Seduced by the Scot Read online

  Steel and softness.

  Independence and uncertainty.

  Brynne was a maze of contradictions, and he adored every twist and turn that made up the woman he loved. The woman he’d lost due to his own arrogance and their mutual failure to communicate. The woman he’d do anything to have again.

  “Tell me ye are happy.” He glided a finger along her jaw. Curled it beneath her chin. Nudged her head until there was nowhere she could look but into his eyes. Nowhere she could hide. Not from him. Never from him. “Tell me ye are happy, and I’ll leave.”

  “I…” Her throat convulsed as she swallowed. “I am fine.”

  “That’s not happy.”

  “Maybe not,” she acknowledged stiffly. “But it’s a far cry better than miserable, which is what I am with you.”

  A dagger shoved between his shoulders would have hurt less.

  “Bry–”

  “This not going to work, Lachlan. It was never going to work.” Her hazel eyes flashed with a combination of frustration and bewilderment. “Your coming here changes nothing.”

  “And is that what ye feel for me?” he challenged roughly. “Nothing? Because the goose pimples on yer flesh when I do this”–he trailed his fingers along her neck, traced the coarse pads across the slanted lines of her collarbone, slid down to outline the rounded curve of her breasts with his palms–“say otherwise.”

  She swallowed again. Skimmed her tongue between her lips. Shifted her weight.

  “Physical attraction is not everything,” she said after a long, ragged pause.

  “Aye,” he whispered, watching her eyes drift closed as he rubbed his thumbs across her nipples. Nipples that were hard and swollen beneath the thin layer of her muslin bodice. “But it’s not nothing.”

  Bending his head, he brushed his mouth across hers.

  Just a fleeting taste.

  A memory of what had been.

  A hope for what might be.

  Her mouth hardening beneath his, she began to pull back…but then with a tortured, breathy whimper that went right to his loins, she rose up on her toes, grabbed on to the lapels of his jacket, and turned the taste of attraction into a torrent of desire.

  “Bry,” he groaned, cupping her breasts and slipping his tongue between her lips as a bolt of lightning sizzled through the air and slammed into the ground at their feet.

  Fire enveloped them, flames licking up their bodies as they hungrily devoured each other like two poor souls starved. And in a way, they were. Starved for love. Starved for affection. Starved for the connection that had brought them together…and then snapped, leaving them floundering in dark water with no way to kick themselves back up to the surface.

  For eighteen months he’d been treading in that obsidian pool of despair, longing for those late nights and early mornings where all he had to do was roll onto his side and Brynne was there waiting for him, a slumberous smile on her lips and passion in her eyes.

  He backed her up against the wall. Filled his hands with all those rich, luxurious waves of tawny blonde hair as they deepened the kiss. As they used it as a lifeline to draw themselves out of that damned well and into the light.

  Inch by inch, stroke by stroke, touch by touch, they went higher, and higher, and higher. The pleasure of having her in his arms, of feeling her heartbeat against his chest, of knowing she was right where she was supposed to be…it was indescribable. It was everything. But just as they reached the edge, just as he thought they might actually have a chance of making it out of that inky darkness…the rope broke.

  And down they plunged.

  “I cannot,” Brynne gasped, wrenching herself free. Shoving away from the wall, she ducked under his arm and stumbled around the edge of the table. Steadying herself on a chair, she wiped the back of her hand across her mouth then clasped it to her belly. “I cannot do that with you without picturing you doing it with her.”

  The “her” Brynne referred to was Allison Adair.

  Lachlan’s mistress…and the biggest bloody mistake of his life.

  His short nails digging into the sides of his temple, he raked them along his skull and hissed out a breath. They’d had this conversation a dozen times. Two dozen times. He’d explained, and apologized, and even begged until he was blue in the face.

  But it always ended the same.

  With his heart bleeding in his hands…and Brynne walking out the door.

  “I don’t know what else tae say that hasna already been said.”

