Once Upon a Tartan

Seven

To go by inches, to make no move until he was positive she desired him to make it was different… sweet, and precious in ways Tye did not want to examine too closely. He focused instead on Hester, on the rise and fall of her chest, on her fingers winnowing through his hair when he ran his nose down her sternum.

He’d neglected this before—he’d neglected a great deal having to do with her pleasure and her enjoyment of his attentions. Stupid of him to ignore such a lovely feast, to deny himself such pleasure.

In a single, slow caress, he shifted her clothing aside, baring one lovely, full breast. Hester closed her eyes and let her head fall back. Tye took it for an invitation and closed his mouth over her pink, ruched nipple.

“Oh, Tiberius.”

He’d never heard his name spoken in such voluptuous tones. When he drew on her gently with his mouth, she groaned and arched toward him.

She might not have the words to make intimate demands on him, but her body was eloquent with need. Hester sighed, she squirmed, she pulled his hair, and more than once, Tye felt a wool sock stroking over his bare arse. Before she could drive him to utter madness, he rose up and kissed her mouth again.

She’d caught the more languorous rhythm of his lovemaking, caught it and was offering it back to him in slow undulations of her body against his. He kissed her onto her back, and she went easily, cradling his jaw when he rested his cheek against her breastbone.

“I cannot think when you are with me like this, Tiberius. I don’t ever want to think again. My wits—”

He brushed his fingers over her mouth. “Thinking isn’t required of either of us right now.” Thank God. Nor was propriety, nor was proper deportment. What was called for was an impressive display of shamelessness on both of their parts.

He sat back, surveying her where she sprawled on the chaise. Her clothing was frothed around her, her hair fell about her in golden disarray, and firelight gilded her bare skin. She watched him with slumberous eyes, but when he moved her clothing aside, exposing not just her breasts but her sex as well, she did not move.

To resist what was before him, even for a few instants, was excruciating. “What I need from you, Hester, is for you to enjoy yourself.” He’d never said such a thing to any woman, which in hindsight was remiss of him. He reached behind her, grabbed a pillow, and stuffed it under his knees.

Her eyes were going wide as he bent his head and brushed his thumb over her curls. “You may scream if you like. There’s nobody in this wing to hear you, save myself, and I will enjoy the sound of your passion.”

He enjoyed the taste of it as well. She was sweet and clean, bearing the scent of lavender even here, laced with the fragrance of a willing woman. While he nuzzled her curls, he felt her hand land in his hair. When he shifted her legs over his shoulders and drew his tongue up the damp length of her sex, that hand fell away on a sigh.

Earning her trust took time. It took long, lovely minutes while he traced each fold with his tongue and flirted a finger shallowly into her damp heat. It took the occasional stroke of his palms over her breasts, it took listening for what provoked her sighs and what—exactly—tempted her to minutely flex her spine.

He was distracted by the music of her aroused body, almost to the point where he could ignore the pulse throbbing in his cock and the soft brush of wool against his back.

He settled his mouth over the center of her pleasure and built a rhythm based on the undulations of her hips, the sound of her sighs, the feel of her body opening itself to pleasure.

She didn’t scream. When her moment came, Tye sank his fingers into her heat, and she convulsed around him almost silently. Low sounds of pleasure came from her throat, and she bowed up to clutch at him while pleasure wracked her. The spasms of her release reverberated through his body, going on and on until he kept the need to spend at bay by sheer force of will.

When Hester lay back, panting and rosy, Tye brought himself off in a few quick strokes against her mons. His seed jetted onto the pale expanse of her belly, leaving him physically spent and more than a little surprised at his own behavior.

He subsided between her legs, letting himself frankly stare at the lovely, wet, pink flesh of her sex. Time enough later to be shocked at the intimacy of what they’d just done, time enough to wonder where such carnal behavior and the trust it required had come from.

He kissed her knee, nuzzled her sex once, rested his cheek on her thigh, and closed his eyes.

Hester was sure etiquette existed for when a man was going to sleep between a lady’s legs, his seed drying on her belly, and her vocabulary sent begging by intimacies too unimaginable to contemplate.

Tiberius would know the words for what he’d just done to her, probably know them in several languages. She traced the curve of his ear with her fingers.

“What is the Latin term?”

“It’s vulgar and translates to something like ‘he who licks a particular part of a woman’s anatomy.’ Do not move.”

He rose looking disoriented. The sight of him thus—naked, his arousal fading, his hair going in all directions as a result of Hester’s disarrangement of it—was disconcertingly dear.

He reappeared with a cloth in his hand and resumed his place kneeling between her legs. “This is not what I had planned, Hester Daniels.” He swabbed briskly at her belly then more carefully at her sex. “You tempt me beyond the call of reason.”

“Do I really?” What a lovely notion. “You tempt me too, Tiberius.”

He pitched the rag away and stood scowling down at her. “A man’s sense of self-possession is important to him, or it ought to be.”

Hester hiked up on her elbows and regarded him as he tried to be stern and proper, his hair sticking up, not a stitch on him. With a flash of insight, she realized he wasn’t afraid, nor was he anything approaching embarrassed, but he was uncertain. The idea that he, of all men, would suffer such insecurity was untenable.

She pushed up to a sitting position, which put her at eye level with a part of his anatomy that was curiously unassuming in its present state, and just plain curious by any lights.

“Tiberius?” Hester caught him by one wrist and tugged him a step closer. “My self-possession is important to me too.” She leaned forward enough to rest her cheek over his soft, damp genitals. Two could play at the business of being shocking, though it wasn’t her aim to disconcert him.

She wanted to reassure him, in fact, and to regain that sense of closeness with him she’d enjoyed before he went haring off in search of a damp cloth and his dignity. His hand gathered her hair and draped it over her shoulder.

“Is it? Then you will accept my apology for taking the kind of liberties a man does not appropriate with marriageable women. It was not my intent to offend you.”

