Kissing the Countess

by Susan King

  She had never seen him drunk, either. She stood.

  He leaned his weight heavily on his hand, lowered his head, and fastened her with an intense gaze from under dark brows.

  "An excellent Highland tune," he said. "Sing it after dinner next, will you? Our guests will be so entertained. Hu ill o, my secret love was she. A wee touch of the Highland flavor here at Kildonan, provided by our own Lady Kildonan."

  She walked toward him.

  "Lips like raspberries," he sang low. "Mouth like wine... What was the rest?" he asked. "Hair like fire? Temper like... ah, the terrible storms that sweep in from the islands? The ones that blow the roofs off the houses? The ones you climb up into the hills to see—when you are not lost," he ground out, "or fevered, or busy consuming mice."

  "You've been drinking," she said, folding her hands tightly.

  "Aye, thank you," he said, and he pushed away from the door. "Does the minister's daughter disapprove? The same minister's daughter that fed it to me by the spoonful not so long ago and enjoyed a wee dram herself, before she got out of her clothes?"

  She lifted her chin and clasped her hands in silence.

  "Madam, pardon me, that was poorly done," he murmured.

  "It was," she agreed. "My disapproval depends on what was consumed, how much—and whether it is a habit."

  "Whisky, enough to keep up with Wetherstone—who is a sponge for the stuff, apparently—and it is not a habit," he said. "I've only been drunk one other time in my life, and I did not like it, have never repeated it until tonight. I prefer a clear head," he said, stepping toward her, "especially when I must deliver bad news."

  "And what might that be?" She straightened her shoulders as he came closer, and stared at him resolutely, heart pounding.

  Chapter 21

  "I've just had a long chat with Wetherstone," Evan said, "and the jolly fellow has decided not to buy any Kildonan sod after all, nor rent the castle at the handsome price he had earlier proposed to me. Not that he dislikes the Highlands, mind you," he went on, moving closer. "He is very keen on hunting holidays and climbing tours. But his wife is not keen to live part of the year in the remote northwest Highlands among savages. I wonder why." He folded his arms. "They'll purchase an estate near Inverness, or one closer to Stirling... and civilization."

  "That is good news," she said. "At least for them."

  "For you, too, no doubt. The bad news, my dear countess, is for me and for my solicitors, those money-hungry devils that await me in Edinburgh."

  "Solicitors?" she asked.

  "I need funds, madam, and this estate must provide them. And I very much needed Wetherstone to follow through on his promise to purchase a portion of this property. Now I have lost his offer. But you knew that would happen," he said. "You helped to undo the plan. Lady Wetherstone is so upset that she's taken to her room with a sick headache. Not only is Lord Wetherstone upset about learning the truth of life as a Highland laird—he's not happy about being shut out of his wife's room!"

  He thundered the last, pointing at her own door. Catriona lifted her eyebrows high at the unwanted image of Lord and Lady Wetherstone amorously together.

  "I can sympathize with the man on the latter problem," Evan went on, "since I share the same dilemma."

  "You could have come to my room whenever you wanted," she said. "I've waited to hear your knock on my door since our first night here, yet nothing. You've left me alone."

  "As I promised," he reminded her. "Did you knock on my door? It would have been open to you if you had. But my knock would be pointless, wouldn't it, for both of us? Apparently you have no intention of staying on as my wife. That became clear to me tonight."

  "How so?" she demanded. "Because I do not want you to sell Kildonan, especially to an Englishman? Because I think you should have discussed it with your wife first?"

  "How could I," he growled, "when the agreement was made long before I had a wife? Lord Wetherstone and I discussed this in Edinburgh two months ago. You had nothing to do with it then." He strode a few steps, shoving fingers through his hair, turned and strode back.

  "I have something to do with it now," she said.

  "Oh, aye, you've had quite a hand in it," he muttered, turning to cross the same carpet she had paced earlier.

  "You could have told me," she said. "Just as you could have told me that you were the Earl of Kildonan."

