“Perhaps.”
“Bugger it, Kitty! Tell me ye love me!”
“Are you trying to tell me what to do again?”
“To be sure, I absolutely am. Ye maun love me.”
“Why?”
“Because…”
Seeing his pain, his hesitation, Kitty placed a gentle hand on his cheek and looked up into his golden gaze. Seeing her gentle nod, Jack read the warmth in her eyes, the understanding that she knew it was hard to admit things one never imagined feeling. To say words one never expected to say. Suddenly the dreaded hesitation lifted, and Jack knew it was no longer a burden to say what he felt, because for her he would do anything.
“Because I can never apologize enough for leaving ye in New York, lass. My only excuse is I dinnae recognize the feelings I held for ye even then. It wisnae until ye were gone that I suspected, but even then, I dinnae recognize it for what it was, because I had never known it before. I haven’t any pride remaining. I can finally understand why MacKintosh and Richard act as they do. Because they are fools in love. As I am a fool because I love ye, Kitty.”
“Oh, Jack!” She stroked his cheek tenderly before drawing his lips down to hers. His hands slid along her jaw and tilted her head back as he drew her closer. Their lips met in the softest of kisses gently brushing, an outpouring of feeling as parted lips tasted.
“Say it, I beg of ye. Put me out of my misery,” he whispered against her lips.
“I love you.” She hardly had a moment to form the words before he crushed her to him with a groan of satisfaction and took her lips fiercely with his own.
“Good God, Kitty, just hearing those words from yer lips makes me want to ravish ye right here,” he murmured harshly in her ear as he caught her earlobe between his teeth.
She pulled back in surprise before her green eyes blazed, full of daring. She crooned seductively, “I love you, Jack.”
“Be careful what ye ask for, lass,” he warned with a gleam in his eye.
“I…lo-o-ve you, Jack,” she drawled, goading him to do more. “I lo…”
He covered her mouth again with a growl of pleasure, drawing her body up tightly against his. Kitty slid her arms up and over his shoulders, plunging her fingers into his mahogany locks as she pressed her body against him. Leaving her to maintain their bodily contact, he snaked one hand between them to cup a breast. The other skimmed down to her hip where his fingers began to gather her skirts up.
“God help me, Kitty, but I want ye. It’s been too long,” he growled as his mouth traveled down her neck, nipping and sucking.
He kissed his way down her chest, pushing aside her bodice until he was able to catch a nipple between his teeth. She gasped, clutching his head to her breast as he slid both hands up under her skirts and pulled her up so she might wrap her long legs about his hips. Turning, he pressed her up against the foyer wall, pinning her there with his massive body. His hands roamed her bottom and thighs before dipping between them and through the slit of her drawers to find the inferno of heat hidden there. He teased her with his fingers, drawing a shaky moan of excitement from her before she drew his mouth back to hers and proceeded to devour his lips with her own.
Kitty pushed her own hands between them, shoving them into his jacket to push it off his shoulders before returning to massage his chest and slide around him.
“Oh, Jack!” she cried into his mouth as he loosened his trousers and pressed his steely arousal against her core. “I’ve missed you.”
“Ye couldn’t have missed me more than I missed ye, my love.” He pulled back to meet her bright green gaze with his hot molten eyes. “I’m a fool to have left ye. Never again!” he swore as he thrust into her, taking her gasp of delight into his mouth. “Never…bloody…well…again!”
He drove up into her again and again as she cried out with delight with each stroke, pulling his hair and nipping at his neck and shoulders. Never had their lovemaking been so frantic, so consuming. Jack wanted nothing more than to melt into Kitty and become one with her.
‘“My God, Kitty!” he moaned into her shoulder, his voice and body trembling with emotion as he felt her release burst with a desperate cry while her body clenched and throbbed about his manhood. With a shout of satisfaction, he drove up into her violently once more, shoving her back against the wall as his own release incinerated him, leaving him completely spent.
