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‘That’s no answer.’
He lifted her hand to his mouth and began to kiss her fingers. The tip of each one. Then the pad of her thumb. His eyes never left hers. They were darker in the lamplight, gleaming with a combination of desire and challenge. Did she want this? He took her index finger in his mouth, and sucked. She released his other hand, slumping down in her chair. Her foot, clad in stockings but not her boots, found its way to his leg. She ran it up his calf over his trousers, and saw the surprise register.
He sucked on her middle finger, his tongue tracing the length of it. ‘Cordelia?’
Corr-deel-ia. ‘Guidebooks,’ she said, sliding her foot higher, over his knee, to the inside of his thigh. He clamped his legs together, holding her there. ‘I write guide books. The Single Lady Traveller’s Guide To—Paris, Brussels, Rome, Dresden. Others. I can’t remember. And now the Highlands.’
‘Impressive. Surprising. You’ve not done any destinations closer to home?’
‘I don’t have a home.’
‘I know how that feels,’ he said.
Sadness chased across his face, but was quickly banished. No questions. ‘No, let’s not talk about it,’ Cordelia said, as if he had spoken aloud. ‘I am tired of thinking about it. My own turning point. There is nothing—I’m tired of it.’
‘Then we won’t talk of it. Should I go, Cordelia?’
‘Do you want to?’
‘You know I don’t, but you also know that I will.’
‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t want you to go.’
He let go her hand. He let her foot slide back on to the floor. He got to his feet and came round to the other side of the little table and pulled her upright, sliding his arms around her waist. ‘I am glad,’ he said, ‘because I have never in my life wanted any woman the way I want you. Now.’ And then he kissed her.
* * *
He kissed her, and the connection was elemental. She understood it, when he kissed her, this feeling of knowing, of being known. You. You. You. She recognised him with such a strong physical pull that she staggered. As if she had been waiting all her life for him. As if none had gone before him. As if none but him would ever matter. She could analyse and question and dissect, but she had no interest in doing any of that, no interest in establishing a conflict between her mind and her body. Her body had already won. ‘Yes,’ she said, though he had not asked, ‘the answer is yes.’
She led him into the bedchamber. No words were necessary after that, though they spoke with their lips, hands, eyes. Kissing. His mouth felt as if it were made to kiss hers, hers to fit his. His kisses were like questions. This? And this? And this?
And this, she replied, touching her tongue to his, relishing the sharp intake of his breath in response. And this. She opened her mouth. His kisses deepened, his fingers tangling in her hair, his breath warm on her face.
Her hairpins scattered. She pulled at his coat. He threw it on to the floor, then kissed her again. She reached behind her to unfasten her gown. He turned her around, wrestling with the buttons and fasteners, kissing her neck, her shoulders, his breathing ragged. The gown took some time to wriggle out of, hindered and impeded by kisses. He pulled her against him when it finally fell to the floor, her bottom against his thighs. She was frustrated by the layers of her undergarments. He curved his arms around her to cup her breasts. She shuddered, wanting his skin on hers, her nipples hard, aching for his touch. He began to untie the strings of her corsets.
He cursed under his breath. She could not understand the language, which might have been Gaelic, but might have been something more colloquial. When her stays dropped to the floor, releasing her breasts with only her chemise to cover them, he turned her around. Slashes of colour on his cheeks. His eyes glittering with desire. Her own breath quickened, the knot in her belly tightened, the low throb lower down began. ‘Take them off,’ she said, pulling at his waistcoat.
He discarded his own clothes quickly, efficiently, without any modesty. He was as lean and hard as she had imagined, his shoulders broader, his skin paler, the muscles beneath tensed. And he was more than ready, his erection jutting up against his stomach. Cordelia shuddered. She had never wanted anything so much as this man inside her.
He had been watching her studying him. She smiled at him then, quite deliberately, and felt an answering heat as he smiled the same smile in response. This was going to be—everything. Anything. All. Did she say it aloud? She thought it as he pulled her to him once more, and she felt the thickness of him against the apex of her thighs. His kiss was desperate now. Her own too, her mouth ravaging his, her hands clawing at his back, at his buttocks, at his flanks.
