Once Upon a Tower

Page 17

She managed to drag her mind away from the whispering touch of his fingers. “Let’s drop literature for a moment, and try for rational conversation. Are you informing me that you intend to be one of those husbands who routinely accuses his wife of unfaithfulness?”
“No.” He gave her a wry smile. “I’m talking bilge, aren’t I?”
“Perhaps a bit,” Edie acknowledged.
“We Scots are pigheaded fools,” he admitted, altogether too cheerfully to her mind.
She nodded toward Layla, who was bending toward her dinner companion, her bosom brushing his sleeve. “I am not amused by that sort of accusation. For obvious reasons.”
Kinross’s eyes followed hers. “In my estimation, your stepmother is unlikely to be unfaithful. I would guess that she is engaging in that flamboyant display in an ill-judged effort to gain her husband’s attention.”
Edie felt a surge of something like joy. He was not only rational, but intuitive. She found herself grinning at him. “Exactly.”
“Just because I may experience jealousy does not mean that I intend to act on it.”
“Ah.” She couldn’t stop smiling. But they had to be clear about this, because she refused to spend her life with a man who glowered at her every time she chatted with a neighbor. She dropped her voice again, even though no one was paying attention. “I shall never be unfaithful to my husband . . . to you.”
She had never realized that a man’s eyes could glow like a banked fire. “Nor shall I to you.”
“So if a hot-blooded Italian shows up at your castle—do you really have a castle, by the way?”
“Yes.”
“And if that Italian decides he would like to flutter his eyelashes at me throughout the meal—”
“I might boot him into the next county,” the duke said flatly.
Edie studied him closely. “Are you like this as a matter of course? Because I was under the impression that you ran a large estate. I can’t imagine how you could do so if you have a penchant for violence.”
“Five estates, as a matter of fact. I am justice of the peace in two counties. I would say that I am known for rational thought, prudence, and careful consideration of all sides of a question.”
Edie raised an eyebrow.
He leaned closer, and his hand gripped hers a bit tighter. “I expect it’s only because I don’t have you yet. Not to harp on Shakespeare, but Juliet does say that she has bought the mansion of a love, but not yet possessed it.” His voice dropped, too, and Edie had that peculiar feeling again, as if she were drowning in his eyes.
Then his words sank in. “Did you just imply that you bought me?” And: “Ow,” she said, shaking free of his hand. “Your grip is very strong.”
“I did not imply that I paid for you, but quite the opposite: Juliet says that she has purchased Romeo.”
“So I bought you?” Edie quite liked that notion.
“But you have not yet taken possession.” His voice was throaty and deep, the sound of a man who was taking pleasure in the reversal of their roles, who had utter confidence in his own masculinity. The erotic heat of his voice slipped into her blood like an intoxicating drink.
“I like Juliet. Do you know, I have always wanted to own a puppy, but I suppose a man will do just as well.” She laughed. “My room here at Fensmore even has a balcony.”
The look in his eyes when she said that made her color again. “I wasn’t saying it for that reason!”
“The question of being owned works both ways. Juliet also says that she is sold, but not yet enjoyed.”
“I had no idea Shakespeare plays were so . . .”
“So what?” The duke took another drink of wine. Somehow he managed to look calm, even serene, although he was caressing her wrist.
“Sensual,” she said, clearing her throat.
“Yes, well,” he said, his smile widening. “In the right circumstances, Lady Edith, anything is erotic.”
Edie started wondering how many lovers he’d had. He had probably whispered love verses into the ears of Scottish lasses from the time he was sixteen. She almost opened her mouth to ask, and then realized that there were some questions better left unanswered.
It gave her a bit of a qualm. No one had ever bothered to write her a verse. She was a naïve dunce when it came to this sort of thing.
“You’ve told me you prefer to be called Edie,” he said.
She nodded.
“I would be honored if you would address me as Gowan.”
Edie nodded again, and then caught a glimpse of the young lady seated across from her. She was staring at the two of them with stark envy, and when Edie met her eye, she whispered, “You’re so lucky.”
Edie smiled her thanks, and looked sideways at Gowan again. He had, finally, turned to talk to the lady on his right side.
His skin gleamed like honey in the candlelight. His hair tumbled behind his ear, the touch of red matching the dark cherry of his lips. He looked as if he came from a long line of warriors that had bred true.
Edie was starting to feel peculiar. Things like this didn’t happen to her. She spent her days playing an indecorous musical instrument and squabbling with her father. Yes, she was pretty, but not particularly sensual. She never thought a man like this, a man who simmered with erotic confidence, would look to her, because she wasn’t one of those girls who flirted and threw seductive glances. She didn’t even really know how.
Could it be that the duke greeted every woman—or at least, those he was determined to seduce—with this sort of intensely seductive poetry? How many women had found themselves compared to Juliet?
She waited until he finished his conversation; she herself was shamefully neglecting the man to her left. “I don’t look like this most of the time,” she told him.
Gowan broke into laughter.
“I feel as if you keep seeing me in masquerade. First, I was quiet and peaceful and all in white—”
“Like an angel,” he said, and his voice had that throb again that made her feel hot.
“But I am not an angel,” she forced herself to say. “I’m not even particularly quiet, though I do have a deep aversion to conflict. And now, tonight . . .” She indicated her gown. “This is not me, either.”
“Seductive?” he asked. “I am seduced.”
Edie now understood how Casanova got his reputation: he must have had this ability to look at a woman with melting desire in his eyes and, of course, she collapsed into his bed.
She pulled herself back together. “Queen of Babylon–ish. Truly, I am a great deal more ordinary than this.”
“I don’t wear a kilt often, either. I like to wear the colors of my clan, but the wind can be bloody cold on one’s legs.”
Edie smiled at that. “Your kilt becomes you.” No woman in her right mind would dislike it when worn by this particular man.
“And that red gown becomes you.”
There was a moment of charged silence between them.
He dropped his voice. “I would like to pull down the sleeves.”
Edie bit her lip, her breath caught in her chest.
“I would like to lick you from your mouth to—”
“You mustn’t speak like that!” Edie hissed. “What if someone hears you?”