He leaned against her, panting, his breaths matching hers as they recovered from their bout of lovemaking. Lovemaking, Jack thought, as he allowed her to drop her feet to the ground, her skirts falling in place while he straightened his trousers and clothes and took a handkerchief to his forehead, wiping at his sweaty brow.
He had never understood the difference of terminology before. Shagging, bedding…fucking. None applied to Kitty, and perhaps they never had, for he realized he had loved her for weeks without mindfully acknowledging the true nature of his feelings or realizing he liked her out of bed as much as he adored her in it. She roused emotions in him he had never felt before.
She loved him as much as he loved her.
“Say it again.”
“I said it first and many more times than you,” she teased softly as he wrapped his arms about her, pulling her comfortably against his chest. “Why don’t you say it again?”
“‘I like not only to be loved but to be told I’m loved’,” he whispered huskily in her ear, quoting Elliot, instead earning a tender chuckle from her.
“I know, I do as well!” she told him. “So how about you try again?”
“‘Without warning as a whirlwind swoops on an oak, Love shakes my heart’,” he offered, earning simply a gentle hug from her.
“Better, though not exactly what I was hoping for,” she said with a smile he felt against him. “Still, it pleases me to no end that you’ve been practicing. I must confess you have quite stumped me.”
“I was hoping I might,” Jack grunted with pleasure as he leaned back so he might see her face. “Sappho, you know. I thought the reference obscure enough to baffle. I thought when faced with a lifetime of potential defeat,” he admitted, “I must be able to present a challenge for you.”
“A lifetime?”
“I would sit with you on that bench in Newport just holding your hand in my old age someday.”
“But you left me, Jack.” She tried to pull away, but Jack refused to allow her withdrawal.
“But I bought this house for you, and I was about to come after you, my love,” he countered. “You simply beat me to it.”
“I’m glad I could save you the trouble,” was her acerbic response.
He just chuckled, hugging her to him again while brushing a kiss to the top of her head. “No trouble, just time exhausted against a lifetime together. I don’t want to wait to make you my wife. Will you marry me, my love?”
“You haven’t said it again yet.”
“Is this how you plan to go on? Tit for tat?”
“It does seem smart, if I am to enter into such an estate again, to begin as I mean to go on,” she told him in all seriousness. “I would give as well as I get, for once.”
Jack turned her face up so he might study her expression, reading accurately the fears and uncertainty in her eyes and realizing perhaps for the first time he wasn’t the only one with reservations. While he faced the unknown in taking this leap into intimacy and faith in another person, Kitty had qualms of her own, having already been disappointed by marriage and all it entailed. He traced the back of his fingers tenderly down her cheek, meeting her eyes and letting all his adoration show in his gaze.
“I love you, Kitty. You are my future, all I can hope for in life. I would cherish you for the next fifty years if you’ll allow me. I will never give you a moment of regret, I promise you. Trust me.”
Kitty’s heart burst with love for her earl. Though she had hoped and dreamed of this moment as she had written to him, it had always been with doubt, so sure was she that Jack would never return her love. That he just wasn’t a
man to bare his soul to a woman. And here he had done it, without even the lure of her fortune to prompt him. How surprised he would be when he discovered he would gain so much more from their marriage!
He leaned over and kissed her lingeringly when she hesitated. “Fear not, my love, you will never have cause to worry. Marry me. The sooner, the better.”
“Yes, Jack. I would love to be your wife.” He kissed her once more, savoring the soft brush of her lips against his. “And sooner would be better. Um, does this house have a nursery, Jack?”
“Och! Miss Hannah,” he recalled with a broad smile. “Shall we go to her and tell her she shall have a new papa very soon?”
“You sound pleased by the prospect of being a father.”
“I am,” he admitted, surprising himself even as he said the words. But he loved that wee lass as well for she had quite captured his heart. “Has she allowed another to plait her hair since I left?”
“No,” Kitty confessed. “She misses you dreadfully.”
