Claimed by the Laird (18 page)

She was floating, the sound of the sea soft about her, the waves of pleasure still beating through her body. She half opened her eyes. Lucas was holding her, cradling her in his arms, his mouth pressed to her hair. She felt wonderfully cherished and almost satisfied. But she doubted that he was. Smiling a little, she slid a hand down his body and curled it around the long, hard length of him, hearing him suck in a breath.

“Please,” she said.

Gently he rearranged her so that she was propped against the high back of the sofa, lying back against a pile of cushions, her bottom on the edge of the seat. Her body was still thrumming with the lovely lambent afterglow, but she felt a new need now, more urgent, pulsating through her. Lucas pushed her thighs apart and knelt between them. She lay back, feeling exposed and suddenly nervous, aware of how she must look, her breasts flushed, her limbs tumbled. He spread her wider and she trembled.

With one plunge of his hips he buried himself inside her. She was tight from before, and the shock of it had her gasping with sheer need. Her body closed about him and she felt him surge into her, over and over, the powerful rhythm of it lifting her up, driving her hard back against the cushions, her hands braced at her sides, her body arched as she took each thrust. He cupped her head and drew her forward for his kiss and it was as fierce and tender and demanding as the pulse of his body in hers. He held her by the waist so that he could caress her breasts with his lips and tongue, and she felt the pleasure start to expand again and light up and fill her. Heat and light and love and need and Lucas... Her body clenched hard, taking her by surprise, so much sharper this time, spasm upon spasm of bliss. She was conscious of Lucas pulling out of her, of his own shout of pleasure, and then he was wrapping her in his arms and she was sliding down into the darkness, held close against his heart.

When she woke, she was warm and sleepy and wrapped in blankets. She was also alone. For one terrible moment, she thought that Lucas had simply dressed and left, and her heart shriveled and cold struck through her body. Then she saw a glimmer of light in the open doorway of the Round House, a flare of orange against the darkening blue of the sky outside. Evidently Lucas had collected some driftwood and built a fire.

Christina wrapped the blanket around her and walked barefoot over the floor to the doorway. Lucas was sitting staring out across the sea. His expression was somber and her heart missed a beat.

He regrets what we have done.

She did not. It surprised her, but this time she had no regrets at all. She felt light and happy and satisfied, and for once her mind simply refused to grapple with the consequences or implications of her actions.

Lucas got to his feet when he saw her. He came across and took her hand.

“Are you all right?” he said. He drew her down to sit on the stone beside him and did not let go of her hand. The fire was warm; it held at bay the cool of the evening as night started to fall over the sea.

“Yes,” Christina said. “Thank you,” she added, and saw him smile. He pressed a kiss to the palm of her hand.

“You are so polite,” he murmured. “So very well-bred.”

“Not really,” Christina said. “Not at all.” She hesitated. Perhaps she was wrong to pursue this. Perhaps she should just let matters be, ask no questions. But she disliked pretense and she could see no way forward now if they were not honest with one another.

“I am not sure what to do now,” she admitted with painful honesty.

Lucas smiled. His gaze had been on their entwined fingers. Now it came up to her face. “Neither am I,” he said.

“You’ve never had an affair with your employer before?” Christina asked, and saw the black of his eyes turn as hard as obsidian.

“I don’t have affairs.” He sounded curt. He threw another branch on the fire, and it snapped and hissed as the flame caught it. “My parents’ example taught me not to take such matters lightly.”

“Of course,” Christina said. The smile had died from Lucas’s eyes and something dark and hard took its place. He got up and moved a little away from her. Nothing could have emphasized more his separation from her, his rejection of intimacy. She felt emptiness yawn inside her.

“I told you that my mother bore me out of wedlock,” Lucas said. “I was aware from the youngest age that I was different, shameful in some way, an outsider. I hated my father for the way that he behaved. I still hate him, even though he is long dead.”

Christina felt another pang of shock, and hard on its heels a swift rush of empathy. Perhaps his mother had been a servant girl seduced by her employer, or a woman betrayed by the man she loved. In the end it did not really matter; her shame, her unhappiness had evidently scarred Lucas deeply. Christina had no idea what it would be like to be born not having a place in the world, but she knew that people could be cruel. Lucas had survived the stigma of his illegitimacy, but it would not be something he would forget or treat lightly.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “It must have been wretched for you. I am so very sorry.”

“It was more wretched for my mother,” Lucas said. “I do not believe she ever recovered from his desertion.” He looked up. In the firelight his face was illuminated in hard lines and dark shadows. “I don’t want to make my father’s mistakes,” he said. “I don’t want to be like him, weak and cowardly, siring a bastard out of marriage and abandoning its mother.”

