If You Desire

by Mara

  Hugh glanced away. He’d been smug when he’d lectured Court, smug that he’d had the discipline to stay away from Jane all these years.

  “Hugh, how can you ignore what’s happened? Court made up his mind to marry Annalía, and within days, a bullet almost splattered her brain across our front doorstep. And then me. Have you forgotten my fiancée? It was you who found Sarah’s broken body. Would you expose Jane to a fate like that?”

  Christ, no. Never. “I will no’ consummate the marriage. I will no’ keep her,” he said in a low tone. “It will no’ be a marriage in truth. Besides, I’ve already jeopardized her. Grey will seize on her because of me. I know this. Grey will definitely kill her without me to protect her. I might hurt her.”

  “Even ill in the head, Grey will be deadly. As much as I hate to say it, he has unmatchable instincts.” Ethan caught his gaze. “Why do you no’ let me take Jane away?”

  The thought made Hugh’s blood boil. “Grey will never harm her while I live. Mark me, Ethan. Never.”

  Ethan raised his eyebrows. “Then you’d better hope I get to him before he gets to her. You think to protect her when you’re no’ cold about this? Certainly no’ cold like Grey is. You’re going to get both yourself and the girl killed.”

  “Damn it, I can take care of her—”

  “And keep your hands off her at the same time?” Ethan gave him an incredulous expression.

  “I have discipline. You ken that I do.” Hugh strode to his wardrobe for a few essentials—a pistol as backup to the one he always wore holstered, and another rifle, second to the one he kept in his saddle holster. He also packed a good deal of ammunition for all of the weapons. “And I’ve stayed away this long, have I no’?”

  “I also know you’ve got years of want stored up. You might seem calm on the outside, but I’ll bet inside you’re seething with it.”

  Seething. The perfect word for how he felt. “Does no’ matter. She hates me.” Especially after this morning. “Hell, she’ll probably balk.” Though he wondered. Weyland always got what he wanted. But then, so did Jane. Surely Weyland couldn’t want him as a son-in-law as much as Jane wanted to have nothing to do with him. “I will no’ keep her,” he insisted again. “And she will no’ want me.”

  Ethan studied him for long moments. Then he exhaled a resigned breath. “Aye, then. That, I can accept. Even if the old man forces her to wed, the chit will want out at the first opportunity.”

  Hugh scowled at Ethan’s tone. As if he were reciting a fact.

  “Is it so bloody inconceivable that she might want me as I want her?”

  Ethan simply said, “Aye.”

  Hugh snatched up his bag, then exited the room to stomp down the stairs.

  “Where’re you taking her?” Ethan asked, following. “No’ to the clan?”

  Hugh shook his head. He’d considered taking her to Carrickliffe, but the people there all knew about the curse. At best, they would be wary around Jane, superstitious and treating her as though she were doomed. At worst, they would try to spirit her away from Hugh, seeking to save them both. He would only go there if there was no other alternative. “I’m taking her north to Ros Creag.”

  “Does Grey know about the lake house?”

  “I never told him about it, but I canna be certain whether he does,” Hugh answered. “If he hasn’t reached England and I only keep us there for a few days—”

  “I’m fast, but I’m no’ that fast.”

  As Hugh reached the front door, he said, “Any suggestions among your various hideaways?”

  “Grey knows of several, and I canna swear by the rest. You should take her to Court’s.”

  Hugh slowed. He hadn’t thought of Court’s property, probably because his brother had owned it for so short a time.

  “Court said the keep was old, but it’s solid and only needs a bit of work,” Ethan said.

  He’d told Hugh the same, and that it was in the middle of thousands of acres. “I’ll go to Ros Creag, and if I haven’t heard anything from you in five days, we’ll journey north to Court’s.”

  “Good. I’ll alert the staff to your arrival,” Ethan said, referring to the skeleton staff that lived just off the property.

  “If Grey follows us, I hope to God you’ll be following him.” Hugh skewered his brother with a look. “Much is in your hands, and you canna afford to get distracted. The sooner you kill Grey, the sooner this marriage is annulled.”

  “Then doona get settled in,” Ethan said with a chilling smile. “And best take care with the marks on your face. You doona want them to scar.”

  “Go to hell,” Hugh bit out, opening the door.

  Ethan cursed under his breath, then said, “Wait a minute.” He strode off, returning with the Leabhar , and offered it to Hugh. “Take it. It will remind you as nothing else can.”

  Hugh accepted the weighty book. “And what about you? What if you need it?”

  Ethan’s face was perfectly cold. “I’ve no heart to be tempted, remember?”

  Hugh narrowed his eyes. “What did you do to the girl last night?”

  He smirked, reaching up to rest his hand on top of the door. “Nothing she dinna want me to.”

  “Quin said she’d been afraid.”

  Ethan’s brows drew together. “No. I dinna scare her.” He touched his scar for the second time—something he never did. Either he’d never wanted to remember the injury, or had never wanted to draw attention to the mark. But this morning, he’d been mindful of it for the first time in years. “Goddamn it, I bloody had a mask on.”