“Then we should wait no longer.” He clasped her hands to pull her along, heading for the door. “Let’s go and get her, for I missed her as well.”
“Do you not need a coat?”
“Nay, not at all!”
Jack pulled her along, hastening down the front steps, nearly running the short distance to the Glenrothes townhouse before she pulled him to a stop, breathlessly laughing as they reached the front stoop.
“Wait, Jack!” she panted. “Before we go in, I just wanted you to know Hannah isn’t the only reason I was asking if you had a nursery.”
“She isn’t?” he questioned, bemused by her words. “Then why…Nay!”
“Yes. We’re going to need it.”
“Kitty!”
She threw her head back and laughed aloud, throwing her arms around Jack’s neck as he lifted her in his arms and swung her around joyfully, right there on the sidewalk of Carlton Terrace.
Neither noticed Maggie, Eve and Francis were at the window of the MacKintosh townhouse laughing right along with them, rejoicing for them, until little Hannah pushed through the trio and pounded on the glass to get the couple’s attention.
“Uncle Jack!” came her muffled cry of delight.
With a whoop of joy, Jack dashed up the stairs, not stopping until Kitty saw him through the window, snatching the child up in his arms and swinging her around, much as he had done her mother.
Epilogue
Glenrothes Townhouse
Edinburgh, Scotland
December 24, 1892
“I’m so glad you’re finally back from London, Evie,” Kitty told her sister, though her eyes were glued to her husband who was currently trotting about the room with Hannah on his shoulders. They were battling the cavalry of Francis and Laurie who were in the same formation, as Hannah and Laurie waved their wooden swords at one another. The foursome was loud and raucous, but that was how things normally were when they were together.
“I’m glad to be back as well…Francis! Mind the breakables, if you please!” Eve called sternly, though the broad smile on her face belied the severity of her tone. “What are we going to do with them?”
“Did you think we could stop them?” Kitty teased, unable, even after two months of marriage, to believe she had been so lucky as to find a wonderful man who was also such a wonderful father to her daughter. She stroked a loving hand over her slightly rounded belly, more than five months gone now with the next child who would be so fortunate. Life simply could not get any better.
Turning to her sister, she found Eve also with a hand on her much more extended belly, a grimace upon her face. “Are you all right, Evie?”
“I’m fine,” Eve assured her. “Just a kick. This one will be an active child, no doubt. Mother says I was just the same when she carried me.”
“How did Mother find London?” Kitty asked. Maggie had accompanied Eve and Francis first to Paris to have a wardrobe prepared for Moira, and then to London where they had taken in the Little Season presenting Moira there. After the birth of Eve’s baby in the next few weeks, they would return for the Season in the spring as well.
Moira had already gushed about her brief time there, having adored every minute of a society that went beyond the company of her father and grandfather. Already she had a score of suitors, each one enchanted not only by her status as an heiress but by her vibrant beauty and demeanor. Soon Moira would find a man to love as well.
“Mother liked it very much. I think she’ll probably go back with us for a few weeks before you are due to deliver. Where is she anyway?” Eve asked.
“Mother is instructing Moira on the table settings for dinner,” Kitty grinned. “It seems her years confined to the most remote highlands with little womanly influences have left Moira lacking in what Mother considers necessary skills.”
Eve joined in her laughter. “I hope she doesn’t overdo. Moira will never want her own household after Mother gets through with her!”
“You know Mother. A Christmas Eve dinner must be as elegant as can be,” Kitty chuckled again. “It doesn’t matter if it’s just for family when that family numbers eighteen members and possibly more.”
“Still…” Eve began to argue until Hobbes appeared in the doorway, clearing his throat. “Yes, Hobbes?”
