Once Upon a Tower (6 page)

Nine

G
owan entered the drawing room early and stood about talking to a crowd of Smythe-Smith relations, trying to appear as if he wasn’t bored to tears.

When he’d attended the Gilchrist ball, and indeed most of the time, he’d worn English attire: an embroidered coat, a starched neck cloth, silk pantaloons. But after that sparring exchange with Edie, he wanted to reveal himself to her as
himself
, not as a pretend Englishman.

He wore the Kinross kilt, in the tartan of the Chief of Clan MacAulay. It felt right. Surrounded by these sleek and silly Englishmen with covered knees, his bare legs felt twice as strong for being free of the hindrance of breeches.

Marcus Holroyd, the Earl of Chatteris, paused at his side. “Kinross, it’s a pleasure to see you here. My fiancée has just informed me that you are newly betrothed.”

Gowan inclined his head. “Yes, to Lady Edith Gilchrist.”

“My very best wishes. I understand that she is a gifted musician. Do you play as well?”

Gowan felt not a little embarrassment that he had no idea of Lady Edith’s interests, let alone her gifts. “A musician along the lines of your inestimable fiancée?” Gowan had sat through a Smythe-Smith recital once, and he hoped never to be in the presence of such dissonant cacophony again. If his wife was a musician of that caliber, he would implore her not to play.

“I have not had the pleasure of hearing Lady Edith play,” Chatteris replied, not revealing by so much as the twitch of eyebrow less than complete support for his fiancée’s musical talents.

There was a stir by the door, and they turned. “There’s Honoria,” Chatteris said. Gowan glanced at him. The man had a look of quiet longing in his eyes.

Odd. Weddings among the aristocracy weren’t usually arranged for amorous reasons. As Gowan watched, Chatteris went straight to Honoria’s side.

Where was Lady Edith, damn it? He was getting sick of deflecting lascivious glances from women who appreciated his kilt for all the wrong reasons—and appeared curious about what he wore under it.

The Earl of Gilchrist entered the drawing room, and approached Gowan with his slightly awkward, rigid gait, then bent his head. “Your Grace.”

“We are to be kin,” Gowan responded cordially, extending his hand. “It’s good to see you, Gilchrist.”

The earl clasped it briefly. “I expect that you will be pleased to see my daughter after this separation. It is well that you come to know each other better before your wedding.”

“In fact, we should discuss dates for the ceremony. I would like to reconsider the length of our betrothal.”

“I do not approve of hasty marriages,” Gilchrist stated. “A year’s betrothal would not be untoward, in my estimation.”

Gowan wouldn’t have minded before he and Edie had exchanged those letters. But now  . . . “I did mention my orphaned half sister,” he reminded the earl. “I would be reluctant to leave her motherless for a year.”

Lady Gilchrist now joined them; Gowan turned and bowed to her, straightening in time to catch Gilchrist’s unguarded look at his wife. It was embarrassing. The man was at his wife’s feet, figuratively speaking.

“Lady Gilchrist,” Gowan said. “It’s a pleasure to meet you again.”

“You must be so eager to see our daughter,” she said, an unexpected dimple appearing in one cheek. When she looked like that—a bit naughty—the combination of her beauty, sensuality, and wit was dazzling.

He kissed her hand, returning her smile.

Then he noticed that Gilchrist’s eyes had gone black. He was startled until he realized that blank rage could mean only one thing: Gilchrist believed his wife would stray, even to her own son-in-law. Gowan felt sorry for him.

A trace of that pity must have appeared on his face, because Gilchrist’s eyes narrowed, and he raised his chin. “Lady Gilchrist,” he said, his voice as hard as a piece of granite, “where is my daughter?”

Lady Gilchrist didn’t show the slightest reaction to his tone, though Gowan thought his tone was harsh in the extreme, never mind that he’d changed her “our daughter” to the decidedly proprietary “my daughter.”

“Edie entered with me,” she said, “but she met that lovely young lady Iris, who also plays the cello. One of the Smythe-Smith girls.”

