Elaine Coffman - [MacKinnon 04] (15 page)

Maggie had never known anyone so sensitive. She tried to
remember that as she spoke in the calmest of tones—firm, but calm. “New or most
expensive doesn’t always mean best, but I dinna say there was anything wrong
with your piano, Adrian. I said it needed tuning—something any piano would need
after being shipped such a great distance.”

She contemplated responding to his last statement implying
she didn’t know how to play. She decided to ignore it, when the next thing she
knew, she was saying, “I began playing the piano when I was four. My father was
an accomplished pianist and taught me himself. I learned to play on a
Cristofori made in 1720.”

His voice was as hard as his look. “I know nothing about
pianos or their makers, so I’ve never heard of Cristofori—but I know a great
deal about those who flaunt their superiority over others. People of that ilk
have never been held in very high regard by me.”

“I daresay they are not held in high regard by anyone, save
a woodenhead. When I said what I did, I didn’t mean to imply your piano was
inferior, or that I considered myself to be your superior. I only mentioned
Cristofori because he invented the piano. Yours is a Stein, built much later
and possessing a lighter, sweeter tone. It is far advanced over the
Cristofori.” She remembered the way she had run her hands over the polished
rosewood of the piano the first time she had seen it, remembered the thrill of
playing on such an instrument. “I’ve never had the privilege of playing such an
instrument before. To own one would be any pianist’s dream.”

Adrian couldn’t remember ever being so angry over something
so trifling, so simple. All this jabber about pianos and their makers with
fancy names made him feel inadequate, and that made him angrier still. He was
sorry he mentioned the piano, sorry he asked her to play. He had no way of
knowing that to do so would give him such a crushing feeling of imperfection,
or serve to remind him of his humble beginnings. She had been born into wealth
and splendor, while he had been born into a family as poor as piss and potato
peelings. Well, he might not be the son of a fancy Scottish earl, but by God,
he was the grandson of a duke, and he had a brother who was a duke as well.

It occurred to him then that the only thing he had to
impress this new wife of his was his wealth, and a woman like her was little
impressed by that.

He didn’t speak as he walked her into the music room. She
was silent as well. When they reached the piano, he waited for her to seat
herself at the bench before turning away. He went to a small table and poured
himself a glass of brandy, then took a chair across from her, one that gave him
an unobstructed view of her face.

“What would you like to hear?” she asked.

“Suit yourself,” he said.

What would you like to hear?
his mind mimicked. She
knew, of course, that he didn’t know anything about music. Anger boiled in his
veins and increased the tempo of a heart already beating too rapidly. How many
times had he wished he were more educated? His hand closed tightly around the
fragile glass he held. He wished it were her educated neck. The frustrating
feeling of impotence grew stronger.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
It was what
he deserved, requesting a cultured, refined lady for a wife. One who had a
title. What was he thinking? That some of her refinement and her fancy learning
would rub off on him? He would have pushed his thoughts further along this
line, but she began playing, and he found himself distracted.

Music to soothe the savage in the beast.

Even that thought angered him.

Maggie chose three lively pieces by Mozart, then settled
into a slower tune.

“You’ve changed composers,” he said, hoping to God that was
true so he would be spared further humiliation at the hands of this woman.
“What are you playing now?”

“Chopin,” she said. “
Prelude, Opus Twenty-eight, Number
Fifteen in D-flat Major
, commonly called
Raindrops
.”

The desire to throttle her was growing stronger. “I prefer
Raindrops
over,” he coughed, “the other.”

She laughed, a lively, musical sound that seemed to compete
with the beautiful melody she played. “That’s what my husband always said.”

The glass in Adrian’s hand shattered, sending fragments
tinkling to the floor.

That’s what my husband always said?

Bitch! Goddamn bitch!

She had been married before. Some other man had been
before him
. Fury, red-hot and intense enough to kill, exploded within him.
His chair scraped, then fell over with a deadening crack as he sprang to his
feet. Maggie stopped playing and turned to look at him. Her hand flew to her
throat, a look of complete surprise upon her face.

