Moon Dreams (51 page)
At first, he thought she slept, and an odd loneliness tugged
at his heart. Perhaps he had just dreamed her words. He wanted them so much to
be true that he could have just imagined them in the happiness of the moment.
It didn’t seem possible that a lovely, gentle lady like Alyson could love a
cold, hard ruffian like himself, not after what he had done to her.
But he would make it up over time, she would see. Then,
maybe, he could hope one day to hear those words in truth. He had never
realized how much he needed to hear words of love, to hear the reassurance of
family again. For too long he had been without a home, and at heart he had
always been a family man. He hugged his son close and smoothed a straying lock
from Alyson’s brow.
Black lashes lifted, revealing the misty gray of her
glorious eyes, and her lips lifted in a smile at sight of father and son. “Rory,
I thought you were but a moon dream sitting there.”
“And so I am, dear heart.” He bent to kiss her cheek and
hold the infant where she could see. “See what comes of moon dreams? Dangerous,
they are.”
“Oh, no, lovely, lovelier than any other dream. Let me hold
him, Rory.” Alyson took the bundle and lifted the blanket to explore the small
creature they had brought into this world. Sighing with pleasure, she smiled up
to her weary husband. “He’s going to be just like you. I’ll have two of you to
love.”
As her words spoke her meaning clear, Rory felt them burn
straight to his heart and knew he would never be entirely separated from her
again. He didn’t own her, but they were a part of each other, as it should be.
He slid his arm around her shoulders and bent to whisper kisses along her
cheek. “Aye, and I’ll love ye until there’s a whole lot more than that, lass,
but there’s a lifetime for a’ that. For the noo, I’ll show you how much I love
ye. Sleep, and have sweet moon dreams, my bonny jo. I’ll be here when ye wake.”
Stagshead, June 1761
Laughing at the cooing sounds and dancing hands of the
infant in the cradle, Alyson abruptly tilted her head as if hearing something
beyond the room. Myra looked up too, and listened, but heard nothing. She watched
in surprise as a soft smile crossed the lady’s face. Without a word, Alyson
drifted from the nursery.
Not taking time to arrange her hair or change her gown, she
floated down the staircase, past the startled housekeeper, and toward the carved
front doors. A footman hurried to fetch a cloak and place it around her
shoulders or she would have stepped out into the breezy sunlight without one.
Both servants exchanged glances over her head, smiled, and ran off to inform
the others.
A copse of trees lined the drive and filled the narrow
valley at the bottom of the hill. The rhododendrons had spread wantonly along
the forest’s edge, and new shoots of heather and foxglove sprang up beneath
their protective cover. In a few weeks the hills would be a burst of color, but
the thick rich greens after the winter’s white were sufficient for Alyson. She
pulled up her hood and waded into the shadows of the trees.
She could hear the horse now, and she smiled at its wild
pace. The poor beast would be exhausted if its rider had ridden that way all
day. She waited in the dappled pattern of sunlight along the side of the road.
Horse and rider flew around the bend, the capes of the rider’s
redingote flapping in the breeze, his cocked hat balanced precariously over gleams
of dark red, polished knee boots clinging to the horse’s side. At the sight of
the nymph waiting in the forest, the horse shied, and the rider pulled up on
the reins, dancing his mount to a halt.
Within moments Rory was off the horse and lifting Alyson in
the air. Her eyes were like bluebells this morning, and he filled his arms with
the lovely fragrance of heather and the soft curves of a willing woman. His
long-denied body responded to this sensual barrage, and he bent to bury her
face in kisses.
“Ach, lass, if ye knew how much I needed this, ye’d run and
hide,” he murmured as his lips found the moist corners of her eyes and traveled
down flushed cheeks to at long last settle on her lush lips.
Alyson drank heavily of the glorious wine of his kisses,
breathing in the masculine scents she had missed so much. She circled his waist
and clung to the muscular line of his back. Rory pulled her closer, and their
lips parted and melted in loving kisses.
Silently cursing the nuisance of cloaks and coats and gloves,
Rory reluctantly lifted his head to smile into Alyson’s welcoming expression. “Ye
know how to make a man feel wanted, lass, but I fear I’ll not make it back to
the house if we dally here longer.”
She laughed and lifted her fingers to the fastening of his
coat. “They will all be waiting for you, and I’ll not see you again until
midnight. It’s been months, Rory. Would you make me wait any longer?”
With a wild grin, Rory threw off his gloves and braided his
fingers into her hair, leading her off the path into the protection of the
trees. “I’ll not wait a moment longer than I have to. How quickly does that
gown come off?”
Coat and cloak landed on the ground. As the horse sampled
tufts of grass, Rory laid his wife upon their makeshift bed and joined her.
After the months he had spent in London, they were almost
shy with each other, but that lasted only until their lips met again. Closing
his eyes to better inhale this heady potion, Rory allowed his hand to roam
freely, drawing gasps as he found the concealed hooks at the front of her
bodice and slid his fingers into the warmth beneath.
“I like this gown. You need a dozen more like it,” he
murmured, pushing aside the ribbons and lace of her chemise to explore the firm
curves of flesh.
Alyson cried out her eagerness. When he touched his tongue to
her breast, she was lost. Her hands laced through his hair and she rose against
him, urging him on. Rory had no need to be begged. Within minutes their clothes
were in disarray, but they were together again.
As she took him inside her, molding her fingers to the
rippling muscles of his back, he groaned with delight. Their bodies melded
together as if it had been yesterday that they had done this last. With
exquisite patience Rory brought her to the heights he had reached so easily,
moving slowly, then quickly as Alyson caught up with him. Her eyes flew open at
the sudden wild leap of their bodies.