She was tempted to take him in her mouth. To taste him and learn what pleased him. But the dratted man wanted words now, words and coherent sentences and maybe just a touch of reassurance.

Of appreciation.

“I am not offended.” She kissed him low on his belly, the hair at his groin tickling her chin. “If marriageable women are denied the kind of pleasure you just gifted me with, then I pity them as a race.”

“Hester?” Her name on his lips had a controlled quality.

She sighed against his skin, wondering why pleasure made her drowsy while it made him loquacious. “Hmm?”

“Nothing.” He scooped her up against his chest, her nightgown and wrapper floating to the floor. “You are a remarkable woman.”

“I’m a tired woman. You have worn me out, Tiberius.”

He settled her onto the bed and stood back, his expression hard to read in the waning firelight.

“For pity’s sake, Tye, come to bed. It’s time for my vocabulary lesson.”

To her relief, he put one knee on the mattress. He’d needed to be invited to share her bed, which was interesting.

“Would you rather go back to your own bed?” She held the covers up for him to scoot in next to her. “I hardly know how to go on in this situation. I rely on you to establish the rules.”

He fluffed the pillows and got off the bed, which Hester took for a delaying tactic. When he returned, he carried her nightclothes and his robe, all of which he laid across the foot of the bed. “There are no rules, Hester, other than the ones we establish. I think one rule ought to be you don’t ask me to teach you naughty language.”

“I’ll ask Aunt Ariadne, then.” Except then Aunt would retaliate with questions of her own.

“You’ll do no such thing.” In an instant, he’d gone from tidily laying out their nightclothes to blanketing her with his naked frame. “If you’re to be acquiring a command of indecent terms, you’ll acquire it exclusively from me.”

She smoothed a hand over his hair. “I’d like that. Now get under the covers. You’ll catch your death strutting around in the altogether with your hair damp. Are you trying to flaunt your wares, Tiberius?”

He rolled off of her, lifted the covers over his body, and lay back against the pillows. “Yes, I am. I am flaunting my wares shamelessly. Are you tempted?”

He sounded amused despite himself—if a little exasperated—and this pleased her, to think she could make him smile even if the damned man wouldn’t actually show it. “I am impressed.” She rolled over to her side lest he see her smile. Behind her, she felt Tye shifting on the mattress, and then a voice sounded very near her ear.

“Cunnilingus.”

She drew his arm around her waist and snuggled her backside into the lee of his body. There was no point trying to disguise the laughter that lit her from within, no point hiding her pleasure in the answering humor she felt reverberating through him, either.

How did a man clarify that he’d come to propose marriage when a woman’s mouth was inches from his ill-behaved cock? Tye considered this question as he wrapped himself around his naked, laughing, prospective marchioness.

The answer was simple: he didn’t. He hadn’t, in any case. He’d been too busy resisting the temptation to sink his hand into the golden glory of Hester’s unbound hair and guide her mouth a few inches lower.

“Tell me about your sisters, Tiberius. I see you are a faithful correspondent to them.”

His sisters? Hester was naked in his arms on a commodious, soft bed, and she wanted to talk about his sisters. Very well—sisters were not a topic that far removed from marriage.

“I am blessed with three, all younger. They take after our mother in that they are very sociable.”

“Unlike you.” She turned her head to kiss his biceps where he’d threaded an arm under her neck.

“Unlike—?” He kissed her nape in retaliation. “If I were any more sociable at the present moment, madam, you’d be wearing my ring.”

“Tiberius, did no one ever tease you?”

“Gordie.” The admission was out, a truth, not a comfortable one.

“Tell me about him. All I know is he ruined Mary Fran, and then had to be brought up to scratch by the combined forces of his superior officers and the old Earl of Balfour.”

“Gordie was not happy in the military.” Another admission. “He said the army was changing and no longer a fit place to stash superfluous younger sons and other ne’er-do-wells. He would have done very well as my father’s heir.”

The words hung in the darkness, something between a shame and a regret, though the truth didn’t sound half so awful aloud as Tye had always thought it would.

Hester turned out of his embrace and lay on her other side, so she was facing him. “How can you say such a thing?”

“It’s simply a fact. Gordie liked to tool about the countryside, calling on the neighbors, visiting in the churchyard. He could talk politics with my father all night and knew the names of every yeoman ever to raise a chicken on Flynn property.”

She pushed his hair off his brow, an oddly soothing caress. “And you don’t?”

“I’m not much for visiting.”

This caused her lips to quirk up in that secret, feminine smile Tye was coming to watch for. “I’d say you visit rather well.”

She shifted again—she wasn’t the most restful bed partner—and wrestled Tye into her embrace. He allowed it, though permitting a woman to cuddle him was a novel addition to his intimate repertoire. When he was wrapped in her arms, his cheek pillowed on her breast, his nose full of lavender and lemon verbena, she stroked his hair back off his face.

A slow, pleasurable caress that should have been soothing, though Tye’s reproductive apparatus was not exactly soothed. Before she could return to the topic of his sisters—or, God help him, his parents—Tye decided to advance his artillery on the main objective.

“Do you ever consider marriage, Hester?”

She yawned, which had the effect of raising then lowering the feminine pillow beneath Tye’s cheek. “Not happily.”

“Don’t you want children?” Even his sisters admitted to wanting children, though Joan was adamant her artistic and fashion endeavors had to come first.

“Of course I want children.” Her reply held not a hint of banter. “Every woman is raised to want a family and a home of her own, and I’m no different, except my parents’ union was not happy. My sister is so much more vivacious than I am, so much prettier—she’s tall, you know—I accept that I might have to settle for being a doting aunt.”

“Your sister could not be any more attractive than you are, Hester Daniels.” He hadn’t meant it to sound like a scold, but he’d seen Miss Eugenia Daniels in more than one ballroom. “There’s a difference between pretty and attractive.”

