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  "Then Kieran and I must wed immediately," Fortune said. "Colleen tells me the Deverses will return from England by Lammastide. Will is to marry his cousin Emily Anne at Michaelmas."

  "Then you most certainly cannot be wed to Kieran until after his brother has married, Fortune," James Leslie said firmly. "The Deverses will not be pleased by what has transpired while they were away. If they return to find you married to Kieran it will make bad blood between the people of Maguire's Ford and the people of Lisnaskea. William Devers asked you to marry him, and you turned him down. Nicely, but it was still a refusal. If you and Kieran publicly declare yourselves, and wed before William marries his cousin, it will be an even greater insult. You know you have our permission to wed Kieran. All we ask is that you wait until after Michaelmas, and William's nuptials."

  "I agree with you, my lord," Kieran Devers said quickly, forestalling any vocal outburst by Fortune, to whom he now turned. "Your father is right, sweetheart. I love my father, and my brother. I don't want a feud between us over our decision."

  "But they will be offended anyway," Fortune reasoned.

  "But their offense will be less since Willy married first," Colleen interjected. "My stepmother will fume, I guarantee you, but with Willy wed she will be able to put a far better face on the situation than if she returned to find you and Kieran a fait accompli. What worries me is her desire to possess Maguire's Ford which she had hoped to gain when Willy married Fortune." Colleen turned to the duchess. "Kieran says the estate is yours, my lady. Is it so? Please understand that while I love my stepmother, and would not be disloyal to her, I love my older brother too. Lady Jane is acquisitive. She will not like the idea that Kieran will have this place through marriage to your daughter who spurned her son."

  "Kieran will not gain Maguire's Ford," Jasmine said quietly. "My two younger Leslie sons have been raised Protestants. Being the younger in our family, they have nothing to recommend them but their good name. My eldest son is the marquess of Westleigh. My second son, the duke of Lundy. My third son will one day inherit his father's dukedom. Only Adam and Duncan are titleless, and landless. They can well live without the former, but it is difficult to live without the latter. I shall divide Maguire's Ford equally between them. To steal this estate away from me on any grounds would require a great deal of influence at court. I do not believe your stepmother has that particular resource, but I do."

  "But then where will Kieran and Fortune go, especially given his intransigence regarding the matter of religion?" Colleen wondered. "He has said something to me about the New World."

  "Aye. Sir George Calvert is attempting to found a colony in the New World based on the principles of religious freedom. He is a Catholic himself, well-liked, and well respected. The king is very fond of him. If anyone can succeed in such an endeavor, he can. I believe there is a place for Fortune and your brother in his colony. When we return to England we will see what progress he has made. In the meantime I shall write to my son, Charlie, who is at court. He will obtain whatever information I need. Do not worry about Kieran, my dear. There is a safe harbor for him, and for Fortune. Now, however, we must make a berth for you. Our guest chambers are small, but very comfortable. I'm certain Adali has already shown your maidservant where you will lay your pretty head." She smiled at Colleen.

  "You are most gracious, my lady," the younger woman said, curtsying. "I am so glad that Kieran insisted I come to Erne Rock to meet Fortune, and her family. My mind is at peace now knowing my brother will be safe."

  Lady Colleen Kelly did not depart Erne Rock for several days despite her good intentions to do so. She found she liked the duke and his wife. Fortune frankly delighted her, despite her outspoken ways. She could well understand why her stepmother had not taken to the girl, but she could also see that while Fortune had been the wrong lass for Willy, she was absolutely the right girl for Kieran. Lady Jane lived a rather insular life in Lisnaskea, Colleen realized, for she herself had been gone for several years, and knew that in Dublin Fortune Lindley would have been much appreciated for her wit, her beauty, and her intellect. Her older brother and Fortune were a perfect match although she knew that their marriage would bring trouble for them. Her stepmother would find some way to exact revenge.

  "Have you chosen a wedding day?" she asked the couple the night before she was to finally leave for her own home. Kieran looked to Fortune.

