Till Next We Meet

by Karen Ranney

  But it was all too obvious that the young man standing at the door and smelling of the stables knew no more than she and was not capable of offering comfort. Strength, yes. Loyalty, of a certainty. But the only person who could offer the comfort she required was Moncrief.

  “Thank you, Peter,” she said. “I don’t need anything.” But before the young man left, she spoke again. “Thank you for your loyalty,” she added. Moncrief prized loyalty.

  He hesitated, as if wondering whether or not to speak. “He inspires it, Your Grace,” he said, and slowly closed the door behind him.

  If he bowed to her, she didn’t notice it. She wasn’t impressed with the trappings of being a duchess. Except, her conscience whispered, when power accompanied the position. Not one person had argued with her when she had banished Annie. Instead, they had looked awed at the signs of her temper. But she couldn’t help but wonder as she sat there if the woman they obeyed was the duchess or the wife?

  Someone had built up the fire before leaving, and she was grateful for the warmth. Still, the room had a chill that made her cover Moncrief with another blanket.

  The night was too quiet, Moncrief’s stentorian breathing the only sound. She watched him until she was certain that he rested comfortably. Only then did she stand and walk to the windows, gazing out at the darkness surrounding Balidonough.

  Her prayer was unspoken, out of deference to Moncrief’s sleep. Instead of the vicar’s pompous and somewhat arduous prayers to the Almighty, hers was plain and uncomplicated.

  Heal him. Make him well and strong and vibrant. Take anything you want from me in payment.

  She could hear Moncrief’s laughter in her mind, and almost feel his arms around her. Only a wish, one so desperate that she wanted it to be true.

  The night was eerily reminiscent of when they had married, at least according to details from Moncrief and Glynneth. Had Moncrief maintained a vigil as she did now, wondering if she would live or die?

  She closed the curtains and walked back to the bed, staring down at him. He was too pale, almost ashen. She bent over him and placed her hand on his forehead to find it cool.

  He had given more than she in this marriage. He had given her his name, his patience, and his great wealth. He had made her his duchess. He had taught her passion and delighted in her response.

  What had she given in return? Nothing.

  Uncomfortable with the tenor of her thoughts, she sat, reaching over to smooth Moncrief’s cheek. His eyes opened at her gesture, her heart aching at the look of pain in his eyes.

  “Would you drink some whiskey? It might ease the pain.”

  “A barrel of it,” he whispered, and tried to smile.

  He reached out and touched her arm, and she placed her own hand over his. He closed his eyes again.

  “How did I get home?”

  “A man brought you in a wagon,” she said, describing what had happened.

  His eyes opened again, his gaze fixed on her.

  “Tell Peter to keep him here. I think he’s the man who shot me.”

  “Where do you think you’ll be going?” Mrs. McClaren asked her.

  Glynneth held on to Robert’s hand, an overstuffed valise in the other, and faced the woman who had been kind to her from the moment they’d met.

  “Mr. McClaren isn’t back yet, which means that something has gone wrong. I can’t bring disaster down on top of your heads,” she said. “It’s better if Robert and I go away.”

  “He could have broken a wheel, gotten lost, a hundred explanations.”

  She shook her head. “No, something else has happened. I know it.”

  “You can’t think I’d let you out in the cold,” Mrs. McClaren said, reaching down to pick up the small boy. “Not my little Robbie. Where will you go?”

  “I have a place,” Glynneth said.

  Mrs. McClaren didn’t move, swaying back and forth with Robbie in her arms, a more than adequate barrier to the door. “What place?”

  More than once she’d wanted to tell her story to the older woman, and no more so than now.

  “I’m going home.”

  “Will they take you in?”

  Glynneth thought of her father, the man who had been so intolerant of her until the last few months. He’d sought her out on his own, even going so far as to say that he had missed her. He’d wanted to mend their estrangement, he’d said, and had asked after Robbie from time to time. Very well, now would be the time to test his words and his newfound affection.

