A Year and a Day (26 page)

Cait’s tongue flicked
tentatively against his l
ips, which parted automatically.
Ewan drank her in like water falling onto parched earth. “God…Cait…” he groaned, and there wasn’t time for any more speaking, only gentle grunts and sighs as he relearned every inch of her magnificent body.

He still couldn’t explain what made Cait different. There was physical pleasure, of course, but
the
connection that
they shared went
deeper tha
n that.
Cait knew him. She understood him. She
loved
him- he was certain now that his sister was right, even if Cait had never dared to speak the words. It was unfair and painfully ironic: the one woman who could bring him to his knees was the one woman that he couldn’t have.

Ewan roamed over Cait’s body with his lips and tongue, priming her for his possession, but he couldn’t hold out long. He’d waited too much already. It was only a matter of moments- only long enough to strip away their clothes- before he
laid her across the bed and fused their bodies into one
. She was so tight, so
wet.
He
all but lost himself in sensation. He was barely inside her before he wanted to come. Every fibre of his body was keening toward that release- but a flicker of conscience saved him at the last moment from making his folly total.

Cait broke around him, muscles shivering and clenching.
He felt himself hovering on the bring of his own release
. Then, with a burst of strength that he didn’t know he had, he withdrew completely from her body. Still mindless with sensation, Cait only made a tiny gasp went he pressed his
sex
against the soft flesh of her belly, and finally came.

Ewan groaned in self reproach when he spilled himself onto her skin. Cait looked at him
in confusion
, but he tried to smother
the look
in a kiss. His tongue pushed into her mouth and, after only a moment’s anxious hesitation, she melted for him again.

The next day, Ewan awoke his wife with a kiss on the back of the neck. They were still snuggled together. His arm was threaded around her waist, and he used his fingers to strum the flat plane of her belly.

He’d been laying like that for what felt like hours, lost inside his thoughts. Despite the comfort of lying with his wife, he hadn’t been able to rest. He was too tortured by his thoughts, and of what he was meant to do. He was still thinking, desperately, of any way to put things off.

He knew that he couldn’t stay married to Cait forever, but he was beginning to wonder if he really had to rid himself of her right away. After all,
Laird
Cameron was still healthy. As long as Cait didn’t get pregnant, why couldn’t they keep things precisely as they were, and simply drift apart naturally at the end of a
year?
Cait couldn’t expect more than that. Besides, she’d still be his wife until then regardless of what he did now.

“Ewan?” Cait said sleepily. She rolled onto her back so that she could see his face.

“Good morning,” he whispered, and then dipped down to brush her lips.

“Good morning,” she answered back, blushing at the low, seductive hush of her voice. He smiled faintly, and then glanced away. Cait frowned, “Penny for your thoughts.”

Ewan looked guilty- as though he’d just been caught at something. He hesitated for a moment, and then spoke: “I was thinking about you?”
 

“Oh?” she asked, pinking with pleasure.

Ewan nodded. He put his hand on her stomach again, palm flat, pressing gently, “I was thinking how glad I am to have you to myself. I thought that I wanted a baby but…” he took a breath and blurted, “I’m glad that you aren’t
pregnant
. I don’t want a baby now. I only want you.” All of the blood drained from Cait’s face, but Ewan didn’t notice, he just kept talking, not daring to stop and think about what he said. “I’ll have to have a baby someday, but I’m not ready yet. I think that it would…compli
cate
things between us and…well…it really isn’t fair. We’ll only be together for a year after all. Don’t you agree?”

Cait did
not
agree, but she couldn’t seem to find her voice. She couldn’t even
breathe
as Ewan’s words sliced through her heart, shredding all of her dreams. “I…” she started, but couldn’t say more.

“It’s perfect just like this,” Ewan said, his voice growing in confidence when she didn’t protest. If she could come around to his way of thinking then there really was no call to break things off just yet. “And I want to keep it this way. I don’t ever want it to change.” Finally finished, he smiled. “Was there something you wanted to tell me?”
 

“Yes,” Cait said in a tiny voice. Then, meeting his eyes, she lost her nerve. “I mean…no,” she said, changing her mind. She couldn’t tell Ewan that she was having his child when he’d just made such a passionate declaration against the idea!

“Good,” Ewan said, the tone of his voice darkening and becoming more husky before. The hands that had been lightly raking her belly grew more insistent. He used them to push her back into his blatant arousal. “Of course, I don’t mean that I want to stop having fun.”

Fun
, Cait thought, the word sounding bitter in her mind. Is that what Ewan called what they were doing? How like a man! She felt numb and betrayed by what he’d said before, and resisted the first tingling of sensation when his hands plucked at her hips and breasts. She didn’t
want
to forgive him for what he’d said, for what he’d
done
in sucking the joy from her happy news, but she was too enslaved by his body to resist for long. It was only moments before she was answering his suggestive touch, bucking into his hand and goading him harder and faster with soft mews of pleasure into his ear.

