His Duty, Her Destiny Page 17

  Softly, as his lips touched hers in the lightest caress, a flame leapt out of control deep within her body, its heat igniting her, tightening her fingers involuntarily upon his back, pressing them through the fabric into hard muscle while her mouth waited upon his, suddenly reckless and contradicting all her cool intentions. Fool. Foolish woman. This is no way to punish him. Turn back, before it’s too late.

  But he knew how to read even the smallest sign, and the quick pressure of her fingertips told him all he needed to know about the conflict raging inside her, the passion she had always struggled against, and the reawakened adoration she had once held for him. The teasing of his lips sensed her tingling anticipation and the verge of her surrender, and he closed his mouth over hers with a kiss that had begun as a token but now roared into flame like a heath fire in a drought.

  Unthinking, she cried out into his lips a soft mew of submission and then, swept up into the blaze, felt the soaring heat of his desire fuse with her own years of yearning. Distantly, the urgency grew within her womb with the need to know him intimately, and the ache between her legs was stirred by the hard strength of his arms and hands that bent her to his will. She had been convinced that she would care about the hurts sustained in being his; now it mattered least compared to the overwhelming need to be taken, possessed, and sweetly conquered. While his lips kept her mind in turmoil, his hands urged her further into abandonment, searching over breasts and skilfully questing beneath her skirts, setting alive her sensitive skin.

  As if they had both been waiting for some signal, even though it was before time, their needs swept them past any reservations that would otherwise have made them more cautious. Neither of them paid any heed to the poor timing, or to the mental barrier that Nicola had erected, or to the physical problems, or even to her total lack of experience. When Fergus shed his doublet with some difficulty, she helped him, and when she showed no qualms at the sheer pace of his ardour, it was he who reminded her that she was yet a virgin, giving her the choice to wait for a more appropriate time.

  Then, it was if she was fencing with him again but wanting to be both winner and vanquished, held, and taken forcibly, and made his for ever. She took his head between her hands in a sudden frenzy of irresponsibility, releasing everything she had held dear and close, ready for the right moment. Whispering against his lips, she told him her secret desire. ‘It’s yours, Fergus Melrose. Take my virginity now, here, while it’s still mine to give, freely. I give it to you if you can take it here, before they come looking for us. Can you do it? Broken ribs and all? Can you take what I offer you and still accept me tomorrow in seeming innocence? Quickly, Fergus Melrose…can you do it?’

  ‘Is that what you want, truly?’ he said, scarcely believing her.

  ‘Yes, it’s what I want. Now. Here. Or are you in too much pain?’

  He spoke between hungry kisses. ‘Never mind the pain. But I wanted to take you through it slowly, Nicola. Infinitely slow. To seduce you and make you want more, and more. This is going to be—’

  ‘I know, I know. I will want more. Take it.’

  He did not wait to argue, but bent his head to kiss her again with a new ferocity she recognised as the acceptance of her challenge, for that was what it was. A challenge he could not have refused, coming from her.

  She could not have known, at that stage in their storm-driven relationship, that for Fergus there was more to it than that. As they kissed, he sensed in her the duel of excitement and curiosity, of fear and driving force, of the need to fight him and to be conquered on her own terms, not on his as it would be from tomorrow. Everything that had happened between them so far had been the result of his intervention and insistence, her independence having been rudely snatched from her. He knew that this was the reason why, earlier, she had balked at the idea of consummation, as a desire to keep some control of the one precious thing she owned. Or so she thought. This was a challenge in the guise of a gift, and vice versa, one she would not want him to refuse because the timing was not perfect. Nor did she want to win it. It was his task to make it memorable for her in the most difficult of circumstances with a crowd of her relatives waiting outside the door, and now was not the time to remind her that this was not the only precious thing she had to give. Nor did he think that her expectations were even remotely realistic.