He pulled her chemise over her head. She untied the drawstrings of her pantalettes. She wore only her stockings and her garters. He swore again, this time a word she recognised, a harsh, guttural word that should have shocked her, but expressed exactly what she was feeling. Then he cupped one of her breasts in his hand, covered the nipple of the other with his mouth.
Heat, shivering, frissons of pleasure, tugging, connecting up. Delightful. Delicious. But almost too late. There was no time for this, not now. She pulled his face back up to hers and kissed him frantically, pressing herself against him with abandon. Now, now, now. ‘Now!’
‘Aye. I hear you. Dear God, I hear you. Cordelia, I am so—I don’t think I can wait.’
‘Iain, I know I cannot.’
He laughed. A deep, masculine laugh that vibrated against her breasts, her stomach. Then he kissed her, pulling her on to the floor because even the small distance to the bed was too much. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, her legs around his waist, as he thrust into her.
She cried out.
‘Wheesht yourself, these walls are thin,’ he said, but he was smiling wickedly, and he thrust, and she covered her mouth to muffle her cries, and dug her heels into his buttocks and clenched around him, holding him deep inside her, and he stopped smiling and swore again, that shocking word that said exactly what it was she wanted from him, and inside her, she felt him thicken.
He thrust again. She felt her climax building. She never climaxed as easily as this, not this way, but it hadn’t even occurred to her that she would not. He was sweating. His face was strained, his eyes were dark, but focused on her with an intensity that made her feel as if they were connected. Not just joined, but connected. He was inside her. She was inside him. When he kissed her, she responded with every part of her body.
‘Come with me,’ he said. She had heard that before. Had pretended before. This time, there was no need to pretend. She nodded. He thrust. She held him. He pulsed high inside her. She could feel it, the spiralling, but she could still hold on to it. He thrust again. She arched up under him, tilting her body to hold him higher, and it happened, the loss of control, the fall, the clutching, pulsing, ecstasy, and she cried out, and he thrust one more time, and cried out too, pulling himself free of her at the very last moment, and she had the urge to hold him, to keep him there inside her, regardless of the consequences. Or courting them, even.
When it was over they lay panting, sweating, tangled on the floorboards, like victims of a tempest. In the aftermath, as the urgency abated, and the bliss cocooned her, Cordelia forgot about the ending. One of Iain’s legs covered hers. His hand lay possessively on her stomach. He was staring up at the ceiling, his face a blank. Empty. Sadness washed over her. Something else that was different. It had never been anything other than a pleasure before. Some more pleasurable than others, but always fun, usually satisfying, in the way that a glass of wine fresh from the cellar was satisfying, or a bowl of fresh pasta eaten in the sunshine, or a walk on hot sand in bare feet.
Not like this. This was something much more elemental. Before, during, she would have given him anything not to stop. He had invaded her, seen things she did not want anyone to see on her face. Come with me, he had said, and she could not have done anything but what he asked. He hadn’t taken her, she had given herself to him. All of herself, in a way she never had, nor ever thought she would want to. That he had, despite the power he had over her, been so careful of her too, made it somehow much worse. That she had not wanted him to be careful, that she had for one wild, fierce moment, wanted to court the consequences, frightened her.
It was as if the whole day had been a peeling back of all her layers culminating in this revelation, the core of her, the lonely inner self. Cordelia jumped to her feet, suddenly appalled at what she had done. Her dressing gown was at the top of her trunk. Pale-yellow silk embroidered with flowers, it was masculine in cut, with straight sleeves and a collar. It was one of her favourite pieces of clothing. She tightened the belt, turning to find Iain on his feet, his expression troubled.
‘I’m sorry that was so— We got carried away. I am not usually so...’ He shrugged hopelessly. ‘I’m sorry, I thought it was what you wanted.’
‘I did,’ she said shortly, unwilling, unable to lie. She had never been the type of woman to take pleasure in making a man feel guilty.
‘Then what’s wrong?’
‘I’m tired. I have to leave early.’
‘Don’t lie to me, Cordelia, and don’t think you have to pander to my ego either. If it didn’t work for you—though if it did not, you’re a bloody good actress.’
‘It did.’ Now she was embarrassed. After all that. She would not think of all that. Cordelia began to pick up her clothes.
Iain was already wearing his trousers, pulling on his shirt. ‘Then what is it? And don’t give me the line about being tired.’
