Alice arose with a disheartened sigh. She stared down. Jonathan Hargrave’s eyes were shining more than fever-bright. A smile curved his lips.
“Lady Alice?” he murmured, his voice filled with expectation.
How could she tell him that her kisses had been a mere experiment, one that had failed miserably?
“Go back to sleep, Captain.” She turned and fled.
Her cheeks burned as she ran through the cold, dark night. One quickening of her pulses, one sign of weakness in her legs, one quiver, one ache deep inside—was that so much to ask? That’s all she’d wanted from the captain’s kisses. But she’d felt nothing. Oh, her face felt hot all right, but only with embarrassment. What must the man think of her?
Now, unfortunately, she had her answer to the question that had been gnawing at her all evening. Just any man’s kiss could not enflame her. It was Christopher Gunn’s embrace she longed for whether she’d been willing to admit it to herself or not.
In her haste she never saw the dark figure lurking in the shadows. He stepped out from hiding and she ran full-tilt into him. He was as solid as a brick wall. Alice cried out, but a hand covered her mouth to silence her scream. A strong arm closed around her.
“I was a fool,” a deep, angry voice said into her ear. “A damn fool! I know I’ve lost, but even the loser deserves a consolation prize. One last kiss and then I’ll leave you be.”
Before Alice could respond, Christopher Gunn’s hot, demanding mouth covered hers. She went weak in his arms as his lips moved over hers—caressing at first, then becoming more forceful. Not even conscious of what she was doing, she let her arms slip inside his cloak. Her fingers clutched at his back. Urged on in such a manner, Gunn slid one hand to her breast. Alice moaned against his mouth as new fire singed her soul. She leaned into his body, sure that her legs would give way at any moment.
This was a kiss! This was a man—the only man she wanted.
Abruptly he released her.
“Good-bye, Lady Alice. I hope you and your captain will have a long, happy life together.”
Alice was too stunned by his words to answer. By the time she found her voice, Gunn was gone.
The cold, dark trek to his cabin did little to relieve the ache in Gunn’s groin. Damn, how he wanted her! He realized now that he’d punished himself more than Alice with that final kiss. He tried to force her image and the taste of her lips from his mind.
“Ishani,” he said. “She’ll be waiting for me, wanting me. It’s high time I made the girl feel at home. What do I need with a delicate English lady?”
Gunn forced his thoughts away from Alice, but the Ishani dilemma did little to ease his mind. She was beautiful, spirited, passionate, and more than willing to be his woman. But she was neither a woman nor his and therein lay the problem. Ishani was the headstrong thirteen-year-old daughter of Chief Madockawando and betrothed to a hot-headed but powerful and important brave named Scarappi.
Although Gunn had played no part in taking Ishani from her people or moving her into his cabin, it seemed she was now his responsibility. She’d burst in upon him two nights before, announcing that she had decided to be “Gunn’s woman.” What, if anything, she’d told her people before leaving the tribe, he had no idea. Her explanation to him was that since her older sister would soon wed Baron de Saint Castin, the Frenchman, Ishani had decided she would wed Gunn, the Britisher. Now he had to find a way to return Ishani to her people without shaming her or starting a war.
“Simple as that,” he muttered aloud.
When he arrived home, Ishani was there. The Abenaki maiden ran to him, throwing herself into his arms.
“Oh, Gunn, you come back!” she cried. “I thought you went away for good. But you want Ishani. You come back to Ishani.”
Her dark eyes pleading, her long dark hair swinging about her breasts, Ishani took his hand, trying to tug him toward the bed, but Gunn shook his head. He wanted a woman. He ached for a woman. But the only woman who could satisfy him was Alice. This pretty child was only playing at being in love.
He slumped in a chair.
“I need to be alone to think. Go on to bed, Ishani.”
For a long time he sat staring into the fire, trying to concentrate, but his mind wandered back to the sight of Alice kissing Jonathan Hargrave. He became so engrossed in his own anger and frustration that he never heard Ishani weeping softly into her pillow.
Alice climbed into bed, still feeling stunned. She wanted Christopher Gunn—wanted him more than she could ever have believed she’d want any man. But to her dismay she realized that his kiss had been one of farewell. Where was he going and why had he left her? She felt truly alone.
She lay awake far into the night, trying to figure it all out. Lord Geoffrey had always known what was best for her. Why hadn’t she trusted his instincts this time?