He didn’t come inside her again. Cait noticed this time, and thought bitterly of the night before.
Coward
she thought, and held her tongue, even though she knew that his efforts were too late to make a difference. She felt heartsick at Ewan’s sudden rejection, and dirty where his seed was drying on her skin.

“Should I ring for a bath?” he asked, wiping off his own body with a damp rag and
putting on his clothes
while Cait remained in the bed. She shook her head. Muira would have already called for hot water for the children, and there were only limited servants to lend a hand. Cait was sure that she could manage. Besides, she didn’t particularly
want
to forget her pique so soon.

Finished dressing, Ewan left the room. He had noticed Cait’s silence, but suppose
d
that she was simply overtired. He decided not to dwell on the matter. Happily, as soon as he entered the dining room, he was provided with a distraction.

“Maisie
SIT
in your chair
! Thomas, quit poking your brother.
Duncan
, jam toast is NOT a hat!”

Muira was sitting at the end of the table,
the baby was
on her lap as she presided over a chaotic meal. All of the children had been bathed. Maisie’s pale gold hair was drying down her back- but they also looked as if they’d required another washing as soon as they left the table
. They
were covered from head to toe in honey, crumbs and egg.

“Uncle Ewan! Uncle Ewan!” the three oldest called, bobbing out of their chairs until a sharp word from their mother sat them back down again.

“I want to see my pony today, Uncle Ewan!” Maisie begged, twisting in her chair, “PLEASE can I see my pony?”
 

Ewan chuckled, remembering the girl’s last visit to the farm. He’d promised her a horse of her own when she was older.

“It’s not fair that Maisie gets a pony!” Thomas pouted. “I want one too!”
 

“Thomas. That’s greedy!” Muira chided, but Ewan shook his head.

“How about I take you all down to the stables?” he suggested, thinking that the bright, cheerful babble of the children would be a perfect antidote to his grey mood.

The day before Ewan had been, frankly, sick of their incessant chatter and bickering. It was the primary reason that, despite his hunger to see Cait, he’d tarried in the village. He did love the children, however. He felt a bitter pang: He wanted a child of his own.

He supposed he was lucky that Cait clearly
didn’t
. Surely she would have married sooner if she had a desire for a great pack of bairns- and she had protested when he
first
voiced his idea. Ewan could understand the feminine point of view. It
was
dangerous to have a child
. He’d
worried for his sister
with each and every pregnancy. He was grateful
that she and the babies had always turned
fine
- but that wasn’t always the case.

Ewan shuddered when he thought about Cait dying to bear his child. What would be the point if he lost her? He could never be perfectly happy unless she was close
,
which was going to prove a problem when the year was up.

Ewan led his niece and nephews out into the barnyard, and he paused for a moment while they ran after a kitten. J
ust across the shallow river he
saw the beginning of Frasure lands, and an idea struck into his mind. He would
have
to have another wife to bear his heir. He wasn’t looking forward to it- but he had managed to sleep with other women before. There were a few prospects that didn’t turn his stomach
. H
adn’t the
Laird
said that there was no reason to keep Cait on the side? He couldn’t settle her in his mother’s house, but perhaps he could keep her just across the river.
Laird
Frasure was a
good man.
He wouldn’t hesitate to offer a Cameron shelter as a personal favor to the tanist.

A bittersweet smile flitted across his lips as he imagined the scenario. It would be a half-life with Cait, but at least it would be a life. He’d have to spend most of his time at the Castle, of course, but he could surely arrange a pretense for visiting the farms- and spending most of his time in the little cottage just across the bridge. He imagined keeping house with Cait, just as they had at Glen Mohr. There would be nothing to keep her from bearing his child then, if he could bring her around. It would be a by-blow, but he was certain that he would love it even more than his legitimate heir.

“Uncle Ewan! Come on!” Maisie said impatiently, and tugged his hand so that he finally snapped out of his daydream. He led her to the stables and showed the children “Maisie’s” horse: a fine chestnut pony that had been born the spring before.

After showing them the horses, and exacting promises that they wouldn’t approach the animals on their own, he left the children to explore the countryside, while he returned inside to seek his wife. She was just coming down the stairs when he entered, looking pale and as though she’d just been sick.

“Cait? Are you okay?” Muira asked, frowning sharply.

“Of course!” Cait snapped in a tone that was uncharacteristically hard.

Muira quirked a brow, shot her brother a questioning look, and then made a pretense of changing
the baby
’s swaddling to leave the room. As soon as they were alone, Ewan approached his wife.

“Good morning,” he said in a rich baritone, and then popped another kiss on her cheek, “You decided to join us.”

“Yes,” Cait said curtly, and then sat down to what was left of the morning meal: a few slices of cold toast, a boiled egg and an apple.

“I thought that we might walk over across the river today,” Ewan announced, “There’s a little cottage just across the water that I was thinking of making an offer for.”

“Did you?” Cait said coolly. “I don’t know that I’m feeling up to a walk.”

“Are you sick?” Ewan asked, echoing his sister’s earlier question. His face was so patently concerned that Cait felt a little stab of guilt and shook her head, “I’m fine,” she assured him, and then pointedly returned to her breakfast.