Page 44 of Highland Fire

Lifting the weight of her hair with both hands, she shook it back over her shoulders, then rotated her head to ease the tension in her neck.

Downstairs, a door slammed, and her eyes went involuntarily to the reflection of the door in her dressing-table mirror.

It gave onto her husband’s chamber. When it remained reassuringly closed, she leaned both elbows on the flat of the dressing table, letting out a little hiccuping breath as she cupped her hands to her eyes.

Rand had arrived home hours ago, long after she had retired for the night.

By this time Serle would have given him a complete report of the dog attack.

He would know that her nerves were shot to pieces, and that she did not wish to be disturbed.

Not that Rand would accost her in her own bedchamber.

By tacit consent, from the day they were wed, this room had become her sanctuary. Rand would never dream of violating it.

She didn’t know why she was so on edge. It wasn’t only a reaction to the harrowing experience with the dogs.

Nor was it fear of what Rand might have to say about her gallivanting all over the countryside without benefit of escort.

A host of little things, inconsequential, revolved inside her head, warning her of some dire threat to her person.

It was past one o’clock in the morning. The servants, or at least some of them, were still up and about.

For a long time, she had lain wide-eyed in her bed, listening to their shuffling footsteps as they crossed and recrossed the flagstoned hall to her husband’s bookroom.

He had been closeted there for hours, drinking himself into a stupor.

She didn’t know how she knew this, but she was certain that she wasn’t imagining it.

He was brooding about something. She could feel it in her bones.

The shattering of glass brought her to her feet so quickly that her silk wrapper flared and tangled in the legs of her stool, overturning it. More doors slammed and Rand’s voice sounded, strident and imperious, issuing orders to servants. Dear God, what was going on?

She had just made up her mind to douse the candles and slip into bed when she heard him taking the stairs.

He was moving at the speed of lightning.

Thoroughly frightened now, she moved blindly, and in her haste, stumbled against the stool she had overturned.

Clutching the edge of the dressing table to steady herself, her hand knocked a crystal bottle onto its side, spilling its contents, and the essence of lilies became distilled in the air.

Like a creature of the wild sensing danger, she held herself immobile, her ears straining for every sound. None came to her but her own rapid heartbeat and the moaning of the wind outside her window.

Scarcely daring to draw breath, she carefully restoppered the perfume bottle.

After righting the stool, she crossed to the walnut washstand to fetch a cloth and hand towel, halting every few steps to listen for any sound that would give her a clue to what Rand was doing.

The silence was only marginally reassuring.

She had just finished mopping up the top of her dressing table when a movement in the mirror caught her eye.

The door to her husband’s chamber slowly opened.

She couldn’t move; couldn’t call out. As though rooted to the spot, she watched the reflection in her looking glass. Rand’s voice broke the spell.

“The fragrance of lilies becomes you. They represent purity, did you know? Pure and virginal.” He laughed softly, taunting her. “There are other kinds of purity, but you would know nothing of that.”

She turned very slowly to face him, every instinct warning her not to make any sudden moves.

He wore no jacket or neckcloth, and his white lawn shirt was open to the waist, where it disappeared below the band of his black pantaloons.

One shoulder was propped against the doorframe.

His blond hair was disheveled, as though he had combed his fingers through it only moments before.

He was smiling, but without warmth. Though his eyes were heavy lidded, giving him a drowsy appearance, she knew he was as alert as a jungle cat lying in wait at a watering hole.

When he spoke, his voice was smooth and mellow.

“Now what could possibly have brought that anxious look to your face? Could it be…a guilty conscience?” Though he paused to give her time to reply, she didn’t even make the attempt.

“Not conscience,” he said whimsically. “Of course not. As we both know, you have no scruples to speak of.”

He straightened, and only then did she notice that he held two crystal glasses in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.

“Champagne,” he said, “I believe it’s customary,” and he proceeded to fill the glasses in his left hand.