“That is the oddest compliment, but I think you mean it.”

He didn’t exactly kiss her breast, but he opened his mouth against her skin and breathed in the fragrance of her. “Pretty fades in time, and women who rely on their looks alone can all too easily become pathetic, like a man who relies exclusively on his title. You have bottom and sense.”

“Now if only I were seventeen two hands and broke to the bridle, hmm?”

Bottom and sense were to Tye high praise, but it struck him as he nuzzled her breast that Hester Daniels also had a bruised, if not broken, heart. He lifted his head and rolled to his back. “Come here, Hester. If we’re to indulge in the equestrian analogies—which I do not encourage, mind you—then you can mount up.”

She regarded him curiously in the dim light but obliged him, straddling his hips and curling down onto his chest.

He undertook to organize her hair. “Why should you have to settle for being a doting aunt? Why not marry?”

Why not marry me? Except winning the argument in the general case before he put a specific opportunity before her seemed the more sensible course.

She was quiet so long, Tye thought she might have fallen asleep. “I was not… I did not exercise good sense when Jasper proposed to me. I let him conduct a hasty, quiet courtship, allude to an agreement with my father, and impose himself upon me, all without protest on my part. Marriage is designed to make women stupid. We are supposed to be willing to do anything to gain that prize. I see this now.”

For God’s sake, it was exactly the argument his sisters made, frequently and at great volume. They insisted on the right to choose, said the church itself did not countenance women being forced to marry, and flounced off to the next house party completely oblivious to the marquess’s draconian views on the matter.

“But you want children, Hester, and I think you would make a fine mother.”

She cuddled closer and pressed her nose against his throat. “This is a very peculiar discussion to have with you, Tiberius. I did not realize you would excel at prying confidences from me.”

Nor had that been his objective, but another part of him wanted to hear her confidences. “I didn’t discuss Gordie with anybody until I came up here.”

“And then Fee got to you, didn’t she?” Hester shifted on him, letting him have more of her weight. “She no doubt had you maundering on about your late brother, and you all unsuspecting. She’s gotten to me too, and this is the reason why I will eventually waver on the idea of marriage. I love that child. I would die to protect her, and if we discount last summer, I’ve known her only a handful of weeks. She is that dear.”

“Die to protect her?”

“You would too.” She sounded sleepy but sure of her point.

He didn’t argue—a gentleman never argued with a lady—though marrying Hester hardly equated to offering his life for his niece. Instead of arguing, he stroked his hand over the warm, delicate planes of the lady’s back, tracing her bones and muscles, learning her geography by touch.

When he realized he’d let the silence stretch for some minutes, he offered another point for her consideration: “Your husband would give you children, Hester.” A high card, he hoped. “He’d provide for you and those children, keep you safe and comfortable all your days.”

She said nothing. While her breathing evened out and she became a warm, trusting weight on his body, Tye reveled in the chance to explore her. He could reach the delectable curves of her derriere, trace the knobs and bumps of her spine, turn his nose and catch the flowery fragrance of her hair.

He fell asleep trying to find the right words to ask her—ask her in all seriousness—if she might consider marriage, were he to be the one providing her those children.

Hester awoke feeling safe, warm, and happy. The contentment was a bone-deep bodily awareness, spectacular in its pervasiveness.

“Not only do you have sense and bottom”—a large, warm hand squeezed Hester’s fundament—“but you excel at the marital art of sharing a bed. Good morning.”

Tiberius Flynn, the Earl of Spathfoy, was wrapped around her in all his naked glory. In all of their naked glory. What did one say under such circumstances?

“Good morning, my lord.”

“Miss Daniels.”

She did not dare turn over to peer at him. “Are you laughing at me, Spathfoy?”

“I am cuddling with you, much to my surprise—and delight, of course.”

His voice sounded convincingly serious. Hester peeked over her shoulder and found his green eyes were dancing with suppressed mischief.

“Dratted man.” Wonderful man. Wonderful, warm man, holding her close and making her day start with such a sense of well-being. “The rain has stopped.”

“Ah, the weather. How it gratifies me to know my lovemaking, or perhaps my mere presence in your bed, reduces you to platitudes. And here I took you for the daring sort.”

“You are so naughty. Teach me another word if you don’t want to discuss the weather.”

That shut him up. It chased him from the bed in fact, which was a pity. Hester heard him cross the room, then heard a stream hit the bottom of the chamber pot behind the privacy screen.

She blushed. She listened, and she blushed. When Spathfoy came back to the bed, she caught a minty whiff of tooth powder.

“Will you marry me, Hester Daniels?” He spooned himself around her, making the entire mattress bounce in the process. “I’ve never spent the night with a woman before. I find it rather agrees with me.”

“You have an untapped capacity for the ridiculous, Spathfoy.” Now she got out of the bed, having to struggle a bit to escape his hold. She grabbed the first piece of clothing she could find—his dressing gown—and wiggled into it before leaving the bed. She didn’t need to use the chamber pot, thank a merciful God, but she did avail herself of the tooth powder.

He’d appropriated her toothbrush. Hester set the thing back into the cup that held it and stared.

This was intimacy, to share a toothbrush, to wake together. Last night had been intimate too, but it wasn’t the sexual thrill Hester would miss when Spathfoy departed.

She would miss him—cozy and casual in the morning, laughing with her in the bed, whispering unpronounceable naughty words into her ear, and running his hand over her backside in the most proprietary fashion as she fell asleep on his chest.

Intimacy with him was wonderful, thrilling, and precious at once. She very much feared this combination of feelings was what vapid young ladies alluded to when they said they were smitten with a man.

In love with him.

She felt an abrupt urge to cry, ignored it, and twisted her hair into a thick braid instead.

“What are you doing back there?” Spathfoy’s voice floated from the direction of the bed. “I propose marriage, and you must see to your toilette?”