Don’t give me the line. His accent was rougher, the Lowland gruffness taking front stage. She couldn’t think what to say. I can’t believe I did that, would give him the wrong impression, though it would certainly help get him out the door, and getting him out the door was what she needed more than anything.
Whatever he read in her face, it made him look grim. Iain picked up his coat and pulled it on, stuffing his stock into the pocket. ‘So you’ve had your bit of rough, and now you want to be alone, is that it?’
‘No! What an appalling thing to say.’
He ignored her, pulling on his shoes.
‘Iain, that’s not it.’
‘Then what?’
Fully dressed, he looked intimidating. There was a wild look in his eye that made her think of some of the Highlanders she had seen. Cordelia ran her hand through her tangled hair, coming up with a ball of fluff and a splinter of floorboard. ‘It was too much,’ she admitted.
‘Are you sorry?’
‘No.’
The answer was out without needing to think. Iain sighed heavily, but he managed a lopsided smile. ‘I’m not sorry either, but my head’s reeling, if you must know. You’re not the only one to find it all a bit much.’
His honesty disarmed her. ‘It has been a very strange day,’ she said with a faint smile. ‘Extraordinary.’
‘Cordelia.’
He touched her temple, just as he had on the docks. This time, she had to fight the impulse to pull away, for she was fairly certain he could read her thoughts.
‘I hope whichever direction you take, it makes you happier,’ he said.
‘Oh, I’m not unhappy.’
‘I told you not to lie,’ he said gently. ‘I know you don’t want to hear from me again, but if there should be anything you need me for, here’s where you can find me. You understand, I would not expect you to deal with any consequences alone.’
He handed her a card.
‘Thank you,’ Cordelia said, ‘but I am sure...’
‘I mean it.’
‘I know.’
‘That’s something,’ he said. ‘Goodbye, Cordelia.’
He did not touch her. She felt an absurd, contrary desire that he would kiss her. ‘Goodbye.’ She touched his temple, echoing his own gesture. ‘I hope whichever direction you take, it makes you happier too.’
He acknowledged this admission of her own state of mind with a nod. Then he turned and walked through the door. She stood where she was. The outer door opened softly, then closed. She went to the window, pulling the curtains to hide her, and looked out. The lamps were lit around the square. He emerged a few minutes later, through the main hotel entrance. She could not imagine what the night porter must have thought, and did not care. She thought he would stop, look up, even though she was careful not to let him see her, but he did not. He pulled his coat around him, and headed across the square, in the direction of the river, without looking back.
Chapter Three
Cavendish Square, London—spring 1837
Iain’s hands automatically went round the woman to stop the pair of them falling. His body recognised her before his mind caught up, before even he had a glimpse of her face, which was burrowed into his chest. ‘Cordelia.’
Blue-grey eyes, wide with the shock, met his. Her hand went to her mouth, as if to push back the words, and he remembered that same gesture, self-silencing, only the last time it had been a cry of ecstasy she had stifled after he’d warned her about the walls of the hotel being thin. Her legs had been wrapped around his waist. The hair that was now so demurely curled and primped under her bonnet had been streaming in wild disarray over her shoulders on to the floorboards. Now, she was struggling to free herself. He let her go, but blocked the doorway, a firm shake of his head telling her he’d read her thoughts. Not a chance, he told her. She glared at him, but retreated into the room.
‘Mr Hunter. You are a tad early.’
Lord Henry Armstrong held out his hand. Iain took it automatically, his mind racing. ‘Five minutes at most,’ he replied. ‘Am I interrupting?’
It was a rhetorical question, for the atmosphere in the room was tense. The muffled sound of heated words had been audible in the hallway as he handed over his hat and gloves. And now he looked at her properly, Cordelia’s bonnet was askew, her shawl dangling from one arm. Not, it seemed, escaping his arrival, but running from the man who claimed to be her father.
The man who was now bestowing upon him a smile which Iain found peculiarly irritating. Condescending. Patronising. Mendacious. One or all, it aroused all his base instincts, and made him want to punch something.
‘Cordelia,’ said his lordship, ‘this is Mr Iain Hunter.’
It was the mute appeal in her eyes that kept him silent. Lady Cordelia, whom he knew as the widow, Mrs Cordelia Williamson, was obviously eager that her father should remain in ignorance of their previous acquaintance. Her father! Iain bent over the hand she extended and just touched her fingertips. The eyes were indeed the same colour as Lord Armstrong’s, but he could discern no other resemblance.
