Broken Highlander's Blood Oath (4 page)

“Little nightingale, I will keep you safe,” he whispered on a breath, on a plea, with Analise’s lips moistening his palm with warmth and tenderness. “You don't have to offer me anything, lass.”

That promise was a healthy bit of foolery for a crippled man, nevertheless Donan vowed to do all he could, and still in certain circumstances he was powerful. The Laird Glenncannon had not lost his wit or his stubbornness.

“But, I’m yours!” Analise cried softly, rising up before him, losing the cover of fur with a maddening slide. “Can you not see that we belong together?” Donan’s gaze followed the fur sliding past Analise’s belly button where it stopped. “Can you not
feel
it?”

Aye, twas all that he could feel, Donan thought, as he wondered at the wit of having a discussion with such perfectly bouncy naked breasts. Why he judged he could not get his hand completely around one fragile mound and the judicious thought made him itch to try.
Jesu
, in that moment, he decided he loved big bosoms and especially ones with just that shape of swollen nipples. The tips were pink, baby soft, and quivering.

“Because you saved my life and that makes my life yours!” Analise exclaimed, swaying her beautiful breasts beneath his nose. “You cannot give my life back.”

Wondering at his sanity and gritting his teeth, Donan steadfastly took hold of the fur as he pulled it loose from Analise’s rounded hips, obtaining a glimpse of the whole of her before he wrapped her within its warmth once more.

“You will lie down and sleep. Tis cold and you need rest,” he stated firmly with a catch of gruffness in his voice.

“But-but—”

“Nay, lass! If you are mine, then you will be obeying me.”

“Oh? Then you do see. I mean you agree.” She smiled, lying down obediently.

“Aye, lass, I see.”

Analise sighed, thinking that her beloved lord looked very fine in the firelight. He had set his profile to her and she admired his strong features, coming to believe he must be what people would call a Black Scot. His hair was a thick mane, coal black and curling lightly on the ends from the dampness. He had striking black brows and gray eyes that gathered and clung like a shifting silver mist on a deep gloaming. Aye, twas a Scot’s word, gloaming, and she’d never understood the depth of it until she’d gazed into her master’s eyes at the moment of passion between them.

Her master, her beloved ... her lord.

He was all this to her and she’d never allow him to deny it. Not now. Not after they'd kissed souls and perhaps not before they'd first touched gazes as if they were kissing souls. She would be anything for Donan, anything she could offer him, for she understood that he resisted. And she understood why.

It was his legs he worried so much about. Legs that still looked strong and thick, as any man’s legs should in their braces. And the rest of him, saints, he was a rolled tight mountain of brawn with a spike of iron embedded between his thighs. She’d felt that steely man’s spike rising against her, when Donan held her in his arms.

She'd never lain with a man; however, she couldn't live in Armand’s domain without being aware, more than she wished, of men and women’s couplings. It was one of the avenues Armand had used to shame her, with lurid words and forced watching of coupling servants. Now perchance, she was even glad to have seen the thrusting servants, because if she had been allowed to believe only in Armand’s words, she would have been terrified of the act.

But now she knew with all of her heart what she couldn’t have known before; the man, beloved to her, would never harm her. Not in intimacy or in any other way. Nay, Donan had such strength, but he held her tenderly. And would not Donan be very surprised at all that his Analise did know of carnal intimacy?

Aye, Analise thought tilting her head, and then slowly so as not to be noticed, she pulled the fur that covered her down a bit so the top mounds of her breasts showed nicely. She had a man to lure, didn’t she? Whether she was to be Donan’s mistress or his wife, she didn't care. All that mattered was their new love and attraction for each other, that and being free of Armand.

Donan wondered whether he’d rescued a tender virginal maiden or a tender virginal imp, because if Analise pulled the fur down much further, her twin prizes would be ripe to view again. He kept his gaze averted though, enough so she’d not realize he could see all that she was trying to display for him. It was a warrior’s talent: to appear to not to be looking at what he really was looking at.