“Stop teasing me, Spathfoy.” She emerged from the privacy screen while tying a ribbon around the end of her braid. “You used my tooth powder.”

“Come here, and I shall kiss you, then you’ll appreciate my larceny. I could have done that for you.”

He was regarding her braid narrowly. Hester stopped her advance before she got within range of his long arms. “Why aren’t you leaping up, wishing me good day, and scampering off to your own quarters? The sun will soon be up, Spathfoy.”

He looked amused, and perhaps he had cause. His dressing gown hung nearly to the floor on her, swallowing her up in its vast, comfortable folds. Then she realized he was peering at her socks, the only article of clothing to survive the night’s festivities in a proper location.

“The sun will be up soon,” he said, stretching out on his side, “but the servants know to leave the trays outside our doors, Miss Daniels. Stop grousing at me and get back in this bed.” He patted the mattress as if he had every right to invite her into her own bed.

“You will not blame me, sir, if you’re found here in flagrante delicto and we are forced to marry.” She attempted to flounce onto the bed, though his dressing gown made flouncing a rather undignified business. He had to help her get extricated from his clothing, and then she found herself wrapped again in his embrace.

“Do you wish me to go, Hester?”

How she loved feeling the way his words rumbled up from his chest. She closed her eyes, the better to feel him speak. He’d put her on her back, while he was still on his side with her tucked along his length.

“Soon. You must.”

She felt his cheek against her temple, felt him hike her leg over his hip. “I’m not teasing, Hester. I have to leave within the week, and I intend to keep proposing to you until you agree to leave with me.”

“Hush.” She turned her face into his chest to prevent herself from saying something stupid. He was sincere. She heard it in his voice, felt it in his body. He was also a man bound by duty and honor to an excessive degree—witness his visit to a mere niece—and Hester was not about to take advantage of him.

She regarded him too highly for that.

“I am not ready to consider any proposals of marriage.”

It was the kindest thing she could think of to say. He’d offered out of decency, and she’d declined based on the same consideration.

Hester Daniels doted on her niece, but she positively melted in the presence of the small, drooling bundle that was her cousin Augusta’s firstborn.

Balfour caught Tye’s eye over the tea service. “We’ll leave them to it, shall we? They’ll be cooing and smiling at the wee lad the livelong day while grown men go hungry and cold for want for female attention.”

In truth, Tye would rather watch Hester talking nonsense to the baby in her arms. Her expression was one of such suppressed yearning, Tye could practically hear wedding bells—and naughty vocabulary whispered by firelight.

“A ramble to the burn?” Tye asked, rising. Balfour didn’t look like he had any agenda other than escaping the ladies’ presence, but Tye was learning not to underestimate the man.

“Sounds just the thing. Ladies, you will excuse us?”

His countess sent them along with a wave of her hand, while Hester, Fiona, and Lady Ariadne didn’t even look up from where they were fussing over the baby.

Balfour led the way through the back gardens. “I look at that wee lad, and all I can think is my brother had best hie himself back from Canada soon.”

“Your brother?”

“My oldest brother, by damn. We had a letter from him a year or so ago, though the man’s been officially declared dead. The letter wasn’t dated, you see, and my uncle was able to convince the courts it wasn’t proof my brother yet breathes.”

Tye had heard the gossip. The present earl was a younger son, styled as the earl with all the honors attendant thereto upon declaration of his brother’s death. Gossip was apparently not up to date.

“I didn’t know of this letter. I gather you would be pleased to see him?”

“Pleased? I’ll kiss the sodding bugger on both cheeks and dance the Fling. The verra last thing I want is for my own wee bairn to grow up mincing and bowing his life away as the Earl of Balfour.”

“And what is your uncle’s interest in the earldom?” Tye didn’t particularly care, but Balfour had opened the topic, and it was serving to pass the time.

“He holds the earldom’s trusts, and he’ll not turn loose of them until Asher is demanding he does so in the Queen’s own English with a court order clutched in each fist. The day can’t come soon enough for me.”

“You’d relinquish the title?”

Balfour stopped walking as they gained the path to the stream. “Are you looking forward to being the next marquess? To spending half your time in the stinking confines of London so you can participate in the farce known as the Upper House of Parliament? Will you drag your family the length of the kingdom several times a year to keep up appearances in Town while trying to stay ahead of the cholera and the typhus?”

He strode off in the direction of the burn. “Bloody lot of nonsense, the title. My dear wife brought me wealth, and I share it with the earldom as she directs, but I would much rather have my brother back than all the wealth and consequence in the world. Come along, man. I want to see the great guddler in action.”

Tye followed more slowly, realizing he, too, would rather have his brother back—flaws and all—than the title his father would someday leave to him.

Except that choice was not before him.

“Will you tell Fiona of her impending journey, Balfour?”

“Not today, and possibly not ever.” As he ambled along, Balfour snapped off a sprig of heather and brought it to his nose. “I’ve been in communication with the courts, Spathfoy. Fiona was born after your brother went to his reward. She’s a Scottish citizen. Your dear papa has not filed suit in any Scottish court to gain custody of her, which leaves her, I believe, in my custody, or possibly her mother and stepfather’s.”

“I see.”

Balfour had not been idle since Tye had last seen him. He’d put two rainy days to significant use.

“What do you see?”

“You are expecting a legal action regarding guardianship of Fiona. As far as I know, none has been instituted in the English courts either.”

They’d reached the stream, and Balfour was tugging at his boots. “As far as you know?” He paused, one boot in his hand, one on his foot. “Would your dear papa make you aware of such a thing?”

“I believe he would. Why are you removing your boots?”

“My niece was impressed with your ability to tickle a fish, Spathfoy. I can’t have her head turned by both you and the lad.”

Tye used the tree Fiona had climbed to brace himself while he pulled his own boots off. “My father hasn’t any need to institute a lawsuit, Balfour.”