“I can’t imagine you ever doing such a thing,” Christina said. She could sense the anger in him but also the determination; he would never be a man to abandon the woman he loved. For a moment she felt a huge pang of loss to think of the woman who would win Lucas’s love. That would be a love worth fighting for, full of tenderness and loyalty and respect. Except she wondered if Lucas was capable of such a love, if he would ever take that risk.

She wanted to reach out to him, but there was something about him that forbade it, something cold and self-reliant. She remembered the occasions on which she had tried to reach him, offering him her help, and he had rejected it. Experience had taught him to trust no one, to accept comfort from no one. Even so, she felt a little chilled by the distance between them. Not long ago they had been as close as it was possible to be. Now she could feel a chasm yawning.

“You should marry,” she said impulsively. “You have cut yourself off from all human comfort. It cannot be good for you.” And even as she said it she felt a jealousy and possessiveness that she knew she had no right to feel.

Lucas’s smile was so tender that her heart turned over. “I do believe that once again you are trying to help me.”

“I’m sorry,” Christina said.

“Don’t be,” Lucas said. “It is one of the nicest things about you, Lady Christina. You are so generous.”

It should have made her happy, but instead Christina felt a pang that was close to despair. She was angry with herself for thinking that it would be different this time. Nothing had changed in their situation since the night in the cottage. Lucas was still a servant; she was still behaving in a way that was reprehensible and wrong. Yet one thing
had
changed. She knew she loved him, and that made the situation all the more impossible.

This is not good enough,
she thought suddenly.
I want more than this. I do not want stolen meetings and to skulk around as though I am ashamed.

But there was no way in which she could have more. There was nothing for her here.

The firelight shimmered before her eyes. “I must go,” she said. “I need to be back before dinner.” She stood up.

“Wait,” Lucas said, and despite herself, despite knowing that they were back on formal terms, employer to servant, Christina felt a jolt of anticipation. She looked at him. There was a quizzical look in his eyes. Then he smiled at her, the sort of smile this time that sent quite a different reaction skittering down her spine.

“There is something I want to know,” he said. “I want to know how you lost your virginity.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

L
UCAS
FULLY
EXPECTED
Christina to tell him to mind his own damned business. He had put a distance between them, withdrawing from her, telling her as clearly as though he had used the words that he did not want intimacy, that he could offer her nothing. Yet despite that, he did not want to let her go. He needed her; he felt an urgent desire to keep her with him, to delay her when he knew she should be gone, back to the castle, back to her family, back to a life in which she played no part.

He looked at her. Her hair was loose about her shoulders, a rich auburn-brown tousle in the firelight. She was so beautiful, her face serene in repose, her blue eyes so honest and her skin so creamy smooth he ached to touch her again. There was a scattering of freckles across her shoulders. He wanted to kiss them, to kiss her, to feel that lush mouth against his. His body tightened simply at the thought.

“I’m not sure that is an appropriate topic for discussion,” Christina finally said.

She looked at him, then smiled, a smile that was part shy and part wanton, and the lust kicked him hard, and at the same time he felt his heart twist with emotion. He cared about Christina. She was too special, too lovely, not to care about. It felt strange and unfamiliar to acknowledge his emotions; he was not sure how he felt about them, but he was not going to deny them. There was no point in self-deception. He wanted Christina and he needed her and he had not the first idea in hell what he was going to do about it.

“You’re right,” Lucas said. He put out a hand and pulled her down beside him, pressing his lips to the sweet hollow of her throat. “It is perfectly appropriate to make love,” he murmured against her skin, “but we simply must
not
talk about it.”

She laughed but there was a hint of uncertainty in it. “Lucas...”

“Yes?” He traced the freckles on her shoulder with his tongue. He could not help himself. He needed to touch her.

“It
isn’t
appropriate, is it?” She eased away from him, drawing her knees up to her chest, resting her chin on them. Suddenly she looked young and afraid and it made his heart turn over. “It isn’t appropriate for us to make love.”

“It feels right to me,” Lucas said truthfully. On impulse he reached out and drew her back into the curve of his arm. It felt good to have her there. He felt good and whole and complete.

“It does to me, too.” She looked puzzled. She reached up to kiss him, a little tentatively, a brush of the lips that had him wanting more. “I don’t want this to end,” she said. “I tried. Truly I did. I know you did, too. But...”

“Then don’t think about it.” He pulled her to him and kissed her for a third time, the rush of desire between them instantaneous as wildfire. Lucas knew he should tell her the truth about himself, now, immediately, before any more damage was done, but here, now, in the quiet of the Round House with the wash of the sea against the rocks below and Christina in his arms, he felt the first peace he had known since Peter’s death. Later, he thought as he lost himself in the kiss. Later he would tell her everything, explain everything.

