To Beguile a Beast (11 page)

She scowled at him. He was lying in a puddle, the puppy huddled against his chest, both man and beast shivering with cold. “I need help to get you inside.”

“No”—he heaved himself to a sitting position—“you don’t.”

She took his arm and pulled hard, trying to help him up. “Stubborn man.”

“Stubborn woman,” he muttered back. “Don’t hurt the pup. I paid a shilling for him.”

“And nearly died bringing the beast home,” she panted.

He lurched to his feet, and she wrapped her arms about his chilly chest to steady him. The position put her head under his arm, her cheek against his side. He laid a heavy arm over her shoulders. “You are a lunatic.”

“Is this any way for a housekeeper to talk to her master?” His teeth were chattering, but he balanced the puppy in the crook of his other arm.

“You may dismiss me in the morning,” she snapped as she helped him awkwardly up the step. For all his sarcasm, he leaned heavily on her, and she could feel the ragged heave of his chest against her cheek. He was a big, stubborn man, but he must’ve been riding in the rain for hours.

“You forget, Mrs. Halifax, that I’ve tried and failed to dismiss you since the night you arrived at my door. Watch it.” He’d fallen against the doorframe, pulling her off balance.

“If you’d just follow my lead,” she gasped.

“What a very bossy woman you are,” he mused as he staggered through the doorway. “I can’t think how I managed without you.”

“Neither can I.” She propped him against the wall and shoved the door shut. The pup whimpered. “It’ll serve you right if you catch an ague.”

“Oh, how dulcet is the feminine tone,” he murmured. “So soft, so gentle, even enough to rouse the protective urge in any man.”

She snorted and led him toward the stairs. They were leaving a trail of water that would have to be cleaned on the morrow. Despite his sardonic words, he was pale and shivering violently, and she truly was afraid he’d catch a deathly chill. She’d seen strong men laid low by fever before, when helping her father on his rounds. They’d be laughing and alive one week and dead within days.

“Watch the step,” she said. He was tall enough, heavy enough, that if he started to fall, she wasn’t altogether sure she could keep him from tumbling down the stairs.

He merely grunted, and that worried her more—did he no longer have the strength to argue with her? Her mind leapt ahead as she helped him slowly up the stairs. She’d have to get hot water, perhaps make tea. Mrs. McCleod had left a kettle near the banked kitchen fire last night—perhaps she had again tonight. She’d get him to his room and then run down for the kettle.

But he was shuddering in waves by the time they made the hallway outside his room. The puppy was in danger of being flung from his arm.

“You may leave me here,” he grunted when they reached his door.

She ignored him and pushed the door open. “You’re an idiot.”

“Several imminent scientists in Edinburgh and the continent would beg to differ.”

“I doubt they’ve seen you half-dead and clutching a wet puppy.”

“True.” He staggered toward the bed. His room was huge. A bed with massive posters squatted between heavily draped windows, the coverlet trailing on the floor. On one wall was a large ancient fireplace, made of the same rose stone as the rest of the castle. For a moment, Helen wondered if this room had been used continuously by the master of the castle since it was built.

Then she shoved the thought from her mind. “Not the bed. You’ll get it wet.”

She guided him toward the fireplace. A single enormous chair sat before the cold hearth. Sir Alistair sank into it, shuddering, while she bent and stirred the fire. A feeble ember still glowed there. Carefully she heaped coals upon it and blew until the fire caught. Rainwater ran down her face from her hair and dripped to the floor. She shivered, but she wasn’t nearly as cold as he.

She stood and faced Sir Alistair. “Take off those clothes.”

“Why, Mrs. Halifax, such daring.” His words were slightly slurred as if he’d been drinking, though she had detected no alcohol on his breath. “I had no idea you had designs upon my person.”

“Humph.” She picked up the shivering puppy and placed it near the fire, where it sat in a forlorn wet heap. She’d worry about the dog later. At the moment, its master took precedence.

Helen stood and started peeling the soaking coat from Sir Alistair’s shoulders. He leaned forward to help her, but his movements were clumsy. She flung the wet coat on the hearth, where it began to steam. Then she knelt before him and worked the buttons through the soaking fabric of his waistcoat. She could feel him watching her, his eyes heavy-lidded, and her heartbeat could not help but speed up. She got the waistcoat undone, pulled it off, and threw it on top of the coat. When she started on the buttons of his shirt, she was conscious that her breath was coming harder. She concentrated, staring at the white translucent material plastered to the hard planes of his chest. Crisp hair was shadowed under the cloth. She could feel his hot breath on the top of her head. This position was too intimate.

She determinedly drew off his shirt before she could stop and think about it, but she still faltered when his nude torso was revealed. His body was ever so much lovelier than her imaginings. The wide strong slopes of his shoulders led to surprisingly thick muscles on his arms, and his chest was broad and covered with dark curling hair on the upper part. Brown-red nipples peaked through the hair, hard and pointed and shockingly bare. His taut belly had only a fine line of dark hair that circled his navel before widening below and then disappearing into the waistband of his breeches. She’d stretched out one hand toward that seductive line of hair before she’d even realized her own movement.

