Rules of Attraction (12 page)

"We're safe." He caught her wrists. "Now watch. Watch."

Hoisting himself above her, he lowered himself. Her nipples touched first, nestling into the rough hair that covered his pectorals. His heart leaped with excitement. He wanted to overwhelm her, give her no choice… he wanted to crush her to him, take her now. His mind chanted encouragement. So he shook as their stomachs pressed together, and he fought every fierce, masculine instinct as he slowly flattened her breasts with his chest.

Overwhelm her, yes. Give her no choice, start this relationship as he meant to go on, yes. But he couldn't frighten or hurt her, and from the look on her face she was frightened.

He released Hannah's hands, and they sprang up to push ineffectively. She pushed and shoved until he slid his arms around her, under her shoulders, and trailed his fingers through the hair at the base of her skull. Then she quieted, resting cradled in his arms, staring at his face as if some feature there fascinated her.

Good. That was good. He couldn't help but smile and some of his triumph must have shown, for she dropped her gaze and squirmed as if she wanted to get away. He was taming her, gentling her to his hand, but he could see that she knew it and resented it.

"Sh," he whispered, although she'd made no sound.

"How do you do that?" she demanded belligerently.

He had thought her a girl, but obviously she was a woman, for she asked a question and expected an answer when he had no idea what she was talking about.

"How do you make my senses shut down?" she asked. "I can't hear, or see, or smell, when you touch me. I can only touch…"

Her voice trailed away, and he asked, "And feel?"

"Yes," she was whispering again. "And feel."

Focusing her eyes on his face, with a tentative finger she traced the accent line of his cheek, the scar beneath his eye, the velvet of his mouth.

"Have you got it worked out, now, sweetheart?" Dougald asked.

In a voice rife with tragedy, she said, "Yes. I'm a wanton."

"I can only hope," he teased.

A mistake. Immediately tears trembled on her lashes. He thought himself so clever, yet he had forgotten her mother had been disgraced by passion. That Hannah had lived with that disgrace every day of her life. Smoothing her hair from her forehead, he marveled at the soft texture of each strand. Keeping his voice low and persuasive, he said, "You're responsive, but that's nothing to be ashamed of. The release we find in passion is the closest we come to the soaring of the peregrine. You are so beautiful, you touch my heart, my mind. I've seen what damage a thoughtless husband does to a marriage. Won't you trust me? I'll give you all my attention, my wholehearted commitment. I'll not cheat you, not physically, not mentally. Marriage is forever, a vow spoken and meant to be kept. We'll be happy. You have many things you can share with me. Your charm, your diplomacy, your kindness— they will complete my life."

"What will you share with me?"

My God, her tone was plaintive! Was she thinking? Was she reasoning? Did she realize how painstakingly he planned each move, each word?

So he reached for her soul with a kiss. Their lips melded. He led her through a new dance, one she'd never performed before, and he reveled in her sensuousness. She moaned into his mouth, and tasted of autumn's apple and summer's rye, and of Hannah. Each touch of her tongue swirled him closer to bliss.

In one moment of sanity he thought that was wrong. He pulled away and stared down at her. At the doe-soft eye, the damp, full lips, the softly rounded cheeks. She couldn't lure him. He was older, he was the man. Yet if he weren't careful, she would ensnare him as surely as he sought to ensnare her. That would be awful. That would be… impossible. Men did not love. Not as women loved. Once he had captured Hannah's heart, he would hold her in the palm of his hand. That was the way it was supposed to be. That was the way he planned it.

She must have seen some of his consternation in his face, for she asked, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." No, he was doing everything right. He couldn't fail.

The stars glittered. The harness jingled. The horse snorted. The lane curled up around a grove of trees.

Dougald
had
done everything right. Like any young, sweet, innocent girl, she had mistaken the passion between them for love. He had taken full advantage of her delusion, and carefully fostered her fantasy. Only after their marriage had she begun to suspect that he didn't love her. Perhaps, worse, she had begun to suspect she didn't love him.