  “Yes,” she said firmly. “I am certain of it.” Then, because of the fondness she felt for Mrs. McClaren, she left her with a warning. “The duke will come back here,” she said.

  “What shall I tell him?”

  “Do not lie to him,” Glynneth said. “He has a way of discerning the truth even in the most improbable situations.” He had seen through her early on, and had realized that she’d felt a confusing mixture of hatred and friendship for Catherine.

  “Why leave, Glynneth? You’ve done nothing wrong.”

  Yes, I have. But they were not words she could tell Mrs. McClaren. The other woman finally surrendered Robbie, and Glynneth took him in her arms. She picked up the valise again, and before she could change her mind, walked from the house where she had known such peace and safety.

  Perhaps it was time everything came out in the open, but she was not so brave as to tell Moncrief herself.

  Chapter 25

  Twice more during the night, Catherine treated Moncrief’s wound, and each time she did it looked the same. There were no red streaks emanating from it, no swelling that might presage another worry, that of infection. For all her cantankerous words, Annie had treated the wound properly, or perhaps Moncrief’s bullet powder had simply done its job.

  Occasionally, Moncrief would rouse, his eyes at first hazy, then slowly recognizing her. In the middle of the night he woke again, and when she would have given him a little more whiskey to ease the pain, he pushed the glass away and struggled to sit up.

  She pressed him back against the pillow. “You will not get up,” she said sternly. “You’ve been wounded, and you’ve lost a great deal of blood.”

  “What a pity that I managed to escape Quebec only to be shot at home in Scotland.” He looked disgusted, and she smoothed her hand over the scowl between his brows. “Where is the driver?”

  “Downstairs, being interrogated by Peter. But I will not discuss that with you now. Instead, tell me how you feel?”

  “As if he’d run over me in that wagon,” Moncrief said, smiling. “But it’s no worse than I’ve had before.”

  She folded her hands primly and tried very hard not to frown at him. “Peter tells me you were wounded before,” she said, feeling somehow as if she should have known.

  He waved his good hand in the air in an obvious attempt to make light of it. “Every soldier is injured sooner or later. I managed to be in the wrong place twice.”

  “You have to take better care of yourself, Moncrief.”

  “If I promise, may I get something to eat?”

  She stood and went to the bellpull located beside the bed and gave it a sharp tug. In less than a minute, a footman entered the room.

  “Your Grace,” he said, bowing toward Moncrief.

  Catherine frowned at him, then realized that as long as Moncrief was in the room, his staff would always defer to him. She might as well have been invisible.

  “Fetch His Grace a bowl of broth, and have Cook also prepare a strong herbal tea.”

  She heard Moncrief’s sound of disgust and smothered her smile. “You will not have any solid food yet,” she said over her shoulder at him.

  “Add a custard to that,” Moncrief told the footman, “and I’ll double your wages.”

  “Do so, and I’ll have you pulling weeds tomorrow,” Catherine threatened.

  The footman looked from one to the other as if doubting what he should do.

  “Very well,” she said, sighing. “I don’t suppo
se a custard can hurt you all that much.” She nodded at the footman who looked relieved. “Do not, I beg you, take the duke’s words to heart. He is no doubt feverish.”

  “I’m feeling quite well,” he said to the young footman as he turned to leave. “I’ll double your wages regardless.”

  As the door closed behind him, Moncrief glanced at Catherine. “They were, no doubt, paid lamentably by Juliana. We should review all their salaries.”

  She nodded, wondering what kind of man could be lying wounded in his own bed and be concerned with what his servants were paid. A different one, certainly, from any she’d previously known.

  “Tell me what happened,” she said, “while we’re waiting for your broth.”

  “And custard. Don’t forget the custard.”

  She only shook her head at him.

  He lay there bare-chested, one shoulder wrapped in bandages, his hair askew, a lock of it falling in the middle of his forehead. An utterly charming smile revealed lines at the corners of his eyes. There was something altogether wicked about the look in those eyes, however.

