Read Knight Everlasting Online
Authors: Jackie Ivie
Knight Everlasting (11 page)
They were putting the horses on the downwind side of the large tent. On the left. Just past the first bit of tree line. They'd probably post a guard. They always did. She'd face that if she got that far. She'd get a palm-sized rock before attempting it, since that was how she'd learned. Hitting a man didn't do much unless he was surprised and the fist she hit him with contained a rock. Or she aimed for the groin. Juliana swallowed. She hoped it wouldn't be Tavish.
Aidan was ill. That was all she needed.
His wife hadn't been a maid.
Aidan lay on his back, his muscles and lungs spent and aching with the effort of continuing the fight against the loch. So he'd ended up floating and watching the rain above him as it pummeled the waves rocking him about. She'd played at virginity and thought to fool a younger lad that she was being forced to wed. Afraid if he suspected, Aidan would beat her, as would her father afterward. So he'd allowed it, acting untried and new to the act, and listened to her complaints of how he pained when he'd taken her. She'd been slenderâhe remembered thatâbut well aware of her charms. And how to use them. He'd acted like an innocent fool.
Because otherwise he'd have had to beat her.
He instinctively knew she wouldn't survive the beating he'd felt like giving. She'd been too frail. Too slight. Too full of her own beauty and what it did to the men about her to care that she crushed her new husband's dream.
It hadn't even been his child she'd died birthing.
A wave crested over him, bringing a choking volume of water, and Aidan flipped to renew the swim. It had gone dark while he swum, mercilessly pumping his limbs through the water until his arms and legs ceased responding. Then he'd stopped, near the center, rotated onto his back, and just floated. And existed. And remembered.
Fighting the elements had a certain power. The quest for survival made a man forget old hurts and new frustrations. Aidan rolled over and started back. The water had grown colder while he'd tarried. The force of each wave carried the same effect of parrying an attacker's claymore. The challenger always going for the head so a good upward thrust could take off a man's lower jaw. Or they'd swing up for his groin, for any hit there put a man on his knees. Or a slice across the inside thigh, making a wound so deadly a man could watch his lifeblood race out with each heartbeat. Or they'd take off an arm, so a man could bleed to death unless he knew to tie it off and stayed conscious enough to do it. The waves had the power of an attacking horde and the force of a hundred claymores, pounding into him and pummeling him into the depths, making him fight for the surface over and over again.
He was flagging. Tiring.
Each breath burned with the quantity of water he was also inhaling. Each stroke of his arms had the weight of a fifteenstone boulder attached. Each pump of his legs was hampered by an opposing force of bog-thick mass. He didn't stop, though. He fought it . . . but it wasn't enough. He was going to sink beneath the waves, tossed about by an ocean of fury, and not a soul would guess what had happened.
Not even the girl who'd caused it: Juliana.
If she hadn't been a maid, she'd have no question of what he'd been fighting, but she'd never know why. And never for certain. He went beneath another wave and fought for the surface while his heart pounded loud in his ears and his chest thudded with withheld air, until he broke the surface again, floundering weakly and ineffectually against wave after wave of assault.
He'd put her in Arran's care.
Juliana? His mind was playing tricks. The lass that so unsettled and disrupted him that he'd chosen to play with death rather than take her maidenhood and make her his . . . he'd put her in his brother's care? The youngest MacKetryck? The unsure, untried, untested Arran?
Aidan spit out water and coughed on it until it burned. He'd been a fool! Arran was no match for Uncle Dugald if he took a fancy to Juliana . . .
Just as he had Aidan's wife.
Anger shoved through Aidan then, pushing for air and making him take it. And that was followed by rage, a rage so severe his fists went to hammers of fury that slammed into the water, launching him up from the waves to his knees. And that made it possible to give his most gruesome battle cry. He hadn't finished the yell before he attacked the waves.
Aidan's shoulders went to a perfect rhythm, sending his arms in stroke after stroke of power and intent, making a motion that churned its own waves. And his feet kicked, feeling renewed strength and vigor against the bog-like consistency of the water, until it foamed and frothed behind him in surrender.
