The Delicate Matter of Lady Blayne.

Natasha Blackthorne.

Dedication.

Thank you to Terri, Deanna, Naomi, Lisa and Alvania for your extra help and support on this novel.

Thank you to all my beta-readers, readers and my Facebook and Twitter friends.

A big special thank you to Tarah.

Chapter One.

August 1816.

Edinburgh, Scotland.

The waning sun shone in tones of rose and gold upon the shimmer of a plum velvet gown. The day had been warm, but now, with the sun setting, a cool, shifting breeze carried the scents of flowers and ruffled the golden-brown curls at the woman's long, graceful nape. James stood still, transfixed by the enchanting sight.

Sunny.

He spoke the name silently, not daring to speak aloud for fear she would vanish into a mist and he would awake alone in his bed as he so often had.

But no, he was not dreaming.

Only a few feet from him, Lady Catriona Blayne-known to her intimates as "Sunny" because of her ever-cheerful demeanor-stood by a rose bush, her head bent as she smelled the flower she held.

But this woman was different from the girl who haunted his dreams.

He moved his gaze over her dark gown. Its modest white lace collar gently scooped down to show just a hint of her collarbone.

James felt his eyes enlarging at the sight of the generous breasts that filled out her bodice. Her well-defined but by no means slender waist that curved softly into wide, softly rounded hips. It was the kind of womanly figure a man could grasp a hold of and give his passionate best to without fear of bruising or breaking anything.

He remembered her as being girlish. A tiny, skinny lass who should never have turned his head. Yet, her inner light had drawn him, a lusty young man, against his will. Those new sensual curves sent an instant sexual charge tingling from the base of his spine, through his stones to his cock. His heart began to beat faster, pumping blood into his loins. He was getting hard. Harder. But such overt, almost indecent carnality was a shocking juxtaposition to his former image of her.

Oh, devil take him. Sunny was a lady, in every sense of the word.

Hadn't he once forgotten that, thereby making the worst mistake of his life?

He should not indulge in such salacious thoughts about her. He forced himself to focus on something else besides her lush form.

What color was that gown anyway? He frowned.

Dark plum.

Half-mourning. Really? It had been what? Three and a half years since the previous Lord Blayne had died. It might not have been excessive for an older woman to wear mourning attire now. But Sunny was young.

He did not want to think about her grief. That was mean, jealous, petty. Yes, of course it was. And yet, he couldn't help it.

Almost eight years ago, she had rejected his proposal.

She had chosen to wed an invalid instead. A mere boy.

What nonsense to feel jealousy. Any love that James had held for her had in fact been infatuation born of his callowness. It meant nothing now. He had experienced a lifetime since then. Nevertheless, after all the years and distance and war-God help him, seeing her still seemed like a dream.

Perhaps even a shock.

A shock to the heart.

What an asinine thought for him to have. He'd come home, after all this time, because of her. Because of the duty he bore the past three years as the new Lord Blayne to see to the well-being and safety of his late cousin's wife.

She was nothing to him now.

Nothing at all.

Just another obligation on an endless list.

"Sunny." The name escaped him before he thought. Did his tone sound too impassioned?

Yes.

Damn.

However, she didn't look up. She hadn't heard him.

All the same, he stood there, fuming at himself for revealing his feelings so readily. The very first time he'd spoken her name! He had sworn that when he next saw her, he would show no emotion. He would treat her with all the respect due to his cousin's widow, no matter their past. Respect. Nothing more or less.

So why, then, did he feel the need to keep constantly reminding himself of that point?

Because she'd been pretty before. Pretty. But now, damn his eyes, she was stunning. She just might be perfection.

His boot crunched a dry twig.

She still did not look up.

"Sunny?" He spoke louder this time, more calmly.

She looked up from the rose and turned her head to look at him. Her green eyes appeared dull, glazed over, unfocused. As though she did not recognize him.

"Catriona?" He tried to make his voice as gentle as possible as he approached her slowly.

Her pupils were dilated, which seemed odd, seeing as they were out of doors in the sunlight. They seemed to dilate even more as her eyes widened.

"James."

Warm pleasure filled him. Warm pleasure? An utterly inadequate way to put it. The sensation that filled him was like that which he felt upon returning to his cabin on a cold morning-not just any cold morning, but after having come in from hard-driving sleet on the deck of a ship sailing somewhere in the northern Atlantic-and taking that first drink of coffee spiked with whisky and feeling the fiery spirits spread through his belly.

That was how hearing his name spoken in her soft voice, after so many years, had felt.

Too dramatic a mental image?

Undoubtedly. God. How he wished to feel that warmth. It was something far greater than just carnal excitement.

