How to Seduce a Scot (5 page)

The sight of that one, singular woman throwing a knife had been the most erotic thing Alex had ever seen.

He almost could not speak a word of sense for five minutes after. He'd let his sister prattle on about preparing dinner and killing a man, neither of which she had any experience with, until he had regained his breath and some modicum of self-control.

The girl had been like a doe in flight as soon as she'd laid eyes on him—frozen before she ran from the hunter. He had been careful to modify his tone, to treat her as he might his sister, but still she would not look at him. He could not help but touch her.

Now, alone in his room, the most improper place to care for her—wounded slightly or not—he stripped off his black leather gloves. He spoke of the weather, of the ices at Gunter's, of the ball at Almack's the night before, all banal, urbane, pointless conversation. Which wasn't actually a conversation but a monologue, since Miss Middlebrook did not speak a word.

He knew better than to take her into his bedroom proper, for then his angel would no doubt fly back to heaven at once, never to be seen again. He brought her to his sitting room and fetched wash water for her wound himself.

She was still waiting for him when he came back. He had not been gone long, but part of him had been certain that she would disappear as soon as he was out of sight. Part of him almost hoped she would, because the tightness in his trousers was becoming uncomfortable from being near her for too long. Of course, it was a sweet discomfort, one he savored as he looked at her.

The slanting rays of the afternoon sun warmed her yellow hair. It was piled on top of her head as it had been the night before, only now she wore no flowers in it. Her girlish, light blue walking gown did nothing to camouflage the glinting intelligence in her green eyes. He wondered why she had bought such a simple dress, or if perhaps she had made it herself.

The thought of her tiny hands manipulating a needle and thread was almost his undoing. He had to breathe deep before he stepped into the room and let his presence be known. His angel sat and waited for him, as calm as a bishop.

“Thank you for indulging me, Miss Middlebrook. I would be deeply horrified if you left my house wounded, with no one to care for you.”

“This is the duchess's house,” his angel said. She smiled as she looked up at him with a sideways glance that on any other woman would have seemed coy. On her pure face, it only looked like harmless teasing. Still, that look made him want to touch her lips with his. “And my mother might look after me,” she said.

“She might,” Alex conceded, keeping his tone light. “Still, I would rather see you put to rights before you go.”

“I will not keep my family here for dinner, in spite of your sister's generous offer. I think your brother has very likely had all of the Middlebrook family that he can stand.”

Alex laughed. “My mother has forced him to sit with much tougher ladies than your mother and sweet sister. Put your mind at ease. I would be obliged if you would stay and eat with us. The duchess's cook keeps feeding us as if we are a standing army, and it would do us good if you took a bit of the pressure off Robert and me. We are always troubled to send so much food back to the kitchen untouched.”

“Mary Elizabeth doesn't help with eating it?”

Alex laughed again, beginning slowly to unbind the makeshift bandage at her wrist. “She eats more than the two of us put together.”

Miss Middlebrook did not laugh as he had intended, for though a small table stood between them where she sat in one armchair and he in another, his fingers were on her wrist as he opened the bandage for inspection. He was sorry that his touch left her silent, but he could not help her without touching her. He kept his focus on her arm, and did not look at her face, in case he embarrassed her further.

It was a shallow cut but long, reaching from the base of her wrist halfway up to her elbow. Even as he unbound the cloth, a bit of blood began to seep out again. He clucked his tongue as his old nurse had done every time he or Robbie came home with a scrape.

“That could turn nasty,” he said. “I'm glad you're letting me have a look at it.”

Miss Middlebrook spoke then, and her voice was soft. “Thank you for helping me. I did not think it would still be bleeding.”

He cleared his throat. She suddenly seemed a good deal nearer than she had only a moment before. The skin of her arm was hot beneath his fingers—not feverish, but warm. He wanted to place his lips against the inside of her wrist. Instead, he washed away the blood with the soapy, clean rag he had brought from his dressing room.

“It is good that it bleeds a little,” he heard himself say. He felt as light-headed as a green boy who had just kissed his first girl. He ordered himself to stay alert, and to hold to his word not to malign her, even with his thoughts. “A little blood keeps the wound clean.” He opened the crock of honey at his elbow.

She jumped under his hands as he applied the first of it to her open wound.

“This will help the bleeding stop, and will help the cut heal.”

“I've never heard that,” she said, eyeing the crock suspiciously.

He almost laughed out loud at the wary look on her sweet face. He wanted to kiss it away.

He kept his voice light, though his tongue was growing thick with longing in his mouth. Her breasts rose and fell with her breath. He could see nothing else but the sweet mounds that called to him to cup them in his palms.