“I used to think that I was wanton for desiring such things,” she said softly, her hand sliding beneath his shirt to find the warm skin beneath, “but now I can only believe that something that feels so right cannot be wrong.” She frowned slightly. “I wonder if it is always as good as that? Somehow I doubt it can be.”

“No,” Lucas said truthfully. “It isn’t.” He smiled at her seriousness. “It’s seldom as good as that.”

She laughed. “I thought you did not make a practice of this?”

“I never said I had always lived as a monk,” Lucas said mildly. “When I was young I too was curious and hot-blooded.”

“And now that you are older,” Christina teased, “matters are quite different.”

Lucas tangled a hand in her hair, savoring the soft satin of it as it slid between his fingers. Tilting her head up, he kissed her again, running his tongue over her lower lip, sliding it inside her mouth. He deepened the kiss, feeling a shock of pure need that cut as fiercely as a knife blade. She tasted sweet and hot and he could think of nothing but how much he wanted her.

“Oh.” Her voice was little more than a sigh. “I know I should not do this again, but it feels so very good....”

Lucas swallowed hard. Her open enjoyment made him feel as though he could conquer the world. “I am glad,” he said. “Glad that you liked it.” His voice was a little rough. The fire felt hot.

She traced lazy patterns over his chest even as they kissed. Her hand slid lower, over the flat planes of his stomach, and he felt a quiver of response. She nipped gently at his throat, his shoulder, the hollow beneath his ear, and he shut his eyes and let the sensations flow through him, without thought now, simply feeling. It was exhilarating to abandon himself to seduction. She was flicking her tongue over his chest now, tasting him, exploring his body with an innocent sort of boldness and pleasure that was intensely arousing. He reached for her, but she slid down his body, frustrating his attempts to hold her, shedding his clothes as she went. The slight clumsiness of it only served to make his heart ache all the more and stoke his arousal higher at the same time. Her lips and tongue danced across his stomach and brushed his thigh with inquisitive enjoyment, and he groaned and tried to roll her beneath him, but she turned the tables and straddled him, sliding back up his body, rubbing sinuously against him.

His breathing was unsteady. He could not control it, nor the urgency with which he pulled her head down to his, tangling his hand in her hair as her mouth came down on his. Her body slid over his, and down, sheathing him, so hot and so tight that he would have shouted aloud had she not been kissing him. He gasped, arching up into her and tempted beyond endurance.

He rolled her over so at last he could take her as he wanted, plunging into her, filled by the taste of her, driving them both on until there was nothing but the whirl of sensation and desire. But suddenly he did not want this impatience, this greed. He wanted to bank down the passion that blazed between them and give them time. His hands slowed. He moved with a leisurely pleasure that had her murmuring broken pleas for satisfaction. There was tenderness with a sharp edge of desire and gentleness that still aroused. He explored her the way he had always wanted to do, learning each curve and contour of her body, each dip and hollow. She moved with him and against him, and for the first time in his life he allowed himself to surrender completely to the need he had for a woman, this woman, body and soul. He felt her body shatter with pleasure and she arched beneath him, crying out his name. Still he moved with the same deliberate control, feeling her quicken again, her body sheened golden in the firelight, her skin flushed with passion. He kissed her and felt her body grasp him, and this time he allowed himself to fall, too, into the shuddering relief of fulfillment. He had known that taking her again would make no difference to his hunger for her. If anything it was more acute each time he touched her. He pulled her close, resting his cheek against hers, breathing hard.

He did not know how long it was before he stirred again. He felt no need to move, no need to think. He had drawn the blankets over them and they were lying entwined in the warmth and light of the fire, and he would have been happy to stay like that forever. The sense of peace inside him had strengthened. So had the sense of belonging, as though he was bound fast to this woman and never wanted to let her go. It should have frightened him, yet it did not. It felt entirely right.

When he opened his eyes, hers were already open and she was looking at him.

“You asked me a question,” she said. Her palm was flat against his chest. “Do you want to know the answer?” She was hesitating, blushing. She did not meet his gaze. All he could see was the downward curve of her lashes against her cheek.

“Yes.” He shifted her more comfortably into the crook of his arm. He remembered that he had wanted to know how she had lost her virginity because he was certain that it was connected in some way to the one thing that she had never talked about, the one thing she pushed away—her mother’s death, her broken betrothal and the sacrifice of her future for her family and her clan.

“It’s true that I have had a lover before.” The look she gave him was sweet and shamefaced, full of defiance, exactly like the innocent virgin she was not. “But you knew that from the first, didn’t you?”

“I guessed,” Lucas said. He pressed his lips to the top of her head.

Christina’s blush had deepened. “No one expects virginity in a man. But in the unmarried daughter of a duke...” She let the sentence fade away.