But now he would make her love him again, and when she did—
Crack!

Tree bark behind Dougald exploded in woody shards. What…? Why? Could it be?

Dougald abruptly came back to the present. The stallion beneath him reared. Hell! Someone was shooting at him. During the brief moment it took to shake off past enchantment—

Crack!

A bullet tore through the air by Dougald's ear. Taking advantage of the animal's caprice, he tumbled out of the saddle and rolled away from the slashing hooves. Coming to his feet, he ran in a crouch, keeping his face down and his white shirt out of sight.

"Got 'im!" he heard a man shout.

As his stallion snorted and fought invisible demons, then raced toward Raeburn Castle, Dougald slipped into the small grove of trees beside the path. The salt-stunted trees were thin and windblown, the ground around them grassy, undulating meadow. Not far away the sea crashed against the shore, muffling any other sounds, but in the feeble light of the stars he saw two figures detach themselves from among the boulders and run to the place where he had fallen.

One tall, one short, neither held a pistol but both wore greatcoats with capacious pockets.

The streetfighter in Dougald knew he could take them.

The realist in Dougald recognized an ugly truth. Someone was shooting at him— at the lord of Raeburn. He'd scoffed when Charles said the servants whispered tales of sabotage and assassination. But he doubted this attack could be coincidence.

Someone was trying to kill the lord of Raeburn, and the lord of Raeburn… was he.

The men searched the ground with increasing indignation, coming ever closer to the trees.

Finally, one stood straight and exclaimed, "'E's not here!"

Dougald smiled as he stepped out behind them. "Yes, he is."

As they scrambled to turn, he grabbed them by the hair and smashed their heads together. They howled as their skulls cracked. One went down. He grabbed the other by his rough coat and lifted him to his toes. "What the hell are you doing, shooting at me?"

And another man, unseen in the shadowy, jumbled landscape, struck him from the side. Dougald went down cursing as first the one, then the other, jumped him.

He should have remembered— always make sure of the odds before picking a fight.

10

A
s Hannah descended the stairs toward the breakfast room, her muscles ached and her eyes felt gritty— the results of the previous long and eventful day. At least that was what she told herself. She didn't acknowledge a restless night spent chasing demons who turned into Dougald and in turn chased her while the flames of hell licked at their heels.

She had been so foolish
— yesterday when she'd allowed herself to be trapped, and all those years ago when the girl Hannah had convinced herself she loved Dougald because he had seduced her— and because she had wanted him to.

Gripping the curve of banister, she frowned fiercely.

All the hard-won wisdom in the world didn't make a difference. It didn't matter what her mind told her, or that she looked back on the younger Hannah and pitied her belief that passion equaled love and that men fulfilled their promises, because when she was with Dougald—

"Oh, beauteous maiden who brings forth the morning!"

She gasped and almost tripped off the last stair as a dandy leaped lightly from his hiding place beneath the stairs. A gentleman of indeterminate years, dressed in the latest London fashions, he held a yellow rose he extended with a flourish.

Pressing her hand over her rapidly beating heart, she said in her frostiest tones, "Sir, I don't believe we've met."

"Of course not! I have presumed because I wished to verify that the report was true."

Who was this little fop who stood an inch shorter than she, wore higher heels on his shiny boots, and took such liberties with civility? "Report?"

"That the fairest lady in all the land had taken up residence beneath the noble roof of Raeburn Castle."

She stared at him. Did he think such flattery would turn her head? She knew very well how she looked this morning. She wore a subdued cotton gown of powder blue, its long sleeves trimmed with a cautious ripple of lace. She had pinned her plainest white collar close around her throat, and after a bit of inner debate, had tied a starched white apron around her waist. Silly to think such frumpish apparel would discourage Dougald, but she liked to think she had the good sense to dress with discretion.

"Ah, you wonder who I am. Could it be my new cousin did not even tell you of my existence?" The stranger flattened the back of his hand to his forehead. "I, who am his heir?"