“Never mind,” she told herself at last. “Tomorrow I’ll set things right.”
As she drifted off to sleep, she could still taste Gunn’s kisses, still feel the aching pleasure of his hands gently kneading her breasts. She sighed and smiled. She had made up her mind. She would honor Lord Geoffrey’s wishes.
A
lice awoke with the sun next morning, feeling her usual cheerful self. All her optimism, all her hopes for the future were once again shining bright.
She ran to the window slit and flung back the deerhide curtain. The yard looked frosty white this early, with the rising sun adding a shimmering rosy hue to everything in sight. She took a deep, invigorating breath. The cold air smelled of salt and sea and pine, a delicious potpourri.
Going to Pegeen’s cot, she shook the girl awake. “Get up, you lazy thing. I need your help getting ready.”
The bleary-eyed servant squinted up at her mistress through a riot of dark, tousled hair. “Ready, mum? For what? Where are we going?”
“Possibly to my wedding,” Alice announced. “You see, I’ve decided Mr. Gunn isn’t so bad a bargain after all.”
“Oh, Lady Alice,” Pegeen cooed, “what a fine man that one is!”
Alice smacked Peg’s round bottom playfully. “On that we both agree. Now, move your Irish arse, girl.”
While Peg heated water in a black kettle hung on a spider over the fire, Alice opened one of her trunks, searching for just the right thing. She’d decided it was high time she left off wearing her dreary mourning duds.
“Not too fussy,” she said to herself. “But it must look elegant. Ah, here’s the very thing.”
The gown of rust-colored damask, etched with a delicate design in a purplish rose and olive, featured a wide falling band at the shoulders, bordered in white Buckinghamshire lace. The overskirt was drawn dramatically toward the back to give an enticing hint of underskirt peeking from beneath the long lace apron. Full sleeves belled out, the cuffs dripping more of the delicate lace. With this costume Alice would wear the parure of rubies and pearls that had been one of Lord Geoffrey’s many gifts to her.
“Oh, mum,” Pegeen said, sighing, “that’s a proper wedding gown, indeed.”
“Well, don’t just stand there gawking, girl, help me bathe and get into it. I have to be ready by the time my groom arrives.”
Chris Gunn was in no hurry to get back to the fort that morning. He awoke stiff and aching from spending the night in his chair. The cabin was cold and Ishani was still fast asleep.
He got up and threw more birch logs on the fire, poured water into the pot, and cut a large hunk of dried pumpkin with his hunting knife. Moving aimlessly about the cabin, he ate as he went, his mind working all the while.
He kept remembering the sight of Alice leaning down to kiss Jonathan Hargrave. The act had seemed defiant to him. Maybe she had known that he was there in the shadows, spying on the two of them. If so, she had put on quite a show for his benefit. Her kisses had been meant, he was sure, to cleanse the taint of his own lips from hers.
No woman had ever tossed him over for another man. “And Jonathan Hargrave, of all men,” he grumbled through a tough bite of pumpkin. “Damn his eyes!”
But what could he do? It seemed that Alice had made her choice. Hargrave was a solid, steady sort of fellow, but hardly a lady’s man. Not cast in the usual flamboyant mold of the sea captain, he was a plodder, a ponderer, a dullard to Gunn’s way of thinking. The very idea that such a man could steal a woman from him was almost more than Gunn could stomach. He had to do something, but what?
A thought struck him suddenly. What if Alice was only using Hargrave to make him jealous? Granted, she’d tried to make out that she hadn’t the slightest interest in either of them. Yet there was no mistaking her warm response to his own embraces. Gunn had held enough women to be able to recognize true desire. Was Alice only toying with him? He’d seen many women back in England play just such a game. Though he would never admit it to anyone, he’d fallen victim to such triangles more than once before.
“Well, two can play at this,” he said aloud, smiling to himself.
Drawing back the homespun curtain, Gunn peered in at Ishani. The girl lay sleeping in the rumpled bed of furs, her long, copper-colored legs stretched out and her straight, blue-black hair spilling over her shoulders. Asleep, she looked even younger than her tender years.
Gunn shook his head and smiled. “Imagine the little scamp running away, coming here and informing me she’s decided to be my woman. Well, it’s back home you go tomorrow, baby girl.”
He reached out and brushed aside her hair with one finger. Her eyes flickered up. She stared up at him for a moment, then moved over to make room for him, her smile an invitation.