“He hasn’t?” Balfour dropped his socks on top of his boots and stood with his fists on his hips. “He’s simply going to lift the child from under our noses and expect we’ll accommodate his thievery?”

Tye got his second boot off, and like Balfour, draped his socks over his boot tops. Wool socks…

“My father has sent me an affidavit that ought to be sufficient to guarantee safe conduct for me and my niece from here to Northumbria.”

Balfour’s expression didn’t change, and his tone became, if anything, softer. “Don’t be keeping me in suspense, laddie. What manner of affidavit?”

Tye regarded his socks of soft gray wool. “Quinworth has sworn in writing before witnesses of good character that he’s read Gordie’s will, and in that will, Gordie is very clear that any children are to be raised under the authority of their paternal family. Both the will and the affidavit are witnessed, sealed, and otherwise legally valid documents. I’m sorry, Balfour.”

Balfour swore colorfully and at length in Gaelic. “Write to your dear papa that I will be initiating suit in the Scottish courts to establish my custody of the girl.”

“Balfour, you can’t stop me from complying with my brother’s wishes.” Though Tye wished his brother’s damned will—and his father’s preferences—hadn’t put him in such a contretemps.

“Then enjoy Fee while you have her, Spathfoy, because I will not rest until she’s safely returned to our care.”

“I will do my utmost to see that Fiona’s best interests are served during her tenure with us in Northumbria. I am bending my every effort in that direction already.”

“For the love of God, I wish you’d go bend your damned efforts somewhere else. Now shut your pretty English mouth before you scare the last fish out of the burn.”

He stalked off toward the stream, not even turning when Tye spoke again.

“I’ve proposed marriage to Miss Daniels, Balfour. I think you’ll agree that Fiona’s adjustment to new circumstances will be made easier by her step-aunt’s presence under the same roof. If Fiona’s mother can entrust the child to Miss Daniels’s care in Scotland, then surely the lady’s supervision of the girl will be adequate in England.”

And both of them knew the courts would likely see it that way, too.

Balfour turned, his expression impossible to read. “And has Hester accepted your proposal?”

“She has not—yet.”

He nodded, muttered in Gaelic about the daft, horny English getting their deserts, and slipped into the frigid water so stealthily, Tye didn’t hear even a splash.

“He has proposed marriage, Augusta.” Hester made this confession quietly, because Fiona was nearby on a blanket with the baby. Aunt Ariadne had declined to accompany them onto the terrace, making noises about her complexion that Hester suspected were intended to hide fatigue.

Beside Hester on the bench, Augusta also spoke quietly. “Is the proposal sincere, Hester? I do not mean to imply you could not earn the notice of such a man, but—”

Hester held up a hand. “I know, Augusta. My experience with Jasper has not left me with the greatest confidence in my judgment. I thought I did not like Spathfoy, but the truth is, I did not know him. He is kind.”

“Kind?”

Augusta’s dark brows rose, and Hester could see her cousin found the notion of Spathfoy’s kindness absurd.

“He teases me, often so gently I don’t even know he’s teasing. He does not take advantage of me, and Augusta, I sometimes feel I am taking advantage of him.”

“Taking advantage?”

Hester nodded, though embarrassment was making her cheeks burn. “He is very skilled in some regards.”

“Hester Daniels, what have you done?”

Augusta had anticipated her vows with Ian. Hester was almost sure of that. That wasn’t censure she heard in her cousin’s voice so much as concern. “Nothing as reprehensible as what I permitted with Jasper, I can assure you of that.”

Augusta patted her hand. “I am relieved to hear it. I would urge you to continue to exercise sound judgment in this regard. Spathfoy cannot mean to tarry here much longer.”

“He’s leaving within the week. He wants me to go with him as his fiancée.”

Augusta studied Hester for such a long time, Hester felt another blush rising. “He’s told you this?”

“Yes, very plainly.”

“Don’t give him an answer yet, Hester. Men benefit from being made to work for their rewards—they thrive on it, in fact. Fiona, stop tickling that child or I’ll make you change his linen.”

Fiona desisted immediately and started singing to the baby in Gaelic.

“I know I’m lonely, Augusta, and I know my confidence is somewhat shaken when it comes to marital prospects, but Tye—Spathfoy—is becoming a friend. I can talk to him about anything—even Jasper—and we laugh together sometimes. This is…” She glanced around, again making sure they could not be overheard. “It’s endearing.”

Augusta was quiet for a moment while Fiona’s childish soprano floated over the gardens in a high, sweet melody. “Did you laugh with Jasper?”

“Not often, but yes, occasionally.”

“Did you think he might one day be your friend?”

“I hoped it, at least at first.”

“You are smitten with Spathfoy, which is understandable. He’s a handsome, wealthy, titled man. If you say he has hidden charms, I will not argue with you, Hester. Nevertheless, such a man can afford to court you properly, to put a ring on your finger, to escort you about all the London ballrooms, to show you off as his affianced bride. Make him give you that at least. Make him wait for your answer, make him do more than pop up here unannounced on some pretext of visiting his niece and sweep you off your feet. You haven’t even met his family, haven’t seen his estates.”

Augusta’s words were low and fervent, also very sensible.

“I don’t know if I can wait for all that, Augusta. I find him very attractive.”

Augusta smiled a feline, married smile. “I found Ian attractive too. I still do, but Jasper left you susceptible to any man who makes an offer, Hester. Can’t you just enjoy the earl as a flirtation?”

“I thought I could—I rather hoped I could, and then he goes and turns up gallant.”

“And here he comes, though how men can look gallant when they’re scowling at each other like that is a mystery.”

“At least they’re not bringing us any dead fish to deal with. Fiona, your uncles approach.”

The girl skipped off, forgetting the baby on the blanket. It was left to Hester to bundle the infant up and take him to his parents. While Spathfoy boosted Fiona into a tree, Ian and Augusta’s heads were bent in conversation under a rose arbor.

