Betrayed (30 page)

Krayne watched the indecision playing across her face before she finally sat down. She removed her slippers and tucked her feet in beneath her bottom. The firelight flickered mahogany streaks in her hair and shadows upon her face, casting her beauty in dramatic overtures.

“Very well, here I am,” Amber said, her quiet voice doing nothing to break the spell. Her smile was soft and inviting. “What did you want, Krayne?”

This,
he acknowledged with a grin. He caught her eye and locked the emerald dazzle into his heart.

And mayhap he wanted an intimate byname for her lips alone.
Krayne
sounded so cold and informal, did naught to produce the spontaneous warmth that had wrapped her tongue around
Lexie.

Suddenly irritated with himself, Krayne left his chair to pour them each a goblet of wine. “We will talk. I would know my wife a little better.”

“I’d say you know me well enough after…you know.”

Krayne chuckled at her innocence. ’Twould take a hundred years and more to know her body as well as he would like to and he intended to enjoy every night of them. He brought the wine back and pushed a goblet into Amber’s hand, then tilted her chin up for a kiss that brushed her lips. “I’ll discover all I need ta know of yer body fer myself. ’Tis the rest of ye I’m interested in now, lass.”

Amber clasped the goblet as he went back to his chair. She took a deep sip, but instead of cooling down his kiss, the wine flushed additional heat to her cheeks. “What do you wish to know?”

He stretched his legs, his own goblet cradled in his lap, and fixed a brooding gaze on his boots. His leather breeks were a snug fit, giving her a bold view of muscled thigh and the thickened shaft outlined against his abdomen. She quickly flitted her gaze higher, to rest on the large, capable hands around his goblet, and almost sighed aloud when she recalled how his hand had swallowed hers when he’d led her up the great hall on their wedding day.

They didn’t do that enough.

Dragged by the wrist, aye.

Hauled up at the waist.

Locked to his side by her arm.

Pinned. Jerked. Pulled.

Would that they could walk hand in hand through this marriage, but for now it seemed that every breath would be a struggle.

“Tell me about Stivin.”

Her eyes shot up at the softly spoken command. Krayne wasn’t looking at her, though. His gaze was steadfast on his boots, his face set in stone ridges and dales, and she knew this was as difficult for him as it was for her. He still believed that she’d betrayed Stivin, and in a way, she had, by mere fact of her friendship. Her throat closed up at the memory of her gentle friend, his head filled with poems and dreams, his black eyes brimmed with youthful energy, his future stretched before him.

“Did ye love him?” Krayne asked dully.

He couldn’t look at Amber. This discussion was way overdue, but he wasn’t sure how he would deal with the truth. If she’d never loved Stivin, he should hate her for misleading the lad into rushing headfirst to his death. If she had loved Stivin, would his pride bear her pining for another man, be he alive or dead?

“Aye,” she said at last. “I loved him very much.”

Krayne felt something break inside him, perhaps the cask that held his pride.

And still there was more. “I was silly enough to think my uncle would betroth me to Stivin.”

His fingers tensed around the cold pewter of his goblet, but nothing could keep the pain down. It leaked from him, seeping through the cracks of whatever part of him had broken, and he wasn’t so sure it was his pride after all.

“And ye got me instead,” Krayne muttered hoarsely. He threw back the remainder of his wine, then flung the goblet into the fire.

“I didn’t betray him, you know.” She wiped at the corner of her eye with a thumb. “I never told anyone about your raiding plans.”

“I never considered ye informing yer uncle of the raid a betrayal, Amber. ’Tis a matter of family loyalty.”

“You know I’ve little love or loyalty for William Jardin. I owe him nothing and I’d never have betrayed Stivin to him or anyone else.” Her hands fisted in her lap and her eyes flashed green as she looked up at him. “William banished my father and then tricked him on his deathbed to lure me back to Scotland.”

“Why would he do that?”

“You would know more than me. All I know is that my father broke off his betrothal to Joanna Johnstone, your mother, and that somehow started this feud. My father was a kind, gentle man. He wouldn’t hurt a soul.”

“Ah,” Krayne muttered, “but that’s another tale and yer father’s not entirely at fault there. What I meant was, why would yer uncle want ye back in Scotland?”