She turned, surveying the room. “Ah, there she is.”

Young ladies were everywhere, looking like little drifts of snow in their white frocks. Gowan’s eyes moved from one to the next, rejecting each. Not . . . not . . . not . . . He frowned, looking again from white gown to white gown.

He had been certain that he would recognize Lady Edith’s sweet countenance. After all, he had stared at it for two dances in a row. He knew the tilt of her nose, her green eyes, the slant of her cheekbone.

“Perhaps,” Lady Gilchrist said, amusement curling through her voice like smoke, “you are not taking into account the fact that Edie is not fond of white gowns, although she does wear them when she must.”

“I would hope that my daughter is recognizable to her future spouse no matter her gown,” Gilchrist said, his words sharply clipped.

Gowan ignored him and began to look at each and every woman in the room, not only those wearing white. Beside him, Lady Gilchrist’s chuckle was like the drowsy call of a bird at dusk.

Then he saw her.

His fiancée . . . His future wife.

Edie
.

His heart thundered. He recognized every angle of her face, lush lips, hair . . . who could forget that hair? It looked as if old Roman coins had melted into canary wine, leaving strands of darker gold woven with sunlight.

At the same time, she was not precisely the woman he had chosen to marry.

This woman was utterly sensual. Her body was shaped for a man’s caress; her breasts were soft and full, alabaster skin framed by red silk. She was talking to someone and laughing . . . her laughing lips matched her gown. Her hair shone with the deep luster of jasmine honey. It was pulled up in ringlets that flowed with slight variations in color.

He heard Gilchrist say something, but he didn’t listen. Blood pounded in his ears. When he’d first met her, Edie’s eyes had been placid pools of sweet water. Now they were deep, filled with laughter and intelligence. There was nothing placid there. Nor in the scarlet lips, nor the rounded bosom.

“I see why you did not recognize her immediately,” Gilchrist was saying, his tone pinched and disapproving. “That gown is most inappropriate. I can only think this is your influence, Lady Gilchrist.”

“It is not merely my influence, but indeed my gown,” his wife replied. “As a betrothed woman, she need not rigidly adhere to the conventions regarding dress which govern unmarried ladies.”

“If you will excuse me,” Gowan said, bowing. “I will greet Lady Edith.”

“Do call her Edie,” Lady Gilchrist said gaily, seemingly untouched by her husband’s dour judgments. “She prefers informality among family members.”

Gowan had the same edgy, intense feeling as when he embarked on a hunt. This was the woman who had written him that letter. She was to marry him. She had written of dancing in the sheets with him.

As he moved across the room, his eyes fixed on his betrothed, his kilt brushed against his legs, reminding him of other body parts that were hardening as he walked. He sensed a kind of erotic surprise such as he’d never felt—never dreamed he would feel—before.

As if conscious of his gaze, she turned and met his eyes.

How in the world had he believed her to be chaste, quiet, and submissive? Her eyes were brilliant, her mouth mobile and utterly sensual. It was as if he were encountering a complete stranger.

Desire flamed through his body. Her lips parted slightly, and he knew that she, too, recognized him.

He had thought she was like a drink of clear water. But now, meeting her gaze, she was a river that tumbled with life and danger. She would change his life. She would change everything about him.

Instinctively, he responded as the men of the Highlands always had before the woman they honored above all others. Dimly aware that the room had gone still, he stopped just before his fiancée, sank onto one knee, and took the hand that she extended to him.

“My lady,” he said, his voice deep and sure. He saw no one but her, knew she saw only him. With one swift, sure tug, he peeled off her glove. A sigh came from behind him, but he paid no mind.

This was no performance for an audience; it was for the two of them alone.

He raised her hand to his lips, and carefully placed a kiss on her naked fingers. It was a brazen, outrageous gesture.

He didn’t care.

Ten

E
die felt as if she were caught up in a play . . . something larger than herself. Nothing dramatic had ever happened to
her
, to Lady Edith Gilchrist. The most excitement she’d had was when her father invited a cellist to their house so that she could play for him.