  “Sometimes…” she murmured without looking at him. “Sometimes I wish I never saw you and her. In that bed. Sometimes I lay awake at night and wonder where we would be now if I didn’t see you then.”

  “I told ye nothing happened,” he said fiercely. “I never betrayed ye, Bry.”

  “There’s more than one way to commit a betrayal, Lachlan.”

  “Aye.” As a spark of anger ignited, he glared at the middle of her shoulder blades where a long curl, tugged free from its coiffure, dangled. “There is. And what of the betrayals ye committed, Brynne?”

  At that, she whirled around. “My betrayals?”

  “I held secrets from ye.” Even now the shame of it heated his cheeks, but he plowed ahead, determined to speak his piece. “I dinna deny that. And if I ever did anything tae encourage Allison tae seek out my bed that night, I’m sorrier for it than ye will ever know. But ye took vows, Bry. Ye promised tae stay by me side as me wife ’Til death comes tae part us asunder’. Those were the words we spoke tae each other. When ye left me, when ye left us, was that not a betrayal?”

  “You gave me no choice but to leave!” she cried.

  “Or maybe there was a part of ye that was never completely there. With me. In that castle.” The weight of his words, the truth of them, hung in the air like a guillotine waiting to fall. “Less than half a year, and ye fled in the dead of the night like a bluidy thief. Do ye know what I think?”

  “No,” she said shortly.

  “I think I just gave ye the excuse ye were already looking for tae end what ye regret ever starting.”

  Her eyes cooled; ice glazing over the top of a pond on the first true cold day of winter. “This discussion is over.”

  “Aye,” he said, his voice clipped and all the more bitter for it. “Run along. That’s what ye do, isna it? When things get uncomfortable, ye run back tae what ye know. Like a horse with an entire field at its feet, but instead it returns tae its little square of wood and straw and grain.”

  “I’m not a horse,” she said scornfully.

  “Then what are ye?”

  “I know what I am not. And I am not yours. Not anymore.”

  As she stormed out, Lachlan couldn’t help but ask himself if she ever truly was.

  The next morning, Brynne rose with the sun and went straight to her brother’s study, where she dashed off a letter to their solicitor in London. The legality of dissolving a marriage that had both been consummated and surpassed its first year would be difficult, if not impossible, but if anyone could tackle such a difficult task, it was Mr. Jacobson.

  All things being equal, she’d prefer to avoid an outright divorce. Especially since she hadn’t told anyone she was married. Not only that, but such an act would require her to prove that Lachlan had committed either adultery, cruelty, or incest before the Court of Divorce and Matrimonial Causes.

  Two of the three were not applicable. She and Lachlan were certainly not related, and while she could argue that he had caused much emotional distress, it did not raise to the level of cruelty demanded by the court.

  As for the third…

  The third she refused to consider on the grounds that a charge of adultery meant invoking the name and the presence of the third party involved. And Allison Adair was the second person on earth she never wanted to see again.

  The first being Lachlan.

  Naturally.

  Which left, to the best of her knowledge, judicial separation. The marriage would remain legally binding,
but the court would prevent Lachlan from interfering with her affairs. In short, she would be married but not married; bound to Lachlan legally, but not responsible to him personally. She could own property in her name, control her own inheritance without having to give it to her husband, settle her own debts.

  Such an act would prevent her from ever marrying again. It wasn’t ideal, but having been spurned once by a man she loved, she had little interest in ever repeating the experience.

  There could be no children, which she did want.

  Someday.

  But surely such a sacrifice was worth her independence. Because she wasn’t a horse in a stable. Whatever Lachlan had meant by that ridiculous analogy. And she was going to travel.

  Someday.

  And if she didn’t…if she failed to fulfill the dreams she’d shared on a starlit night with a boy who’d one day shatter her heart….well, there were worse things.

  She was financially supported by her family and respected by her peers. What need did she really have to see the world, or paint for anyone besides herself? She was content here. And if she occasionally felt a tug towards something greater, something more meaningful, then she could simply host a charity luncheon for the orphanage or hold a dinner party to benefit the theater or do any other number of things to prove that despite what Lachlan had said, she was happy.