  "And what was I to say? 'Greetings, I'm the new earl and about to sell the place out from under you. Pass that blasted blanket so we can keep warm here—and by the way, would you have any roasted mice handy'?"

  "You could have come to me and explained," she said. "I have lain alone, awake well into the night, thinking about the future—our future, as you asked me to do—and while I was beginning to believe perhaps we could have a wonderful life here after all, as earl and countess, as man and wife, as—mother and father someday,"—she gasped a breath, hurting to know that her deepest needs and desires might be snatched away—"you were plotting to sell the land, rent the castle, and go south as fast as you could!" She was shouting now. Tendrils of hair came loose, slipped down, as she breathed heavily with her temper.

  "I did not know," he said quietly. "Did not think you were inclined that way. I rather thought you meant to dissolve this marriage."

  "You could have asked me!"

  "I was waiting—giving you the time and the chance to think, as you wanted. Starting over, do you recall that? Courting. Though I'll be damned if I'll come courting with flowers and pretty speeches. I'll play no games. Be my wife or not, as you will. But let me know which way your head is turning with the changing winds, madam!"

  "Yours is clearly turned south," she snapped, "toward Edinburgh and your life away from here."

  "Not from desire, but from need," he returned, his voice quiet but firm now. "I must have funds, as I said. Some of this estate must be sold. There is no choice."

  "Why?" She folded her arms. "Another matter you could have discussed. How can I agree to be your wife in full, if I do not know much about you? Drinking, debt, what else do you need to tell me? How could you be in debt, when your father milked this land for profit over years?" The fortune his father had created for him was said to be vast. Had Evan lost it?

  "What do you really know of me?" It was a challenge, his voice lower, softer, but rough-edged. "Tell me."

  "I now know you have kept secrets from me," she snapped.

  He spread his hands. "Then now you know I tend to keep things to myself. It is simply my nature. I will admit my flaws, madam, and that is one. Go on. What else?"

  "I know you are—the son of the man who sent most of my friends and family out of this glen." She drew in a breath that caught and nearly became a sob. "I know that."

  "Since he did not raise me past the age of knickers, I am free of his influence for the most part," he said. "My mother and her family have had the stronger influence, and they are Highlanders to their roots, fine people who now live in the Lowlands. I love the Highlands, Catriona. For years I stayed away because my father was here. But since I came back, since I have been with you—I know now that it is in my soul, this place. And I cannot, would not ask for different."

  "Then why sell Kildonan?" she demanded. "Why leave here—and leave me? Why give these lands to those who would not understand our life here, and cause more heartache such as we had under your father's influence?"

  "Leave you?" he asked softly, as if she had said only that.

  She nodded, fighting tears. "If you sell Kildonan and Glen Shee... I will not go with you. I will not leave my glen."

  He pulled in a breath, glanced away. "Your father and aunt were about to send you down to Glasgow."

  "I would have gone to live with friends in the high hills. Even if we would be evicted later," she added bitterly.

  "I would never send you away. Never, Catriona."

  "Wetherstone might. Grant might," she blurted. "He wants to buy some of these lands, too. Do not sell to him."
<
br />   "Grant? Why not? His lands border Kildonan. He is at least a Highland laird. He will not care if he cannot get his oranges and newspapers on time," he snapped. "Perhaps I should sell him as much land as he wants, now that Wetherstone has lost interest."

  "Why not stay here—stay with me,"—she was near to crying now, but would not let the tears fall—"and be a Highland laird yourself?"

  He frowned, silent. She thought perhaps the drink was spinning in his head, befuddling him, but for the snap and spark in his eyes. "Stay here? The Highlanders of Glen Shee are not fond of the new earl."

  "They could be," she said. "Prove yourself to them."

  "How?" He huffed a laugh.

  "You wanted to fix the bridge," she suggested. Her heart began to pound with new hope. "You could give them back their homes."

  He crinkled his brow as if puzzled. "Impossible."

  "They could be found, restored to their homes."