Overhead, in a break between the towering trees, she found
the moon floating in the sun’s light, and she cried out her ecstasy as Rory’s
life flowed into hers. Her eyes closed again in joy as her body responded with
the electricity she remembered so well. Joyfully she felt his heavy weight
pressed into her, and she held him close.
“Lass, we’re an old married couple now. We’re not supposed
to behave like this,” Rory chuckled some while later as he shifted his weight
to one side and pulled her with him. He wasn’t ready yet to lose her warmth. He
relished the way her breasts spilled from the open bodice and chemise. They
were fuller than he remembered, and he pressed the puckered crests against his
palm. The erotic sensation brought a tightening in his loins.
“We can be an old married couple when we go back to the
house,” she jested. “For now, we will be lovers on an afternoon tryst. We
cannot linger long. My husband is expected any moment.”
Rory laughed, and Alyson’s heart swelled. He looked so much
younger than when first they met. She had worried every day that he was away,
but whatever had been decided in London hadn’t taken away his hard-won pleasure
in life. She had feared the grim privateer might return if things went wrong.
She touched wondering fingers to his sensual lower lip, scarcely believing that
it was love she saw warming his gaze.
“I doubt that your husband would be an understanding man. We’d
better dress hastily.” He made no move to do so.
“There is time. Tell me what happened in London. I have not
had a letter in weeks. Don’t make me wait until you tell the others at dinner.”
“And where would you like me to begin? With all the wicked
ladies waiting for me behind every door I entered?”
“I’ll slay them with a wave of my hand. Tell me of
Stagshead, Rory. That’s what you truly wanted. Did you get it? Did Lord Bute
help you as you hoped?”
He grew serious and pressed a kiss to the worried frown
between her eyes. “I told you that it no longer matters. But at your
insistence, I am now a pauper. Lord Bute was very helpful, your father was
quite persuasive, and His Majesty was receptive to the idea of filling his
coffers a second time for the same land. It is ours now, lass, for better or
worse.”
Her frown didn’t completely dissipate. She studied Rory’s
square face, lined with the weariness of playing the part of courtier. These
had not been easy months for him. She had known they would not be when it was
decided he must go, but they had been necessary. He needed to know where he
stood, and she had been in no condition to help him. Now she was healed, and he
was home, and they could go forward.
“And your cousin, then? Does this mean the king took the
land away from Drummond? What will happen to him?”
Rory grimaced and lay back against the rough capes of his
coat, pulling her with him. “Your cousin Alex is more ruthless than I’ll ever
be, lass. He took care of that matter for me. He found a physician who
certified Drummond as insane and found an institution that agreed to keep him
locked away in comfort for the rest of his life. Don’t look so alarmed, Alys.”
He touched a gentle hand to her cheek. “It is no Bedlam. It is a private home with
skilled workers. He is quite mad, lass. It became more obvious as we traveled.
He still thinks he killed me. I never said the Macleans were perfect. His
mother had the same madness. It happens from time to time. There’s naught we
can do about it.”
His halting phrases didn’t reassure. Alyson could tell he
still fought with himself over the outcome of that tragic night. He would have
dealt better with it had Drummond died at his hand in an equal fight, but these
things couldn’t be changed. He was right in that.
She moved her hips suggestively along his, bringing him back
to the pleasures of the present. “Shall our son be a penniless laird, then, my
lord? Have you managed to give away all that troublesome money?”
Rory grinned. “Not quite all. You have been handsomely
dowered. There is a nice trust set aside for our children when they come of
age. And the rest, your father and Alex intend to help me oversee. Alex has
taken a fancy to your shipping line, so I need not travel to Plymouth and
London to keep an eye on that. Your father is content to open the town house
and travel to oversee the other investments, and I am to sit here and make my
wife happy while deciding what to buy and sell. We shall all be paid handsomely
for our services, never fear.”
“Praise the Lord,” Alyson agreed fervently. “Now all we need
do is find a nice Scots wife for Alex and hope my father doesn’t take a fancy
to a younger woman. It would be dreadful if Alex were bypassed again for that
silly title.”
Rory laughed and kissed her and loved her all the more for
this concern she showed a man who had caused her naught but anguish for nearly
a year. He could feel the softness of her thighs rubbing against his, and he
decided he could wait a few minutes longer to see his son. Turning Alyson on
her back, he leaned over her, drinking in the beauty of her laughing features
as she rose hungrily against him.
“For your information, dear heart,” he told her, “your
father is currently dangling after my Aunt Deirdre. She tells me she always
wanted to be a countess, and that you would make a much more satisfactory
daughter than I have a nephew. Is there anything else you would like to know
before I ravish you thoroughly?”
Alyson lifted her arms to bring Rory’s head down to hers. Pressing
her kiss against his lips, she murmured, “When do we begin?”
Moon Dreams
Patricia Rice
Copyright © 1991/2015 Patricia Rice
First Digital Publication:
Book View Café Publishing Cooperative
Edition February 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-61138- 459-8
First published: 1991 by New American Library, New York
Cover design by Killion Group
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce
this book, or portion thereof, in any form.
This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical
events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names,
characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination,
and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.
Digital edition: 20141108vnm
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bestseller lists under her
belt, former CPA Patricia Rice is one of romance’s hottest authors. Her
emotionally-charged contemporary and historical romances have won numerous
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America RITA® finalists in the historical, regency and contemporary categories.
A firm believer in happily-ever-after, Patricia Rice is
married to her high school sweetheart and has two children. A native of
Kentucky and New York, a past resident of North Carolina and Missouri, she
currently resides in Southern California, and now does accounting only for
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