No. Stop it. Now.

He sucked in his stomach, hardening every muscle and willing the sensations away. He didn't want to feel anything for her except his proper sense of obligation.

Well, no need to be so harsh. To feel some fondness for her-mild fondness-would be acceptable.

But not lust.

And certainly not that intoxicating rush of warmth.

She held her hands out to him. An automatic gesture, he could see from the wooden way in which she moved. Always proper, always polite. As she had ever been.

He could not be rude in return. He took her hands, touched her for the first time in years. The iciness of her flesh bled through her thin silk gloves.

Some life came into her eyes, their dull green becoming a green such as rain-washed leaves sparkling in the sunlight. He caught his breath at such brilliance of color. Yes, that definitely placed her securely at the top of his list of perfectly beautiful women.

It put her on a list all her own.

He'd never seen such a gorgeous, flawless form before-and certainly not paired with such large and luminous green eyes. Yet, there was danger in the realization. Full of sadness, those emerald orbs struck direct to his heart.

Tightness seized his chest. A feeling as though he dared not draw a full breath, or something vital within him might break. As he held still, a sense of shock rippled down into the pit of his stomach, like the moment a ship rocks with the first volley of cannon fire.

God. He remembered that kind of pain.

Pain he'd never imagined, until her.

And after her, the agony of loss had almost undone him.

Her sad gaze continued to assail his, rendering him immobile.

Another gut-rocking volley of pain tore into him. Its intensity shocked him.

Take control of yourself.

He shook himself. He was thirty-six years old. No longer a young man. No longer capable of such foolish heights and depths of emotion.

He kept his expression impassive. Inwardly, he frowned. No, he did not want to care about her grief. He certainly did not want to feel it.

But he shouldn't be shocked. It had always been that way. He might not understand her. Not at all. She was a woman, after all, and women were inscrutable. But he could feel for her. That had been their connection from the start. The way she could get under the layers of rationality and self-mastery that he had worked years to build between his emotions and the world, and make him feel. It had made him take a second, long, hard glance at a passing pretty yet utterly skinny little chit and fall in love with her.

The chit who had somehow grown into a goddess.

Her chest rose and fell more rapidly, drawing his attention once again to those new, luscious curves. Those magnificent breasts.

Thank God trousers were looser now than the tighter pantaloons he had worn the last time he had stood with her alone in the garden at Landbrae, the Blayne estate. He could still feel the sting of her hand making contact with his cheek. Could still feel the urge to lunge at her, to restrain and subdue her, the sensation like fire in every part of him as he'd summoned every drop of restraint he'd possessed and watched her flee.

Well, he was no longer driven by his passions. He would never be so foolish again.

He smiled. "It's grand to see you again, Sunny."

There. He had kept his tone fond, friendly. Despite the pounding of his heart. Despite his ever-hardening erection.

There. All was in order. Everything was under control.

She glanced away from him and her hands went limp.

He firmed his grip on her hands, preventing her from pulling away. "How are you?"

"I am a widow now." She spoke incredulously, as though she'd had no reason to believe she would become one. She laughed softly.

The sound held a certain wildness. It sent an odd chill through him. A wild light sprang to life in her eyes. Bathed in the rose-gold light, she looked so different from how he remembered her. She had always been gentle-natured, modest. Never wild.

Sunny's condition continues to deteriorate. Without desperate measures, I fear what she could eventually be capable of.

The words from his aunt's last letter blazed within his mind and sent another chill through him. Again, he felt as though he had slipped into a dream.

Maybe not such a pleasant dream as he had first thought.

He frowned. What a morbid thought. He forced it down and carefully regarded the girl he had once loved. He tried to make his voice gentle. "It has been over three years, Sunny, since Freddy left you."

She smiled. Her small, even white teeth flashed against her rose-colored mouth. A perfectly kissable mouth. He had claimed it but once. One unforgettable evening. He fancied he could still remember her exact taste. Like peaches and honey, but also like something else he couldn't quite place.

All other women's kisses tasted the same. There was something unique about Sunny's kisses, the sweetest he'd ever known. And now her smile held him captive, caught between the memory of her sweetness and his present determination to feel nothing towards her but a proper sense of obligation.

Then her face did that peculiar crinkly thing that women's faces did right before they began to cry.

He didn't abhor women's tears in general. Women came with tears. If a man wanted to have his bed warmed, he accepted this.

But Sunny's feelings too often became James' feelings.

Oh, Christ, she couldn't.

Surely, she wouldn't. It would be damnably unfair. A strike to his composure from which he feared he'd not be able to defend nor recover.

At least not easily.