Claiming the Courtesan

Oh, if only it were true, she thought painfully.

She accepted his hand and rose stiffly to her feet. Her body hurt in a thousand places, and she couldn’t suppress a deep groan. She was battered and bruised and still humiliatingly teary.

Her silent docility must have worried him, because he looked at her searchingly. “Are you injured, Verity?”

“No.”

She was shaking and felt alarmingly light-headed. She began to sway.

Stupid, really. She had more self-control than this. But she couldn’t stop the way everything around her approached, then receded, in bleary waves.

From far away, she heard Kylemore swear softly and savagely. Then he snatched her up in his arms and carried her across to the huge thoroughbred he always rode. She was too distraught even to protest at getting on the beast. In a daze, she felt Kylemore pass her across to Hamish.

“Whisht, lassie. We’ll soon have ye home.”

She suddenly welcomed Hamish’s lilting Scottish burr. She’d always found it dauntingly alien before.

Vaguely, she was aware that the duke reassembled the saddle and placed it on Tannasg’s back. Then, very carefully, Hamish handed her up to Kylemore. Tenderly he tucked her in front of him on the massive horse. His arms encircled her with a confidence that promised to keep all hazards at bay.

Poor, foolish Verity to credit such sentimental pap, she thought without any great emotion.

Silently, they made their way back to the house she thought she’d left behind forever.

Verity propped herself up against the pillows in the large bed where she’d fought so many skirmishes with the Duke of Kylemore. Skirmishes she’d invariably lost. A fire blazed in the grate, banishing any chill from the room.

Everyone had treated her with exaggerated care since their return. A long, hot bath perfumed with rose oil had eased her strained muscles. Then Morag and Kirsty had helped her change into a plain white nightgown; the scandalous creations Kylemore had ordered still lay unworn in the armoire against the wall. Exclaiming their sympathy in musical Gaelic, the maids had salved her scratches and bandaged her torn hands before leaving her to sleep off her ordeal.

What Verity would have liked most of all was one of Kylemore’s massages, but she hadn’t seen him since he’d carried her up the stairs and set her on the bed so gently that she’d felt like a fragile princess.

Now, and with a heart lighter than she’d ever expected, she admitted defeat. When the duke came to her tonight, he wouldn’t find her defiant or unwilling. The woman who had fought his every caress was lost somewhere in the mountains.

Verity had changed. She was no longer Kylemore’s intransigent captive. Or even the complacent mistress he’d kept in such style in London.

She wished she knew what was left.

Was anything left?

Her nervous fingers pleated the sheet over her knees. Kylemore had been concerned and considerate after he saved her life. But now he’d had time to remember that she’d run away yet again.

Was his temper seething? Heaven help her, the last time she’d deserted him, he’d kidnapped her, brought her to this hideaway and forced his way into her bed.

Oh, Verity, that can’t be a tiny thrill at the idea of him forcing his way into your bed once again, can it?

The door opened, saving her from examining this unwelcome thought too closely. Kylemore stood in the entrance, wearing his customary wardrobe of white shirt and breeches.

He paused, studying her. Trying to contain his rage, she supposed. Her gaze fluttered downward, then some force stronger than her apprehension made her raise her eyes.

It was as if she’d never really seen him before.

Hungrily, she traced the straight shoulders. The lean, beautiful body. The narrow hips. The long, powerful legs.

He was truly a man to take a woman’s breath away.

Her gaze moved across his chest and up the strong neck to his face. Shadows still lingered there. Her attention sharpened on the strikingly autocratic features.

Tonight, perhaps because her own barriers were so perilously low, she saw more than just the endless drive to dominate and possess.

She read the signs of old wretchedness. He might hide his torments from the daytime world, but they emerged in the screaming nightmares that shattered his sleep. She read pride and intelligence. She read the passion that made him, as much as her, its victim.