“Pardon me, my lady, for disturbing your family…fun.” The butler’s lips twitched slightly when Hannah, after demanding that Jack put her down, ran over to Hobbes and lifted her arms, begging to be picked up. With a sacrificing sigh, Hobbes lifted her into his arms, all the while maintaining his most dignified demeanor. “There is a person of some military bearing at the door, carrying a letter addressed to the Earl of Glenrothes. He claims to be sent from the Home Office in London on direct orders of Mr. Gladstone himself.” He sniffed with an aura of disbelief as Hannah tugged apart his immaculate tie.
“The Prime Minister?” Francis questioned, lowering Laurie to the floor. He traded a questioning look with his wife, but both shrugged at the unanswered query. “Please send him in, Hobbes. I hope you didn’t leave him standing on the stoop.”
“It is Christmas, my lord.” The butler tapped his heels together and departed, taking Hannah with him. Despite his unruffled severity, they all knew she was a particular favorite of his.
A moment later he returned, announcing, “Anthony Temple, Lord Captain.”
A sandy-haired man in a distinguished black suit entered the parlor behind him, making a slight bow. He was perhaps in his late twenties but appeared older, as if the burdens of life had weighed heavily upon him. “Retired,” he added, before offering his hand to Francis who shook it. “Lord Glenrothes, my pardon for interrupting you on Christmas Eve, but I come bearing a letter from the Home Office that you might find a welcome gift for the season.”
The earl took the letter the captain passed to him, offering his thanks, and broke the seal while all the others stared with silent curiosity upon him. Whatever could be so important as to bring a messenger of this lord captain’s rank out on Christmas? Their curious glances all asked the same question.
Francis read quickly and all could easily read the astonishment on his face as he gripped the missive tightly in his hands. “Is this true?” he choked out as he searched the man’s face. “Have you seen him?”
“Yes, my lord, I myself had the honor of finding him.”
Francis looked so completely devastated that for a moment Kitty was almost certain he would cry right there before them all. Apparently, Eve could see the same emotion, for she rose laboriously and hurried to his side. “Francis, what is it?”
Francis could only shake his head in denial, but the Captain spoke again. “My lord Glenrothes, Mr. Gladstone is requesting that you return with me in all haste. Might I wire him that you will attend him in London?”
“Aye,” came the strangled reply. “Straight away. Give me an hour if you would?”
“Very good, my lord. I will return shortly.” The man turned smartly on his heel and ex
ited on his own, no one else even noting his departure as they all stared at Francis, waiting.
“Francis?” Eve prompted once more, wondering what could drag Francis away from his family on Christmas Eve.
“Vin,” he said at last, taking a deep, shuddering breath before releasing it with an unsteady laugh. “It’s my brother! Eden, they found him…alive!” Francis gathered her in his arms, laughing and sobbing openly into her shoulder as he swung her around. “My God!” he shouted then. “Vin is alive!”
Outside the parlor door, Moira dropped the tea service she was carrying at her feet, the sound of shattering porcelain breaking through the sounds of joyous exclamation.
“What?”
A Note Before You Read
As I was finishing A Question of Love, the first book in the Questions for a Highlander series, I was thinking about Francis’ brothers knowing at some point, I might write about them as well and, of course, I wanted them to all have wonderfully romantic names.
About that same time, I was sitting around with my dad watching old movies including the 1942 classic Mrs. Miniver. In the movie, Mrs. Miniver’s son was a WWII pilot named Vincent, but mostly they called him by a short form of the name, Vin.
Or rather, Van. The way they kept pronouncing it, in that soft English accent, was just lovely and, I thought, very dashing and romantic, as well. Van. Short for Vincent. Not VIN, like our American car identification numbers (or heaven forbid! Vin Diesel) but Van.
That is how I think of this Vin, a hero as well, a soldier who fought for his country. I hope you will hear his name in your mind the same way as you read his story.
Chapter 1
I cannot be awake for nothing looks to me as it did before,
Or else I am awake for the first time,
and all before has been a mean sleep.
~ Walt Whitman
London, England
Christmas Day 1892
All You Could Ask For Page 88