  Despite the soreness of broken ribs, he placed his hands under her thighs and lifted her, swinging her round to the open bunk bed padded with furs, parting her legs with his own as he sat her on the edge. Huskily, he whispered. ‘Hold on, beautiful woman. I’ll try to be careful. Pull your skirts up out of the way, sweetheart…. Oh, Nicola…I cannot wait for ye…I shall be useless…forgive me if I hurt you. Hold fast, sweet thing, and don’t cry out. This is your gift to me; mine to you will take longer than this, I promise.’ His fingers wrestled impatiently with the points that tied his hose to his shirt, finally releasing his throbbing hardness.

  He sought her mouth, gentling her with his lips, feeling her eagerness unabated, her co-operation ungrudging, her hands clinging and caressing, urging him on. All the nights of wanting and the days of imagining poured into his being at the moment of entry, lending him the power he needed to pass the first tender barrier. He pushed, withdrew, and pushed again more slowly but with force, and her lips parted with the pain of it. He heard her stifled yelp, the gasping cries and felt the sudden struggle against him, just as quickly checked. ‘Go on,’ she whispered, shakily. ‘Go on…it’s all right. Do what you have to do, Fergus. Don’t hold back.’

  In his fantasies, he had talked to her and made long slow love to every inch of her body, drawing her together along every delicate strand. Never had he thought it would be this way, in the dark undercurrent of his dreams where he became silent and grim in the grip of the primitive urge to possess. But that was what she wanted from him, something she knew he was well able to perform, for to conquer came naturally to him.

  Half-blinded by his unleashed passion and on the very edge of control, he braced himself against the panelled bed and moved rhythmically into her, seeing the woman with the lad’s trews clinging to her legs and her hair falling down, a rapier poised in her hand, then the haughty viper-tongued noblewoman who lashed him with insults, and last the chastened and bruised woman from whom he had demanded a proposal of marriage. Recalling all this in the space of one moment, he was caught in the surge of power far too soon, as he had known he would be and, unable to delay it for even a second, he was thrown into the maelstrom while his body, ignoring the pain, delivered the vigorous thrusts that rocked Nicola without mercy. From deep within his chest came a muffled roar that he stifled in the rich mass of her silken hair while she clung to his neck and shoulders as if to a bolting horse.

  Cradling her like a child in his arms, his hands smoothed her over the rich stuff of her gown, his eyes searching her lovely flushed face for a sign of tears and distress. The one tear hanging upon the thick lashes he removed with lips and tongue, opening her eyes to him. ‘Nicola,’ he whispered. ‘My beautiful and courageous woman. I took your gift. I could not refuse it. Can you forgive me?’

  Breathless, as she had been after their fencing, she let her gaze feed on him as if he had answered some mysterious question she had long asked herself, searching his contours and using her fingertips to confirm his expression of contrition, tenderness, longing and…yes…some triumph, too. ‘There’s nothing to forgive,’ she whispered, taking a nip at his chin with her teeth. ‘It was a wound I sought from you, this time, but on my terms. Do you still want me for a wife, Fergus Melrose, or am I free of you now?’

  His kiss was hard upon her mouth, drinking in her sweetness as if his thirst had only just begun. ‘How can you ask it, woman?’ he growled. ‘You will never be free of me. I have marked you and possessed you. You are mine and mine alone, and you will make your vows tomorrow. What’s just happened between us was not meant to free you of your obligations, but to bind you. Do you understand me?’

  �
�Yes, my lord,’ she said, hiding her smile in his shirt-front.

  He lifted her chin. ‘Now we have to emerge from here and put on a front of extreme boredom. That will be our test. Can you stand?’

  The next few moments were indeed as much of a test for them as anything they could have devised, and though Nicola was practised in the art of recovery after a mishap, this experience was unique in many ways, and she needed the support of Fergus’s hand as they stepped nonchalantly through the cabin doorway. Helping each other without the aid of a mirror, they had repaired damage to clothes and hair as best they could, though it remained to be seen whether their seemingly casual chatter would convince the waiting companions.

  ‘My apologies,’ called Fergus cheerfully to the group. ‘We’ve finally come to an agreement of sorts. We shall go by sea after all. It’s sure to be easier, and quicker too, unless we run into a storm.’

  ‘Glad you’ve decided,’ said George, missing nothing, as usual. ‘We’ve been taken round by Captain Munro. It’s a fine ship, Fergus.’