  "A few days after William is wed," Fortune said. "When Lady Jane learns we are remaining here at Maguire's Ford for the next few months, she will have no choice but to invite my family to the wedding, for to exclude us would be a dreadful faux pas as my parents are of high rank, and friends of the king. And we will have no choice but to go, lest we appear to either be snubbing the Deverses, or our absence give rumor to the lie that it is Will who turned me away in favor of his cousin, Mistress Elliot. Such a thing would be unthinkable."

  "Mama would like that," Colleen said candidly. "When will you tell the family of your own plans?"

  Fortune's brow grew troubled. "I do not know," she said. "I am frankly at a loss how to broach it. I do not want to spoil your younger brother's wedding day, and I fear such knowledge would."

  Colleen nodded. "Kieran will have to go back to Mallow Court," she said. "If he remains here at Erne Rock there will be no stopping the gossip. It will certainly come to my parents' ears when they return. Mama's servants love Kieran, but now that he is not the heir, they are loyaler to my stepmother and Willy, mindful of their own futures. I cannot blame them."

  "Lady Kelly is absolutely right," the duke of Glenkirk said. He put a comforting arm about Fortune. "I know you love each other, poppet, but until the day you are wed, you and Kieran must be separated. The Deverses will be angry enough when they learn of this turn of events. However, Sir Shane is a reasonable man. I shall be able to make our peace wi him, but his wife, and her son will be mortally offended. There will be nae forgiveness there, poppet. If I am nae mistaken, they will go out of their way to make difficulties."

  "But Lady Jane is getting what she always wanted. Will will wed his cousin, Mistress Elliot," Fortune said despairingly.

  " 'Twas not you Mama wanted for Willy, Fortune," Colleen said. " 'Twas your rich estate. She thought she could stifle her disappointment over her niece, and accept you as a daughter-in-law because you would bring her son Maguire's Ford, and Erne Rock castle. But once she met you, saw how beautiful you were, how willful, and determined you were to run your own life, she knew she could not bear you, for you would have taken Willy away from her, which is something that poor Emily Anne will never do."

  "How astute you are," the duchess said quietly.

  "Please, do not think me disloyal, madame," Colleen replied. "I love all my family, and would have them happy. Mama cannot help herself. She is ambitious for all her children. Using some of the inheritance her father left her she arranged marriages for my sisters, Mary, and Bessie, with minor lordlings in England. She was very proud of those matches. Only the fact that my Hugh's mother is English placated her and enabled her to give her consent to my marriage. She doesn't really like the Irish even if she is the wife of an Irishman. She means no harm. She has done her best to be a good wife to Papa, and a good mother to all of his children. Only Kieran escaped her vigilance, but because he has been so amenable about Willy being made Papa's heir, she is willing to tolerate what she refers to as his impossible behavior. Every family, she says, has at least one bad penny."

  "Kieran isn't a bad penny," Fortune said indignantly. "He is a man of strong principles."

  "Unfortunately my principles are not those of my stepmother," Kieran Devers said with a wry grin.

  Colleen laughed. "Nay, they are not, brother."

  ***

  In the morning, Lady Kelly departed Erne Rock Castle for her home outside of Dublin. "I may offend Mama, madame," she told Jasmine, "but if Kieran's wedding to your daughter is shortly after our brother Willy's wedding, then I would be there to see it. Will you write, and
let me know what date they have chosen? If I am not mistaken, Papa will be there with me. He says nothing for he does love Mama, but he loves Kieran too, even though my older brother's intransigence hurts him deeply."

  "I will write," Jasmine promised.

  Lady Kelly's coach moved out of the courtyard and across the little drawbridge. Kieran and Fortune rode alongside of the vehicle as far as the Dublin road. There the coach stopped for a minute while brother and sister bid each other a tender farewell, and Fortune kissed Colleen's cheek lovingly. Then the carriage rumbled away, Kieran and Fortune waving after it until it was out of sight around a bend.

