Page 33 of The Butterfly
Never one to back down, Niall squared his shoulders and stared him down, refusing to be cowed.
“She almost killed herself because of him, Niall. He hasn’t paid nearly enough for my peace of mind.”
“Then yer desire to stay in London has nothing to do withher?”
Adam scoffed. “Don’t be daft. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I want Daphne in my bed, and she will be. When I am finished with Bertram, we will all leave for Dunnottar together—Daphne included.”
The shock of his words struck Niall like a knee to the groin. He grappled with them for a moment, staring at the open door in disbelief, the soft, lilting notes of the harp steadily flowing out toward them.
“Ye cannae mean to—”
“I do,” Adam snapped. “And I do not have to explain myself to you, or anyone else. Do not forget your place, Niall.”
One hand balled into a fist, the other moving so fast, he could hardly think before he realized he’d taken Adam’s coat into his fist, drawing the other man forward until they were nearly nose to nose.
“My place … how could I ever forget it, when you, and my da, andyourda never let me! After all I’ve done for ye and yer family, after all the times I had yer back, never judging ye for the depths ye had to sink to in order to avenge the girl we both love, ye can stand here and talk to me like I’m no more than a servant! My fuckingplace? I’m not the one who forgot their place, ye bloody fool.Youare. If ye willnae go back, then at least let me take her and Serena. They need to go home.”
Jerking out of his hold, Adam panted like an enraged bull, his face flushing and a thick vein in his forehead pulsating with barely contained rage. Niall could imagine he made just as frightening a sight, his own skin flushed hot, his palms itching as he longed to strike something, someone.It was rare for him to speak to Adam out of turn. The man was his friend, but also his master. His loyalty to the Callahans was as unwavering as his da’s had been. However, it was because they had been friends so long that Niall knew he could step outside the bounds of his station and tell Adam the things he needed to hear without being thrown out on his arse.
“We leave when I say we leave,” Adam declared. “I do not know what’s gotten into you, but if you don’t sort yourself out, I’ll do it for you.”
Niall flexed his fingers, his knuckles cracking as he fantasized about hitting Adam. He could practically feel the crash of knuckles against jawbone. He wanted it. A fight would help him expel some of the pent-up emotion that had filled him to overflowing. He was confused, he was angry, and, it seemed, he was grieving. He had not stopped grieving Olivia from the moment she’d left him for her Season.
But, a row would solve nothing, and Olivia would only grow more cross with him if he bruised his knuckles against Adam’s face.
“I’m not the only one who needs sortin’ out,” he muttered. “I’ll go ensure yer horses have been properly tended to …Master.”
Brushing past Adam, he strode toward the front of the house, the harp music fading away behind him. Time spent with the horses should have been his first recourse. It never failed that a few hours riding or grooming his favorite beasts proved enough to soothe him and bring balance to his turbulent thoughts. He had mulled over many a problem while brushing a coat or changing a set of shoes. It would be no different now, he supposed, as he trotted down the front steps and rushed off toward the mews.
By the time he returned to Olivia, he would be in a better frame of mind. She would forgive him for being an ass earlier … she always forgave him, especially now that so much had occurred to rip them apart. After all the things they had suffered before she was brought back to him, he would be damned if anything else tore her away from him ever again.
1814
Five Years earlier…
Niall clung to the slender, nude body cradled in the shelter of his larger, equally naked one. With a sleepy sigh, he nuzzled Olivia’s unbound hair, the dark strands spread out over his sheets, a few stray tendrils tangling with the stubble along his jaw. She’d come to him after everyone else within Dunvar House had gone to bed, throwing herself into his arms with a desperate moan and fire sparking in her eyes.
Since the night of her coming out, they’d been together this way as often as they’d been able, stealing kisses and petting one another in dark corners, in stable stalls, and yes, even returning to that magical place beside the pond where he had kissed her for the first time. While he’d remained true to his word and refrained from sinking his cock into her virgin passage, he had tutored her in just about every other form of pleasure he could think of. He’d kissed every bare inch of her skin, marveling at the way a single touch could make her skin break out in gooseflesh, memorizing the hills and valleys of her womanly body. She delighted him, even though she often complained that she had no bosom and was shaped like a boy.
There was nothing boyish about her, as his cock could attest at just the sight of her. The breasts she so hated were one of his favorite parts of her, the ripe, plump nipples like little cherries he loved to take into his mouth. And her sweet quim … he tasted that often, too, teasing her toward climax with his lips and tongue. He tried not to think overmuch of the man who would take her away while he did what he could with her, battling the urge to do the one thing he could not.
She did not make it easy for him to exercise self-control, the lusty little thing. The maidenly, demure Olivia melted away when she was with him, and she transformed into a siren, capable of robbing him of all his good sense with just a touch of her hand or press of her lips. She’d learned his body the way he had learned hers, putting those dainty hands upon him and finding all the places that made his blood surge toward his groin. She loved to rake her fingernails through the dark hair on his body, tickling his chest and abdomen, teasing his flat nipples until they pebbled and shrank. She kissed him all over, worshiping him with her lips as if he were some kind of god and not merely the Stablemaster who plundered her body in the hayloft. And, her mouth. It proved far more capable of debauchery than he’d thought. It had not taken her long to grow used to taking his cock to the back of her throat, sucking him better than any maid or whore ever had.
She pleasured him often that way, but knew how to use her hands, as well. Other times, he would lie between her legs and fit his cock against the inner folds of her cunt, rubbing himself against her until she spent, writhing and moaning beneath him. Her body was so responsive that his attentions never failed to draw her wetness, until she’d coated him in it, her slippery flesh tormenting him with a hint of what being inside her must feel like. He was never certain if it were simply the idea of it or the friction and pressure that would send him over the edge, groaning and shaking as he spilled his mettle over her belly.
There were always quiet moments after, tenderness following the desperation of their passion. She would drape her little body on top of his and fit her head beneath his chin. While toying with the springy curls blanketing his chest, she would draw him into a game they’d played together often since their first night in this very hayloft. She referred to it as ‘the game of what-ifs’.
“What if, instead of going to London, I stayed at Dunvar with you and Adam?” she would whisper in the dark.
“Adam willnae be here for long,” he’d remind her, absently stroking his fingers down her naked back. “He’s talked of the Grand Tour so often, I think it willnae be long before he’s taken himself off to the Continent.”
“Just you, then. Come on, Niall. Don’t be stubborn. Play the game with me.”
He hated the game as much as he loved it. Because it made him feel things like hope, even when he knew there could be none. Nevertheless, he always played along when she asked.
“What if ye told yer da ye dinnae want to wed any of those stuffy lairds?”
“What if I told him I would much rather marry you?”