“Ishani,” he whispered.
Her arms came up to circle his neck before he could say another word.
“Oh, Gunn, you come to me!” she cried excitedly.
“No, Ishani. There’s no time,” he told her. “First, we must talk, then I have something important to do this morning. I need your help. There’s an Englishwoman at the fort. I mean to make her my wife.”
Ishani’s eyes lost their glitter, but she brightened when Gunn went on.
“She’s giving me a hard time. There’s another man involved, you see. I want to pay her back in kind. Are you willing to help me?”
Ishani smiled and nodded eagerly. “Anything for you, Gunn.”
Dressed and ready, Alice sat at the tiny window of her room watching the gate of the fort. He would come, he had to, she kept telling herself. But so far Christopher Gunn had not shown himself.
Some of her self-assurance began to fade. She had planned so carefully what she would do, how she would accept his offer of marriage without seeming to throw herself at him. That was not her way, after all.
“Where could he be?” Alice asked herself aloud, drumming her nails nervously on the windowsill.
“Could be he set out trapping already, mum.”
Alice gave Pegeen an annoyed glance. She hadn’t expected an answer to her question, and she had certainly not wanted that one.
“He’ll come,” she assured herself as much as her serving girl.
While Alice watched, the fort came alive. The guard changed with a great deal of pomp and ceremony. Fresh soldiers dressed in smart red coats replaced those who had stood watch on the walls all through the night. The blacksmith set about stoking his fires, then shoed his first horse of the day. The gates opened, allowing a detail of six men to leave the fort. By the carts they pulled, Alice guessed that they must be going to the forest to replenish the fuel supply. The one odd thing about the whole scene before her was the complete absence of women. How strange it seemed to see only men in a world all their own. More than one of them glanced toward Alice’s window as she sat watching.
As the morning sun rose higher, Alice’s hopes waned. She stared down at her finery and sighed. Perhaps she’d misjudged Gunn. Had he been only teasing her yesterday? Had their shared kisses been no more to him than a bit of sport? No! She refused to believe that. He had moved her deeply. Surely he had felt something as well.
A bugle call pierced the cold morning air, bringing Alice’s attention back to the parade ground. Holding her breath, she watched the heavy gates swing open. She rose slowly, her heart thundering in her breast as she saw him enter.
Gunn was mounted on a great, black stallion—a fiery-eyed beast that she was certain no other human being could have ridden. He sat tall and straight on the bare back of his mount as the devil-horse stepped high and proud. The pair looked more centaur than horse and rider.
“It’s himself,” Pegeen said in an awed whisper.
“It is, indeed.” Alice rose, starting for the door. “I’ll go now and greet my intended.”
Gunn scanned the yard for her the minute he entered. He knew she wouldn’t be there among all the men, but he guessed that she would come out when she saw the flurry of excitement his entrance created. He’d planned to create a scene for Alice’s benefit alone. It wasn’t often that he donned the special costume of an Abenaki warrior, a gift from Baron de Saint Castin on the day Gunn saved the Frenchman’s life and the two men had become blood brothers. Nor had he brought Ishani to the fort since she’d arrived, proclaiming herself “Gunn’s woman.” He hadn’t wanted to expose the girl to the woman-hungry stares of the men.
This morning was different, however. This morning was special. There was a certain young woman who needed to see that she was not the only female in his life. She needn’t know that he was planning to return Ishani to her people as soon as he could persuade her that it was the right thing to do.
Not giving the slightest sign that he was looking for her, holding his head rigid and seeming to stare straight ahead, Gunn let his eyes dart from side to side, as watchful as a fox. He spied Alice’s door open a crack. A moment later a bright skirt caught the sunlight. Gunn reined in his big horse and waited.
Although Alice felt like running to him, she tried to maintain some manner of decorum, even in her excitement. How could she have been so mistaken about him when she arrived? He was by far the most handsome, most exciting man she had ever seen in her life. There was something about the way he looked at her that made her feel as if his deep-green eyes were actually stroking her body. As for his kisses, no man had ever kissed her that way, certainly not her husband. She knew that even when they married, she would never have enough of Gunn. Her longing for him seemed almost sinful in its intensity, she thought with a delicious little shiver.
When the men of the fort closed in around Gunn, blocking her path, Alice gave up her ladylike posture to shoulder her way through the crowd.