This was Dougald's heir? She inspected him more closely. He wore checked wool trousers of brown and blue with a thin thread of yellow, a matched checked waistcoat, a large bow cravat and a gold-and-diamond collar pin. His brown frock coat sported velvet cuffs and collar of a most intense cobalt that matched his finest feature— beautifully lashed blue eyes that managed to hint at a melancholy that would have done Byron proud. Unfortunately, he did not have a Byronic coiffeur. Rather his brown hair grew long on one side and someone, probably his talented valet, carefully combed it over the top to hide the bald spot… which glistened in patches of pale skin from among the glutinous strands.

Hannah pretended not to notice. "You… live here?"

"Yes." He inspected the rose he still held, and she realized he had chosen it not for its beauty, but to match the yellow thread in his plaid waistcoat. "When I'm not in London, I make my home at Raeburn Castle."

"I apologize for my ignorance, sir." Hannah smirked. She was more and more aware of the trials afflicting Dougald in his new position. Although she feared she would be damned by her sentiments, she reveled in his calamity. He had always been so ambitious for himself and his family; in inheriting this estate, he must have thought he had achieved all his goals. But between the elderly ladies, the heir and his own wife, Dougald might have just bitten off more than he could chew. Not that Dougald could imagine such an instance, but she could— and had, many a time in her fondest dreams. "I'm afraid no one told me of your residence herein."

"If I could be so bold as to introduce myself— I am Seaton Brackner, Baron Onslow, the son of the twelfth earl's youngest brother and the current Lord Raeburn's fifth cousin once removed."

She curtsied. "Miss Hannah Setterington, sir. I have come to be a companion to His Lordship's aunt. And your aunt, also, I presume."

"So the report is true." He bowed and again extended the rose. "The fairest maiden
has
taken residence herein."

Solemnly, she accepted the blossom. "You flatter me, sir, but I am too sensible to allow you to turn my head. I will mark your interest as nothing more than a London-dweller's boredom in his current rural circumstances."

"You crush me." He offered his arm, and she placed her hand on his sleeve. "Rather, you would have crushed me, but I must believe you never look in the mirror or you would realize the sincerity of my adulation."

She amended her first judgment. Sir Onslow wasn't completely a little fop. Rather, he was a resplendent urbanite suffering in the ennui of the country, probably because of monetary concerns. He was also, she decided, her most likely source of distraction in
this
untenable situation. "Where are you taking me, sir?"

"My first thought was to the breakfast chamber, but if you prefer, fair maiden, I will summon my steed and toss you into the saddle, and carry you away from the drudgery of ordinary life."

She eyed the top of his head, which she could clearly see, and thought that the chance of him tossing her anywhere seemed unlikely. "The breakfast chamber sounds appealing." Although Dougald undoubtedly lurked therein.

Sir Onslow heaved a huge sigh. "Like so many young ladies, you lack imagination."

"I don't lack imagination. Rather I suffer from a strong streak of practicality." And the sure knowledge that if she tried to flee Raeburn Castle, Dougald would be after her in a flash. She wouldn't involve any man in the strife between her and her husband; someone would get hurt, and that someone would never be Dougald.

She and Sir Onslow strolled down the long, broad gallery that ran from the stairway toward the great hall.

"So you met the aunts," he said. "Or shall I say… Aunt Spring and her companions. By the way they scold me, they might as well all be my aunts."

His gloom made her smile. "I met them last night."

"What did you think?"

"They are lovely ladies, and I'm sure Aunt Spring will be a pleasure to care for."

"How discreet you are." He sounded woefully disappointed, but he brightened. "I always think the aunts are like a small pack of terrier dogs, circling and nipping, bounding and demanding."

She repressed a smile. "Not a pack, sir. They have quite distinctive personalities."

"Indeed!
Very
distinctive personalities, but taken as a whole, they are interfering, judgmental, benevolent know-it-alls."

"You seem… bitter."

"Not at all. I adore them, too. Who wouldn't?" He heaved a theatrically large sigh. "Only I do wish they had an ounce of discretion between them!"