  He shook his head. "I have to sell Kildonan. And I have to fix that blasted bridge," he growled.

  "Do you think no one will buy land with a broken bridge on it? Don't be ridiculous."

  "I cannot tolerate having it on my land," he said. "You do not understand."

  "Then tell me," she said. "All of it. A wife—should know these things of her husband. If I am to stay—a wife."

  He took a long step toward her, took her by the waist, drew her toward him so that her body met his, clothing layered between them. Yet she could feel him hard and strong against her. "Are you going to stay my wife? Which way does that wind blow, Catriona Bhan?"

  He remembered, she realized. He remembered that he had called her fair, when others had labeled her only big or tall. That thought, and the warm press of his hands at her waist, made her feel as if she were beginning to melt from within.

  "Catriona," he murmured when she did not answer. He lowered his head, nuzzled her nose with his, soothed his lips over her cheek. "Catriona..."

  Indeed, she was melting, would turn to a willing puddle of desire in his arms if he did not stop touching her, sliding his lips on her cheek so softly—

  Or kissing her mouth. When he did, she sighed out, near a gasp, and opened to his kiss, could not help herself. He pulled her to him, where he was so hard and insistent for her, and his mouth took hers almost roughly, the taste of whisky clean and pungent on his breath, on his lips and tongue. She circled her arms around his neck and kissed him in turn, for she could not stop, feeling her heart slam in tune with his.

  Then she pulled back, shoved to get free, for she could feel how intensely he wanted her then, and she wanted him, too, with an almost desperate need. Yet she fought it, pushed away, and he let her go. And that stepping away broke her heart a little.

  "And so the Highland winds change again, do they?" He lifted his hands as he stepped back, and she felt the almost physical tug in the empty space between them.

  "How can I be the Highland wife of a Highland man," she said, "if he is not in the Highlands? Why must you sell?"

  "Are you my wife? That is a knotty question, isn't it?"

  She lifted her head. "We have had little time to decide that."

  "I do not need much time," he growled. "I know what I want—you, my lass. I do not need proof. I just know. God save me, I cannot say why I feel this way," he muttered. "Particularly at this moment."

  She folded her arms, felt her chin wobble. His revelations gave her such hope. But she would keep to the safer path, while he was willing to swing out into the riskier areas. "I am not asking for proof," she said. "I only want to know why you want to sell my home out from under me. Not this castle. That is yours. Glen Shee is my home."

  He nodded. "Here it is, then, what you should know. My father left considerable debt. He put a good deal of money into Kildonan and thousands of sheep, but he did not clear all the debts before he died. I had some immediate funds and made up most of the deficit. But I have... other debt, and sales from the estate must go toward satisfying that."

  "What debt is that?" she asked.

  He blew out a breath, looked away. "What does it matter? It will be paid, no matter what I must do. I have given my word."

  She realized his stubbornness was legion, and that he would not tell her if she pressed, and that she was not a harridan to push for it. Some secret troubled him deeply, and she must wait and have faith that whatever it was, he would handle it with the same integrity that she saw in him in all matters.

  Standing there in silence in the small, quiet space that wedged between his room and hers, she knew how much she wanted to be his wife. But she could not leave Glen Shee. It would tear her apart. She would never be the same.

  "So you still intend to sell to pay your father's debts and make up your own debt, whatever it is?" she asked softly.

  "Aye," he said, half turned away from her.

  "Then... even if we start again as we agreed, we will have to end it," she said. "I will not leave Glen Shee."

  "Stubborn lass," he murmured, and glanced at her over his shoulder, still half turned away. "What makes you think we can only make a marriage here in Glen Shee? What has that to do with it?"

  "It has all to do with it," she said. She stood quietly, strongly, shoulders squared. "It is part of me. I cannot undo that. If it is not part of you, I understand—but I cannot leave here."

  "And if you had been evicted with the rest, those years ago? Would you not have coped, madam?"

