Teresa Medeiros (44 page)

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Morgan silently cursed his own folly, knowing he should have left London a week ago. He executed the intricate turns of the dance with flawless grace, his bland expression hiding the turmoil of his thoughts more effectively than a mask. He’d been a fool to let Ranald talk him into lingering one more night when even Elizabeth Cameron’s pleas had fallen on deaf ears.

He was acutely aware of the stares passing between him and Sabrina. The crowd was positively drooling for a taste of fresh scandal.

He searched the crowd for Ranald, wanting nothing more than to strangle his cousin for this new betrayal. Ranald had begged Morgan for his assistance in his wild scheme, swearing on his MacDonnell honor that Sabrina would not be in attendance. Morgan snorted under his breath. MacDonnell honor, indeed! What a joke! Angus had taught him from boyhood that the two words were mutually exclusive.

Morgan had not expected to find Sabrina sitting among the frenzied gaiety, perched like a princess on a throne. He stole a glance at her.
His
princess, he thought, fighting a fierce rush of possessiveness. Demure in white, her folded hands and coronet of braids restoring the purity of the little girl who had so boldly and foolishly offered him her heart. But she was no longer a little girl. She was a woman now, her eyes darkened with vulnerability.

He was forced to turn in the dance, drawing his eyes away from her. Why in God’s name hadn’t he left sooner? he wondered. It had taken him a week to convince Dougal that he’d washed his hands of Sabrina for good. He was still stinging from the bitter rebuke in Elizabeth’s eyes.

“You look so fierce, my lord,” his partner exclaimed, her lashes fluttering beneath her jeweled mask. Her voice lowered to a suggestive murmur. “Perhaps we should have lingered at my lodgings for a more
private
celebration.”

Morgan had come to the ridotto with every intention of spending his last night in London living up to the MacDonnell reputation for drunken debauchery.
Out of the many invitations he’d received, he’d deliberately chosen this young, widowed viscountess, hoping her statuesque blond elegance would be the perfect antidote to Sabrina’s dark, elfin beauty.

He refused to think of it as committing adultery. Tomorrow morning Sabrina would sign her elegant signature to an official document and his marriage would be over, wiped away as if it had never been.

He brought the viscountess’s gloved fingers to his lips. “I fear you’re right, my lady. Coming here was a grave mistake.”

He cupped her elbow, fully intending to guide her to the door, Ranald be damned, when the minuet ended and the lilting strains of an ancient Highland air filled the room.

Morgan closed his eyes, hearing not the civilized notes of violin and harp, but the bittersweet melding of bagpipe and clarsach. It cut through him like a blade. Eve and his other clansmen drifted through his memory, but this was another world, a world where they could never belong. He opened his eyes to see Ranald slinking away from the orchestra pit, and he knew who had prompted the unlikely melody.

Some of the dancers struggled to find a dance to fit it, but most wandered off the floor, seeking fresh punch and cake. Knowing it was a mistake even before he did it, Morgan allowed himself one last look at Sabrina.

Her eyes were fixed on the remaining dancers. In her face he saw none of the bitterness or jealousy he had expected, but only a wistful yearning like that of a child shown a treasure she could never have.

Murmuring an excuse to the puzzled viscountess, he crossed the nearly deserted dance floor. Every eye in the room followed him. A shocked hush fell over the crowd as he held out his hand to Sabrina.

“Would you care to dance, my lady?”

Sabrina gazed at the spot in the air just past his hips. She caught her trembling lower lip between her teeth, her every emotion written plainly on her unmasked face. Uncertainty of his expectations. Fear that
this was just another of his cruel jests. And most fragile of all, hope that it was not.

Morgan held his breath, afraid to hope himself. Then, risking the laughter and censure of others and so much more than they would ever know, she laid her small hand trustingly in his.

The dark eyes she lifted to him were luminous. “I would be honored, sir.”

The spectators held their own breath as he leaned down and swept her into his arms, holding her as gently as a child against his chest.

Sabrina hooked an arm around his neck, unable to resist rubbing her cheek against the warm, familiar texture of his throat. She hadn’t felt this exquisitely alive since the accident.

The other dancers stood like statues as he twirled with her, eyes shut, cheek resting on her crown of braids. Theirs was a new dance, yet older even than the poignant ballad that sang wordlessly of love and loss. Older than the thunder rumbling its majestic hymn against the domed roof.