  The late June morning was cloudy and warmish. It was obvious that a storm would threaten by late afternoon. They rode a ways without speaking, heading for their favorite place, the ruins of the hall of Black Colm Maguire. Fortune had asked Rory about it after the first time she and Kieran had sheltered there. Black Colm had been so called not for his dark hair, but his black heart. When he carried off the wife of his chieftain, and raped her, his enraged relations had finally had enough of him. They had stormed Black Colm's hall one moonless night. He had disappeared, however, gone to his master, the devil, so it was said. He was never seen again. His unfortunate victim was rescued and brought back to her home, but never again did she speak a word to anyone to her husband's sorrow. Black Colm's hall was pulled down and razed.

  " 'Tis an unhappy place," Rory said, but Fortune did not find it so, for it was here she and Kieran might be alone, free from spying eyes. To her the ruined hall was a place of happiness. The summer rain came suddenly with a small rumble of thunder. It poured down in sheets, obscuring the lough, and the hills beyond. The horses huddled beneath a wide stone arch, almost dry. Nearby Fortune and Kieran sat within their sheltered alcove, arms about each other.

  "We should choose a wedding day before you leave me," she said.

  "You need but tell me, sweetheart" he replied, "and I will be there." He kissed the top of her red head, his arm tightening about her.

  She snuggled against him, rubbing her cheek against the leather of his doublet. "October," she said. "As soon as possible after Willy marries his cousin. October fifth?" She looked questioningly up at him.

  "It sounds as good a day as any, my love." He brushed his lips against hers softly. "Sweet, sweet," he murmured low.

  "Kieran, I cannot bear it that you are to leave me," Fortune whispered. "I am behaving like a child, I know, yet the thought of not seeing you every day is hard." Her hand cupped his dark head, and drew him to her so she might kiss him softly.

  "It is not forever, my love," he soothed her, nibbling on her lower lip. She was so damned exciting in her innocence.

  "Could we not meet here where there is no one to see us?" she cajoled him sweetly, her tongue sweeping around his lips.

  "The family is due back at Lammastide, and that is just a little over a month away, Fortune. Once they return it will be difficult for me to disappear too often without rousing suspicion. When my dear stepmother orchestrates a family celebration, we are all pressed into her service, and expected to be at her immediate beck and call. Willy's wedding will be the triumph of her life to date, for he is the heir to Mallow Court. If poor Emily Anne thinks it is to be her day as the blushing bride, she will find herself sadly mistaken, and overshadowed by her mother-in-law," Kieran chuckled. "We can meet here several times a week until the preparations begin. After that I cannot say when I will see you, sweetheart."

  For a long moment Fortune felt overwhelmed with her disappointment, but then she laughed. "I suppose I will be so busy preparing for our own wedding that I will not miss you at all. Well," she amended, "almost not at all. Won't they be surprised when we marry just a week after Will and his Emily?" Her eyes danced wickedly.

  "Shocked is more like it," he said with a grin. "You don't want to give them any warning?"

  "Nay, Kieran! There is simply no good time to tell your family. 'Twould but spoil Will's wedding, and cause such an uproar that we would be the focus of everyone's attention, and I do not think that would please Lady Jane. Besides, while I dislike your stepmother, I do like Will, and would not deliberately cause his unhappiness."

  "Our marriage will not please my stepmother," he said.

  "Nay, it will absolutely not, but then it is not really her concern, is it?" Fortune said with complete logic. "You are not her son, and she has, in her bigotry, done you a great disservice, stealing your inheritance from you for her son. I hold no sympathy for Lady Jane."

  "You are so strong and so fierce," he said, wrapping her in his embrace, and kissing her hard so that her lips felt almost bruised.

  "Make love to me, Kieran," Fortune murmured into his ear. She tickled it with the pointed end of her tongue, and breathed softly into the whorl of it even as she moved her body provocatively against his. "You want me, Kieran. I know that you do." She slid a hand up to caress the back of his neck, entwining her fingers through the thick dark hair at the nape. It felt silken yet rough to her touch.

  "You're a wicked wench," he told her through gritted teeth. He could feel his male member beginning to stir with serious interest.

  In response Fortune took her other hand, slipped the buttons on her doeskin doublet, and unlaced her shirt front. She smiled as, unable to help himself, he slid his hand into her blouse and cupped her breast within it. "Ummmmm," she murmured as he fondled her. "Ohhh!" she squealed as he teased at her nipple, pinching it lightly.