Heat pumped through him, sent from every beat of his heart and intensified by every breath he managed to gasp from beneath his arm with every other stroke. Over and over, and again and again, pushing and shoving and churning and gaining, his motions fed by a pain and ache and anger so intense, everything about him looked red.
He touched sand. Earth. Rocks. Shrubs. Aidan kept moving and stroking and pumping and then turned it to crawling, pulling plants out by the roots as he used them for his climb, until the ground leveled out, the world about him started changing from heavy red-dipped hate to a softer rose shade . . . and then altering altogether . . .
And then it turned to Juliana's concerned face.
“Aidan?”
He reached up with arms that were still shuddering with the effort, gripped both her arms that were wrapped tightly in her cloak, and pulled her down to him, smashed his face against her in a kiss that had no rebuttal, and kissed her until she returned it. And then he flung the vision aside, ignoring it completely, and started laughing.
The Red MacKetryck had won this time.
Chapter 10
Juliana sat cross-legged on the pallet and watched Aidan sleeping. It was easier to see him in the predawn light, but that hadn't stopped her from watching through most of what should have been a night spent in escaping them, but instead had been thisârestless, sleepless, thought-filled, thrilling, exciting . . . frightening. She'd been unable to sleep whether she covered herself with the blanket they'd given her or not. It hadn't mattered. Sleep had eluded her regardless of how many times or in what position she tried on the pallet. It hadn't mattered how often she berated or counseled herself, or sprawled on her back looking at the darkness that was tent weave above her, doing her best to obliterate every thought of it. The reason behind her failure wasn't going away. It wasn't faltering. It wasn't muting. It wasn't fading.
It wasn't doing anything except breathing in heavy slumber on his cot.
Aidan was the handsomest male Juliana had ever seen. He had a wealth of dark hair that was usually pulled back, putting a sculptor's touch to his features. Since he'd been in the water last night, it had been plastered to him at first. Now it was just fanning out all over his cot, wild and untamed . . . like the man. He'd been blessed with dark eyelashes the match to his hair, and if he allowed the shadow of beard that was darkening his cheeks time to grow, it looked to be just as dark. He'd probably been blessed with that healthy, brawny, muscle-filled frame, but then he'd added to it, working it into jaw-dropping ability and mass.
Most of that she'd accepted from the first time she'd seen him. She didn't have a choice. It was too blatant to ignore.
But then she had to factor in the man himself. The indefinable portion he wielded with such ease: the pumping, heated, thrilling, rousing, inspiring . . .
sensual
essence . . . that came with the promise of so much more. He changed the elements, stirring awareness of him with every look he gave, every gesture . . . every word. The man had an incalculable effect on everyone. Not just women. Not just her.
sensual
essence . . . that came with the promise of so much more. He changed the elements, stirring awareness of him with every look he gave, every gesture . . . every word. The man had an incalculable effect on everyone. Not just women. Not just her.
Juliana went to her knees and scooted closer to the cot where Aidan rested, rhythmically pushing air in and out of his frame as if he hadn't a care in the world. As if he hadn't come crawling from the lake like a creature hatched from the mists hovering on the water's surface. Grabbing her to a full-body hug against chilled naked flesh, altering her plan, changing her purpose, and stirring every emotion she'd been fighting right into her consciousness. That was before he'd collapsed into a laughing buffoon on the shore beside her, the noise bringing all his men, and putting her in such a shocked state, she hadn't even used that small bit of confused time for the perfect escape opportunity it presented.
Now it was lost. Gone. Whisked away and changed. Completely.
In the torchlight they'd brought, it hadn't been possible to hide a naked and exhausted and wet Aidan lying on the ground, nor why she was outside the tent, swathed completely in a tartan atop her cloak, a stone still gripped in her hand, and near the horses, while the bundle of dry venison strips and oat cakes she'd dropped told the same tale.
It took four of them to haul Aidan to this tent since he'd gone to his knees both times he'd tried to stand. Four. They each grabbed a limb and hefted while his brother Arran held the torchlight high and gave her continual troubled looks she'd refused to meet or return. They hadn't acted like hauling Aidan was easy, with cursing and low grunting and an occasional huff of slipped breath as the four of them worked in tandem.