The music lilted to a halt. Sabrina opened her eyes to find Morgan’s mouth a hairbreadth away from hers. She parted her lips in silent invitation. Before he could accept, a clipped voice rang out.

“Unhand that woman! Have you no scruples, sir? Perhaps that’s the way you uncouth Scots treat a lady, but we English are a civilized people. We don’t tolerate such shocking displays!”

Sabrina didn’t know whether to laugh or groan as Philip Markham planted himself firmly in their path. Morgan was saved the trouble of swatting him like a fly when Ranald came charging to his defense.

“Uncouth?” Ranald bellowed.
“Uncouth?
What the bloody hell do ye mean callin’ the chieftain o’ Clan MacDonnell uncouth? Why, he’s worked his fingers to the bone becomin’ the most couth man in London. If ye want uncouth, I’ll give it to ye, ye prancin’ prig!”

Philip blinked, his righteous indignation quailing before the unexpected attack of this masked dervish.
“Who allowed you in here?” he said weakly. “Does anyone know if this man has an invitation?”

Philip’s query met with only shrugs and averted glances. No one offered to search Ranald for it.

Ranald tore off his mask and wig and lifted his fists, ready to brawl. “These here are the only invitation I need to smash yer uppity face.”

The crowd gasped anew as the pure Gypsy beauty of Ranald’s face was revealed. Several of the women tittered behind their fans.

Sabrina’s own mouth fell open when Morgan’s roar of surprise drowned them all out. “Why, I’ll be damned! Nathanael MacLeod, as I live and breathe! Nate, you canny rascal. They told me you were dead!”

Ranald lowered his fists and puffed out his chest. “Aye, but it takes more than a wee tumble from a carriage to kill an
uncouth
Scot.”

Enid burst from the crowd with a theatrical sob that would have put Columbine to shame. “Oh, my darling husband! You’re alive!”

Unable to bear this fresh excitement, two of the women swooned into their partners’ arms. All Sabrina could do was stare stupidly from Ranald to Enid to Morgan, realizing the scoundrels had planned this from the beginning.

“But
you
can’t be her husband,” Philip whined. “I’ve already bought the wedding gown. I’m going to marry her.”

“Like hell ye are.” Ranald threw the first punch. Chaos erupted as Philip’s friends came rushing to his aid.

Sabrina ducked as a crystal cup went sailing past her head. Morgan pressed her face into his chest and plunged through the fracas, his grace serving them well.

“Shouldn’t you help Ranald?” she screamed above the din, spitting out a mouthful of his cravat.

“Help him do what?” he yelled back.

Over Morgan’s shoulder she saw two satin-garbed gentlemen reel into a limp heap as Ranald cracked their
heads together. Sabrina was forced to concede Morgan’s point.

A squat young man hurled himself at Morgan, obviously intent upon her rescue. Sabrina snatched up a champagne bottle and smashed it over his head.

“Livin’ up to your MacDonnell name, aren’t you, lass?” Morgan said, crooking an eyebrow. He stumbled to a halt in the relative calm before the wide double doors and lowered her until her toes touched the floor. His boyish grin was irresistible. “Not much different from dodging Grants and Chisholms on the battlefield, is it?”

Two women rolled past, powdered faces contorted in fury, fingers curled into claws. “Oh, I don’t know,” Sabrina said, still dazed by his proximity and the bizarre events of the night. “I think the Grants might be more a tad more couth.”

His eyes sobered as he gazed down at her. His hands still rested beneath her arms, gently cradling the sides of her breasts. She drew in an unsteady breath as his thumbs stole out to caress their peaks. An angry cry went up behind them. They turned to find Ranald and Enid barreling breathlessly toward the door, hand in hand.

“Damn!” Morgan swore. “I thought we’d have more time.”

Time was definitely in short supply as the crowd stampeded toward them. Morgan propped Sabrina on a table out of harm’s way before whirling to throw open the doors.

Thunder clapped with vengeful fury. A cool blast of wind rushed through the open door, extinguishing the lamps and throwing the room into chaotic darkness. A cacophony of screams and bellows rang out.

Sabrina trembled in the shadows, wondering if Morgan had abandoned her. She didn’t have long to wonder.