All Hester caught as she moved to surrender their son to them was Augusta nearly whispering to Ian, “Husband, we must talk of this further.”

Hester handed off the baby and wondered if Ian was the sort of husband who taught his wife Latin in bed.

“Ian, that man has proposed to Hester!”

Ian settled back against the coach’s squabs and regarded his countess—his upset countess—and added one more item to the growing list of things a just God was going to hold Spathfoy accountable for—though the Scottish courts likely would not.

Could not.

“Calm yourself, my heart. You’ll upset the lad, and we’ll be all night settling his wee feathers. Hester will never give her hand to a lying scoundrel of an Englishman.”

Augusta looked up abruptly from the child in her arms. “We still haven’t heard from Mary Fran and Matthew?”

“Not a word. I’m keeping the telegraph office in coin, sending wires all over the Continent. Not a single reply.”

“This is not good. You are certain Spathfoy hasn’t told Hester his plans for Fee?”

“I would bet my horse on it. It isn’t that Spathfoy is so English, it’s that he has no wife, no children of his own. He sees them as separate bits of business: you propose to this one, you collect that one for delivery to the marquess. If anything, he probably thinks having Fee at the family seat will be an inducement for Hester to marry him.”

Augusta blew out a breath, her brows knitting in thought. “That is diabolical.”

“That is what happens when a man has no countess to show him how to go on.” He tucked an arm around her shoulders and saw that their son—drat the boy, for it meant Ian wasn’t to have a turn holding him—was falling asleep in Augusta’s arms. “The way the lad is tending to his slumbers now, we won’t get our nap this afternoon, Wife. I would bet my horse on that as well.”

“You seem to think Hester will throw Spathfoy’s proposal back in his face.”

“Of course she will. Hester got a bellyful of scheming, charming men with that Merriford jackanapes.”

“Merriman. And you have it all wrong, Husband.”

He closed his eyes. Augusta might know her own cousin, but Ian knew women. “How is that, my love?”

“Spathfoy is cunning, Ian. Hester might detest the man for flying false colors, for taking Fee away from those who love her just because some old man in England has rediscovered his familial conscience, but Hester will go for Fee’s sake. She’ll marry that useless, handsome excuse for a raiding Englishman to make sure Fee isn’t all alone in Northumbria among strangers.”

“She wouldn’t be that daft.”

“It isn’t daft when you love somebody. Hester spends more time with Fiona than Mary Fran did.”

Ian felt yet another cold slither of misgiving in his vitals. “Than Mary Fran could, you mean. Running Balfour on a shoestring took up more of my sister’s energies than it should have, but Fee had three uncles about her to keep their eyes on her.”

The baby let out a tiny, peaceful sigh, making Ian and his wife momentarily pause to behold their son. For no reason at all, Ian kissed his wife’s cheek.

“Fiona is a child,” Ian said. “All she knows is her mother was always preoccupied with household matters at Balfour, then Mary Fran became enthralled with Matthew. Of course Fee appreciates an adult spending time with her.”

Even an adult such as Spathfoy?

Augusta busied herself cuddling the baby close. “And now her mama and step-papa are off on an extended honeymoon, and Hester has come to the Highlands to mend a broken heart. She and Fee are thick as thieves, Husband. This cannot end well, not for Hester, and not for Fiona.”

Ian wanted to argue; he wanted to soothe and reason and offer the comfort of superior male wisdom, though he was nearly certain Augusta had the right of things. He also wanted to beat Spathfoy within an inch of the damned English border.

He settled for tucking his wife closer and drawing the blankets a little more securely around their son.

Hale Flynn, ninth Marquess of Quinworth, took his brandy to the balcony of his private sitting room. In the west, the sun was taking its damned time to sink below the surrounding green hills, but to the east, the comfort of night was making an approach.

He sank into a chair, set his brandy aside, and withdrew the letter from his pocket.

Nights were no better really, though when the sun rose, he could ride out over the vast Quinworth acreage and at least find a few hours’ enjoyment at the start of his day.

He didn’t need to read the letter—he’d written it himself, addressed it himself, sealed it himself. The staff knew, of course. They took the post off each day and brought him the incoming mail all sorted into business, personal, and family correspondence.

This letter had gone out as family correspondence; it came back as personal, as if by action of post, his marchioness could dissolve their marital bond—though not the decades of familiarity marriage had engendered.

Her ladyship was dissolving his sanity. Season by season, year by year, her stubbornness and independence were taking a toll on his reason and on his ability to hold his head up socially. Nobody said anything to his face, of course, but his womenfolk were not biddable.

Not the girls and not their mother. Taking their cue from the marchioness, his three daughters went about socializing all over the realm, spending the Season in London, the summer at various house parties or by the sea, back to London for the Little Season, and then Yuletide with friends and cousins.

If the northern summer light didn’t appeal to Joan’s confounded artistic inclinations, he’d have nobody to share an eighty-seven-room mansion with but Spathfoy. And Spathfoy bided at the family seat only periodically to look in on the farms, or possibly—lowering, odious thought—on his own father.

Quinworth’s voting record in the Lords was distinguished. His holdings prospered year after year. He was accounted a handsome man, a man still in his prime, and from time to time he considered forming the kinds of liaisons available to wealthy, titled men even long past their prime.

Then discarded the notion, unwilling to take the final step that would prove Deirdre had won. With a sense of growing despair, he held the letter to his nose and inhaled.

“Spathfoy has proposed marriage to me.” Hester had to speak slowly because her Gaelic was very much a work in progress. She could understand almost everything Fee and Aunt Ariadne said to her, but they made allowances for her weak vocabulary and faulty syntax.

Ariadne’s face lit with pleasure. “This is marvelous! You will be Fiona’s aunt twice over. Have you told the child?”

Hester got up to pace the small, slightly overheated drawing room where they were having their late-morning tea. “I haven’t given Spathfoy my answer, and to be honest, I’m not sure what it will be. Augusta says I should make him wait, and suggests because of what happened with Jasper, I might not know my own mind.”