It took only one man to make sure she accompanied them. She thought it might have been Stefan, since she didn't recognize him. He didn't speak to offer his name or anything else. He didn't have to. The grip he'd used to make her drop the stone, and the further manhandling she'd endured to get her down to her underdress with no sign of a weapon left to her, had been clear. He hadn't needed to point after the others.
They filled the tent with the volume of them before dumping Aidan onto his back on the cot, bowing it to the ground with his weight. Juliana wasn't ordered into the tent until they'd taken everything from the enclosure except the pallet on the ground and two blankets crafted of their own sett. One they'd pulled in a haphazard fashion atop Aidan, not even covering his lower legs or feet. The other was meant for her. She didn't ask and no one explained. They'd filed out then, giving grunts and signals as they went that probably meant her recapture and doom if she tried to escape again, as well as specifying who the perpetrator would be. Then her escort, if it was Stefan, gestured her into the tent with a jerk of his head and added to the severity of the order by his crossed arm stance and lowered jaw. She wasn't given the chance to mistake it, since Arran was right at his shoulder holding the torch, projecting another confused and worried look toward her that he didn't need to explain. She could guess. With his hero worship, he'd probably been classifying her as a deranged fool for trying to escape Aidan MacKetryck . . . and doubly a fool for being an unprotected woman doing so.
Then she'd heard the sounds of leather or something akin to it sliding through material. All about her. With the torchlight behind them, Juliana had watched them weave the door shut with strips of rawhide, going in and out of prearranged holes that looked like large unsymmetrical sewing. She could guess that it was happening at the corners as well. Smart. It would be difficult to escape this mesh of tent without a blade . . . and that was what they wanted. She wasn't going anywhere until Aidan was recovered and went back to specifying his wants about it. Always his. Never anyone else's. They probably blamed her for his illness, too.
Or whatever he suffered.
She could have told them then they didn't need to bother. They could have left the door wide and a horse at her disposal, and even given her a trunk filled with foodstuffs. Something had happened to her. Something so large and vast and inescapable, that all the chains in the world wouldn't alter it.
Juliana had looked then for the first time over at the bulk that was Aidan MacKetryck, his image dimming as they'd moved away, taking the torchlight with them. Her heart had pulsed sharply and distinctly in her breast, reminding her. Again.
She wasn't going anywhere. She couldn't.
The way they'd prepared the enclosure kept it quiet and private, and yet so totally abuzz with the sensation of Aidan MacKetryck stretched out on his cot . . . naked . . . that no matter what position she tried atop her pallet, she couldn't alter it. Or change it. Or ignore it.
I love him.
It was so totally wrong. And yet the more Juliana tried to block it, the more the certainty grew. She thrilled to it, vibrating all over with it while shivers coursed throughout her, and then got covered by more of the same. It was akin to the warning before a storm of weeping combined with the happiness from seeing a new batch of kittens being attended by their mother. And yet more severe at the same time. Unbelievably. Intimately.
And now Juliana was on her knees at his cot, lifted to a position above him, and filling her eyes and every other sense with what she'd never allow if he were awake and conscious to it. If she had to fall into this horrid emotional state over a man, at least this one was deserving of it. She'd never met a more powerful male. The lords and men of court her father had entertained wouldn't show well against him. Even her betrothed, the lauded knight, Sir Percy Dane, was a shadow beside Aidan Niall MacKetryck.
Of course, MacKetryck knew it. All of it. Every waking moment, the man projected self-confidence and arrogance and awareness of just who he was and what that meant. That was galling, but as Juliana perched next to him on her knees, she realized she wouldn't have him behave any other way.
She reached with a hand and slipped a stray bit of hair from where it was clinging to the eyebrow he was able to lift and move with such subconscious ability and appeal. Juliana thanked the dimness for covering the tremble of her fingers from herself. She held the lock of hair between two fingers and her thumb and rubbed slightly, separating the strands and feeling the silkiness. He'd never know. None of them would.
Nothing altered about the body before her. Aidan continued breathing deeply and rhythmically as he had all night, sleeping heavily. A condition that had annoyed and frustrated her as she'd sought it, and now was a balm and catalyst to what she was doing.