For a moment that seemed longer than eternity, they stared
at each other, neither of them speaking. The room grew deathly silent. Her
heart thudded so loudly, she was certain he could hear it across the room. If
she had ever seen a face angry enough to kill, it was his.

“Adrian, what—”

He held his hand up. “Don’t say another word.”

“But—”

Through clenched teeth, he said, “If you know what is good
for you, you’ll keep quiet.”

She never took her eyes off him, but simply sat there,
frozen in time, watching him struggle with himself. What had she done?

At long last, he spoke, and when he did, her skin crawled
and her blood ran as cold as his tone. “Your husband,” he said, crossing the
room to where she sat pale and still, her hand spread against the pounding in
her chest, her eyes wide and staring up at him.

He stood looking down at her, his eyes sharp and deadly as a
sword point, the muscle in his jaw working. His hand trembled as it came out to
lift one of two curls that lay over her shoulder, rubbing the silky texture,
then letting it sift, painstakingly slow, through his fingers. The tension was
palpable. She felt like tearing her hair and running from the room.
Say
something, damn you! Anything! Only speak to me! What in the name of God have I
done?

“How strange,” he said, speaking too slow and too calmly to
be anything but the voice of utter and complete rage. “I wonder why you waited
until now to tell me you have been married before.”

His hands came up to fasten around her slender throat, his
thumbs caressing the hollow where her blood pounded as if desperately trying to
escape.

Her eyes never left his face, nor did his leave hers. Fear
tingled throughout her body. She knew he was going to press now, press on the
hollow of her throat until he cut off the flow of precious air to her lungs, or
snapped her neck. She inhaled deeply and closed her eyes.
I’ll make it easy
for him
, she thought.
I won’t make him remember the fear in my eyes.

He released her throat, his hands dropping lower to grip her
upper arms. Her eyes opened slowly. He drew her to her feet.

“Tell me, sweet Margaret, just how the matter of your being
married before escaped my attention. Didn’t you think it was important?
Something I had a right to know?”

Her face was pale, colorless, her eyes a bit too bright and
sparkling. “Of course you have a right to know,” she whispered, unable to
control the trembling of her lips. “I thought you did. I never dreamed you
didna.”

“And how would I know, since you’ve never seen fit to tell
me?”

“Ross,” she whispered. “He said he wrote to you. He said he
told you all about me, so naturally, I assumed—”

“Ross,” he said thoughtfully. “Of course, it’s just the sort
of thing my dear brother would do—leave out anything pertinent, anything that
might have made a difference.”

Her breath sucked in sharply. She drew back to look at him.
“And does it? Does it make a difference?”

“It’s a little late to be asking that now, don’t you think?
The marriage is legal and binding.”

“Before,” she said, “if you had known before, would it have
made a difference?”

“Of course,” he said, his words calm and cold and shattering.
He lifted a finger to trace down the curve of her throat. “If I had known
before, sweet Margaret, I would never have married you.” His hand dropped away.

“I see,” she said, her voice breaking and unsteady. She
closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, feeling her composure slip away. She had
never felt so close to crying in her life. She looked at him and felt her heart
crack like an eggshell. She felt guilty and full of shame, guilty because she
left something to Ross that she should have seen to herself, shame for knowing
how the news must have shocked him and knowing he had a right to have a virgin
for a wife if that was—as it was to many men—important to him. There was so
much pain in his face, pain she understood.

Even as she understood his disappointment, she couldn’t help
wondering why.
What is so horrible about my being married before?
She
decided it was because he thought her to still be in love with her husband,
because he saw her previous marriage as a threat to their happiness. But then
she remembered that he was in love with Katherine, and you couldn’t threaten
something that did not exist.

She opened her eyes. The urge to cry had passed. “I’m sorry
about the mistake…”

“Deception,” he corrected.

“It wasna intentional.”

“I don’t give a damn about intentions. I’m interested in the
facts.”