  Ramond was mounting the steps up to the forecastle, but Lotti took Nicola’s arm to turn her round the way she had come. ‘And you look as if you’ve already run into a storm, sister dear,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t tell me it’s taken you all this time to decide that.’ Not expecting an answer, she busily tucked a lock of dark hair back into the gold caul behind Nicola’s neck and replaced a hairpin that had come adrift, noting the flush that had not had time to fade. ‘You are all right?’ she breathed. ‘God in heaven, lass, but he’s a powerful creature, is he not?’

  Nicola’s secretive half-smile was more convincing than words that she was indeed all right, her brief nod of agreement as close as she could get to explaining the euphoria of being desired by Fergus Melrose, no matter how hurried or unglamorous the act of love itself. He had accepted her gift with all the care he could afford and with far more than she had expected, and she herself had led the way, and he had followed. Just this once, she had led and he had followed, and she had allowed herself to be conquered only because it suited her to do so. Fortunately, there was no one who would ask her to explain herself, for she would not have known where to start.

  In one sense, Sir Fergus’s doubts concerning her expectations were justified: she had not been satisfied in the same sense that he had been, as men usually were in these matters, however scanty the preparation. Having no experience of what that satisfaction might entail, she knew only that she had given away what was still hers to give to the man she wanted to receive it and, whether on the spur of the moment or not, hurriedly, poorly timed or ill advised, she had no regrets. His promises to make it last longer in the future sounded good, but had little meaning for her except in terms of time and, if she still wondered whether the combined presence of her brothers would make a difference to his attitude, she was relieved and happy to discover that this newest intimacy meant as much to Fergus as it did to her. She was kept close to his side all the way to his grand house on Holyrood Wharf and all through the mid-day dinner that followed.

  Physically, there was a problem she was obliged to share with her two maids, who found a way of tearing Rosemary’s chemise to clean up the inevitable signs of a first loving, after which she was more comfortable. If they were surprised by anything, it was Sir Fergus’s house that impressed them rather than what they saw as Nicola’s sudden capitulation. Who would not capitulate, they wondered, given the chance?

  The meal, beautifully prepared and served on the finest silver plate by liveried servants in a large oak-lined chamber, impressed the Coldynghams to a man, keeping the conversation flowing throughout the meal. But the one whose mind could not be engaged fully was Nicola herself; she could not summon, like Sir Fergus, that extra reserve of equanimity needed to sail through the event without looking as if something monumental had just happened to her. For one thing, the memory of his ardour had taken her aback for, though she understood the basic mechanics of coupling, her education had been deficient in the details. She had not been aware, for instance, of how much physical effort was involved, not only by him but by her, too. The fierceness of her dreams had fallen some way short of the realistic; the actuality was both exciting and frightening, for there had been moments during the heat of the action when he had seemed like a stranger to her once again, a man in the throes of some unstoppable force that had little to do with her as a person.

  Afterwards, in the short time allowed to them, he had tried to explain that that was not how it should have been, leaving her wondering how it should have been, if not like that. In her giving had also been her receiving, though he had not appeared to think so. Was it possible, then, that he had more than that to give? Would there be a time to find out soon, while her curiosity was at its peak?

  Concerning her apparent inconsistency, the niggling question remained. It had been less than a fortnight since her first scathing attack upon Sir Fergus’s pedigree, character and status, and now here she was, on the eve of a betrothal, giving him a part of herself that, if she’d kept to her original intentions, she could have withheld for some considerable time. Was there, after all, an element in her that refused to conform to her new independent image, the one she was so sure everyone had recognised and understood?

  ‘Inconsistent?’ said Lady Charlotte, examining Sir Fergus’s grapevine along one sunny wall. ‘Well, of course you are, love. So are we all, to some extent. Very few people are consistent all the way through. People do the strangest and most unpredictable things, quite out of character. That’s what makes them human. Take Ramond, for instance.’

  Nicola squeezed a grape but found it still hard. ‘Ramond?’ she said. ‘You mean suddenly changing tack? But that was circumstances, Lotti.’