Walking into the room she had been pleased to see Iris Smythe-Smith, who was quite good at the cello, having somehow succeeded in avoiding the influence of her family’s quartet. And then she had felt an odd prickling in her shoulder blades, so she had turned her head. And there, walking toward her, was her future husband.

It was as if her eyes grabbed the image of him and gobbled it up. He had muscled legs, beautiful legs, twice the size of the Englishmen’s in the room. His chest was wide and his shoulders looked even wider thanks to the plaid thrown over one shoulder.

And his face . . .

It was rough-hewn, not beautiful, a warrior’s face with a strong chin. But his eyes were most astonishing. There was no polite emotion in them: just blazing possessiveness.

She felt, suddenly, as if he were looking straight at her, and as if he were the first to do so in her whole life. As if he looked into her soul and saw the real woman. Her heartbeat thudded in her throat.

The duke went on one knee before her. He took her hand, peeled off her glove, and kissed her fingers.

For a moment, Edie felt dizzy. The mere touch of his lips was a voluptuous promise. This was the kiss that a knight errant gives his lady before he gallops off in her defense. The kiss that a courtier gives the queen of his heart. Kinross had abased himself before her. And yet, in the act of kneeling at her feet, he had only asserted himself as a man born to command.

Then he rose, towering over her. How could she have not noticed that the man was the size of a Scots pine? Perhaps she did notice. But not really. She hadn’t seen that he was so big in every way. And ruthless.

He looked like the sort of man who saw a woman and decided on the spot to marry her. And not for practical reasons, either.

That idea was utterly shocking—and delightful.

“Lady Edith,” he said, and she remembered that Highlands burr. It rolled over her skin like a love song.

“I prefer to be called Edie,” she said, forgetting to draw her ungloved hand out of his. And then: “Your hair is
red!
”

His right eyebrow flew up. “It always has been. Though nothing compared to that of most Scotsmen, my lady.”

“I have never liked red hair,” she said, stunned because this hair . . . this hair she
did
like. It was the color of blackened steel with fire burning in its depths. It was the red of a banked kiln at night, of a coal.

His laughter rumbled through the room and as if by a signal, the people around them turned away, judging that the drama had come to an end.

“You didn’t know that my hair is red, and I had no idea that you are a musician.”

“I play the cello,” she said lamely.

“Which instrument is that?” he said, his forehead creasing in a frown.

“What? Which instrument? You don’t know?”

His eyes searched hers, and then his laughter enfolded her again. “I suspect that you have a great deal to teach me, Lady Edie.”

Edie frowned at him. “Are you jesting, or do you truly not know what a cello is?”

“I know very little about music in general. My grandmother did not approve of frivolities, and I’m afraid that she put music into that category.”

“Music is not a frivolity!”

“She found it unnecessary to daily life in the way that shelter and meat are.”

Edie debated whether to inform her future husband just how far ahead of bread music came for her. It didn’t seem like a point she had to make at the moment. He had great composure, this duke of hers. She saw flashes of deep emotion in his eyes, but at the same time, he was so ducal.

And
male
.

And in that moment, she realized that she didn’t really care what he thought of music. She was more interested in what he thought of the claret dress. Some female part of her purred with satisfaction at the way he still held her hand.

He smiled down at her, his gaze so potent that her heart sped up once again. “I believe that it is time to repair to the dining room.” He drew her hand into the crook of his arm. She hadn’t even heard the butler announce the meal, but the other guests were arranging themselves to proceed to dinner.

Kinross looked at her with all the fierce interest of a musician with a new sheet of music, a score never played. And she felt the same.

It was very strange.

The smile that curled her lips came from her heart. The duke—Kinross—was the epitome of imperturbability, and yet, for a moment, she had caught sight of a flash of vulnerability in his eyes.

She was not alone in this whirlpool fever of desire and curiosity.