Helen snatched back her wayward hand, hid it in her skirts, and said briskly, “Stand up so we can get the rest of these clothes off you. You’re nearly blue with cold.”

“Mrs. Halifax, your regard alone is enough to heat m-me,” he drawled as he stood. The rakish words were only marred by the chattering of his teeth.

“Humph.”

She knew that her entire face was enveloped in a fiery blush, but she still needed to get those wet breeches off him. She began on the buttons, waving his fumbling hands away when he tried to help her. He swayed as she got the last button undone, and suddenly she was no longer worried about her flush or what he might think of her.

“Get to the bed,” she ordered.

“Bossy woman,” he muttered, but his words were slurred again, and he shuffled toward the massive bed.

Once there, she had him lean against the mattress as she stripped his boots, breeches, hose, and smallclothes from him. She had only a glimpse of long hairy legs and a dark patch of fur at their apex before she was shoving him into the bed and heaping the covers on top of him.

She expected some sardonic comment from him then—perhaps along the lines of her hurry to get him into bed—but he merely closed his eyes. And that forbearance shot a bolt of pure fear through her. She stopped only to scoop the puppy up and plop him beneath the covers next to the man, and then she was running to the kitchen.

Thank God! Mrs. McCleod had indeed left a kettle warming by the banked kitchen fire. Helen quickly made tea and took the pot, a cup, and plenty of sugar along with an ancient metal bed-warming pan back up to Sir Alistair’s bedroom. When she entered, panting from the quick climb up the stairs, his body was a still mound beneath the covers, and her heart gave a painful jolt.

But then he stirred. “I was beginning to wonder if the sight of my naked body had caused you to flee the castle.”

She snorted as she laid her full tray on a table beside the bed. “I’m the mother of a small boy. I’ve seen a naked male body many times, I assure you. I bathed Jamie just tonight.”

He grunted. “I’d hope that my form would be somewhat different than a boy’s.”

She cleared her throat to say primly, “There are some differences, of course, but the similarities are still there.”

“Humph.” She knew he watched her as she took the warming pan to the fire and scooped in glowing coals. “Then undressing me gave you no more worry than bathing wee Jamie.”

“Naturally not,” she said with what she thought was admirable aplomb.

“Liar,” he rasped softly.

She ignored that and brought the hot pan back to the bed. “Can you move over?”

He nodded, his face weary and lined. He managed to inch over on the mattress, and she threw back the covers to use the warming pan on the sheets. She tried hard, but it was impossible not to see the long line of his bared leg, hip, and side. Heat uncurled in her belly. Hastily, she averted her eyes.

When she finished, he rolled back and grunted, his eye closing. “Feels good.”

“Good.” She set the pan on the hearth and hurried back. “Try and sit up so you can take some tea.”

His eye opened, surprisingly sharp and focused on her bosom. “You’re soaked through, Mrs. Halifax. You need to attend to yourself.”

She glanced down and saw that her chemise and wrap were nearly transparent. Her pointed nipples were outlined quite clearly against the thin fabric. Goodness! But modesty hardly mattered at the moment. “I’ll attend to myself as soon as you’re settled. Now sit up.”

“I shall repay you for your officiousness later,” he warned, but he heaved himself against the pillow until he was half upright.

“You do that,” she replied as she heaped sugar into the cup and then poured steaming tea in it.

“I don’t think sugar will help your tea, Mrs. Halifax,” he drawled behind her.

“Oh, hush.” She turned and caught his gaze focused on her bottom. “It’s hot and sweet, and that’s what you need now. Drink.”

She held the cup for him and he sipped, wincing. “Your tea could take the rust off iron. Do you mean to kill me?”

“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m trying to do,” she murmured soothingly. A small corner of her heart seemed to tug at his gruff words. He was so stubborn, so surly, and at the moment he needed her so much. “Take some more.”

He sipped from the cup again, his gaze all the while on her face, steady and disconcerting. Her fingers trembled as she watched his strong throat work. She hastily took the cup away and set it on the tray.

“Thank you, Mrs. Halifax,” he said. His eye was closed, and he’d sunk into the bed, but there was color in his face again. “I think I shall survive the night without you.”

She frowned. “Perhaps I should heat a brick or bring more tea.”

“God, please no more tea. You may retire for the night. Unless”—he opened his light brown eye and glanced at her sardonically—“you’d like to join me?”

Her eyes widened involuntarily at the blunt invitation, and for a crucial moment, she didn’t know what to say or do. Then she whirled and left the room, his laughter echoing behind her as she rushed to her own bedroom.

Entirely naked.