He should have gone to Madame Claremont's. No doubt of it.

“Well, now you've heard of it. You can spread the good word among the English that honey cures all ills. Well, most of them.” He kept his movements brisk and his tone businesslike as he bound her wrist again and set his tools aside.

“You seem very prepared for mishaps in this household.”

He smiled at the note of teasing in her voice, and looked into her eyes only to find her staring back at him, a little of his own hunger on her young face. She could not be a day older than eighteen, as innocent as a newborn lamb, and just as vulnerable. He remembered his oath to her, and his own honor. Still, he had never wanted to touch a woman so much in his life.

Her plump lips seemed to beckon him as she licked them once, though he knew it was his own lust that called to him and not the girl at all. She had no idea what she was feeling or why. She need not know until her wedding night.

Mary Elizabeth had told him of Catherine's plight. Miss Middlebrook had no father or brother left in the world to defend her. He was not a marrying man, and would not be for many years to come, but in that moment, he knew that he would look after her as if she were his own until she was safely wed.

He was happy to hear his own voice steady in his ears when he finally remembered to speak. His tone was light as he rose to his feet, offering her his arm.

“We must be prepared for anything. Mary Elizabeth has been known to cut herself simply slicing a loaf of bread at table.”

Catherine Middlebrook laughed, and it was the sweetest sound he had ever heard. He was growing fanciful in his infatuation with this girl, but there was something about her, something so unconscious and unspoiled, that made him want to wake her from her slumber of innocence. But he was no cad. When she laid her hand gently on his arm, feather light, he simply led her out of his sitting room and down the front staircase to meet her mother.

* * *

“Your mother and sister just left.”

Mary Elizabeth stood at the foot of the grand staircase, declaring to all and sundry who might be listening that Catherine had been effectively abandoned to her own devices among the Waterses, whom she had only known for one day. Had she not been a lady, Catherine might have cursed out loud. As it was, she pressed her lips together to suppress a sailor's oath, and tried valiantly to swallow her ire.

She could feel Mr. Waters's eyes on her, as she always could. It did not make her nervous now, only aware of a strange, new heat running beneath her skin. She could not blame it entirely on him. It was something odd, and it came from her.

Upstairs, alone with him as she should never be alone with any man save her husband one day, she had watched his lips as he talked. She had listened to the deep and even sound of his breathing when he was not talking. She had felt the steady heat of his hands on her wrist. And the strange heat had begun beneath her skin.

The same strange heat was with her still. It was not a blush. She was used to those. It was something that seemed to walk with her like an old friend, though she had never experienced it before. It seemed to pool just beneath her stomach, making it uncomfortable to sit or to stand. There was a delicious heat that seemed to course through her blood, making her weak.

And now, as she was trying to keep breathing steadily and figure out what was wrong with her without making a cake of herself, her mother had abandoned her as if leaving her among family in Devon.

Catherine would not ever understand what that woman was thinking.

“If I may impose on your butler, might a hackney cab be called?” Catherine asked.

“As if we'd let you out loose among the English,” Mary Elizabeth scoffed. “You'd get your throat cut.”

“I'll see you home, Miss Middlebrook,” Mr. Waters said before Mary Elizabeth could wax poetic on the perfidies of their neighbors.

“I could not trouble you.” Catherine forced herself to meet his eyes. Their fathomless brown was calm, unreadable.

“No trouble at all. Mary Elizabeth, bring your best hooded cloak.”

“Whatever for? It is balmy out there. It's spring, Alex.”

“Bring your cloak so Miss Middlebrook can wear it. It would not do for us to be seen driving in company alone.”

Catherine thought to suggest that they bring a maid along, as any decent English household would without question. She knew that she should correct them, and let them know that whatever a girl might do north of the border, in London, she must be chaperoned at all times. But as she stared up into the handsome face of Mr. Waters, she held her tongue. To take such a foolish risk with her reputation was madness, but as she stood close beside him in the Duchess of Northumberland's entrance hall, she found that she did not care.

The stately butler spoke then from his perch by the front door. “The duchess's carriage awaits you, sir.”

They all waited a moment as a footman brought a deep woolen cloak from who knew where. Catherine stood still while Mr. Waters draped it over her shoulders. She caught her bottom lip between her teeth as he raised the hood to cover her hair and obscure her face.

He smiled down at her, and it seemed as if she caught a breath of heat on his gaze, as she had the night before. “Beautiful. We'll go then.”

She did not notice if Robert Waters or his sister thought her odd, or a strumpet, to go off with their brother alone. She murmured her good-byes and let Alexander usher her out the door and down the duchess's town house stairs to the carriage waiting below.

