still on their trail? Still concerned that they will strike again?”
“I am, on both counts.”
She finished her bacon in one bite then stared out the window for a long while, as if in contemplation of the future. “Why are you doing this?”
Wasn’t it obvious? “It’s my job.”
“No, I mean, this isn’t your fight, Stephen. You are an American, not a subject of the Queen of England. You are putting your life on the line daily for us. These are dangerous men, desperate men. They will stop at nothing.” Her voice quavered with emotion. “Whether or not their cause is valid, what they do is not right. They kill innocent women and children who happen to be in the path of their bombs. They won’t hesitate to murder a man who has vowed to stop them.”
“True.” He studied her profile. It was so finely shaped, she might have been etched in glass or carved from pearly onyx. It seemed right that the sculptress should herself be perfect.
“I am going to ask the queen to dismiss you,” she said.
“What?” He stared at her. Of all the things she might have said to him, nothing could have shocked him more.
“I will tell her you fought again with Brown. Convince her that you are a dangerous influence on her Scot. She will have no choice but to send you home.”
He threw back his head and laughed.
She seemed startled by his reaction and pulled away to stare at him in confusion.
“You would lie to your mother to have me fired? Why?” Then it struck him. She thought she was protecting him. “You can’t believe that I would live my life any differently back in America than I am doing here.”
He saw the fear fill her eyes again. “I can’t watch you . . . watch you die for us!”
“But you can send me packing and never see me again? Is that what you want?”
She stood up abruptly, made it halfway to the door before he caught her around the waist. Byrne pulled her into his arms. He knotted his fingers through her hair, tugged her head back to turn her face up to meet his. He kissed her fiercely and long, and he didn’t release her delicious mouth from beneath his until he felt her body go limp in his embrace and she was fighting for air.
“Oh no!” she cried, staring at him, then kissed him back with equal urgency.
Within seconds, his soldier’s mind took over. Might we be discovered? Unlikely in this rarely used wing of the castle. Will anyone miss her? Yes, possibly, but why look here? Who knows I am here? Brown at least, maybe a servant. Then he remembered Lorne. The marquess had been here too, at least he thought so. A vague memory was coming back to him. Not good. Alternative locations for bedding the lady? None. Solution: barricade.
Byrne spun her around, gripped her shoulders, and without a word, sat her on the bed. He shifted the tea tray from chair seat to floor then wedged the chair back under the latch to prevent it from releasing or the door from swinging inward.
Satisfied, he turned to face Louise, half expecting her to have de-materialized. But she was still there, just as he’d left her. Even better, no questions clouded her beautiful eyes.
“I think Lorne knows,” she whispered.
His already racing heart leapt. His gut clenched, which made his ribs ache. “About us?”
“About me, at least. That my nature is too passionate to stay faithful to my vows.”
“He took vows too. If he cannot keep his—”
“Then why should I? It’s not that simple.”
The pain in her gaze broke his heart. How could any man not throw himself at her feet and beg for the honor of making love to her?
He hesitated, stepped closer to her. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“No,” she said, opening her lovely arms to him. “No talk. Not now.”
He went to her, fell down onto his one good knee, a supplicant. His arms closed around her waist. He laid his head in her lap—all memory of other women and other times gone.
“I have wanted you from the moment I first saw you,” he whispered into the blue satin ocean of her skirt.
“And I you,” she said, her voice husky with emotion.
She’d said no talk, but he couldn’t stop himself. This was too important to be done carelessly or without letting her know his concerns. “I am not your Donovan.”
She laughed. “No. Indeed you are not.”
“I won’t be