They moved toward the other guests, who were forming themselves into a procession, according to the customary rules of rank. Her father and Layla had taken their places toward the front; Kinross, as duke, moved ahead of them. They ended up just behind the bride and groom, Lady Honoria Smythe-Smith and the Earl of Chatteris.

Kinross leaned close; his breath was warm on her ear. “Are you as musical as the bride and her relatives?”

Laughter bubbled out of Edie’s mouth. “No!”

The touch of his arm sent a shock down her body. “Better or worse?”

That made her laugh even more. “What if I were to say worse?” She looked up at him from under her lashes, enjoying the flirtation.

A slow smile grew in his eyes. “Could I bribe you not to play?”

“Never. Playing the cello is the thing I love most in the world.” She added, “You might as well know that it’s the only thing I do truly well.”

“You dance very well.”

“That’s part of being a musician. I was terribly ill the night we met; did you guess?”

He shook his head. “I had no idea until you wrote me about it.”

“I had a high fever. I felt as if I were floating from place to place.”

“I think dancers are sometimes described as levitating.” His eyes crinkled with laughter. “I did think that you were marvelously graceful.”

“I was afraid I might topple over,” she confessed. And then: “I think the only part of the evening I truly enjoyed was our waltz. You waltz very well.”

“As do you, my lady.”

He was manifestly a duke. It showed in every lineament of his countenance, the unconscious grace of his every movement, in his air of authority. But at the same time . . . there was something else about Kinross as well. She cocked her head, trying to work out what it was, but the doors to the dining room were pulled open and the line began moving forward.

The meal passed in a tumble of conversation—with an older gentleman to her left, with Kinross to her right, then back to the man on her left.

When they weren’t speaking, Edie kept stealing glances at her fiancé. He appeared dispassionate, as if one could never read his feelings in his face. Yet she thought she’d glimpsed a vulnerability. It made her wild to talk at great length, and see if she could tease it out again.

Kinross’s face was harsh in repose. But when his eyes met hers, the ferocity in them disappeared. She didn’t know what
was
there, but it felt untamed and new. No one had ever looked at her that way.

Of course, he was not truly looking at plain Edie, who played the cello. He was seeing Edie dressed up as Layla.

The duke moved his leg, and his thigh brushed up against hers and remained there. It had to be accidental; a gentleman would never do such a thing. He glanced at her, his eyes wickedly suggestive, and turned back to his conversation. It wasn’t an accident.

Every inch of her skin instantly awoke. Improper though it was, Edie loved it. She’d never felt this sort of racing desire—or, if she were truthful, any desire, other than for a cello made by Stradivarius. She reached for her wineglass, discovering that her fingers were trembling. She could feel heat rising in her cheeks.

Finally, he moved his leg, turned back to her, and said, “Have you ever read
Romeo and Juliet
?”

Edie shook her head. She had given it a try after receiving his letter, but she had been unable to make head or tail of the play. It was her own fault, because she’d always disobeyed her governess and avoided her lessons. She hadn’t had time for reading. All she had ever wanted to do was play the cello. It had made her a bit of a dunce.

Something hungry in his eyes made her shift in her chair. “I’m not very well read,” she confessed. “I gather that you are my opposite in that respect.”

“My grandmother, who raised me, disparaged reading for pleasure, but considered Shakespeare to be an exception. Generally speaking, my tutors were busy teaching me double-sided accounting and animal husbandry, and I was unable to go to university. So, believe me, I am far less learned than you might think.”

She laughed. “That’s impossible. I know almost everything about the cello, and almost nothing about anything else.”

“I know quite a lot about being a duke and a landowner, and next to nothing about music or literature. But I do remember this: when Romeo first saw Juliet at the ball, he described her as so beautiful that she taught the torches to burn bright.”

“You can’t have thought that of me. I was dreadfully ill.”

“You were something of a torch, from what I remember. I thought your touch was burning me.” She couldn’t imagine him allowing many people to hear that thread of sharp wit.

