Claiming the Courtesan (10 page)

“If all else fails, I’ll keep that in mind.” He turned his head and spoke in Gaelic. The two giants rose from the corner, where they sat talking in low tones, and left the cottage to the duke and his captive.

The time had come. Finally after all the fraught waiting, he meant to reassert his rights of possession over her body. She was too worn out to summon anything more than a dull anger. She told herself she’d survive this as she’d survived so much else. After hours on that wretched horse, she already ached so badly that she probably wouldn’t even feel him pounding into her.

But beneath the tiredness and meaningless bravado, her heart keened in misery.

“Lie back.”

“This won’t help,” she said tonelessly, obeying him.

What was the point of fighting? This moment had been inevitable from the beginning, and for all her hard-held defiance, she didn’t want him to hurt her.

He laughed briefly. “Miss Ashton, you have a nasty, suspicious mind.” For once, she didn’t sense any hostility. The change only heightened her fear. When he was kind, he was at his most dangerous.

He began to unlace her half boots. She couldn’t rouse the will to flinch away. He’d easily catch her if she tried to run on legs stiff after a day’s unaccustomed riding.

His hands were cool on her bare legs. She’d rinsed her stockings, and they currently adorned a discreet hawthorn bush outside. She tensed. Perhaps she wasn’t quite as inured to her fate as she’d thought.

“Relax,” he murmured. “Or I might forget my good intentions.”

“As if you have any,” she muttered. “As if you have ever had…Ohhh!”

Whatever she meant to say faded in a long sigh of pleasure as those adept fingers began to mold the muscles in her calves.

“That’s enough,” she eventually forced herself to insist, although she thought that if he stopped touching her, she’d weep.

“In a minute,” he said, and she couldn’t summon further demurrals.

“Roll over,” he said after a blissful interval.

With no thought to protest, she turned onto her stomach and lay still as he raised her skirts to reveal her legs to the evening air. For a long time, the firelit cottage was silent except for the crackle of the flames and the sound of his hands working her flesh.

She’d floated off into a world of weary pleasure when she felt him reach beneath her to release the front of her dress. As his fingers brushed across her breasts, her instincts prodded her into hazy wariness.

“What are you doing?” she asked huskily.

He tugged her dress down, uncovering her shoulders—and effectively trapping her arms. “I’m sure your back is as sore as the rest of you,” he said neutrally.

Actually, her rump had taken the worst punishment during the hours on that iron-backed succubus. But despite her current state of exhausted stupidity, she knew better than to invite him to touch her buttocks. Even allowing him to rub her back was asking for trouble.

“You should…”

He began to knead her tight shoulders. She took a moment to remember what she meant to say. “You should stop now. I feel much better.”

Those fiendishly competent fingers didn’t pause. She tried to tell herself she wasn’t glad.

“You’ve got another day of riding tomorrow, Verity.”

“Oh.”

She supposed she’d known that. Of course this poor ruin was only another temporary camp. But her befuddled mind hadn’t actually gone so far as to register that more horseback-based misery awaited her so soon. She closed her eyes and let the duke’s healing hands continue.

What was the use resisting him? He always won in the end.

She’d drifted away into a sleepy daze when she felt him arrange her dress into respectability. Then a breath of air before a blanket settled over her.

“Sleep, Verity,” he said softly.

She snuggled into the warmth, luxuriating in the glorious
looseness of her limbs. She was too lethargic to be surprised at his care.

“Thank you,” she whispered, but he’d already gone.

Only in the morning did she realize this was the first night during their endless purgatory of a journey that he hadn’t tied her up.

Late the next afternoon, they paused on a cliff. The duke turned back toward Verity.

“That’s where we’re heading.” His deep voice sounded even bleaker than usual.

Perhaps the journey was finally taking its toll on even his patience. Today, she’d seen little trace of last night’s Good Samaritan, with his undemanding kindness and gentle hands.

She was just as tired and ill-humored as she’d been yesterday after a day in the saddle. It was impossible to arouse any interest in where they stopped tonight. She swore to herself that she’d never, after this, take life’s more prosaic comforts for granted. Warm water. Clean clothes. A hot meal eaten at a table. She’d savor each of these humble luxuries and send thanks to her Maker for providing them.

That is, if she ever had the chance to enjoy such pleasures again.