‘Do sit down, Mr Hunter. And you, Cordelia.’
When he spoke to his daughter, there was a steeliness that made Iain’s hackles rise. ‘I came here to discuss business,’ he said. ‘I don’t see that is any concern of your—your—Lady Cordelia’s.’
Lord Armstrong laughed, a dry little sound like paper rustling. ‘Take a seat, Mr Hunter, and I’ll explain,’ he said, taking his own seat behind the desk.
Iain paid him no heed. Cordelia stood poised for flight, but he was damned if he’d let her go without an explanation. ‘You’ll take the weight off your feet, Mrs—Lady Cordelia,’ he said, pressing her down firmly into one of the uncomfortable-looking chairs, pulling the other closer to her, stretching out a leg casually in front of hers, just to make his message clear. She threw him a look, but he was pretty certain it was because she resented his managing her, rather than any desire to flee.
‘Mr Hunter,’ Lord Armstrong said, addressing his daughter, ‘is hoping to win a contract to build steam ships for Sheikh al-Muhanna.’
‘Celia’s husband!’ From the tone of her voice, this was news to Cordelia. ‘You mean the prince has entrusted you to award a contract to build ships on his behalf?’ she demanded of her father.
‘As you would know, if you were au fait with family matters,’ Lord Armstrong replied pointedly, ‘my son-in-law is very ambitious for his principality. It is not simply a matter of building ships, he wishes the skills to be passed on to his own people. Since it is a well-known fact that England is at the forefront of the industry...’
‘I think you’ll find that it’s Scotland, actually. The Clyde to be more specific,’ Iain interjected.
‘Yes, yes, we are all one country,’ Lord Armstrong said with a condescending smile.
‘Aye, when it suits you.’
‘As you say.’
His lordship took a visible breath. His daughter—hell and damnation, that woman was Lord Armstrong’s daughter!—sat quite still, ramrod straight, only the nervous tapping of her little boot at the hem of her gown giving her away.
‘The long and the short of it is,’ Iain said, addressing Cordelia directly, ‘I’ve the best people for the job, and I build the best ships, so his lordship here is going to grease the diplomatic wheels and jump through all the hoops of permissions and licences on my behalf. Not to put too fine a point on it, unless I have him on my side to tell me which pockets should be lined and which pieces of paper must be signed, it doesn’t matter how good my ships are, they will never be built. In return for these valuable services, your father will get a hefty fee. Isn’t that right, Lord Armstrong?’
Cordelia’s response to this straightforward speech was, to Iain’s relief, one of glee. Lord Armstrong, who should have been put firmly in his place, had the look of a cat about to pounce.
‘Not quite right, Mr Hunter,’ he said. ‘My terms have changed.’
‘I’m not giving you any more money.’
His lordship smiled. ‘I don’t want any of your money.’
The hairs on Iain’s neck stood on end, for that smile was the very opposite of benign, whatever that was. Malign? ‘You were keen enough to take it when we first talked.’
‘Since we first talked, Mr Hunter, my circumstances have changed.’
‘Be that as it may, your circumstances have nothing to do with me.’
‘On the contrary,’ Lord Armstrong said. ‘In fact, I hope that in the future our circumstances will be very much—entwined.’
Iain was now thoroughly rattled. ‘I’m a plain-talking man, and I’m a plain-dealing one too. I’m not interested in playing games, your lordship, just name your price.’
‘My daughter, Mr Hunter, is my price. I wish you to ally yourself with my daughter.’
* * *
Cordelia’s jaw actually dropped. It was no consolation at all to see that Iain’s did the same.
Her father took advantage of their stunned silence to inform Iain of the excellent bargain he would be making. ‘Now, I accept that Cordelia here may not be as young as you would wish,’ he said, ‘but she comes from excellent breeding stock and her lineage, Mr Hunter, unlike yours, is impeccable.’
As if she were a prize ewe past her prime! Cordelia felt her mouth drop further. Just when she thought she had his measure, her father surprised her. Really, he quite took her breath away. A bubble of hysterical laughter threatened to escape. She made a choking sound, quickly muffling it with her hand.
