Page 53 of Hard-Hearted Highlander
Avaline suddenly smiled, and her cheeks flushed pink. She put down her knife and the toast. “I need your help desperately, Bernadette. You must teach me how to seduce.”
Bernadette didn’t understand her at first. She thought perhaps Avaline was using the word incorrectly. “Seduce?”
“Yes,” Avaline said. “I wish to seduce my fiancé.”
Bernadette’s breath left her a moment. She turned away from Avaline, and with a hand pressed against her abdomen, she walked a few feet, then turned back. “Seducehim? You do know what the means, don’t you?”
“Of course I do,” Avaline said, looking slightly perturbed. “I must fight for him, and if I’m to fight properly, I must know how, and I don’t.”
She wasn’t making sense. “Fight for him,” Bernadette repeated uncertainly. “Why must you?”
“Can you believe it, that wretched man has told me he means to keep a mistress after we are wed? But perhaps he won’t if I know how to please him.” She smiled sheepishly, then picked up her toast.
Bernadette wanted to walk to the window and fling it open and take great gulps of air before she fainted. She was overcome with waves of relief that Avaline had not discovered her betrayal, followed by waves of despair that Avaline believed that she ought to entice a man she’d not yet married who had told her he would prefer a mistress.
“If he said as much to you, that is grounds for ending your engagement, Avaline. No man should enter into matrimony with the idea that he does not intend to honor his vows. Nowomanshould enter into matrimony without complete confidence in his fidelity.”
“Oh, I understand all that,” Avaline said with an airy wave of her hand. “But I’m not going to end it, Bernadette. So... I must seduce him into desiring me before any other, and I need you to teach me.”
“Ican’t teach you,” Bernadette said, irked that Avaline thought she might.
Avaline glanced up from her toast, surprised. “Why ever not?”
“What do I know of seduction?” Bernadette said irritably. She had gone from guilt, to disbelief, to vexation all in the space of a minute. “I live my life looking after you.” She was irrationally angry, she realized, because of that blasted kiss. Because she had felt desired, truly desired, and for once, she hadn’t been a servant, and especially not one being ordered to teach a girl to seduce a man. That blasted Highlander had her at sixes and sevens and Avaline was so...sostupid,that she wanted to repair a marriage that hadn’t yet begun! Could she not see how fraught with distrust and incompatibility her life would be?
Oh, but Bernadette was stupid, too, more so than her young charge, because she wanted that very man. She wanted him to make love to her, and God help her, she could imagine how volatile and passionate and exciting it would be.
“What’s wrong?” Avaline asked, her brow furrowing with concern. “You don’t look yourself.”
“Pardon?” Bernadette asked, forcing herself out of her thoughts. “Nothing. It’s just that I—I fear for you, Avaline. I fear that you would enter a marriage for all of eternity on such unspeakable terms.”
“I don’t know why you’re so upset. All men look elsewhere eventually, do they not?”
“That is not true,” Bernadette said.
Avaline shrugged again and ate her toast, her eyes on Bernadette.
All right, then, she had to think calmly and act rationally. Bernadette clasped her hands behind her back, digging her fingernails into her palms to keep her thoughts focused. “I can’t help you, Avaline. I don’t know how to teach you to...attract him in that way.”
Avaline sighed. “Very well,” she said. “I suppose I must figure it out on my own.” She lifted her teacup and sipped daintily.
“I’m going out,” Bernadette said. She picked up her cloak.
“I think I’ll go back to bed,” Avaline said, and yawned. “I’ve not been sleeping well.” She stood up, and with her tea in hand, she removed herself from the room. As she walked out the door, Renard appeared with the warmed fish. He looked at the empty table, then at Bernadette. She shrugged helplessly.
* * *
BERNADETTEMARCHEDOUTacross the Killeaven lawn and into the woods, then pausing where the woods gave way to moors to look for any strange passersby. Seeing none, she followed the well-worn path, but didn’t take in the scenery today. When she reached the sea she debated turning right and walking in the direction of Balhaire, where she’d twice seen Mackenzie. Or she could turn left, away from him, as far from the trouble she’d created for herself as she could possibly get in one day. Her wish to escape Avaline and Mackenzie was pointless, however—how far would she get? And where would she end? One couldn’t simply walk off into the hills unless one never wanted to be seen again.
She went right.
She trudged up the path, reaching the point she could see the top. He was there, as she’d somehow known he would be. As he’d somehow known she would be. The only difference today was that he wasn’t standing at the very edge of the cliff. In fact, he was nowhere near it. He was standing by his horse, his back against a birch tree, clearly waiting for her.
Bernadette’s heart began to race. Perhaps she was a bit mad. What else could explain it? This man had nothing to recommend him—he was a Highlander, a word synonymous withsavageto some. He was a brooding, tortured figure who, frankly, wallowed in despair. And he was engaged to another woman.
And yet Bernadette looked at him now and felt nothing but that pressing desire. It felt almost as if he’d only just touched her instead of hours having passed.
He slowly pushed away from the tree. When she didn’t move, he started toward her. He moved cautiously, as if he feared she might bolt.