He swallowed and touched himself, running his fingers up hot flesh made iron, surrounding the aching head in his fist. His foreskin was already pulled back by the swelling of his cock, and his seed gleamed between his fingers. His imaginary Mrs. Halifax knelt before him and cradled her own white breasts in her hands. She lifted them, offering them, at once wanton and shy, her lower lip caught between her teeth. He squeezed the head of his cock, feeling the shaft of pleasure shoot to his balls. Her breasts were big and bonny, overflowing her little hands. She took her red nipples between thumb and forefinger and pinched them hard, giving him a wicked look. He groaned and fisted down, pulling gently. If she pushed those soft mounds together, if he leaned forward and thrust his cock between her sweet, hot breasts . . .

Beside him came a small canine whimper.

He instinctively jerked and grabbed for the covers. “Shit!”

Then he remembered and let his body flop back on the pillows. He looked down. The puppy cringed against the bedding, half buried in the sheets that had covered him.

“It’s all right, laddie,” Alistair said. “It’s not your fault I’m a daft man.” Nor was it the puppy’s fault that he still remained erect and aching.

But then he’d woken many a morning in this state. And since he’d returned from the Colonies, he’d had naught but his own hand to satisfy his animal desires. Once, several years ago, he’d reached a point of such frustration that he’d journeyed into a wretched section of Edinburgh. There he’d sought out the services of a woman paid to relieve men of their erotic urges. But when the whore he’d settled on saw his face in the candlelight of her rented room, she’d asked for a higher price. He’d left, humiliated and disgusted with himself, the whore shouting curses behind him. He’d never repeated that awful experience. Instead, he’d settled for his own hand whenever base lust overcame his reason.

The puppy bumbled out from the covers at the sound of his voice, its rear end wiggling in delight. It was a brown and white spaniel with floppy ears and a speckled nose. The puppy had come from a litter belonging to a farmer living just beyond Glenlargo. Saddling Griffin and riding out in search of a puppy yesterday had been a whim. The sight of Jamie scattering petals on Lady Grey’s grave had stayed in his mind, nagging him for hours yesterday. Even more disturbing was Abigail running so determinedly away from the burial. Poor lass, so stiff and unlikable. Not sweet and biddable as a girl should be. He snorted softly. In a way she reminded him of himself.

The puppy stretched on too-large paws, his round belly nearly touching the bed, and yawned. No doubt he would need to relieve his bladder soon and, being a baby, wouldn’t care where he did it.

“Hold on, laddie,” Alistair muttered.

He rose, joints creaking, and began dressing, but he’d only managed smallclothes before his door suddenly opened. For the second time that morning, he grabbed for the sheets. The puppy spun and yelped at the intruder.

Alistair sighed, biting back a curse, and looked into startled harebell-blue eyes. “Good morning, Mrs. Halifax. Had you thought to knock before you entered?”

Those beautiful eyes blinked and she frowned. “What are you doing out of bed?”

“Attempting to find my breeches, if you must know.” He propped a fist on his hip, thanking providence that he still wore his eye patch from the night before. “If you’ll leave me in privacy, I can greet you more fully attired.”

“Humph.” Instead of leaving, she bustled past him and set her tray on the table next to his bed. “You need to get back in bed.”

“What I
need,
” he rasped, very aware that his cock had sprung back to life at her entrance, “is to dress and take the puppy out.”

“I’ve brought you some warm milk and bread,” she replied blithely, and then stood in front of him, arms folded, as if she actually expected him to eat pap.

He regarded the bowl on his bedside table. It was half full of milk. Soggy bits of bread floated on top, a thoroughly revolting mess.

“I’ve begun to wonder, Mrs. Halifax,” he said as he dropped the sheets and reached for the puppy, “if you’ve decided on a deliberate campaign to drive me mad.”

“What—?”

“Your insistence on disturbing my work, hiring servants I do not need, and in general disrupting my life cannot be all accident.”

“I didn’t—!”

He set the puppy in front of the bowl as she sputtered. The puppy stuck its face and one paw in the bowl and began to eat, spilling milk and bread lumps on the table. Alistair looked at his housekeeper.

Who’d found her voice. “I
never
—”

“And then there’s the problem of your attire.”

She looked down at herself. “What’s wrong with my attire?”

“This dress”—he flicked the lace at her bosom, brushing against warm, soft breasts as he did so—“is too fashionable for a housekeeper. Yet you persist in swanning about my castle in it, in an attempt to distract me.”

Her cheeks reddened, making her blue eyes sparkle with indignation. “I have only the two dresses, if you must know. It isn’t my fault that you find them objectionable.”

He took a step toward her, his chest nearly touching the dress in question. He wasn’t sure anymore if he was trying to drive her away or lure her closer. The scent of lemons was heady in his nostrils. “And what of your insistence on barging into my rooms without so much as a knock?”

“I—”

“The only conclusion I can come to is that you wish to see my body unclothed. Again.”

Her eyes dropped—perhaps inevitably—to where his smallclothes tented over his rampant cock. Her lush, beckoning lips parted. God! This woman drove him insane.

He couldn’t help but bend his head toward her, watching those plump red lips as she licked them nervously. “Perhaps I ought to assuage your curiosity.”