Without urging, her pony ambled up to stand beside Kylemore’s. Verity looked over the edge into a valley like so many she’d already seen. Woods. A clear stream winding into a large, shining loch. No sign of people.

Then she realized this valley wasn’t exactly the same as every other. This valley contained a substantial house with a cluster of other buildings around it. A house, moreover, in good repair. A house that was even inhabited, if the smoke coming from the chimney was any indication.

She waited for Kylemore to say something else, but he
merely guided his pony onto the path down the ridge. Her mount, tied to his saddle, followed.

Their small and rather odd caravan—a nobleman, a whore, two giants, a string of pack ponies and a thoroughbred worth as much as a small estate—made its way downward. The duke’s promise to leave her alone finished when they reached the house, clearly the hunting box he’d mentioned back in Whitby an eon ago.

The grueling journey was over. Now her real punishment began.

K
ylemore reined in on the rough patch of grass before the house. Strangely, everything was exactly how he remembered. After so many years away, his memory should have played tricks, but each detail matched his starkest recollections.

The child hidden inside him longed to run away screaming. The self-contained nobleman he’d since become kept his seat on his inelegant mount and waited for Angus to announce their arrival. He didn’t look at Verity—perhaps because those perceptive gray eyes would see too much if he did.

“Your Grace!” Hamish Macleish opened the door and rushed out. “Your Grace, I didnae ken ye would arrive today.”

Unlike the house, Hamish had changed. When they had last met, Hamish had been a vigorous man in the prime of life. He was still tall and straight, but his hair was white, and twenty harsh winters had weathered his face into crags and lines.

“Your Grace, come away in with ye out of the evening air. Your lady will like a bonny fire and a cup of tea, I’m sure.”

“I’m sure,” Kylemore said, dismounting and turning back toward Verity.

Actually, her expression indicated that
his lady
might prefer a dash of hemlock in that tea. He needn’t have worried about her divining his secrets from his demeanor. She looked too petrified to contemplate anything except the fate awaiting her in this house.

He’d wanted to crush Soraya’s pride. Now he found little satisfaction in her terrified silence.

“I’ll at least get you inside before I have my wicked way with you,” he sniped under his breath, hoping irritation might melt the frozen dread from her face. But his hands were gentle as he lifted her from the saddle.

She hardly seemed to hear him, but she trembled under his hold while she found her balance.

He frowned. What was the matter with the chit, for God’s sake? He knew she was afraid—he’d set out to make her so. But it wasn’t as if he planned to do anything to her he hadn’t done before. Or did she imagine he really intended her harm? If he’d wanted to murder her, it would have been considerably more convenient to do it back in Yorkshire.

Anger with Verity—anger part of him recognized wasn’t her fault at all—carried him over the threshold as he hauled her inside. There was indeed a good fire in the parlor, as Hamish had promised, and the ugly, old-fashioned furniture stood exactly where it had when he’d been a boy. Twenty years had passed, and the house’s layout was imprinted on his mind as if his torments here had occurred only yesterday.

He released Verity and moved forward to stand beside a bulky carved oak armchair, where the servants had often restrained his father with thick leather straps. It was the only chair in the house sturdy enough to hold the sixth duke when
his madness was upon him. With a shuddering breath, Kylemore banished the horrific image of his father drooling and screaming and tearing at his bonds with long-fingered hands identical to his own.

When Kylemore had left as a bawling seven-year-old, he’d sworn nothing on earth would make him return to this place. He hadn’t counted on his passion for the conniving demirep who hovered hesitantly on the rug before the grate.

Although it was hard to see the avaricious harpy of his accusations in the pale, frightened girl before him. Hard to see the great Soraya.

Her unbecoming black dress was worn, dirty and bedraggled. Her beautiful hair, despite her valiant efforts on the road, badly needed a maid’s attention. She looked tired, scared, defeated.

Hell, there had to be something wrong with him. He still thought her the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen. Nothing he’d done to her had diminished her loveliness.

Hamish followed them in. “Shall I serve tea, Your Grace?”

Kylemore glanced at Verity. She looked ready to collapse. He’d wanted to vanquish her, but the prospect of her prostrate at his feet through sheer exhaustion didn’t seem much of a victory.

“No. Trays in our rooms, Hamish. Perhaps bring
madame
tea while her bath is prepared.”

Hamish bowed. “As Your Grace wishes.”