“Society has double standards,” Lucas said, “as well as unreasonable expectations of women.” He shrugged. “Half of the human race joins without the blessing of marriage. No one knows that better than I. Women have needs and desires the same as men do.”

She tilted up her head so that her blue gaze scanned his face thoughtfully. “That is a very enlightened attitude,” she said drily. “Especially for a man.”

“I don’t judge,” Lucas said. He spread his hands. “How could I? I am a bastard, the child of an unmarried mother. And—” he smiled, wanting her to understand, wanting her to know he meant what he said “—it does not make you any less special, Christina. It does not make you any less
you
. All our experiences make us the people we are. And you are very lovely.”

Her eyes lit up like stars and he felt a huge thump of emotion literally knock the breath out of him.
Hell.
He was losing his detachment, losing
himself
in his feelings for her, and he was not sure he even minded.

“Thank you,” she said simply. “You said you had guessed,” she added. “How did you know I had had a lover?”

“From your kiss, I think,” Lucas said. “You responded like a woman who had been kissed before.”

“Kissing is one thing.” She sounded rueful. “Any number of debutantes will steal a kiss from a beau. Making love is another matter. That is the line over which we are not supposed to step.”

“But you did?” Lucas asked.

She sat up, wrapping one of the blankets around her, and placed some more twigs on the fire. She did it neatly, without fuss. Lucas realized that he liked that in her, that lack of fuss. It was just one of the many things he found so appealing about her.

“I was betrothed,” she said with the same matter-of-fact honesty she always gave him. “I was young, curious...” Her shoulders lifted in a sort of humorous half shrug as though she was deploring the impatience of her girlish self. “We were soon to wed so I thought it could do no harm.”

Lucas was thinking of his mother. She had been young, too, and passionate, careless of the consequences of her actions. She had loved his father; she had told him so. It was just a pity she had trusted him.

“Did you love him?” he asked.

Regret shadowed Christina’s gaze, and it was so vivid it made his heart miss a beat. “Yes,” she said simply. “I loved him with all my heart, with everything that was in me. I was young and I had nothing to compare it with, nothing to prepare me.” She broke off. “He was handsome, and young, and I found him very pleasing.” The firelight illuminated her smile. It was a little secret smile that made Lucas’s heart pound with jealousy. “And I wanted to know what sex was like.” She traced a pattern on the rock with her fingers and avoided his eyes. “I was in love with lust as well as with him,” she said after a moment. “We met as often as we could. My mama was sick and she was a lax chaperone. I regret that I took advantage of her sickness to do as I pleased, but I imagined that I would soon be wed.” She hesitated. “I thought nothing could happen to alter that. I did not realize how easily life can change, in an instant, everything—” she snapped her fingers “—blown away.”

“What happened?” Lucas asked.

She shifted and her gaze slid away from his. For the first time he had the sense of something painful that she was holding back.

“My father broke my betrothal,” Christina said. Her voice was colorless now. “My mother died and he decided he needed me to help care for the younger children. They had nursemaids and governesses and tutors but it was not enough. They needed the love of a mother.”

“Which you provided.” Lucas could feel his anger catch and burn. “Why could he not provide the love you all needed?” he demanded. “Why not remarry if he wanted a wife and mother?”

Christina made a slight gesture. “Papa was not really capable—”

“Of loving anyone other than himself?” Lucas said.

“I was going to say capable of coping,” Christina said. “He never could care for himself, or for anyone else.”

“So he took your dream of marriage and broke that instead.” Lucas’s fury was so intense he had to make a conscious effort to keep his voice quiet. “And your betrothed?” he said. “What did he do?”

“He didn’t fight for me, if that is what you mean.” Again her tone was dry and he liked her for that tartness, that refusal to show self-pity. “He told me I had to abide by my father’s wishes, and then he went to London and married an heiress with sixty thousand pounds. It was then I recognized that I had wasted my love on a man who did not deserve it.”

“He was a worthless scoundrel,” Lucas said.

He wanted to find her spineless fiancé and kick his teeth in. He wanted to punch the coward who had been happy to take Christina MacMorlan’s virginity but who, when it came to the point, was not man enough to claim her for his own.

Claim her...

His body tightened with a blinding wave of possessiveness and lust.

Christina MacMorlan was his to claim now, and he would not let her go. She was his in every way that mattered.

It felt as though she had wrapped herself about his heart.

The thought was terrifying, and yet at the same time, instinctively, in the very depths of his soul, he knew it was right, inescapable, destiny.

“I am sorry,” he said.

She smiled, but it did not reach her eyes. “I was unprepared, I suppose,” she said. “These things hit you harder when you have no experience to help soften the blow. When I loved I never held anything back. It was a mistake.”