  Catherine returned to sit at the side of his bed. He stretched out his hand to her, and she slid hers along the sheet until their fingers touched. How illustrative of their relationship. Here he was, in his sickbed, recovering from a wound, and she was so demented or perverted that all she could think about was that the touch of his fingers brought magic even to her hand.

  She had fallen to the depths of depravity, especially since she wanted to lean over and kiss him gently on the lips.

  “How does your arm feel?” she asked, to get her mind off the subject of kisses.

  “Sore.” He tried to flex his arm but grimaced at the effort. When he attempted to sit up, she pushed him back down on the pillow again, smiling at his foolishness.

  A knock on the door preceded a startling procession of footmen and maids. One of them carried Moncrief’s napkin, another a glass of wine she had not ordered but about which she didn’t comment. A third offered him a pitcher of hot water, a fourth a basin. Each of them made obeisance to Moncrief, and each of them was the bearer of something entirely inconsequential and unnecessary.

  At least ten people filed into the room, all looking delighted that their duke was half–propped up in bed, his color returned to normal and his smile firmly in place. A few of the maids, however, were staring a little too long and hard toward his waist, where the sheet abruptly stopped and more of Moncrief began.

  Catherine stood and walked to the open door, a none-too-subtle encouragement for them to leave.

  Moncrief only grinned at her when she closed the door firmly behind them.

  She sat and watched him devour the custard first, then the broth. He looked around the tray as if expecting more food to appear. Perhaps tomorrow he could have something more substantial.

  “You should continue to rest.”

  “Only if you join me in this bed. What sort of a gentleman would I be if I allowed you to sleep on a chair?”

  “It’s nearly dawn,” she told him.

  He looked surprised.

  “Your staff has been lurking outside your door for most of the night. They were worried about you.”

  “Have you been awake all this time as well, Catherine?”

  “I’m your wife,” she said. “Why wouldn’t I care for you?”

  “If you are as good a nurse as you claim, you would know to humor a patient. Come and join me.”

  “I would shock Peter, not to mention Wallace.”

  “I trust our servants will ignore us.” He looked the consummate duke with one eyebrow raised.

  She nodded, unable to keep from smiling. She was just relieved he was feeling better, that was all. She was not entertaining any notion of getting into his sickbed with him.

  But when he pointedly glanced at the door, she stood and turned the key in the lock. When she returned to the bed he moved to one side slowly so that she could lie beside him.

  “I’ll have to remove my clothing,” she said softly.

  “Of course,” he said, smiling. “Shall I turn my head?”

  “You won’t,” she said, knowing him only too well.

  “I’ve been wounded.”

  “And you need to be humored.”

  “Yes, please.”

  One candle was lit upon the mantel, the better to allow him to sleep. The light in the room, however, was still too great to disrobe in front of him. When she glanced at the candle, however, he shook his head.

  “You wouldn’t deprive a wounded man of such a treat, Catherine?”

  She slipped off her shoes, feeling wicked and depraved. Perhaps that was the price she paid for being Moncrief’s wife and his partner in loving.

  Her skin felt flushed and tingling, but she very carefully raised her skirts and removed her garters, rolling down her stockings as slowly as her impatience would allow.

  “You have beautiful legs,” he said. “I thought so from the first moment I saw you. But, then, all of you is beautiful.”

  She felt the warmth rise from the core of her to spread up over her chest to her cheeks. Slowly, she unlaced her dress, grateful that it was easily done without a maid’s help.

  “I thought you’d dispensed with all those ugly black dresses.”

  She hesitated, then told him the truth. “It felt appropriate to wear it when you were missing.”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment, and when he did his voice was hoarse. “Come and join me, Catherine.”