  "I would have withered," she said softly. "The mountains—the earth—I am part of that, somehow. I would have faded. Just as happened to many of the people who left."

  "How do you know?" His glance was sharp.

  "I know." She lifted her head. Secrets must be kept. He had them, and she had them, too.

  He looked toward the window. Though it was dark outside, the moon, near full, hung over the mountains."The marriage is in place," he said. "We cannot go back to its start, and we cannot leap forward to its end. We have tasted each other, and we both want more. You cannot deny it."

  She kept her head high. "I do not deny that."

  "Then make your decision, Catriona. Is the marriage worth it to you? Are you willing to make the effort, even if you do not know where we will be or in quite what direction you are headed? It is something like climbing, madam," he said, indicating with a nod the mountains in the distance. "One sets out to climb because the peak is enticing, alluring. So beautiful that it must be conquered and made your own. It holds some sort of bright promise, far off there, so unknown, so far above what you have known, so much finer, better, greater. Do you know what I mean?"

  "I know," she said. "It is hope and dreams."

  "Aye. And you know it's there. You have gone up those heights a little, and you are compelled to go farther. You make the commitment, the promise. And then find that it is not so easy as you thought. There is effort involved as well as joy. You must work for the joy. Are you willing to put heart and soul into the venture no matter where it takes you?"

  "I might be," she said.

  "I am," he said. "Though I do not know where it will go. But I know the mountain is beautiful. Strong. And will make me stronger and better for knowing it. The mountain gets hold of you," he said, turning to look at her. "It gets into your blood, your dreams, becomes part of your soul. It is beyond beautiful, and you will never be the same if you make the commitment and stay with it. You will be a thousand times better for it. It will test you and then transform you—when all you thought to do was conquer it and call it your own."

  Listening—for his voice was of that caliber that vibrated in her very soul, melted her resistance and her heart, could dissolve her anger and fear if she let it, that beautiful, deep, resonant velvet voice—she walked toward him, compelled, standing close, enthralled.

  "Go on," she whispered. "The mountain."

  "If you pledge to stay with the climb—" He turned, moving so that he stood very close to her, looming over her like a mountain, the only man she had ever known who wa
s so much taller than she was, so much more willful, and so very beautiful in body and soul. "Be prepared, Catriona."

  "For what?" she whispered.

  He leaned toward her, reached out, swept his fingers along her cheek. "For the passion you will experience when you attain that height. You will never know anything like it in your life. When you commit to the risk and find the courage to follow this through," he said, leaning close, "your soul will open up. I swear it. I know it."

  She stared at him, and he leaned close. His knuckles brushed along her jaw. Shivers poured through her as she watched him, searched his eyes.

  "And you want me to take a risk," she said.

  "I am saying there is reward in the risk." His fingers slipped deep into her hair, tugged at the knot wound in the net. "The mountain is the other, the beloved, the unattainable and the attainable, all at once." He whispered as he spoke, and she felt him slipping the pins loose, one by one. She closed her eyes for a moment.

  If she wanted, she could stop him now, she could ask for more time, for more explanations. Or she could simply follow the quickening of her heart and see where it led, as she had done before with him.

  "It's true," she murmured. "I do not generally take much risk. I had a demanding father, a strict household.... I was never allowed much freedom, though... I always wanted it, and took it where I could, on my own."

  "In your songs," he said. "In your wanderings in the hills."

  She nodded. "One time only," she said, "I found my courage and followed my heart. That was when I met you."

  "And loved me as I loved you, that night." He still whispered, and his fingers felt divine, warm and sure as he pulled the pins out of her hair.

  Catriona nodded wordlessly, watching him. The net binding her hair came loose, and the copper tresses spilled over her shoulders. Evan drew the net off and pushed it and the hairpins carelessly into his pocket. Then he gently combed his fingers through the mass of her hair.

  He stood so close that she could feel the heat emanating from his body, could smell faint traces of cigar smoke and mountain air. His hands felt like magic, yet all he did was slowly stroke his fingers through her hair, from crown to shoulders.