Chapter Ten #3
She looked up to him. Not for the first time was she struck at how tall he was, except this time was different. There was music and laughter in the night air and somehow, being with him seemed more intimate.
He made a wry face. “Shall we?”
Lyssa had no choice. Everyone was dancing, and they were watching. Reluctantly, she placed her hand on the tips of his long fingers. His hand came down at her waist and she knew he felt as awkward as she did, because he barely rested it there.
They started dancing, joining the skipping line, and were surprisingly very compatible as partners.
They moved together well and within heartbeats, Lyssa forgot the charade of being brother and sister, and even class distinctions.
Instead, she enjoyed dancing with a man who did it well.
A man who was attractive enough to command everyone’s attention.
A man who, when he laughed as they missed a step like he just did, made her stomach go fluttery.
Her stomach had never fluttered before. For anyone.
And she sensed she was not the only one affected.
His hold at her waist had grown more possessive.
He pressed her closer to him and did not shift when her breast brushed against the side of his chest. At one point, when the dance called for her to lean in to him, was it her imagination or did he hold her close for a moment? Very close.
She didn’t question these intoxicating new feelings. She didn’t put up barriers or walls. She accepted…and lost herself in the music, the night, and the presence of this man.
And when the music stopped, neither one of them moved away from the other.
Except that all of the men had come up to clap Ian on the back and laugh at him for the joke they had played. The women crowded in, too, wanting to win his attention…and Lyssa, still caught in a haze of bewilderment at her uncertain sense of longing, found herself pushed back and out of the way.
That was fine with her. She needed a moment to sort things out.
She wandered over to Maggie, who was busy comparing notes with friends on the births of her children. Jean giggled with some other women. Lyssa would have crossed over to her except that an older gentleman took that time to ask Jean to dance, much to the amusement of her friends.
The next set started and Lyssa drifted over to the whiskey table feeling very much alone.
For a second, she was tempted to have another nip, but decided what she really needed was to take a bit of a walk to clear her head.
Whiskey fumes were obviously putting her in a self-pitying mood.
After all, what did she care who Ian danced with?
She checked to make sure Mr. Anderson was occupied dancing. She had no desire to run into him in the dark. He was…but she didn’t see Ian. She decided to search him out and moved toward the edge of the torchlight.
Groups of people stood around, their laughter adding to the music. One or two men called to her, a sign the drink was getting to them, too. She ignored them.
Away from the house, the village was quiet. In the full moonlight, she easily found a path that led down to the millstream. She’d not followed it far when she heard the sound of whispering and recognized the low timbre of Ian’s voice.
Lyssa started to call his name, but then some inner sense warned her to hesitate. In the silence, a woman giggled and there followed the rustle of clothing.
She should have stopped there. It would have been polite and prudent. But there was whiskey in her veins and a woman’s curiosity to be satisfied.
Quietly, she moved closer until she could look around a bend in the path.
There in the dark shade of a tree, Ian had his arms around the Widow Potter—or, to be more correct, she had her arms around him.
She’d already removed his jacket and was laughingly trying to pull his shirt from his breeches, which he seemed to be trying to avoid even while they were both very involved with a kiss.
Lyssa didn’t know what to do. To think that only moments earlier she’d been attracted to him to the point of confusion.
Now, a part of her wanted to march over and pull the brazen widow off of him.
Another part wanted to turn tail and run as far away from him as possible, especially when his hand came up to cover the widow’s right breast. Lyssa could see where it was as plain as day in the moonlight!
The widow moaned like a cat in heat, her leg coming up to wrap around his thigh—
“Ian?”
The girl’s voice on the path above Lyssa not only startled her, but also caught the lovers. Ian pulled away to put on his jacket while the widow hurriedly rearranged her clothing. “I can’t be seen like this. Not tonight!” she said with belated worry.
Ian merely grunted a response and pushed a hand through his disheveled hair. Lyssa wondered if she’d been wrong about his sobriety. He didn’t quite seem himself and there was a frown between his brows as if something bothered him.
As for herself, she slipped back into the shadows, bending down and hiding in the bushes beside the path.
“Ian?” the girl called again and came into Lyssa’s view. She was dark-haired and had nubile features—why did everyone have breasts bigger than Lyssa’s—and had been chasing Ian shamelessly all night.
A second later, the girl stumbled on Ian and the Widow Potter. “What are you two doing down here?” she asked, amazed. Obviously they’d righted their clothing or she would have known what was going on!
“I was showing Mr. Campion the millstream,” the widow said.
“At night?”
Lyssa was so proud of the girl she almost stood up and rooted aloud.
“Of course, at night,” Ian answered with smooth Irish charm. “Especially in the moonlight. How better to see two beautiful women?”
Lyssa had to cover her mouth to keep from making her opinion of such blarney known.
But the women giggled and the next thing she knew, it sounded as if he was kissing them both.
She couldn’t stay in hiding but had to stand up to see for herself. Her ears were not lying. Ian had his arm around the waist of each and nuzzled first one, and then the other.
And they let him!
To think she’d begun to admire him. Had even started to grace him with all sorts of splendid heroic qualities. And now he was making love to two women!
Lyssa jumped out of her hiding spot and charged up the path toward the millhouse, crashing through the bushes without a care to any sound she might make.
Behind her, she could hear one of the women ask, “Who was that?” but she didn’t wait for the answer to tell if she’d been seen or not.
Rushing back into the party, she quickly found Maggie, who had two sleepy heads resting in her lap. “Are you ready to go?”
“Past time,” her hostess admitted tiredly.
“Come, I’ll help you with the children.” Lyssa lifted one in her arms. She didn’t know how Maggie would carry the youngest, as far along in pregnancy as she was, but she did.
Jean had started to doze in a chair. Maggie shook her shoulder. “Come, Auntie, it’s time to go home.”
“What about the others? Is Angus coming?” Jean asked.
“You know Angus is always the last to leave,” Maggie said. “And some of the others have already left. Come.”
They’d gone no more than a few steps when Ian appeared back in the ring of light, alone. The moment he saw Maggie and Lyssa, he crossed over to them.
“Here, Maggie, let me hold the boy.”
Maggie happily relinquished her son to his arms. “Thank you. He’s getting too heavy for his mother to carry.”