Catherine could not find her voice on the ride home. She lived close to the Duchess of Northumberland's beautiful town home, but the time seemed interminable as they rode to Regent's Square. She tried to focus her mind on the mischief her mother might have gotten up to in her absence, what delicacies she might have ordered that they could no longer afford. They had a little money kept for them by their solicitor in the City, but that money yielded fewer and fewer dividends each year.

In spite of her money troubles and her very real need to marry well within a month or two, she could not keep her mind on such grim realities. As she sat with Alexander Waters in the closed carriage, she could smell the scent of his skin on the air, a hint of cedar and bergamot that seemed to linger in her nostrils like a blessing. She wondered if she was going mad. Who would have bergamot in the Highlands, for heaven's sake?

She kept her hands folded demurely in her lap and tried to swallow the strange warmth that seemed to rise in her stomach at his nearness. He sat across from her, facing backward, as was proper, and she kept her eyes down in an effort to avoid his gaze, but that seemed to bring only more trouble. She could not help but look at his muscled thighs encased in his black trousers. No doubt his body would be beautiful beneath his clothes. He must be quite a horseman, to have thighs like those, riding to hounds, leaping over every barrier in his path. In her fantasy, he was not chasing a poor, benighted fox, but her. She was not sure what she wanted to happen when he caught her.

If he ever chased her, perhaps he would kiss her. And if he kissed her, what would that be like?

The carriage stopped abruptly as it drew up in front of her father's town house. She held herself very still as a silent Mr. Waters opened the carriage door without waiting for the duchess's footman. He pulled the stairs down himself, offering a hand so that she could alight in safety.

“Thank you,” she said. “I should ask you in, but…”

“At this odd time of day, it would not be proper.”

She raised her eyes to his at last, and saw that the warmth beneath her own skin was mirrored in the dark brown of his eyes. She wanted to drink that heat down as she used to drink her chocolate in the morning years ago, when they had been able to afford it, when her father had still been alive.

She offered him her gloved hand without thinking, and he took it. He bowed over it as if she were a princess in a fairy tale, and not some penniless girl from Devon. His lips were hot against the cotton of her glove, and she felt the heat of that kiss all the way down to her stomach, and lower. She shivered, but before she could take her next breath, he had dropped her hand and taken one step back.

“Good evening, Miss Middlebrook. I will see you again.”

Catherine fought down the irrational need to ask him when, to ask if he would call on her tomorrow. But she remembered the lessons her grandmother had drummed into her about what was proper in a lady. A woman should never seem too eager to ever see a man again, if she actually wanted to keep him. Catherine knew that she could not keep Mr. Waters even if she wanted to. He was like some wild, beautiful beast that had stepped into her life with no warning, and one day would step out of it again just as suddenly. She knew without being told, as innocent as she was, that Alexander Waters was not the marrying kind.

She pushed the idea of marrying a foreigner from the wilds of the north away with her next breath. Even if Mr. Waters wished to court her, her mother would never move to the Highlands, away from all she knew and held dear. Her mother would want to rule in splendor over some calm Englishman's house, moving into her patient son-in-law's domain and making it her own.

Catherine had to marry a man who would take her family in, and care for them. Her mother would set up household with Catherine here in London, and once Mary Elizabeth was married, Mr. Waters would go home to the Highlands, where he so clearly belonged.

She did not speak to him again but climbed the stairs to the door. Jim was paying attention to his duty for once, and swung it open for her before she even had a chance to knock. He closed the door behind her, blocking out all sight of the street. She wanted to run to the window in the front parlor and stare down at the carriage below as Mr. Waters climbed in and rode away. But she held on to her good sense as her mother and sister closed in on her.

“I thought you would take supper with the Waterses,” her mother said, coming to kiss her and take her heavy cloak. “Why on earth are you wearing this thing?” Mrs. Middlebrook handed the cloak off to Jim, who stared at it as if he had no idea what do to with it.

“I wore it to conceal from prying eyes that it was me riding alone with Mr. Waters in a closed carriage as twilight closes in. Why did you leave me alone there, Mother? That was highly improper, and you know it.”

“What's proper is not always fun, now is it, pet?” Mrs. Middlebrook smiled like a cat that had eaten a low-flying bird. “Did you have fun with your Alex, then?”

“He is not my Alex, Mama,” Catherine said. There was no reasoning with her. The woman simply wouldn't listen. She should have known that by now, but she still was vexed daily by her mother's complete lack of common sense.

“Well, it's neither here nor there, Daughter. Time will tell. He's a good-looking man, that's certain, and rich as Croesus for all that he stays as a guest in the duchess's house. Of course, who would
not
stay with a duchess, if asked?”