  Once the dress was dispensed with, she stood in front of him attired in nothing but her stays and shift. Slowly she unlaced her wood and leather stays and placed them on a chair. Her shift was heavily embroidered with multicolored thistles, but wrinkled where the stays had been, and she smoothed the garment with her fingers before turning back to him.

  She would have entered the bed then, but he shook his head again, still smiling.

  “Almost, Catherine. But you have to remove your shift.”

  “May I blow out the candle?”

  He shook his head.

  She gripped the hem of her shift and pulled it upward, until her head was through the garment. For a moment she held it in front of her before tossing it to a nearby chair.

  A more modest woman would probably have covered herself immediately, but she couldn’t help remember that night when she’d first seen him. He’d simply stood before her with his hands at his sides, allowing her to look her fill. She did the same now, feeling a curious sort of pride when his gaze traveled up, then down her body.

  His smile had disappeared and so had the mischievous glint in his eyes.

  “I remember how you looked that first night,” he said softly. “You were the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen. I kept thinking that you must be a statue come to life because your body was so perfect.”

  “And now?”

  He glanced at her, a smile easing the somberness of his face. “Are you soliciting compliments, Catherine?”

  She was embarrassed at the accusation because that’s exactly what she was doing.

  Slowly, she walked toward the bed, climbing the steps and sitting with her back to him. “I don’t remember anything of that night. Even after all this time, I can’t remember.”

  “Perhaps it’s a good thing you don’t. I was lecturing myself the whole time. I told myself I should not consider the fact that you were naked. Instead, you needed my assistance, not my lust.”

  His comment was so close to her own thoughts of late that she smiled.

  “Take your hair down, Catherine.”

  She reached up and removed the pins that held her hair, letting it fall below her shoulders. She threaded her fingers through it.

  “It will get tangled.”

  “I’ll comb it for you.”

  “With one hand?”

  “You might be surprised at all the tasks I can accomplish with only one hand.”

  She felt her face burn, imagining exactly what he could do
.

  His hand was on her back, tracing a line from shoulder to waist. She shivered, then raised her legs until she was lying on the bed beside him, facing him. He surprised her by covering her with the sheet. She could feel his breath on her arm, but he didn’t say anything. Nor did he move away or closer to her.

  He was watching her, a small smile playing on his lips. “You act as if we’re strangers, Catherine.”

  Not strangers. Too close in some ways. He held her mood in the palm of his hand and could alter it with a smile.

  Moncrief reached below the sheet and cupped her breast with his hand, his thumb brushing over the nipple. “You are so responsive to my touch, Catherine.”

  She allowed her eyes to flutter shut, wishing he wasn’t injured. If he wasn’t, she would kiss him or place her hands on him in a dozen or so places he liked. But all she could do was lie there and let his words fall over her like heated rain.

  “I remember how your nipples taste against my tongue. Or how slick you are when I enter you.”

  Her skin felt as if it was burning.

  “Do you remember the day in the distillery? When you put me in your mouth?”

  She nodded, finding it difficult to breathe.

  “I’ve had to force myself not to think of that memory. It inflames me too much. I want to seek you out wherever you are and bury myself in you.”

  Now she truly couldn’t speak.

  Their faces were only inches apart. He was lying on his good arm, his bandage appearing over the sheet.

  She touched him there, with the most gentle of touches, thinking that if the man who’d shot him had been a better marksman, he wouldn’t be with her now.

  Her hand flattened against his chest, fingers splayed. Slowly, as if she explored him for the very first time, her fingers traveled down his chest, stopping at his abdomen and tracing the shape of his erection.

  “You should be resting.”

  “I am,” he said, smiling. “You’re doing all the work. I’m only enduring the torture.”

  Such a silly word for what he must be feeling if he was like her, inflamed with need, almost in pain from it.

  Neither moved, and the air below the sheet grew heavy and heated with desire. Her blood felt like warmed oil, but he didn’t move to kiss her. Nor did she, trapped in a hazy seduction. She was content to allow him to tease her softly and gently, with whispered words and the most delicate touches.