“You know,” exclaimed Amber, her eyes narrowing on him as she ignored the question. “You know what happened between my father and your mother.”

“I know what
didn’t
happen,” he said evasively.

“Why did my father run away?” Amber prodded. “I cannot imagine him breaking such a promise, even if he did not love Joanna.”

“’Twas my mother who did the running, lass. And yer father did break a promise made afore God, even had he just cause.”

Amber’s shoulders slumped. “So, ’tis true then. He abandoned your mother, and she never quite recovered.”

“What do ye mean by that?” demanded Krayne.

Noting the hardening of his jaw, Amber hoped she wasn’t getting someone else into trouble again. “Your man aboard the ship, the one who served me, mentioned that your mother went into a convent soon after and has stayed there ever since.”

“Aye, that she did,” Krayne said.

“And she’s never come home, even to visit?”

“My mother isolated herself from the world, from her duties and her children. For a long while most people believed her dead, and some still do. That is the way she chose, and we’ve done well enough without her.”

“You take a hard view, Krayne, are you so very sure she deserves it?” Amber thought of her father’s role in this woman deserting her own children, and she had to know the truth. “I want to meet her.”

“We were talking of ye and Stivin,” Krayne reminded his wife. He had no intention of revisiting his own haunted past. “So, ye never told yer uncle about the raid?”

She looked set to argue, but after a moment her chin tucked in. “Not that it matters. Stivin rode to his death either way and all because of me. Oh!” she cried, jumping up. “I hate William. By God, I hate that man! I wish I could undo what he has done. I wish Stivin had never even met me.”

Feeling her distress, Krayne pushed to his feet. Before he could reach her, Amber fled outside to the ramparts. He followed hastily and found her heaving dry sobs against the wall.

“Ye didna betray anyone, lass. Stivin knew what manner of man Jardin is and ’tis the reason he rode after you. ’Tis a man’s right ta defend and protect the woman he loves.” He scooped Amber into his arms, holding her close to his chest, and walked back to the chamber. “Ye have no blame in this.”

His warmth and strength filled Amber, brought her back to life. The deep rumble of his soothing words unlocked the tears to stream down her cheeks. “You’re wrong, Krayne. I should never have worried Stivin with my problems. If I hadn’t said anything to him about my uncle, he wouldn’t have thought I needed protecting.”

“If yer uncle wasna such a bastard, ye wouldna have needed protecting,” Krayne corrected.

“You don’t understand. It wasn’t Stivin’s battle. He didn’t love me. He was infatuated and I should have done more to set him straight. I loved him as a friend, as a brother. He was all I had in Scotland. Mayhap I even hoped that my love could grow into something stronger, that we could join in marriage and end this bloody feud, but even then I knew well that it might never be.”

“Hush now, wife,” Krayne growled.

I loved him as a friend, as a brother.

His own pain disappeared as he lowered himself into the chair and kept her tucked against him on his lap.

“I was not the woman he was meant to die for,” said Amber in a hushed voice. “I could never be that woman.”

“He cared fer ye.” Krayne stroked her hair as he spoke, hoping to God he could reach her. “I would die fer a brother, cousin, sister, mother or friend. As would Stivin. ’Tis the way of man, lass, and naught ye could have said or done would change a thing.”

She cried silently against his chest, wetting him through to the skin, and Krayne did the only thing he knew to do. He rocked her close to him and murmured comforting words until the tears dried up, and then some more, until the heaving abated, until her body went limp as she allowed sleep to claim her.

Somewhere in his desperate need to calm her, he promised a trip to Auchenroddan convent. He found he could no longer refuse Amber a thing, and if she wanted to meet his mother…

“I should never have left England,” she murmured as she drifted off.

“Aye,” he whispered into her hair, “but then I would never have found ye, sweeting.”

Amber awoke on a soft moan of pleasure as her dream greeted the dawn without fading. She was pressed against a warm mass, her back flush with the muscular wall of her husband’s chest, his knees folded behind hers and his hard manhood pressed along the crevice of her buttocks. His hand cupped her breast through the thin cotton of her shift, massaging the soft flesh while his thumb stroked her nipple taut. The raspy breaths on the side of her neck gave way to a sensual kiss that started at an incredibly sensitive spot behind her earlobe and worked its way down to the curve of her shoulder.

