recalled that the first place he had seen her was in his bedchamber. "I am sure I do not," she said, her eyes fixed at a point somewhere over his shoulder. "And furthermore it is not something we should speak of considering the . . . irregularity of the situation."
"That I was in my bed, do you mean?" he asked, all innocence as she glared up at him. "No matter. What I thought, Miss Terrington," he continued, "was that you looked like an elf. What the crofters call a sithiche, a mischievous sprite come from the glens to lead me back the Low Road to the Highlands. Then you opened your lips to bark orders and questions at me, and I was certain you were a tannasg instead, come to pester me into perdition. In the days since, I've come to think I was right."
Her cheeks flushed brighter with indignation. "I'm not so bad as that!"
"Aye, lass." He grinned, carrying her hand up to his lips for another kiss. "You are. But do not worry yourself over it. I am a soldier, and used to fighting for what I want. Now come, I am sure your aunt must be wondering where you've gone."
An elf. The dratted man thought she looked like an elf. Adalaide paced the confines of her moonlit bedchamber, her hair streaming in wild disarray about her shoulders. Behind her the bedsheets lay all tangled, mute testimony to her valiant battle for sleep. In the end frustration and confusion had overcome exhaustion, and she'd abandoned her bed with a disgruntled mutter. Be-damned if she'd spend another night staring up at the ceiling like some heroine in a Gothic, she thought sourly.
Ross had kissed her. The thought brought her to a halt in the center of her room. Her eyes drifted shut, her hand trembling as she raised her fingers to touch her lips. They still felt warm, tender, and she was almost certain they still bore Ross's taste. The sensual thought had her eyes popping open in chagrin.
What nonsense! she told herself, resuming her pacing. She was being foolish beyond permission, and there was no excuse for such behavior. It wasn't the first time she'd been kissed, nor even, if she was to be completely honest, was it the first kiss she'd found enjoyable. She wasn't quite such an antidote as to eschew all male companionship. It was simply that. . . .
It was simply that this was the first kiss to make her want more, she admitted, her heart racing with the heady emotion she recognized as desire. It had made her long to touch Ross, and to have him touch her in ways she'd only heard whispered of. A virgin she might be, but she'd been out in Society long enough to know of what went on between a man and a woman. Until now she'd regarded the prospect of lovemaking with cool disinterest; curious, but also certain she was above such things. Now she hungered in ways she'd never hungered before, and she both rejoiced and despaired in her newfound emotions.
"'Tis but a kiss, Adalaide." Ross's husky murmur came back to haunt her. "A kiss and nothing else." The words had been like a sword thrust into her very soul, but she knew he'd meant them as both comfort and a warning. Comfort to assure her he would not ask more from her than the touching of their lips, and a warning, she supposed, lest she think the kiss a form of declaration. He might like her and desire her in the physical sense, but that was all it could ever be. He would never marry her, and he had too much honor and she too much pride for there to be any question of any other sort of relationship between them. Disheartened at the admission, she returned to her bed.
Tomorrow, she told herself, pulling the covers up to her chin and curling into a tiny ball. Tomorrow she would decide how best to deal with Ross and all the bewildering changes in her life. She was simply too tired to do anything about it now. She closed her eyes, and with the iron determination she used to rule others, she willed herself into sleep and the sweetest of dreams.
The following morning she
stood before her cheval glass, examining her reflection with a critical eye. Her hair was tucked ruthlessly under a starched cap, and she'd donned one of her plainest gowns of dark gray cambric unadorned by so much as a single ribbon or ruffle. There, she thought, giving a decisive nod. She looked like her old self once more. Looking at her, no one would ever guess that she'd exchanged a passionate kiss in the moonlight with a man she was coming to care for more than was particularly proper or even wise. Thinking of all she had to do, she walked into her study, only to come to a startled halt at the sight that greeted her.
"Good heavens!" she gasped, glancing about her in astonishment. "What is all this?"
"For you, my dear," Aunt Matilda said, beaming at her in delight. "And there are even more of them in the entryway and drawing room! Is it not wonderful?"
Addy gazed at the forest of flowers, the act of speech for once beyond her capabilities. Flowers of every color and variety bloomed about her, their clashing fragrances rising to perfume the air with potent scents. Roses, lilies, violets, and some flowers whose names she didn't even know had been crammed into a variety of containers, and they covered every inch of surface in the already crowded room. Addy reached out a trembling finger to stroke the petal of a golden daffodil.
"But—but who sent them?" she asked in a bewildered tone, struggling to accept the overwhelming number of blossoms. She'd only been sent flowers once before in her life, and that a pitiful nosegay of indifferent wildflowers sent to her by a former student in thanks for her assistance.
"Everyone!" her aunt exclaimed, gesturing at the mountain of cards on the table before her. "The pink roses are from Colonel Adamsleigh, and the lilies are from a Captain Davidson. The vulgar display of white and yellow roses are from Prinny, naturally, for the man does possess the most appalling taste, and the vase of pinks are from Major Kelmston. He also included a note asking if you would like to ride with him in the park later today. I sent a note accepting on your behalf."
"But I don't have a horse," Addy protested, lowering herself onto her chair in dazed shock. She shook her head and made a concentrated effort to regain control of her senses.
The Scotsman and the Spinster Page 13