As he left, Kylemore tried not to remember that the last time they’d met, Hamish had called him Justin—not Your Grace. Then, he’d been proud to call Hamish his friend. The intervening years had altered that closeness as well.

Verity was so still that she could have been planted there. He sighed and crossed the room to lift her in his arms. Unless he helped her, he doubted she’d make it upstairs to the first real bed she’d seen in days. Another twinge of conscience,
familiar after days on the road, joined the noxious mix of feelings inside him.

When she stiffened, rejecting his touch, his uncertain temper snapped. His nerves were on edge—they had been for days—and her stubborn resistance provided his turbulent emotions with a focus.

“For Christ’s sake, woman! You’re safe until you’ve washed at least,” he growled down into her wan features.

Wan no longer. A difficult color rose in her cheeks. The unworthy jibe would sting the proud Soraya. He beat back an unwelcome wave of protectiveness; he’d brought her here to punish her, not to become her nursemaid, blast her.

Despite this, his hold was tender as he strode out of the parlor, across the hall and up the stairs. He told himself he only imagined she was lighter than she’d been at Hinton Stacey. But he was guiltily aware that she’d eaten very little in the last week. She seemed terrifyingly fragile, nothing but birdlike bones and perfect white skin.

Then he met her fierce silver eyes.

“I haven’t surrendered,” she said steadily.

He read the defiance in her as sharply as if she’d carved it on his flesh with a needle. He should have known better than to think he’d conquer her so swiftly. That stalwart soul wouldn’t bow just because she was weary and afraid. Renewed relish for the contest between them swamped his brief uncertainty.

Two maids were in the bedroom filling a bath and laying out soaps and towels. They curtseyed and greeted him in the musical Gaelic he still thought of as his heart’s language.

He placed Verity on her feet in the center of the room. Everything was prepared as he’d ordered. Of course it was. He was the Duke of Kylemore, he thought with no satisfaction whatsoever.

“I shall see you in the morning,” he said abruptly.

She blinked at him with dazed surprise. She must have expected him to jump on her before she’d had a chance to take off her shoes. Devil take her, after all this time in her company, he was certainly randy enough for it.

But not ready in the ways that mattered. Too many elements conspired to crack his usual control. The house. His memories. His need for her. Her vulnerability, in spite of her gallant efforts to keep fighting.

No, he’d be wiser seeking what rest he could well away from her and her drawn face and her fiery eyes.

He paused in the doorway. “Burn that black dress when
madame
has taken it off,” he said in Gaelic to the maids.

The next morning, Verity stirred as one of the maids brought her a cup of chocolate. Whatever else the duke intended for her, starvation mustn’t feature in his plans. Last night’s tray had been crammed with delicacies she hadn’t seen since leaving Kensington. He’d even sent up a bottle of fine claret.

Kylemore had been true to his surprising farewell. She’d bathed, eaten and, astonishingly, slept in peace.

Sitting up, she responded to what she assumed was a greeting from the maid, another Scot who didn’t, it appeared, speak any English. Gingerly, she shifted on the mattress to test if yesterday’s saddle-induced discomfort still persisted.

A little, she decided. But a night in a bed had worked wonders. Perhaps His Grace should go back to making her sleep on the ground. She felt much readier to tackle him today.

The maid opened the heavy curtains, which had been drawn since Verity had entered the room yesterday. In the space of a breath, all her well-being evaporated.

The windows were barred.

Verity thought she’d be confined, but no one stopped her when she left her room. With Angus and Andy dogging her heels, she began to explore her prison. The main house was more a sprawling farmhouse than anything else, like an overgrown version of the home she’d grown up in. The interior was dark and oppressive and decorated almost solely with hunting trophies. The heads of long-dead deer lined the walls, and sad examples of the taxidermist’s art crowded together in large display cases to stare out at her with lifeless glass eyes.

Going outside was a relief. As she glanced around the unkempt grounds with a frown, she rubbed her wrists. The memory of her bindings still chafed, even if the silk cords had left no mark.

After endless days of traveling, she found it strange to spend a whole day in one place. The air was brisk for summer, and she huddled into the teal merino dress the maids had produced for her that morning. Although she knew her pervasive chill had nothing to do with the weather and everything to do with rampant apprehension.