With the wind and darkness came a rush of pine and sandalwood to intoxicate her reeling senses. Strong, familiar arms encircled her, drawing her into an embrace as wild and defiant as the approaching storm.
Morgan’s lips seized hers in a kiss as darkly intimate as the mating of their bodies had once been. His tongue plunged into her mouth over and over again, branding her with a possessive rhythm that sent liquid heat melting from all the secret crevices of her body.

Every erotic thing he’d ever done to her was in that kiss. Every possession. Every stroke of his hand, every flick of his tongue, all wrapped in one soul-stealing kiss that left her utterly breathless and whimpering for more.

But he drew away from her, no more than a faceless shadow in the darkness. She thought she felt his hand touch her hair. Then the damp air struck her skin, empty of his presence.

A shuddering sigh tore through her. It was only then that she realized Morgan had left her standing on her own two feet.

She slid down the wall into the cushioned pool of her skirts. Touching two fingers to her trembling lips, she wondered if his kiss had been a kiss of promise or of farewell.

Late that night Sabrina sat on the terrace outside her bedroom in her wheelchair. The Belmont town house was dark and silent. Uncle Willie had locked himself in the library with a bottle of port while Aunt Honora had fled to her bedroom with a severe case of the vapors.

Sabrina didn’t think she would ever forget their flabbergasted expressions as a bloodied and disheveled Philip Markham explained that their daughter had fled the ridotto with her dead husband. Sabrina had to admire their composure. They had simply thanked the stunned young man and retreated to their separate strongholds, leaving Sabrina to the care of the servants.

She tipped her head back to study the sky. Clouds scudded in from the west, their charcoal underbellies absorbing the moonlight. Lightning danced between them, scenting the air with an acrid tang. The sculpted tops of the bay trees whipped in a frenzied dance.

Before Morgan had come to London, Sabrina
would have cowered in her bed at the approach of such a storm. Now she welcomed the threat of its primal fury, yearned for a taste of it with a wild, sweet hunger she’d repressed for too long.

She got her wish when a fat raindrop pelted her in the mouth. A surprised start of laughter escaped her. The rain began in earnest, striking hard and sharp like pebbles against the thin skin of her nightdress. Instead of rolling herself inside to seek shelter, she threw back her head, letting the water cascade down her cheeks and throat, cleansing her with its crisp zeal.

In the next flash of lightning she saw him, illuminated against the darkness like a golden wildcat. He had abandoned his frock coat. His ivory shirt was open at the throat. The wind whipped his unbound hair around his shoulders. His newfound civility had been stripped away, leaving him raw and dangerous, a predator in a world of prey.

The air between them crackled with challenge. Exhilaration rushed through Sabrina, sharp and electric.

Morgan didn’t bother with the chair. He simply scooped her up and carried her inside, laying her among the pillows on the rumpled bed.

“But the chair,” she protested. “It might rust.”

“Let it,” he said, striding back to latch the terrace doors, muting the fury of the approaching storm. Wind drove the rain against the leaded panes, enclosing them in a watery haven.

Sabrina watched him stir the ebbing fire to life, suddenly shy. The damp shirt clung to his broad back.

Her words held a half-teasing note. “Surely you’ve been in London long enough to know it’s not proper for a young lady to entertain a gentleman in her bedroom.”

He faced her, all humor vanquished from his eyes. “Not even if she’s his wife?”

His wife
. Morgan’s proprietary tone sent a thrill through Sabrina.

Morgan knew coming here had been another mistake in a long line that had started when he had agreed
to make Dougal Cameron’s daughter his bride. The distance between them was fracturing with each of her shy smiles, each nervous dart of her tongue to moisten her lips.

His wife
. The words should have been as holy and irrevocable as God intended them to be. As holy as the Bible peeking out from under the edge of her mattress. As holy as the rumpled linens and soft feathers she reclined upon.

Sabrina pressed herself into the pillows as Morgan’s shadow fell over the bed, afraid not of him, but of herself.

“I can’t,” she whispered, averting her eyes.

He sank down on the bed and cupped her chin in his hand, tilting her face to his. “Whatever may happen upon the morrow,” he said gently, “you’re still my wife tonight.”

Sabrina was struck by a wave of shyness. The tears she’d held back for so long spilled from her eyes. “You don’t understand! I’m not worthy of you. I’m not a whole woman anymore. I don’t know what to do. I can’t pleasure you as you deserve.”