Edie was starting to feel slightly unbalanced. His eyelashes were so beautiful: thick and straight. And his eyes fascinated her. One moment they were all ducal arrogance, the next a brazen rake was looking at her with such lust and desire that it sent flames down her legs. And then there was that elusive touch of humor, a private wit that made her want to laugh with startled pleasure.

“What does Juliet think of Romeo on first seeing him?” she asked, pulling herself together. “Does she think he’s burning like a torch as well?”

“Oh, she likes him well enough,” Kinross said. “She probably didn’t find the moment as shocking as he did.”

“Why not?” Edie asked. “What did Romeo feel?”

“The man is utterly changed forever,” Kinross said. “He arrives at the ball in love with another lady—”

Edie’s brows drew together. “He
is
?”

“He was, but I was not,” the duke said bluntly.

Edie couldn’t stop herself from smiling, even as she realized that she had never smiled in quite this way before. It was a Layla smile.

“Romeo believes himself in love, but then he sees Juliet.”

“She burns with a torchlike fever, so he forgets about his previous love?” Edie asked, laughing.

“Something like that.” A twist of husky laughter sounded in his voice, too. She already knew that he didn’t laugh much. Life was serious for the duke; she knew it instinctively. He was as driven as she was, though she wasn’t entirely sure in what direction.

“He falls prey to lust. He risks kissing her, behind a pillar, when that kiss might mean his death.”

“That seems extreme,” Edie remarked. She couldn’t stop looking at him, at his eyes, his cheekbones, his nose, his jaw. She was quite aware that if anyone had fallen prey to lust, it was she. But somehow she wasn’t even embarrassed.

“He throws everything away for the chance to kiss her hand.”

“He would have been killed merely for kissing Juliet’s hand?”

“Their families were enemies. But he doesn’t stop with her hand.” A glow in the duke’s eyes lit an answering fire in Edie’s belly.

“He whisks her behind a pillar and kisses her on her lips.”

Edie swallowed.

“And then kisses her again.”

“Very . . .” Edie couldn’t think of a word.

“He would keep kissing her all evening, but she is called away. He doesn’t even know who she is. But he knows that she is
his
.” The duke’s eyes were hot and possessive. “So later that night, Romeo leaps the walls of the orchard around her house and risks death again to find her balcony window.”

“Oh, I’ve heard about the balcony,” Edie said, making herself break the spell of his voice. At this rate, she’d find herself begging him to kiss her in front of the whole table. “Juliet asks him to marry her.”

The duke shook his head. Under the table, his fingers curled around hers.

She jumped, and another wave of hot blood rose in her cheeks.

“No,” Kinross said, as if he weren’t doing anything so boldly scandalous, “that’s putting the emphasis in the wrong place. Everyone assumes that Juliet was a brazen minx because she asked if he planned to marry her. But the two of them knew the truth.”

His thumb was rubbing over her palm. Edie discovered she was trembling a little. “She knew, and he knew,” the duke said, his voice low and sure. “Romeo leapt that wall because he wanted to kiss Juliet more than he wanted to live. He climbed her balcony; he offered his vows. Marriage is nothing more than a formality in that situation.”

Edie could hear Layla’s laughter and the click of tableware. She should have read the damned play. She should have spent hours reading Shakespeare. The duke was making literature sound a good deal more interesting than her governess had ever done.

“Without Juliet, life was not worth living,” the duke continued. “So when he believed she was dead, he killed himself.”

“His reaction was rather extreme,” she managed. Surely someone would notice that her fiancé was holding her hand. Down the table, Layla was flirting madly with a man who wasn’t Edie’s father.

“Indeed, I used to think Romeo might have been a bit mad.”

A shiver went straight down Edie’s spine. The duke looked . . . He looked as if he had decided that Romeo was entirely sane. Mind you,
he
didn’t look entirely sane. He looked ravenous.

“Stop that,” she whispered. “You mustn’t act like this.” She pulled her hand away.

He smiled at her, a kind of happily mad look. “I’m a Scot.”

“What does that have to do with it?”

“There are those who say that Romeo had Scottish blood.”