It took all of her willpower not to flinch when he advanced to within a foot of her. Without volition, she accepted the proffered glass. “I can explain about going out without an escort,” she said.

He smiled, a slight curling at the corners of his mouth. “I don’t doubt it. You are never stuck for an explanation, are you, my sweet? Well this one is going to tax even your fertile imagination.”

When she opened her mouth to answer him, he cut in savagely. “I don’t want to talk about the dogs your hound savaged. I don’t want to talk about how you deliberately went against my wishes. If we must talk, let’s talk about us, shall we, and this farce of a marriage we have entered upon.”

He knew. Her mouth was suddenly parchment dry, and she swallowed convulsively.

Now she understood the violence she sensed in him.

He knew that she had deliberately deceived him, knew there had never been any obstacle to their marriage, and he wasn’t annoyed in the way she had anticipated.

This was deeper, stronger, more unpredictable.

She could almost feel herself slipping toward the edge of an abyss.

He wandered around the room, examining various objects with desultory interest, occasionally taking long swallows from his glass.

At length, he settled himself on the bed, one knee updrawn, his arm resting across it.

Caitlin had not moved from her position at the dressing table, though she was half propped against it, as if her knees had buckled under her.

“You are not drinking, my pet.”

Obedient to his suggestion, she raised her glass to her lips. She had the strongest urge to laugh, but knew that if she did, it would sound demented. Bedlam could not be more alarming than this.

“There never was a sodger who was courting you.”

Soldier? What soldier? She groped in her mind, but there were no answers, only confusing impressions that made her more afraid than ever.

“I should have recognized your pattern even then. When cornered, you are amazingly inventive.” He replenished his wine glass, and set the bottle of champagne on the table beside the bed. “Come here,” he said, and patted the bedpane, adjusting his long length to make room for her.

There was an interval when Caitlin debated whether to reason with him or not; then she came away from the dressing table and slowly, reluctantly, approached the bed. She sat down gingerly, as far from him as she dared.

“Tell me about David,” he said.

“David? What about David?”

His eyes were moving over her, and she itched to pull the edges of her wrapper together to shield herself from that brooding stare.

In weak moments, she had indulged in fantasies of Rand making love to her.

This was not love. There was no tenderness here.

In his heated stare, she read possession and thwarted desire and something intensely dark and masculine which was beyond her knowing.

“You and David were friends. Pray explain this friendship to me. I really want to understand.”

“David,” she said cautiously, “was like a brother to me.”

He laughed, not very pleasantly, and made a small, choked-off sound of derision.

She was terribly aware of the sheer masculine power of him; broad shoulders, muscular arms and thighs. Through the parted edges of his shirt, she could detect the profusion of gold hair which covered his chest. This blatant evidence of his virility made her feel more vulnerable than ever.

Quickly averting his eyes, she concentrated on his hands.

His fingers were long and deceptively effeminate as they toyed with the glass of champagne which he frequently raised to his lips.

She knew the strength in those hands. It seemed inconceivable to her, then, that she had ever dismissed this man as a fop who could be frightened off by the empty threats of Daroch and the little band of conspirators.

How foolish they had been to imagine they could play cat and mouse with Rand.

Then it came to her that he and she were playing cat and mouse, and the only thing in question was when he would decide to pounce.

“Rand,” she began, appealing to the man she had come to respect and admire in the month since they had wed, “I misled you. I admit it. We are not brother and sister, but if you would give me a chance to explain…”

He captured her wrist with such force the glass in her hand went tumbling to the carpeted floor.

“Don’t try to get around me. I’m not David. I don’t allow females to hold hoops for me to jump through, especially not my wife. Now tell me about David. I won’t ask you again.”

He had shortened the distance between them by simply pulling on her wrist. Knowing that the worst thing she could do when he was in this mood was openly defy him, she had allowed herself to be dragged as close to him as she could come without being embraced.

When he released her to reach for the half-empty bottle of champagne, she let out a panicked breath.