He was a fool
and
he was looking.

Aye, not only looking, but anticipating the flirt. God’s balls, he could remember the young man’s flirt. Back ages ago in his life, when he’d been too quick and randy to know what to properly do with a woman’s body. He could nearly laugh now at the rabbit quickness he and his fellows had employed back then. Oh, but the maidens had laughed prettily at the tumble, never correcting the young lord’s ways.

By the time he’d understood all he was missing, it had been too late. Then for five crippling years, he was left to only wonder about all the sexual mysteries revealed, erotic tales, and intimate techniques he’d learned about during the crusades in native lands. Many a knight returned from those crusades to bed his surprised and much later delighted wife.

Donan felt anticipation raising the heat in his body, and he wondered how far he should permit it to go—or if he should allow it at all. Bloody hell, he wanted to flirt with a pretty lass. He wanted to do all styles of carnal intimacies.  

I am a man ... just responding like a man to what is offered. Why should I not grasp this opportunity?

“My lord, you appear cold. You should remove those wet clothes.”

Isn’t this what I asked for? For someone to but try?
Donan turned his head, raising a black eyebrow, while his thoughts clamored.
Ask just one more time golden nightingale and I would break ... I swear just one more time to be sure.

“Come lay with me, my lord, tis so cold and I’m certain I will fall ill if you do not rescue me.”

Donan’s belly clenched as he watched the maidenly imp falsify a shiver and reach out one of her hands toward him. His eyes narrowed on that hand.

“You’d have to help me take off the braces.” He grabbed Analise’s hand ... too tightly. “You’d have to move my legs. They are dead weight, do you ken?”

“Oh, my lord.” Analise sat upright clutching the fur to her breasts. “You would truly allow me too?  I will. I want to!”

“You ken?” Donan tugged Analise’s hand.

“I will ken, my lord. I-I want to ken,” she whispered.

“We would just lie together. I don’t know if I could—”

“Yes, my lord.” Analise smiled. “Just lay together for warmth, you and me.”

Analise immediately tugged a smaller woolen covering from beneath the furs and wrapped it under her arms, tucking the end snug between her breasts. She didn't want to test Donan’s fragile acceptance with her complete bareness. She could see that he tottered in uncertainty even though his solemn masculine features barely showed it.

“Tell me what to do, my lord." She moved to kneel beside him.

Donan's hand lifted filled with her long blond hair, which he pulled over her bare shoulder. “Call me, Donan. Always, Donan.”

Beloved, master, mine.
“Yes, Donan.”

“My tunic first, nightingale. Take off my tunic.”

Analise watched Donan’s eye coloring turn to gray slate as she reached for the bottom edge of his tunic. It was shorter than most, coming to his mid-thigh, but still caught beneath his rump. She fastened her bottom lip between her teeth wondering, how—

“I’ll rise up, imp.” He straightened his arms with his hands planted firmly on the ground, and then lifted his lower body off the ground.

“Oh, I see.”

Analise turned a smile up at Donan, and then quickly bent her head to pull the tunic from beneath him. When it was free, he lowered himself, and then he raised his arms high. As soon as she began to lift the tunic, she saw that he wore a fuller breechcloth than most men would, probably because of the shorter tunic. She also saw that his legs were not covered by woolen stockings, but by some sort of softly buffed and sewn hide.

Still, her wandering thoughts came to a staggering halt when she tugged the tunic free of Donan’s arms, sitting back on her heels with her gaze fixed on his bare chest, and her bottom lip gaped open.

“Have you not seen a man’s bare chest before, sugar lass?”

Donan’s voice was warm, like mulled red wine, Analise thought, as she tried to shake her head, but it seemed too fixed in place to manage it.

“I-I—" She clutched his warm tunic to her breasts. “Not like this, I don’t believe I—”

Why was she so breathless? Then, Donan laughed in a deep baritone rumble that flexed his muscles right before her eyes  ... every blessed one of them!