“What happened with Jasper was unfortunate. I trust your fears in this regard have been relieved by Spathfoy’s attentions?”

The question was delicately put while Aunt Ariadne fussed with the tea tray. Hester stopped her pacing and regarded Ariadne’s serene countenance.

“Is there something you’d say to me, Aunt?”

“Mr. Deal checks the sconces in the occupied hallways twice each night, or he has one of the footmen do it to ensure the wicks aren’t smoking and there’s adequate oil in the lamps. He told Mrs. Deal, who told me, that he heard laughter coming from your bedroom long after the family had gone to sleep. According to him, this is proof the house is once again haunted by some previous owner of dubious political judgment.”

Hester turned away as if regarding the gardens beyond the window, though she couldn’t help but smile.

“Laughter in bed is a wonderful thing, young lady. A thing to be treasured, and if I had to guess, I’d say Spathfoy is overdue for some laughter wherever he can find it.”

“You’ll think me wicked.” And still, Hester did not risk looking Aunt Ariadne in the eye.

“I’m the one who told you to get back on the horse. Aren’t you going to drink your tea?”

Sly old boots. Hester obediently resumed a place on the sofa. “I haven’t, you know. Not entirely. Gotten back on the, um, horse.”

“Oh, of course not.” Ariadne passed Hester a cup of tea that had to be tepid by now at best. “Though in my day, we didn’t buy a pair of boots without trying them on.”

Hester hid her smile behind her teacup. “You are incorrigible, Aunt.”

“I’m an old woman with a lot of lovely memories. If you’re lucky, you’ll grow up to be just like me.”

“Are you telling me to accept Spathfoy’s proposal?”

“I’m telling you not to let me eat all these cakes by myself. You haven’t known his lordship long, but sometimes, long acquaintance isn’t necessary in affairs of the heart. Has he said he loves you?”

Hester set her teacup down more quickly than she’d intended to. “Love?”

“It’s all the modern rage, the love match, or at least the appearance of one. You can marry where you will, Hester, and Spathfoy can likewise. In my day a woman was bound by the preferences of her parents, at least the first time around, but so were the young men. It put the new husband and wife in some sympathy with each other, which was often an adequate basis for friendship.”

“I think Spathfoy could be my friend and I his.” This felt like the greater confidence, not the fact of his proposal, but why she was considering it.

“Ah. You really should have some cakes, my dear.”

“You are no help whatsoever, Aunt.” Hester took two chocolate cakes—Fee wasn’t underfoot to appropriate all the chocolate ones before anybody else had a chance—and regarded them side by side on her plate. “I want to accept Spathfoy’s proposal, but I am uncertain.”

“It’s hard to be completely sure, though nice if you can be. I was with my second and third husbands.”

“And?”

“One turned out to be an idiot, the other was the love of my life.” She took a placid sip of her tea while Hester wanted to pitch a cake at her.

“I haven’t known Spathfoy long, I haven’t met his family, I don’t know the state of his finances, he hasn’t given me a ring, and he has not declared his feelings for me.”

“If you wait for a proper Englishman to declare his feelings, you will soon be an old maid. The ring can be procured easily enough, and I can assure you the man’s wealthy. His mother is a genius with figures. What is the real reason you’re hesitating, my dear?”

Hester considered her tea cakes, then the view out the window, then the hearth, which sported a fire despite the temperate day.

“I’m not sure.”

But it had to do with love. She was fairly certain her hesitation had to do with love, and the likely lack thereof—on Spathfoy’s part.

Or maybe it had to do with a lack of courage on hers.

Tye had two days left before he had to leave or risk his father indulging in rash behavior. Two days and two nights to convince a shy, headstrong, passionate young lady not just to get back on the horse but to accept possession of the beast for the remainder of her earthly days—and nights.

He didn’t even knock on her door this time, just pushed it open to see Hester sprawling belly-down on the hearth rug, a book open before her, her feet pointing toward the ceiling and her hair in a golden rope over her shoulder.

“I trust I am not intruding?” He strolled into the room and did not permit himself to stare at the soft, warm, wool socks on her upthrust feet.

“Spathfoy.” She glanced up but did not rise. “You were very quiet at dinner. I thought perhaps you’d need to catch up on your rest tonight.”

She was teasing him. She knew how to tease; he did not. It left him feeling at a disadvantage, until another thought popped into his head: perhaps she was not teasing so much as seeking reassurances.

He came down beside her, arranging himself so she was between him and the fire. “What are you reading?”

“A journal I wrote when I was Fee’s age. My penmanship was atrocious—I doubt anybody else would be motivated to decipher it, which is probably a mercy.”

“Were you very serious as a child?” He ran his palm down the length of her braid while she set the book aside and rested her cheek on her folded arms.

“I was a happy child as long as I could stay out of Papa’s gun sights. Girl children were fortunately beneath his notice for the most part, until Genie became of marriageable age, and then he mostly tormented her and Mother.”

She sounded forlorn. “Do you miss your mother?” God knew, he missed his—particularly since coming to Scotland.

“No, I do not.” She rolled to her back and heaved out a sigh. “I wish I did, but I’ve tried to miss her and I can’t. I envy Fee having a mother and stepfather she can miss terribly.”

Which topic, Tye was not about to explore any further under present circumstances. He settled his hand on her belly, let it ride up on her next breath. “Will you miss me, Hester Daniels? I leave shortly. I’d have your answer to my proposal before I ride off to the south.”

“This is a time-limited proposal, then?” She captured his hand and turned her cheek into his palm, the tenderness of the gesture at variance with the pragmatism of her question.

And with her query, Tye found himself on tricky ground. In the manner of women the world over, she’d dropped him square in the middle of a conversational quagmire, where every reply was fraught with risk.