The beast undressed me and now he’s taking advantage while I sleep,
she thought drowsily, but couldn’t summon the will to take offence.

Another hand slid along the contour of her body, down the valley of her waist, over the flare of hip and along the length of her thigh to catch the edge of the material ruffled at her knee and going beneath. Determined fingers smoothed deep tingles along the tender flesh of her inner thigh, up and up, until her shift was bundled at her hips and his thumb rested on her pearly bud.

His kisses trailed up again and the massaging at her breast became more urgent. He nibbled at her earlobe while his tongue flicked, circling tiny orbs of desire down her spine. She arched backward, a reflex she had no control of, causing his shaft to slip further between her legs, the tip sliding against her nether lips.

She rubbed sensuously along his shaft.

In a sudden movement she was pressed flat on her back and his body was raised over her. Smoky grey eyes challenged her to refute his dominance as he lifted her to tug the shift over her head. When he lowered her again, he took each of her hands in his and pinned them high above her head.

Her body was aware of every part of him; the steel-hard thighs nudging her legs apart, the length of his rigid shaft resting on her belly, the musky scent folding around her as he lowered his chest over her.

His jaw was shadowed by the night’s growth, giving his face a harsh, dangerous look that matched the heat in his burning gaze. She squirmed beneath him, suddenly overcome with the need to wrap her arms about him, to bring him closer faster. Her breasts strained in anticipation of the scratchy feel of his morning beard.

His mouth closed over hers in a kiss that was hot and penetrating while he manoeuvred her wrists so that he locked her down with one hand only, freeing the other to go back to her breast, fondling the plump softness, pinching the nipple with just the right amount of pressure. He broke the kiss to move lower, his tongue dipping into the hollow at the base of her throat, then tracing a hot wetness down the valley of her breasts. His lips closed over her other breast, suckling the nipple deep into his mouth, and his hand went down her belly and to the juncture of her thighs. He cupped her down there, his palm grinding into the burn as he rocked her mound slowly and firmly.

Languid heat stole through her as he dipped fingers inside her and her cavity immediately pulsated around them. The fingers withdrew and her eyes shot open to find his lopsided grin directly above her, and then his mouth crushed down on hers. His chest grazed her breasts and his shaft rubbed at her arousal between her thighs, creating a vortex of hot need. His lips slanted over hers, again and again with delicious roughness as his tongue delved inside, stroking, wrapping, tasting, sucking.

Just when she thought she could take no more, when the frustrated burn became a genuine ache, the kiss ended abruptly and the pressure of his body lifted. She opened her eyes to see he’d gone up on his knees.

“Brace yerself,” Krayne ordered gruffly, pulling her higher up the bed and placing her palms flat against the wall above her head.

She met his dark gaze and stiffened her arms, watching his jaw clamp down as he pushed his hands beneath her to grab her buttocks, lifting her up to him as he pressed forward. The tip of his erection nudged her opening. Her legs instinctively opened wider and wrapped around his waist, but he didn’t plunge inside. He looked at her for the longest time, restraint gripped at his jaw and glistening in his eyes as he remained poised for entry.

Through the fog of her own desire, Amber saw the vulnerable element carved into the rocky contours of his face, and her heart opened wide.

“Aye,” she groaned. “Please…”

He eased into her, stretching her, filling her. She tensed for a moment, but there was no pain, only intense pleasure pushing inside her until he was fully embedded. Keeping one hand on her buttocks to hold her in place, he brought the other to her mound, teasing fingers parting her lower lips and stroking the swollen flesh while he moved his shaft in and out with practised slowness. With expert timing, his fingers stopped stroking to cup her as his last thrust shattered to spill the molten liquid into her core. He remained still and rigid deep inside her, his shaft pushing against her womb and some hidden spot that made the burning release last and last.

Before she’d fully relaxed, Krayne grabbed her bums with both hands, holding her firmly as he pumped, long, fast thrusts, pulling all the way out and then plunging back in, fitting her so tightly that the journey was one long delicious sensation. Faster. Harder. Wilder. The hot spiral built quickly, higher than before as he jutted forcibly against that awakened spot at the opening of her womb. His seed spurted inside her and with it came another rush of blinding pleasure that seemed to take forever to abate.