She opened her fingers, releasing the hair strands to sift onto the cot beside his face, and smiled slightly in appreciation of boundless, awe-inspiring male beauty . . . right in front of her . . . available . . . without one soul knowing. A tremor ran through her at the thought, flowing clear to her bare toes before it found a centering site, at the tips of every finger.
Juliana tucked her lower lip beneath her teeth and sucked on it as she moved both hands to the edge of the blanket covering him. He hadn't moved from where they'd placed him. They should have taken care to pull the plaid piece fully over him and tuck it, rather than leave it mostly dangling off the other side. If they'd done that, the flap covering him wouldn't be so easily lifted and peeled back, folding onto itself atop his wealth of muscle, revealing his chest and shadowing his belly. Juliana didn't dare reveal more. Not yet. The chill of morning air might alter his sleep . . . as well as make other things happen, such as worsening the tingling in her fingers.
Aidan had a wealth of chest, tanned to a golden color from running about without clothing. The skin was also mostly free of hair. Juliana smiled slightly and glanced again to his chin and cheeks. The hair growth on his cheeks told her the truth. He didn't grow a full beard because he couldn't, and for the first time, he didn't look like a full-grown, proud, boastful, mature male. He looked young . . . new . . . fresh . . . and more like Arran than ever. For some reason, that endeared Aidan Niall to her even more.
Juliana's smile grew at the idea of a youthful Aidan. He might have even stuttered.
She moved her fingers to his mouth, hovering atop his lip flesh with a tremor that was easily seen, even in the predawn dimness. Breath touched her fingers in a modulated span, matching the rise and fall of the chest in front of her. It was daring and breathlessly so. Juliana lowered her hand slightly, touching just minutely on his lower lip with one digit before heaving with the resultant spark that scored all the way through her.
There wasn't anything dim about that flash of light. Juliana was gasping small breaths as a result of it, blinking rapidly, and wondering how such a small tent could contain and hold something so vast. Her fingers had gone past trembling. They were shaking, and it was getting worse from the effort of holding them so close and yet still keeping from touching him.
This love emotion was a powerful thing. No wonder she'd avoided it.
Juliana waited long moments of time . . . locked in place. Sending ceaseless quick breaths into existence and just hovering. Watching. Waiting. Nothing about Aidan appeared to have changed. If anything, he looked to have settled even farther into his cot, although the binding ropes stretched above his head hadn't moved. Nor could she sense any difference in the closeness of his cot to the ground in front of her knees. Nothing had altered. His features were calm and beautiful in repose, and his breath was still the same slow rhythm, making the chest rise and fall in front of her with the same tempo. Strong. Constant.
Juliana gulped around the odd ball at the base of her throat and skimmed both hands above the revealed skin of his chest and upper belly, not touching. She didn't dare yet! Just . . . skimming. And feeling a sensation so close to touching, it was as if his skin rose to reach everywhere she hovered. Juliana's eyelids got heavy, closing to a slit of view, and her breathing deepened, sending her belly to the edge of his cot with the depth of each one. Sensation wove about the edge of her consciousness, heightening awareness, making such heat fill her, her skin moistened with the release of it, and imbuing her with such glow, the dimness of the tent was incapable of stifling it
“Ah . . . lass . . .”
The whisper alerted her. As did the roll of him toward her, connecting her palms against skin with a crashing effect of lightning to ground. Hard hands followed, gripping her about the waist and hauling her easily from her knees and onto the span of flesh she'd revealed. And even more of it, since it appeared the blanket hadn't waited to fall off the other side of him.
“This had best be a dream.”
He whispered the warning against her lips, before taking them, and sending any answer into the confines of breathless sucking, licking, and toying. Pleasuring. Adoring. Juliana matched him with every stroke, learning the caverns of his mouth as he was hers and elevating the length of his groans with her own.
She felt hands about her buttocks, the backs of her upper thighs . . . her knees, and then the slide of material as her underdress moved, bunching in front of his assault. And then a touch hit her core, striking raw and brilliant lightning all through her and sending her into an arch with the instant shock and thrill.
Hands brought her right back, taking her cry of pleasure into his mouth with the force of his kiss, while the hot, heavy, hard power of his groin slid against where he'd left her vulnerable, open and taut, and still quivering with reaction and want. And need. And craving.
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