“Either you want to be my marchioness and bear my children or you do not. I am hoping you do, though I will not beg.”

She regarded him by the firelight, her expression so unreadable—so unencouraging—Tye would have gotten up and left the room had she not wrapped a hand around the back of his neck. “When I left London, I did not know you, Tiberius, and now you want to give me children.”

“I want to give you legitimate children.” With Hester, he could envision having a big family. The thought had never appealed before.

“I do not intend to buy a pair of boots without trying them on, Spathfoy.”

“I speak of holy matrimony, and you want to go shopping.” He kissed her, because a woman could prose on about her shopping at tiresome length. And Hester would prose on while Tye watched and felt the rising and falling of her breathing, and slowly lost his mind with the pleasure of it.

“I do adore the scent of you, Tiberius.” She wound her arms around his neck and scooted closer, which reassured Tye he wouldn’t be stomping from the room in a rejected huff. The thought that she might, indeed, turn down his offer was… untenable. Leaving Scotland without Hester did not bear contemplation—and not because it would ease Fiona’s adjustment to a new household.

“You are in the mood to tease me, Miss Daniels. Am I only to have kisses of you tonight?”

“About my new boots.” She levered up and kissed him—really kissed him—her fingers trailing softly along his jaw then stealing down to slip inside his dressing gown and stroke over his bare chest. “I want to ask a favor of you, Tiberius Flynn.”

Her thumb grazed his nipple, sending an electric current racing down through Tye’s body. “I am disposed to grant favors to you in my present situation.” He was also disposed to shift his hand so he covered the fullness of her breast through her nightclothes. Her nipple peaked against his palm, which had to be one of the most erotic sensations a man could endure.

“It’s a small favor.” She pushed him onto his back, though it took him a moment to realize what she was about. He’d never made love on the floor before, but it loomed as a capital notion in those regions of his brain still capable of thought.

“You have to close your eyes.” She brushed her hand down over his face. He caught a whiff of sweet flowers and tart lemon, probably from the lotion she rubbed into her skin.

“My eyes are closed.” He found the bottom of her braid with his hands and slipped the ribbon off it. “What is this favor you seek?”

“In a minute.”

He felt her untying the sash of his robe. This too struck him as a positive development. While she parted the folds of his robe, he unraveled her braid and enjoyed the knowledge that she was in all likelihood looking at his rampant erection. If anything, the knowledge made him harder.

“Shall you blindfold me, Hester? I’d enjoy it, I think.” The night was rife with firsts—he’d never meant such an offer so sincerely: he would enjoy it. “I’m told it heightens the other senses, so I could better revel in the scent, feel, sound, and taste of you.”

“Taste.” She didn’t make it a question, or maybe he didn’t give her time to elaborate. Using a hank of her unbound hair, Tye tugged her closer, cradled her cheek with his free hand, and guided her down to his mouth.

“Taste,” he echoed. With his eyes closed, the kiss became a lovely, voluptuous, opening ceremony for what he sincerely hoped was another step in the seduction of his future wife.

Or possibly, of her future husband.

“Keep your eyes closed, Tiberius.” Fabric rustled and brushed against his ribs. “And you must not move.”

At her admonition, he found himself blindfolded and bound by nothing more than the desire to please her, to be whatever she needed him to be for however long she wanted to keep him sprawled naked on her hearth rug.

“Hester?”

“Hmm?” A silky strand of hair wafted across his chest.

“Do I, or does marriage to me, perchance, in some way resemble a new pair of boots?”

More rustling. When he reached out this time, his hand encountered the smooth curve of her naked back, but the position wasn’t the right one for kiss—

“More a parasol, I think.”

The weight of her head settled low on his belly, and Tye’s heartbeat slowed to a dull, pounding thud against his ribs. “My dear, what are you about?”

“Eyes closed. You mustn’t stop me.”

As if… He licked dry lips. “How do I resemble a parasol?”

He felt her fingers trace up the length of his erection, felt her breath waft across the engorged glans.

“You appear all unassuming, folded up and waiting in the corner for an outing, and then”—she licked him, a delicate, catlike swirl of her tongue over the most sensitive spot—“one unfurls you and reveals your beauty, and all manner of interesting uses come to mind.”

He should say something, before she—

She took him into her mouth, slid her lips along his shaft, and withdrew, but not all the way. He fisted his hand in her hair and prayed for fortitude. “Hester, you must not.”

“Must.” Another caress with her tongue, and God help him, she cupped his balls at the same time. “You did, with me.”

Brilliant, faultless logic. He tried to draw in a breath, but was unwilling to move even that much lest he disturb her. This intimacy was one a man usually paid for, something no decent woman ought to conceive of, and she was glorying in it. He drew her hair back over her shoulder. “There’s a name for this.”

She ran her nose up the length of his shaft, rubbed her cheek against the hair at the base. “Later, Tiberius. I’m a trifle busy at the moment.”

And then her mouth was on him again, until she was drawing on him in a slow, maddening rhythm, sleeving him with her wet fingers and driving him past all self-restraint.

“No more, Hester.” His voice was hoarse with banked desire, and he had to ease his grip on her hair lest he hurt her.

“I like this.”

“For God’s—” He pushed her away as gently as he could and used his free hand to stroke himself exactly twice before he was coming, a cyclone of pleasure and lust barreling through his body, making his jaw clench, his spine bow, and colors dance behind his closed eyes.

He suspected he’d lost consciousness. When his mind settled itself enough to process thoughts, Hester had used a handkerchief to wipe him clean. She set the cloth aside, pillowed her head on his belly, and took his cock in her hand. Her grip was just snug enough to be perfect.

He could not have borne it had she moved her hand on him or—merciful God—run her tongue over him even once more; and yet, he could not have borne it if she’d turned loose of him, either.

“You are an astonishing woman, Hester Daniels. An astonishing lady.”

And she was going to make an astonishingly wonderful marchioness, too.