“Ah, lass.” Analise found her hand grasped into Donan’s hand and he placed her palm down on the curly black hair on his chest that formed a furry mat. “Touch and it will be real,” he murmured.

Analise spread her fingers through the fine black mass, feeling the heat of firm male sinew beneath her palm with the muscle drawing tight at her caress. Saints, Donan was a powerful man with so much tempered brawn; the slopes of his muscle tantalized her fingers, until she didn't realize she was tracing the mounts and the indents—

“I’ve not been touched in so many years.”

Donan’s voice was husky and the sound brought her back from warm seductions. She felt flushed and languid while her belly or lower ached with little honeyed throbs. Donan’s eyes were closed and his lips were parted in a firm sensual outline. Analise knew what she wanted to do, but she also sensed she had to be careful not to rush Donan’s sensitive sense of honor. So, she kept a careful watch on his face while she ran her hands over his warm tough body, learning the feel of him.

She could tell he enjoyed it as much as she did, until she came to the sagging band of his breechcloth. It was falling low on his flat belly with a strip of black hair disappearing beneath the cloth. She could see the bulge of his erection pushing against the material. She looked up at Donan’s face trying to judge if she should—

“If only I could, lass.” His face was harsh and his gray eyes were cauldrons of swirling smoke.

“You could,” she whispered. “I would do anything you asked me to do.” Her hand closed gingerly around the hardened outline of his male shaft. “Make me yours. Do anything, Donan. Show me what to do.”

Suddenly, she felt her hand snatched upward and pulled away, caught in Donan’s broad hand as he took it behind her back. Then he pulled her down, toppling her backward with the pressure of his chest, until he had her captured beneath him with her arm part way behind her back. Her neck flexed and the weight of her head fell backward, exposing the arch of her throat.

“Now tell me you will do anything!” Donan used his free hand to jerk the blanket to Analise’s waist. He wanted to frighten her for all that he could not have. He wanted to— “
Tell
me you’ll be spreading your legs for me! Tell me you’ll lick my cock. Tell me you’ll—”

“I will!” Analise’s breasts heaved with the nipples like jutting pink spokes. “I will do anything! Show me love making. Please! Before—”

“Before what?” Donan released Analise’s arm and used his elbows to drag himself forward, until he had her small head cradled in his hands so he could look into her face. “Before what, lass?”

“Before, Armand, rapes me or-or throws me to another who will hurt me like-like—” Quivering little tears dropped through Analise’s golden eyelashes.

“Like who, Analise?”

Her small hands clutched his upper arms. “Like Cheval m-my sister.” She sobbed once, and then caught it. “He let Red Kife r-rape her. He took her away!” She tried to catch her sobs with a shaky breath. “He said that he took her to the Abbey to have her bastard babe. He said accidents happen in childbirth all the time.”

“Your parents?”

“Dead last Michaelmas. I-I think— Cheval thought too, that-that—”

“That Armand killed them?”

“Yes.” Analise choked on another sob. “I tried to find Cheval, but it was so hard with Armand watching me and no one would tell me. The servants are all afraid of him. H-He tortures some. It’s so awful.”

Donan dropped his forehead onto Analise’s temple, holding her close. “I
will
find a way to keep you safe. I will not let that bastard have you.”

“I-I know. I am
yours
now.” Analise’s arms came around his neck. “I'm so happy to be.”

“Nay, little nightingale.” Donan raised his head. “You canna give yourself to a crippled man, just for your fear. You are a fine and beautiful lady and deserve better.”

“Nay!" Analise tugged at his hair, bringing his face down close to hers with a surprising strength. “Tis true, I want to be loved so I will know love should anything happen, but that has naught to do with how I feel about you.”

“Nightingale, you make no sense. You are upset, I ken.”

“Why do you call me that?”

Donan narrowed his eyes—she was vexing and lovely and more than a bit persistent.
Jesu,
he wanted her to the depths of his soul and because he had feelings for her, he would not allow her to make emotional judgments when she was so obviously threatened by Armand, which made her frightened. Nay, by his honor, he had to take reason before irrational loving.