The area immediately around the house had been coaxed into a straggling lawn. Fields lay behind the barn. The rest of the valley was mainly forest, although patches of heather and bracken grew in clearings high on the hillsides. A path led down to a loch. Farm buildings and a couple of cottages where the servants must live completed the settlement. She supposed the scene was beautiful, in its forbidding way.

She soon understood why her jailers permitted her so much freedom. Unless she took her chances on the road over the mountains or she was an exceptionally fine swimmer, escape was impossible. And she couldn’t ask for aid, because apart from the man who’d greeted them yesterday, none of the valley’s residents spoke English.

At first, Verity was relieved the duke left her alone. Maintaining her courage was easier when she didn’t have to en
dure that searching indigo stare. But as the interminable day dragged on, she almost wished he’d appear. Anything to end this awful hiatus, when every minute seemed to stretch across an hour.

Then she’d remember how he’d kissed her in the carriage and fear would flare again. Somehow in that kiss, he’d bypassed her will and her intellect and her hatred. He’d discovered the real woman hidden beneath Soraya’s tricks and seductions. The real woman Verity had never allowed to breathe free in all her years as a courtesan.

What was she to do? How was she to protect herself from Kylemore? Worse, how was she to stifle her own response?

Since her abduction, she’d desperately tried to resurrect Soraya. She so needed the other woman’s self-possession and knowing superiority. But the worldly demimondaine stubbornly refused to emerge from the land of shades.

Instead, all she found within herself was Verity’s cowering heart. Verity wasn’t strong enough to withstand the Duke of Kylemore. He’d subjugate her totally and leave her with nothing after this was over.

He hadn’t gone to this trouble for the sake of a quick tumble. He hadn’t even gone to this trouble to reclaim what he’d shared with Soraya. No, he meant to destroy her. They both knew it.

Eventually the pervasive gloom of her thoughts forced her back to the equally gloomy house. There must be some way she could avoid her fate. Her inevitable, long-promised fate. But nothing sprang to mind, and there was no one to help her. She was as isolated from human assistance as if she were on the moon. Kylemore knew exactly what he was doing when he’d brought his mistress to this isolated hunting box.

Kylemore silently admitted he’d had no idea what he was doing when he brought his mistress to his childhood home.
He already suspected that keeping Verity here was a mistake. She only made him vulnerable, just as this place made him vulnerable. And if ever he needed to hold fast to ruthlessness, it was now.

He flung himself off his mount’s back in the shadowy stables and cursed at length. Hamish had followed him inside out of the twilight, and he reached for Tannasg’s reins.

“Taking the Lord’s name in vain never did much tae help a situation, laddie,” he said in a soft, reproving burr. The lanterns were already lit, and they cast a soft glow over his stern expression.

They had been riding all day. After that appalling journey, any sane man would welcome the chance to stay in one place. But then, Kylemore had never considered himself a sane man. Nor would anyone else if they knew the facts behind this latest disaster, the abduction of his unwilling paramour.

At least the hours in the saddle today had achieved one positive outcome—Hamish Macleish no longer
Your Graced
him to death. Kylemore hadn’t expected them to regain their old closeness. But the day together had revived some of their earlier ease in each other’s company. Not to mention that it distanced him from both the house’s agonizing memories and his troublesome mistress.

Soraya. Verity. The woman he yearned for with every breath.

The woman who, as far as Hamish’s conversation was concerned, didn’t exist. Hell, Hamish already knew blasphemy numbered among his employer’s sins. Kidnapping was just one more peccadillo.

Still, Kylemore, ruthless, heartless knave that he was, couldn’t quite summon the courage to confess why he skulked in this remote corner of Scotland with one of the world’s most beautiful women in tow.

“Look after the horses,” he snapped, tired of the censure
that underlay Hamish’s manner in spite of all the reawakened camaraderie.

Perhaps because of the reawakened camaraderie.

He was tired too of battling inconvenient scruples over his captive. Everything had seemed so clear when he’d searched for her. Soraya had duped him into giving her a fortune. She’d betrayed him by running away without a word. She deserved to be punished.

And by God, he’d enjoy punishing her.

But that was before he’d witnessed her uncomplaining bravery on the long and difficult journey when she’d been so scared of where she’d been going. Of horses. Of him.

That was before he’d seen her vulnerability when exhaustion had forced her to the edge of her endurance. When she’d still summoned the strength to defy him. Even while she must have known that defiance was useless.