  Hugh didn’t think this was a good time to point out that his bearing and demeanor were as disturbing as his face. “Do you know who she is?”

  “Was going by Quin’s today to find out,” Ethan drawled, “but now I find my calendar filled. Did you find out her name from Jane?”

  Hugh saw an eagerness in his brother’s eyes that gave him pause. Though Hugh didn’t have the full details, he knew that Geoffrey Van Rowen was somehow responsible for Ethan’s scar. Hugh also knew that the injury to Ethan’s face had been deliberately delivered in a manner that ensured it would never heal seamlessly.

  In turn, Ethan’s revenge had been protracted and ruthless—and not particularly discerning between those in the Van Rowen family who deserved it, and those who didn’t.

  Hadn’t he done enough to them?

  Perhaps Ethan would lose interest in her over the coming days. “I know she’s a friend of Jane’s, so doona hurt that lass, Ethan, or you’ll answer to me.” He stuffed the Leabhar into his bag.

  Ethan’s cold expression turned menacing. “You think you can stop me if I feel like amusing myself? Go to hell, Hugh. You’re smug about this subject, too,” Ethan said. “But if you get Jane killed, you’ll find you have a lot in common with me. Brother, you’ll end up just like me .”

  Hugh cast him a disgusted look before turning away. As Ethan shut the door behind him, Hugh thought he heard him mutter, “Just doona end up like me….”

  Twelve

  Though well over an hour had passed by the time Hugh returned to the Weylands’, their muffled argument was still going strong in the study, so he sank down into a chair outside the room. He let his aching head fall back against the wall while he anxiously brushed his fingers over the small case in his jacket pocket.

  Everything in Ridergate’s whisper-quiet shop had appeared breakable to a man of Hugh’s size, and he’d wanted to pull at his collar the entire time he was there. But when Hugh had found just the ring for her, he hadn’t hesitated to spend a small fortune on it. What else was he going to spend his money on, if not her?

  He’d known what to buy her because, that last summer, she’d told him exactly what she dreamed of receiving from her future bridegroom: “A gold ring with emeralds and an enormous diamond in the middle. It should be so heavy, I’ll be forever knocking it into things, breaking shopkeepers’ counters and accidentally unmanning pedestrians.”

  They’d been
floating in a rowboat, her head in his lap as he played with her silky hair, fascinated as he lifted it to the sunlight, but he’d frozen at her words, tensing with anxiety. As a second son, he’d had no money to speak of and could never afford anything remotely like what she’d described.

  Then he’d remembered that he could never have her anyway….

  Now, years later, he stared at the ceiling as round and round his mind played out the same scenarios and consequences.

  Far too early in life, he’d learned about consequences, both avoidable and unavoidable.

  The morning after he and his brothers had found and read the Leabhar —which was thought to have been destroyed—Hugh had woken to his mother’s screams. She’d discovered her husband, Leith, the clan laird and a bear of a man in his prime, cold and dead in their bed.

  And then she’d shrieked her blame. Hugh had been nigh on fourteen, far too young to be saddled with that guilt.

  Years later, Ethan had scoffed at the curse, calling their father’s death a freak coincidence, and found a bride from the neighboring MacReedy clan who would actually dare to wed a “cursed MacCarrick son.” Sarah had fallen—or, as most believed, had been pushed by Ethan—from a turret at Carrickliffe.

  Then Court had lost his heart to a foreign lass and intended to marry her, though he knew that he could never give her children and would only bring her misery.

  Court had been defiant, daring to challenge their fate—until his Annalía had been a breath away from being shot in the head. Court had finally left her behind, safe at her home in Andorra, though it had nearly killed him. She’d become his entire world.

  Consequences. The lines within that book said Hugh was not to marry or to bind. Hugh worked to convince himself there was a difference between married and wed .

  Damn it, there would be no sealed union. If Jane agreed, they would be wed, but not truly bound together. As long as he didn’t claim her, she’d be safe. Surely. And God knew, he had no intentions of keeping her.

  He stood when Jane came out five minutes later, her eyes bright with either unshed tears or fury. A good wager said the latter.

  What’s it to be, then? What’s the verdict?

  Weyland was right behind her. “I’ll just go send a note to the minister and pick up the marriage license. Jane, you need to begin packing immediately.”

  Then Weyland was gone, leaving Hugh so dumbfounded he nearly rocked on his feet. “You’re going tae…” he began, but his voice broke lower. “We’re tae…marry?”

  “Yes, I am constrained to agree to this insanity—you are not. And you will ruin my life if you don’t refuse to do this for him.” Turmoil and emotion rolled off her in waves. She’d always been like that—volatile, like an explosive. Yet no one but Hugh seemed to understand just how complicated Jane was.

  So Weyland had succeeded. Hugh hadn’t expected her to be happy about the nuptials, but…“A temporary marriage to me counts as a ruined life?”