  ‘Maybe, but I’ll wager that this experience as Sir Fergus’s secretary will take him in a completely different direction. He’s not too concerned about giving up his studies, is he, after all he’s said for years about wanting to be a diplomat? Of all the Coldynghams, I think that Patrick is probably the most predictable, and even he may surprise us.’

  ‘So what about George? And you?’

  ‘In our own ways we’re not nearly as typical as we appear, love. We give the impression of being sober and civilised and very proper, but, believe me, that’s not how we behave in private. Love’s like that, dearest. It allows you to do anything with your loved one that makes you both feel good. Did you think it was a well-mannered and gentle business?’

  There was a silence between them, of recognition and accord, and Nicola realised that those had been her thoughts, even the more ferocious ones. ‘You knew, then?’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes, love. Women usually know. There’s a difference, somehow. I could tell. Did he persuade you? Is that what happened?’

  ‘No, it isn’t. He didn’t. It was me. I wanted him to take me, there and then. Can you believe it?’

  Lotti smiled and placed a soft hand fleetingly over Nicola’s. ‘I certainly can believe it,’ she said. ‘So you think that’s your inconsistent side, do you? Well, if it’s any comfort, love, I wouldn’t even try to find an explanation for it. The only one who needs to know what you’re about is Sir Fergus, and it looks to me as if he has a fair idea, in spite of those worries we talked about the other day. You’ll be hand-fasted tomorrow. Leave it at that. You’ve done all the right things for all the right reasons.’

  If only you knew the whole story. ‘Thank you,’ said Nicola, placing a kiss upon her sister-in-law’s cheek. ‘I’m glad I have you.’

  But when it drew near to departure time, Sir Fergus took Nicola away from the good-natured brotherly bickering. ‘Are you all right?’ he said, taking her carefully by the shoulders. ‘Would you prefer to stay here overnight and return to River House in the morning with me? I have a room for your maids too. We can spend a quiet evening here.’

  ‘Just you?’

  ‘Just me. I shall make sure you have everything you need.’

  Cocking her head to one si
de, she could not resist a touch of mischief. ‘Everything?’ she whispered.

  His grin was only just short of a laugh. ‘Everything,’ he said, softly. ‘I even have a pair of rapiers, should you get a sudden urge.’

  ‘But what’s George going to say? What will your chaplain say?’

  ‘I never pay a great deal of attention to what my chaplain says. He’s mostly for show. As for George, he’ll understand.’

  George did, though he took care not to betray any sign of approval. ‘Hmm,’ he said to his lovely wife. ‘A bit unorthodox, isn’t it? It was only a day or two ago she was balking at everything to do with him. What’s changed her?’

  Lotti passed him his convoluted head-gear, smiling as he searched for the part to put his head in. ‘They’re an unorthodox pair, George dearest,’ she said. ‘Nicola will be quite safe. Ramond will stay with us tonight.’

  George handed the hat back, defeated. ‘Here, you put it on me, love. I shan’t be ordering another one of these things. I’ll have one like Ferg’s with an ostrich feather to show me where the back is.’

  ‘Yes, dear. You might consider having your hair cut like his, too.’

  ‘Mmm. Fancy him, do you?’

  ‘Well, I fancy the ships and shops and sealing-wax…’ her white teeth and pink tongue tripped over the esses with a smile ‘…but I’m stuck with a lord, so I’d better be satisfied.’ She sighed, dropping her tone to a minor key.

  ‘I think it’s time I got you home,’ said George.

  ‘Yes, dear. Keep your head still, will you?’

  While Lotti’s words of wisdom afforded her some comfort, Nicola realised that it was not only her own inconsistency that was so remarkable, but Fergus’s too. She could not have dwelt upon this to her sister-in-law, however, when only days before she had grumbled to her about his singular inability to change. Now he had changed and she could hardly bring herself to believe that it was either genuine or permanent, in spite of her recent experiences of men’s unreliability. Putting it to the test was one option, but with a betrothal looming so soon the result would be more academic than useful. Nevertheless, put it to the test she would, while the chance to assert herself still existed.