  He backed her hard against the stone wall of the alcove. "You mustn't tease me, Fortune. You don't know what you are doing," he told her. He was beginning to throb with his need for her.

  Her head was spinning with the nearness of him. "Yes, I do know exactly what I am doing, Kieran," she told him breathlessly. "I am tired of being a virgin! Make love to me!"

  "No," he said. "You will come to me on our wedding night a proper virgin, Fortune, but since you are so damned curious I will offer you a small lesson in passion. I wonder if you are brave enough to manage it." Then before she might answer he pulled off her doublet and her shirt, baring her to the waist. "Ahhh," he breathed. "How lovely you are, sweetheart." His big hands encircled her waist, and he lifted her up onto the stone bench where he might view her at his leisure.

  Fortune was surprised at first, but then she smiled very seductively down into his handsome face, and loosening her belt she pulled her breeches down, letting them fall to her calves where her boot tops stopped them. "Just how brave are you, sir?" she asked him.

  "Jesu," he groaned, seeing her, for all intents and purposes, naked. Her skin was pale and flawless. Her Venus mont was hairless. He had heard that great ladies denuded themselves in this manner but he had never seen such a sight before. His country lovers had sported curls where her mound was pink and smooth. Her cleft was mauve shadowed, a long tempting slash that seemed to beckon him to his destruction. "Cover yourself," he begged her. "You are too beautiful, Fortune." He could not restrain himself. His hands reached up and caressed her.

  With a deep sigh of pleasure Fortune closed her eyes, not in the least afraid when he cupped her buttocks in his palms, drawing her near so that his face pressed into her soft belly. She gasped softly as he covered her flesh with little kisses. Then his hands slid upwards to grasp her breasts in a hard embrace. Her body arced itself, pressing harder against his face, feeling the sandy roughness of his cheek against her.

  Kieran Devers was shaken to the core of his very being by her beauty, and her obvious willingness to give herself to him without reservation. His manhood was iron hard now. Why not? he thought to himself. Where was the harm in it? They were to be wed soon. Then his conscience began to niggle at him. Aye, they were to be wed, but he held Fortune in the deepest love and respect. What if he got her with child? What if, God forbid! he were killed in an accident, and their child was born a bastard? She was not her mother, a royal Mughal princess, nor was he a Stuart prince whose bastard child had been welcomed as if he were every bit as legit
imate as that prince himself. He felt himself begin to tremble as he reached the outer edge of sanity, and restraint. With a groan he pulled her breeches up, and buckled her belt. "Clothe yourself," he growled angrily at her.

  "What is the matter?" Fortune asked him. "How have I displeased you, Kieran, that you do not want me?"

  "Put your shirt on, and we will talk," he said harshly, turning away from her as he saw the tears in her eyes.

  Confused, and burning with feelings she had never felt before, and certainly didn't understand, Fortune picked up her silk shirt, and pulling it over her head, tied it. Her doublet followed, and she buttoned it up. "I am dressed now," she said, still standing upon the bench.

  He turned, lifting her down, and enfolded her tightly in his arms. "I love you," he said. "When I take your virginity, I want it to be in our marriage bed. I want the leisure to caress and admire your loveliness. To kiss you long and sweet kisses, not just on your lips, but all over your fair body, Fortune. If anything should happen to me before we said our marriage vows, and you were with child, our child, a child created from our love for each other; our innocent offspring would be considered bastardborn, shunned. I will not do that to you, Fortune. I will not do that to our child. Do you understand?"

  She nodded her head against his chest, then said, "But I long for you so much, Kieran. My body aches with its need for the unknown."

  "As mine burns for you, and the thousand pleasures that will come when we are joined together, sweetheart," he told her. "I see now it is better that we be separated else our passions overcome us."

  "But we will continue to meet here?" she begged him. "At least until Lammastide?"

  "We Celts in Ireland call it Lugnasadh," he told her. "It is a harvest festival, but in ancient times it was the yearly celebration of the many-skilled god, Lugh."