  Every word she spoke was clipped with her proper English accent, and dripping with outrage. “Do you know why I was with Frederick Bidworth—Lord Whiting—this morning?” She answered her own question, “Because I was accepting his sodding proposal today!”

  Hugh’s vision swam. But why should he be surprised? He’d wondered as each month went by, for years, why she hadn’t married. Wait. How had Weyland not known about this? He had to have. She was about to be “settled” without any interference from them.

  Bloody hell. This just kept getting better. Hugh had wanted to kill Bidworth for kissing Jane—whom the man had thought was his.

  “However, my plans were interrupted when you attacked Freddie.”

  Jane was within her rights to be kissing her soon-to-be fiancé. Just because Hugh could think of naught but her didn’t mean she was affected the same way by him. She’d had a life of her own these last years, and Hugh had just been dropped in the middle of it, swinging as he landed. “You were about to accept an earl, yet your father is still insisting on me?” It was a genuine question, but she took it as a retort and glared at him.

  “Why, Hugh? Why is Davis Grey doing this? You know him—is he truly so dangerous that I have to flee my home?” Her face was drawn with confusion. “Why is Father so set onyou ? Did he blackmail you into this as well? Of course he did. Why else would you agree to such a lunatic idea?”

  “I’ve no’ been blackmailed, but I have promised your father. Just cooperate with me. The arrangement will no’ be permanent as long as we doona…consummate the marriage.” He lowered his voice. “Rest easy, this is temporary. I have no intention of remaining married any more than you do. And you know that if I dinna touch you before, then you’re safe from it now.”

  “As if I’d let you,” she hissed.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. His head was throbbing, his neck knotted with tension, but he tried to calm his tone. His ire never daunted Jane. “Did you ever think that this is no’ something I want either?”

  No, he didn’t want this, was never supposed to marry. But now that he’d seen her once more, he didn’t want anyone else to wed her either. And he was just selfish enough to agree to Weyland’s machinations. Her father knew what was best for her, he reasoned, and Weyland had chosen Hugh. “Jane, I dinna come here thinking I’d leave with a bride.”

  “Then why did you tell Papa to see it done ?”

  “Because I can protect you.”

  She advanced until she was toe to toe with him, unflinching as she raised her face to his. “If you do this, Hugh, you have no idea how much I’ll make you regret it. I’m giving you fair warning right now to desist from this.”

  When he said nothing, making his expression unbending, her lips parted in disbelief.

  “Resolved, are we? Then so must I be.” She made her tone soft when she asked, “Hugh, do you remember when I used to tease you?”

  As if he could ever, ever forget.

  “Darling, you’re going to find that I’ve gotten better at it.” She walked her fingers up his chest, and her voice grew breathless. “You’ll see that I’ve gathered new arrows…in my quiver.” Somehow she made that phrase sound wicked, and the customary sweat beaded on his brow.

  “You’ve made it clear that you don’t want this marriage,” she said. “So before you go forward with this madness, consider—how much can you resist…day after day?”

  He swallowed.

  “Prepare yourself, darling.” She turned, sauntering up the stairs with a hip-swinging gait that drew his riveted gaze. Over her shoulder, she said, “Because I’m about to make your life a living hell.” Disappearing into her room, she slammed her door.

  “More of the same,” he muttered, wondering if his wedding might go smoother than his engagement.

  Thirteen

  The wily old man had done it.

  Weyland had somehow convinced MacCarrick to marry his daughter. Felicitations all around.

  Grey had been creeping around the house all morning, entertaining himself by dodging Quin and Rolley. Though Grey didn’t blend as perfectly as he had in his prime, he’d been able to get close enough to gossiping servants to garner information.

  Apparently, Miss Jane was having trunks packed for at least a month, but she couldn’t provide a destination to help them select appropriate clothing to pack. And her lady’s maid was being left behind, while her horse and her bow and quiver were not. Food preparations were being made—refreshments for the minister, who’d arrived early, but no wedding breakfast, as the newlyweds were setting off immediately after the simple ceremony.

  The servants were sniffling at the news of the wedding and their mistress’s departure. They all fawned over her. Not surprising. Weyland had told Grey and Hugh with obvious pride that Jane had always been generous with her wealth and her time, regardless of a person’s station.

  The servants were far from enamored of the groom, however. As one of them opined: “’E’s frightening as ’oly ’ell and not near good enough for our M
iss Jane.”

  This was true. Jane was so far out of his league it was laughable. MacCarrick was massive, stony, and intimidating; Jane was a celebrated beauty brimming with wit and charm.

  And she was MacCarrick’s sole weakness.

  Grey had discovered that the night of Jane’s coming-out ball—an event Weyland had insisted they attend. Grey had gotten MacCarrick drunk to lure him there, but Hugh had skulked outside, watching her through a window, his body tense. There’d been such longing in his eyes that Grey had realized the young Highlander was in love with the fair Jane.

  A bear chasing a butterfly.

  Grey had had to stifle a chuckle at the illogical match—even more so because Hugh had known he wasn’t good enough for her, yet he’d been unable to let go of his feelings.