  And she’d be even happier once she was legally free of him.

  Using Weston’s gold letter seal to stamp the wax, she left the study and handed off the missive to the first footman who crossed her path in the hallway.

  “Please have this delivered to the village before the mail coach leaves for London,” she instructed.

  “Yes, my lady. At once.”

  The footman hurried off to carry out her orders, and she sought quiet refuge in the parlor, her naked fingers–she’d not bothered to put her gloves back on after writing the letter–splaying across the wide wooden sill that shone with a fresh layer of beeswax polish.

  She had every confidence that Mr. Jacobson would soon see the matter of her marriage settled. Hopefully sooner rather than later, as the last thing she wanted–aside from Lachlan showing up unannounced–was a long, drawn out affair that would have steam pouring out of the gossips’ ears and ink splattering across the pages of the London Caller.

  A sardonic smile twisted her lips as she considered the irony. Once, not so very long ago, she’d yearned for a life in the limelight. To be seen, and heard, and known. Not in a way that would invoke a scandal. Oh, maybe a tiny scandal. The sort where she tripped and flashed an ankle for all to see, or was caught out in the rain and a handsome lord offered her refuge in his carriage. The kind that would get her noticed and acknowledged without ruining her reputation.

  But all it had taken was one London Season for her to discover that she did not, in fact, enjoy the attention that had been lavished upon her as the reclusive granddaughter of the Duke of Caldwell. Attention that had always felt artificially sweet, like too much sugar spooned into the tea. While once she’d dreamed of being a social butterfly when she was a little girl yearning to spread her wings beyond the confining walls of Hawkridge Manor, it wasn’t long before she began to dread the endless litany of social engagements and public appearances.

  The perfection that was required of her…it was too much for a single person to maintain. Especially one who already suffered from anxious mannerisms.

  Say this, but not that.

  Approach that person, but not this one.

  Curtsy, dance, smile, laugh, flutter a fan.

  She was like a doll in a music box, spinning and spinning on a metal disc…until one night, at the Duke of Hallowell’s annual ball which marked the beginning of yet another Season, she spun straight into the arms of Lachlan Campbell.

  Chapter Seven

  Six Years Ago

  Grotonborough House

  Duke of Hallowell’s London Residence

  The ballroom was filled with the ton’s elite. The Duke of Hallowell’s ball was an exclusive affair not be missed, and everyone had turned out in droves in the hopes of starting off their Season with a proverbial bang.

  Having successfully completed half her dance card, Brynne was resting her weary feet beside a potted fern. A light sheen of perspiration clung to her upper lip, her shoulders ached from holding them so rigidly during the intricate steps of the increasingly popular Viennese waltz, and there was a blister forming on the back of her heel. But to look at her–calm and composed in her rib-squeezing gown of pale lavender–no one would think anything was amiss. Which was exactly what they were supposed to think.

  Of its own accord, her gaze wandered across the vast room with its glittering chandeliers, velvet wall hangings, and marble tile floor (which was not at all conducive to dancing). Courtesy of the two hundred some odd guests swarming about like a cluster of bees buzzing around a hive, the ballroom was stuffy, if not downright suffocating. She yearned to escape to the outdoor terrace, but for as long as she remained under the watchful eye of her chaperone, she might as well have set her sights on the moon.

  Her chest pressed painfully against the constrictive confines of her boned corset as she took a deep breath. And then let it out on a stunned whoosh of air when her stare caught on a strikingly handsome lord who towered easily over the rest of the guests.

  Five years had passed since she’d last seen Lachlan Campbell. Five years since that magical two weeks when they’d shared their dreams and stared at the stars and promised each other their futures over strawberry drops and half a barley stick. So much had changed in that time…and so much–too much–had stayed the same.

  She was now a young woman of nineteen; which made him a man of twenty-one. But as soon as their eyes met, her recognition was immediate and absolute.