In spite of his anger, his harsh words held an element of
promise.
He
wouldn’t be hurt if he didn’t feel something. She was sorry
for what had happened, sorry she had been misrepresented, sorry that it had mattered
so much to him, sorry enough to want to do the right thing.
I’m sorry. I’m
sorry all we seem to do is hurt each other. I’m sorry we can’t seem to feel
anything for each other except lust and anger. I’m sorry we don’t seem to be
right for each other.

“So,” she said at last, her breathing deep, and sounding
remarkably in control of herself. “What do we do now?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Understandably, I’m not in the
best frame of mind to be making any decisions of importance right now.”

Understandably?
Maggie stiffened, wanting to point
out that he hadn’t come into this marriage with his hands exactly clean either.
He was, after all, still in love with his brother’s wife, and he still had her
portrait in the house. Maggie couldn’t think further. She was too shocked, too
stunned, to be rational.

At last the stunned feeling began to lift and reality
returned. “The marriage was never consummated,” she said, feeling suddenly
tired of all of this and as anxious to end this disastrous mistake between them
as he was. “It can easily be annulled.”

“We’ve lived in the same house together for some time,” he
said, his eyes sweeping over her, lingering on her breasts, then dropping
lower. “I doubt anyone would believe we hadn’t been together as man and wife
before now.” His eyes hardened accusingly. “And since you’ve already been used
by a man, there’s no way to prove the validity of my claim.”

“How dare you,” she said, fury exploding in her. Without
even realizing it, Maggie swung at him, pain wrenching a gasp from her as he
caught her wrist and squeezed.
Break it,
she thought.
I don’t care.
She turned to face him squarely. “I was married,” she said, her breath coming
so fast, her chest heaved, “legally, and in the church. Contrary to what you
think, I was never
used
. I was loved,” she said, tears shimmering in her
eyes.”What a pity you don’t know there’s a difference.” She twisted, trying to
pull away from him.

He was still holding her arm, and he applied pressure,
jerking her against him. “Come here. Let me see just what I’ve purchased,” he
said, his mouth coming down hard upon hers. His kiss was savage, brutal, making
her lips numb. He drove his tongue into her mouth, digging his fingers into her
perfectly arranged hair. He held her head in place, wanting to master her, to
show her she held no power over him, that she was capable of doing only what he
wanted.

He released her suddenly. “Take off your clothes.”

She stood, not moving, or even breathing, staring up into
his face, into those fathomless blue eyes that glowed like the pits of hell.
The only awareness she had at all was the terrible constricting pain she felt
each time she took a breath.

“What’s the matter, goddess? Didn’t you understand me?
There’s no need to be shocked, or even embarrassed. You’ll only be doing the
same thing you’ve done a hundred other times—stripping for your husband.”

“Adrian, please listen…” Her voice sounded far away.

His hands shot out and jerked her against him, close enough
to feel how she fought for each sharply drawn breath, to feel the cool flutter
of her breath across the heat of his face. “The time for listening was before,
not now. Now, drop your clothes, sweetheart. Show me those breasts that have
been tantalizing me all evening. Let me see if your nipples harden when I touch
you, like I imagined they would. I want to see how much you know.”

She inhaled sharply, trying to break his hold.

He held her fast. “Don’t stand there like a simpering
virgin. When I think how many times I’ve wanted to do this and didn’t.” He
paused a moment as if questioning the sanity of what he was doing. “We both
know how experienced you are. Show me!” he said, shaking her. “Damn you to
hell, show me how good you are!”

“I can’t,” she said softly, her arms going around him. “I
can only show you how I feel.” She came up on her toes, placing her trembling
mouth against his.

It was the sweetest mouth, and the most tempting. And he
was
tempted. He closed his eyes, fighting the urge to kiss her back, to give in,
but when he opened his eyes, the shattered look on her face told him she knew
he wasn’t moved. Removing her arms and pushing her away, he said, “I asked you
to take off your clothes.”