“Mama, I cannot marry Mr. Waters, even if he deigned to ask me. You and Margaret would never live that far north.”

“God in heaven, no! We'd freeze. You'd have to come south for visits.” Her mother smiled, as if looking at a future that Catherine knew would never be. Catherine felt a strange longing for it, and thought of Mr. Waters's warm, dark eyes, and his steady, reassuring hands as he bound up her cut.

“Where would you and Margaret live, if I were in the north, Mother?”

“Well, here of course, pet. Your father provided for us amply, as you well know.”

Catherine felt her stomach sink, and it did not rise to hope again. Her mother looked at the same figures she did, and saw their dwindling resources. She simply refused to believe them. She was certain, as she stated time and time again, that their holdings in the City would revive one day, and all would be well.

Not likely, the solicitor had told her. Still, her mother listened to no one but her own opinions, which were based on fancy rather than fact.

Catherine squared her shoulders. She would have to look after the family affairs well enough for both of them.

“It's time for supper, pet. Quit your fretting and come into the dining room. Cook has outdone herself again. It's roast beef and braised potatoes with onions tonight!”

“Beef,” Catherine said with a heart that was sinking even further. They had not been able to afford beef in months. When her father had died, they had agreed to retain every servant they could, for the members of their household were like family. With careful economy, the family had managed quite well in the country. But now that her mother had come to London, she clung to every available luxury as if Papa still lived, and money still flowed freely. Catherine was not certain how to break her of her new spendthrift ways.

“The butcher had a fine cut all ready for us, and I said, why not? My girl only debuts in London once. Let us dine at home in style.”

Catherine did not answer her, but Mrs. Middlebrook did not seem to notice her sudden silence. “It's too bad your Alexander could not stay to supper. Well, we'll give a party and host him and his family another time. Come, Margaret,” her mother said, gesturing toward the stairs where the dining room waited above.

“Yes, Mama,” Margaret said. She stopped at her sister's side and squeezed her hand. “Mr. Robert lent me new sheet music. He said that Beethoven is fine, but that it might be fun to learn a Scottish tune. What do you think?”

“That sounds lovely, sweetheart. Go on ahead. I have to speak with Mrs. Beam.”

Margaret blithely lifted her skirts to her knees and took the stairs two at a time, not noticing the grim look on their housekeeper's face. Jim had disappeared from the entrance hall, so they were alone.

“Miss Catherine, I am sorry to trouble you before you've eaten your supper, but…”

“It's urgent,” Catherine said. “What's wrong, Mrs. Beam?”

The older woman had been housekeeper even when Catherine's father was a boy. Along with the rest of the household, Mrs. Beam had come up from Devon to take care of the family in London. Though Catherine's inheritance went far in the country, it seemed that London prices were eating it up almost as fast as Mrs. Middlebrook ate delicacies.

“It's the butcher's bill, miss. We've no money to pay it.”

“The last of the quarterly allowance is gone already?” Catherine asked. Dread began to grow in her heart, making her stomach swoop within her like a bird in flight.

“It is, miss. I paid the baker for the next month ahead of time, so we'll have our daily bread, but your mother ordered the beef without mentioning it to me. I am very sorry, Miss Catherine.”

Catherine ignored protocol and took her housekeeper's hand in hers. “Do not apologize for what you can't control, Mrs. Beam. I will speak to my mother again, and see if I cannot get her to economize. I do not want to fall into debts in London that my husband will have to pay.”

Mrs. Beam's face lit up as with a sunrise. “You are engaged then, miss? God be praised!”

For a moment, Catherine feared the old retainer would weep with joy. She took her hand back. “Not yet, Mrs. Beam. But I will be. I promise you that.”

The housekeeper schooled her face into a soft smile, but Catherine saw the fear and worry in her eyes as clearly as she felt it in her own heart. “Of course you will, Miss Catherine. A beautiful girl like you—who would not want to marry you?”

Catherine smiled grimly. “Indeed, who would not? Meanwhile, I will write to our solicitor first thing in the morning asking for an advance on next quarter's allowance. He knows I am in the midst of my first Season. I am sure he will comply.”

She did not mention, though she and Mrs. Beam both knew it, that this could be her only Season. She had only this one chance. Tonight had taught her once again that she must make the most of it.

Mrs. Beam stepped closer, lowering her voice in case someone else might be nearby to hear. “You'd best write to Mr. Philips this night, miss. Then, I can send Jim with it first thing in the morning.”

Catherine's fear spiked, and she took a deep breath to tamp it down. “Yes, Mrs. Beam. I am sure you're right.”

She headed upstairs to the dining room then, to eat a bit of her mother's expensive beef.