CHAPTER 2

"It wasn't your fault, Hawk," Grimm offered. They sat upon the cobbled terrace of Dalkeith sipping port and smoking imported tobacco in purely male contentment.

Sidheach James Lyon Douglas rubbed his perfect jaw with a perfect hand, irritated by the perfect shadow of stub-ble that always appeared just a few hours after shaving.

"I just don't understand, Grimm. I thought she'd found pleasure with me. Why would she seek to kill me?"

Grimm arched a brow. "Just what do you do to the lasses in bed, Hawk?"

"I give them what they want. Fantasy. My willing flesh and blood to serve their every whim."

"And how do you know what a woman's fantasies are?" Grimm wondered aloud.

The Earl of Dalkeith laughed softly, a heady, confident rumble of a purr that he knew drove women wild. "Ah, Grimm, you just have to listen with your whole body. In her eyes she tells you, whether she knows it or not. In her soft cries she guides you. In the subtle turnings of her body, you know if she wants you in front or behind her lush curves. With gentleness or with power; if she desires a tender lover or seeks a beast. If she likes her lips kissed, or savagely de-voured. If she likes her breasts-"

"I get the picture," Grimm interrupted, swallowing hard.

He shifted in his chair and uncrossed his legs. Recrossed them and tugged at his kilt. Uncrossed them again and sighed. "And Esmerelda? Did you understand her fantasies?"

"Only too well. One of them included being Lady Hawk."

"She had to know it couldn't be, Hawk. Everyone knows you've been as good as wed since King James decreed your betrothal."

"As good as dead. And I don't want to talk about it."

"The time draws near, Hawk. You're not only going to have to talk about it, you're going to have to do something about it-like go collect your bride. Time is running out. Or don't you care?"

Hawk slanted a savage look Grimm's way.

"Just making sure, that's all. There's scarce a fortnight left, remember?"

Hawk stared out into the crystalline night, heavy with glowing stars. "How could I forget?"

"You really think James would carry out his threats if you don't wed the Comyn lass?"

"Absolutely," Hawk said flatly.

"I just don't understand why he hates you so much."

A sardonic smile flitted across the Hawk's face. He knew why James hated him. Thirty years ago Hawk's parents had humiliated James to the seat of his vain soul. Since the Hawk's father had died before James could avenge himself, the king had turned on Hawk in his father's stead.

For fifteen long years James had controlled every minute of the Hawk's life. Days before his pledge of service was to expire, James contrived a plan to affect every future mo-ment of it. By the king's decree, the Hawk was being forced to wed a lass he didn't know and didn't want. A reclusive spinster who was rumored to be quite hideous and unques-tionably mad. It was King James's twisted idea of a lifetime sentence. "Who fathoms the minds of kings, my friend?" Hawk evaded, pointedly putting an end to the topic.

The two men passed a time in silence, both brooding for different reasons as they stared into the velvety sky. An owl hooted softly from the gardens. Crickets rubbed their legs in sweet concerto, offering twilight tribute to Dalkeith. Stars pulsed and shimmered against the night's blue-black canopy.

"Look. One falls. There, Hawk. What do you make of it?" Grimm pointed at a white speck plummeting from the heavens, leaving a milky tail glowing in its wake.

"Esmerelda says if you make a wish upon such a falling star 'twill be granted."

"Did you wish just now?"

"Tinker talk," Hawk scoffed. "Foolish romantic non-

sense for dreamy-eyed lasses." Of course he'd wished. Every time he'd seen a falling star lately. Always the same wish. After all, the time was nearing.

"Well, I'm trying it," Grimm grumbled, not to be swayed by Hawk's mockery. "I wish..."

"Yield, Grimm. What's your wish?" Hawk asked curi-ously.

"None of your concern. You don't believe."

"I? The eternal romantic who enchants legions with his poetry and seduction-not a believer in all those lovely fe-male things?"

Grimm shot his friend a warning look. "Careful, Hawk. Mock them at your own risk. You may just really make a lass angry one day. And you won't know how to deal with it. For the time being, they still fall for your perfect smiles-"

"You mean like this one." Hawk arched a brow and flashed a smile, complete with sleepily hooded eyes that spoke volumes about how the lass receiving it was the only true beauty in his heart, a heart which had room for only one-whoever happened to be in the Hawk's arms at the moment.

Grimm shook his head in mock disgust. "You practice it. You must. Come on, admit it."

"Of course I do. It works. Wouldn't you practice it?"

"Womanizer."

"Uh-hmm," Hawk agreed.

"Do you even remember their names?"

"All five thousand of them." Hawk hid his grin behind a swallow of port.

"Blackguard. Libertine."

"Rogue. Roué. Cad. Ah, here's a good one: 'voluptu-ary," "Hawk supplied helpfully.

"Why don't they see through you?"

Hawk shrugged a shoulder. "They like what they get from me. There are a lot of hungry lasses out there. I couldn't, in good conscience, turn them away. "Twould trouble my head."

"I think I know exactly which head of yours would be troubled," Grimm said dryly. "The very one that's going to get you in big trouble one day."

"What did you wish for, Grimm?" Hawk ignored the warning with the devil-may-care attitude that was his wont where the lasses were concerned.

A slow smile slid over Grimm's face. "A lass who doesn't want you. A lovely, nay, an earth-shatteringly beautiful one, with wit and wisdom to boot. One with a perfect face and a perfect body, and a perfect 'no' on her perfect lips for you, my oh-so-perfect friend. And I also wished to be allowed to watch the battle."

Hawk smiled smugly. "It will never happen."

The wind gusting sweetly through the pines carried a dis-embodied voice that drifted on a breeze of jasmine and sandalwood. Then it spoke in laughing words neither man heard. "I think that can be arranged."