“Let me pass,” she repeated time and again. The men begrudgingly gave way to her. She couldn’t imagine why they should all be so anxious to see Christopher Gunn, since he spent much of his time here at the fort.
Finally she stood within the inner circle, staring up, her blue eyes bright and shining in anticipation. The sight of him, towering over her, took her breath away. He was dressed like some heathen god, in leggings, breech-clout, and a long cape of the finest dressed white hide. The edge of his mantle was sewn in an intricate pattern of colored beads. A black fur sleeve covered one arm. When the sun came out of the clouds, Alice was forced to shield her eyes to continue looking at Gunn. Copper pendants dangled from his earlobes and a heavy breast-plate of the same metal made him glow as if with an inner fire. His long hair was bound on either side with deerhide thongs adorned with feathers.
“He’d pass for a proper savage,” Alice heard one of the men near her say.
“Aye, it’s a savage the man is,” another agreed. “None other would be friends with that bloodthirsty Frenchman.”
“There’s rewards to be had from consorting with the enemy,” the first man stated. “Just look at them fancy duds.”
The other man laughed. “Never mind the skins, furs, and feathers. I’ll take me the woman and thank you kindly.”
Alice blushed to her hairline. These men were no gentlemen to say such things about her within her hearing. She’d tell Gunn the moment they were alone so he’d put a stop to their loose talk once and for all.
Gunn swung down from his mount. Alice started toward him, but he seemed not to notice her. Instead of coming to greet her, he walked around his mount to take the reins of another horse that had followed close behind as he entered the fort.
Alice’s hand went to her throat and she gasped aloud. There on the second horse sat the most beautiful young woman she had ever seen—tall, slender, with hair like a raven’s wing and eyes like glowing onyx. She, like Gunn, wore a costume of white skins, but a length of European fabric served as her mantle. The pattern of the tartan was unmistakable to Alice—the forest-green and black with the thin red line of Clan Gunn. Her heart sank. This was a clear indication that the bond between Gunn and the lovely, dark-haired, copper-skinned creature was much closer than he’d led Alice to believe.
Now, when she most wanted to fade into the crowd and be lost from view, Gunn seemed to see Alice for the first time. She wanted to turn and run back to her room, but his commanding gaze riveted her to her spot. She watched, hardly daring to breathe, as he reached up, grasped his Indian maiden about the waist, and helped her dismount. Hand-in-hand, they walked toward Alice. Unconsciously she backed away a few steps.
“Lady Alice!” Gunn’s voice boomed over the silent crowd. The only other sound Alice heard was her own heart pounding. “May I present Ishani, princess of the Abenaki nation.”
Ishani, silent and unsmiling, stepped forward and offered Alice her hand. As their cool fingers touched, Ishani nodded and said, “’Ady A’ice, we’come.”
Alice looked to Gunn. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand her language.”
“She’s speaking English,” he assured her. “The Abenaki language has no sound for our letter ‘I,’ so they find it impossible to pronounce. Ishani bids you welcome, Lady Alice.”
A faint smile trembled on Alice’s lips. What was she supposed to say? She had no idea what the proper protocol was in this situation. As Lord Balfour’s wife, she had learned to greet British royalty, but she hadn’t the faintest notion how to deal with an Indian princess. She dropped a curtsy, smiled, and said, “Thank you, Princess Ishani.”
The dark-eyed girl, still unsmiling, glanced up at Gunn. For what seemed a very long time to Alice, they continued staring into each other’s eyes—so long in fact that she cleared her throat to regain their attention. Then Gunn nodded slightly to Ishani, who cast her gaze down for a moment. Alice watched her breasts rise and fall in a deep sigh. Finally Ishani bit her bottom lip, then looked directly at Alice. Her hand went to her night-black hair, and she drew out three shining feathers.
“I give. You take,” Ishani said simply.
A gasp went up from the crowd. Then a murmur of excitement passed from man to man.
“Damnedest thing I ever saw!” Alice heard one man exclaim.
Another added, “If he wasn’t a Scotsman through and through, I’d swear Gunn had the luck of the Irish.”
A third man groaned, “Me with a hard-on you couldn’t beat down with a stick and no one to tend to it, and he’s got two.”
Alice wondered vaguely, Two what?
When she accepted the three feathers from Ishani, a roar went up all around them. She glanced this way and that, then looked up at Gunn for some explanation. He was grinning broadly.