  Oh, he was larger. Wider. His shoulders and chest filled out the emerald green jacket he wore splendidly, and his thighs…well, let’s just say she began to use her fan quite rigorously. The hollows in his cheeks were gone. His hair, combed and groomed and tied back from his face in a neat tail, gleamed a dark russet in the candlelight. Even his stance was different. More elegant. Refined. He held a mahogany walking cane as if it were an attachment of his gloved hand, and the lay of his broad satin necktie was beyond reproach.

  The change from the boy he’d been to the man he’d become was off-putting and, for a moment, Brynne considered disappearing behind the fern…but then he flashed her a boyish grin, and she was relieved to see that beneath all that polish and pomp, he was still her Lachlan.

  “Lady Brynne,” he murmured after he’d crossed to her and bowed.

  His brogue was thicker, she noted. Swathed in velvet and charred with smoke, the rumble of it against her ear caused her belly to jerk in response. It was the first visceral reaction she’d had to a member of the opposite sex since…well, since forever. This was the beginning of her fourth Season, and the number of suitors she’d been introduced to was bordering on the infinite.

  Old, young. Stocky, thin. Bland, charming. Quiet, loud. They’d run the gamut from gentleman to duke and every title in between, but for all their differences, they had a single thing in common: none of them made her breath quicken or her pulse race like Lachlan did.

  To have him standing in front of her after all this time…to see the man he’d become…when her heart pitched inside of her chest and the narrow ribbon of space between her breasts grew both clammy and flush all at once, she forced herself to inhale through her nose and exhale through her mouth as a familiar–and dreaded–tightening sensation filled her chest.

  No. No! She was not going to have an Episode here, in the middle of a ballroom, with two hundred of her closest peers looking on. Especially when they were already staring, and secretly judging, and watching her every move with the greedy keenness of a circle of vultures waiting to descend and pick her bones clean if she made a mistake. For while the ton adored a respectable lady with nary a blemish attached to her name, there was nothing
they loved more than tearing down what they’d propped up.

  With a great deal of self-control, she managed to keep her entire body from trembling when Lachlan gently grasped her hand. Brushing his lips ever-so-softly across her satin-clad knuckles, he peered up at her beneath his brow.

  “Ye grew up, Bry,” he said huskily, his timbred voice intentionally low so that those surrounding them, including her attentive chaperone, the Dowager Countess of Crowley, a longtime friend of the family, couldn’t hear. “Ye were pretty enough before. But now ye’re as radiant as the sun.”

  Radiant as the sun.

  “I…” Words failed her. She swallowed once. Twice. “You look well.”

  Propriety dictated that he should have released her hand, but he didn’t, and neither did she think to withdraw it from his grasp. For some reason, a flicker of sadness, there and gone again before she could blink, rippled across his countenance. “And ye still look like ye’re in the same cage, little songbird.”

  “Cage?” she said, temporarily drawn out of the moment as confusion marred her temple. “I don’t understand.”

  “I wouldna expect ye tae.” His thumb slid slowly across her palm, and her entire arm tingled. “Do ye remember, Bry? When we first met?”

  How could he think, in a thousand lifetimes, that she’d forget?

  It was the happiest she had ever been.

  Brynne had attended a countless number of balls in some of the grandest estates in all of Europe. Watched a parade of magnificent theater productions. She’d had an audience with the queen, for heaven’s sake. And yet the two weeks she had spent with a half-wild Scottish boy when she was but a girl of fourteen were the most precious memories in her possession.

  “Yes,” she whispered, captivated by the banked fire burning in his eyes. “I remember.”

  Lady Crowley stepped in then. A confidante of Brynne’s mother who’d never had children of her own, she had offered herself up as Brynne’s patroness at the start of her debut Season. Her father, who had no interest in taking part in London High Society, even if it was on his daughter’s behalf, had readily agreed, and Lady Crowley had been accompanying Brynne to all of her various social functions ever since.