She chuckled, and then laughed out loud, remembering how she had kissed him and he had wanted her so much he hadn’t been able to resist. Surely that was a very good start to their courtship?
“Watch where you’re putting your feet, Olivia!”
His voice was so loud and so close, she jumped, forgetting how precarious her position was. She wobbled around to face him. He was standing on the first stone, only about three behind her, his wet dark hair dripping into his eyes, looking cross and rumpled and worried.
Her foot slipped, she tried to retrieve her balance, failed, gave a little scream, and toppled into the water.
Again.
The stream closed over her head, and she felt the tug of the current. Her slippers touched the pebbly bottom and she tried to use it as a springboard, but her legs were pulled from under her, and she found herself suddenly so disoriented she didn’t know what was up and what was down. Black swirls and eddies formed around her, her already soaked clothing weighing her down like an anchor, and she began to lose consciousness.
Olivia’s last thought was the unfairness of it, that just as her life was beginning it should end.
Someone was carrying her. Her head was uncomfortably arched backward, as if her neck could no longer support it, and her throat ached appallingly. She struggled to sit up, kicking her feet and flapping her hands like a landed fish, only to be swung up and around, making her feel sick and dizzy. The next moment she was bent like a bow over his shoulder, his hand planted firmly on her bottom to keep her there, while her head now hung toward the ground, her stomach lurching with each step he took.
“Let me down!” she wailed.
“No. You’d only drown again.”
“Please…”
But he took no notice. Olivia tried to work out where she was from the upside-down world around her. Then she knew. Nic was climbing the broad, shallow steps that led to the side terrace of Castle Lacey; he must have carried her all the way from the stream. Her stomach jolted as he half ran to the glass doors, fumbled at the catch, and carried her inside.
“Abbot!” he was shouting. “Where the hell are you, man? I need you. At once!”
After that there were hurrying footsteps and panicked voices, and Abbot saying, “Put her down here, sir,” as if he attended to half-drowned ladies every day.
Nic put her down, and when Olivia’s head had stopped spinning, she found herself deep in a leather armchair, wrapped in blankets, while Abbot busied himself with lighting a fire. They seemed to be alone, she thought, her gaze wandering…No, Nic was there, standing with his back to her and dripping all over the carpet. He was pouring a drink into a glass and he came and knelt beside her. She noticed he looked very pale, his hair plastered to his head, and his thick brows were drawn down into a frown that would frighten most people.
“Drink this.”
She drank it. More brandy. It burned her throat, and she leaned back and closed her eyes, letting the restorative do its job. She could hear Abbot and Nic speaking in low voices, and then footsteps and the door closing as Abbot left. The fire was blazing away now, and she felt quite warm despite her soaking. Sleepy and warm.
“What on earth possessed you?” Nic said, coldly for a man with so much passion.
“If you hadn’t yelled right behind me—”
“You were laughing. Are you insane?”
Olivia felt her face flush. “I thought you’d gone. I was crossing the stream on my way home. Why were you spying on me?”
Nic’s frown grew even darker. “It suddenly occurred to me that you might do something stupid like take the short way over the stream instead of walking to the bridge. I wanted to make sure you arrived home safely.”
“So you proceeded to drown me?”
His frown lifted, and something approaching a smile twitched his lips. “No, you managed that perfectly well on your own.”
“Now you’re laughing. Are you insane?”
“I think I must be, otherwise I wouldn’t have brought you here.”
“Why did you bring me here?”
His dark eyes were intent on hers. Suddenly he smiled properly, his saturnine face changing into handsomeness. “Damned if I know.” But he did know. Slowly his gaze slid over her face, her throat, her bosom, taking his time, exploring every inch of her as if she wasn’t wearing anything at all.
How did he do that? she asked herself, with a shiver. How did he manage to make her squirm and grow hot, just by looking? Until she was longing for…she knew not what.
“Perhaps I’ve brought you here to ravish you, Olivia. Isn’t that what you said you wanted? To be ravished by Wicked Nic Lacey?”