Seduced by the Laird (Conquered Brides Series Book 2) (23 page)

Gregor turned to see that John had forgone his sword, had leapt on Owen, and proceeded to give him a beating that rivaled any Gregor had seen before, to the point that, Collin was actually trying to pull John off Owen’s still body.

“I’ll be right back,” he whispered to Kirstin, settling her back onto her horse.

“He’s gone man,” Gregor said, rushing to John.

“I could beat him into dust,” John growled, pummeling Sir Owen’s bloody face.

“Aye, but ye need not. Let the wolves claim his body now.”

Sir John relented, backing away. He spat on Owen’s dead body.

Certain John wouldn’t again attack, they all mounted their horses, but Gregor couldn’t go forward until he had Kirstin in his arms. She readily came to him, clinging, her arms around his neck, her face pressed to his shoulder.

“Gregor,” she murmured. “Thank ye.”

“Ye need not thank me, lass, there was no other choice but to save ye. I could not bear for ye to disappear from my life for a second time. I love ye, with all my heart and soul. I want ye to know that, to believe it. I am yours.”

“Aye, I know it, and I love ye, too. So verra much.”

And then he kissed her with all the urgency, fear and relief he felt inside. His tongue plundering her willing mouth, and her eager tongue lashing him back. They clung to each other, the world disappearing, savoring every single breath, every beat of their hearts.

Until Fingall cleared his throat. “My laird… If ye dinna mind, I’d like to seek a healer at the castle for this arrow wound?”

Gregor chuckled against Kirstin’s mouth, rubbing his nose against hers. “Aye, I suppose that’s a request I can honor,” he teased. “We’ll shelter there, and have a healer look at Kirstin, too.” Then to Kirstin, he whispered, “and I’m not letting ye out of my sight.”

“Nay, I’m not letting
ye
out of
my
sight, Gregor Buchanan. Ye’re mine, whether ye like it or not.”

“There is but one problem…” He murmured.

“Nay, there is no problem that cannot be easily solved. I am yours and ye are mine.”

“God, I never thought I’d hear ye say it.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Cathal Mackenzie was not at home and the way his brother, Torsten, shifted his eyes away, Gregor had an idea that the man was raiding again. He’d done that a lot when they were younger, but his father had always been able to keep him reined in. Not so, now that their father had gone on to his great reward and Cathal was the new laird.

“Ye can stay as long as ye need to recover,” Torsten said. “I’ve already ordered the healer roused for your man. He’s lucky, another few inches and that arrow could have pierced his lung.”

“Aye.”

“I remember ye,” Torsten said, glancing at Kirstin. “Ye look just as happy as ye did all those years ago.”

Gregor grunted.

“Ye need a healer, too,” he said.

Kirstin nodded. “If she has a salve, I’d be most grateful.”

“Come with me,” Torsten’s frail looking wife said, holding out her hand. Her belly was round with child, but her skin was gray and her lips white. “I’ll take ye to the room that ye’ll share with your husband.”

Not one person spoke up to let the lady know that Gregor and she were not married, even Fingall, though he did shift his eyes to Gregor’s warning in their depths.

“Are ye certain? Are ye all right?” Kirstin asked the woman.

Gregor leaned close and whispered to Fingall, “She’ll be my wife afore the week is out.”

Keeping a keen eye on his woman, Gregor watched them talk as they walked away.

The woman smiled to Kirstin. “The bairn has been keeping me up at all hours of the night.”

“Ye have another child?”

She shook her head and patted her large middle. “Nay, this one. I’ll have the servants prepare ye a bath while ye wait for the healer, and have a gown that might suit ye better delivered.”

Kirstin turned to Gregor before she followed the slow-walking lady up the spiral stairs to a chamber. He winked at her, itching to chase after her to be certain she was all right. But he knew she would be. And he had to tell Torsten what had happened.

Gregor filled Torsten in on all that had occurred—Wallace’s execution, the threat to the crown, The Saint, and the possible outlaws that would be rising given the reward for allies of Wallace. Gregor asked after Cathal, ascertaining whether the Bruce could count on Mackenzie support . Torsten nodded though he looked disappointed. Seemed Cathal didn’t care too much for politics as long as he was getting in plenty of whoring, raiding and drinking. Torsten would have made a better laird. In his absence, Cathal was lucky to have a brother responsible enough to take care of their clan.

After speaking with Torsten, Gregor made his way upstairs to find Kirstin. She’d finished her bath and the healer, having already fixed up Fingall, was already there setting out her supplies.

Gregor sat with Kirstin, holding her hands as the healer rubbed a fresh, herbal salve onto her wounds and then rewrapped them.

“Your wounds looked to have mostly healed, lass. Ye’ll be just fine,” the healer said.

“Thank ye. And my cousin?”

“He will heal nicely. Gave him a tincture to help him sleep. The arrow didn’t go in too far, and shouldn’t impair his mobility too much.”

Gregor paid the healer and once she was gone, he poured Kirstin and himself a cup of wine, and sat beside her at the table.

“To us,” he said.

“To us.” She smiled at him, though the edges of her eyes were still filled with worry.

“My love, this time I want to do right by ye.” He knelt to the floor in front of her, took her hands in his. “I know there is much between us, much sadness and sorrow, and I will be eternity sorry for all of it, but do ye think ye could ever forgive me?”

“I already have,” she said, stroking her thumbs over his. “Can ye forgive me? For running away? For pushing ye away? For tricking ye into thinking I didna want ye?”

“Och, lass, ye need not ask for forgiveness for I never once begrudged ye.” He brought her fingertips to his lips. “I should have said this to ye years ago. Should have told ye how much I loved ye. How much I couldn’t live without ye. How happy ye make me. But I’m saying it now. I want to spend the rest of my life at your side, and it would be the greatest honor in the world to call myself your husband.”

Tears sprung to her eyes and for a moment, he worried that he’d said the wrong thing, asked too much of her but then she pressed her hands to his cheeks and kissed him sweetly on the lips.

“Aye.”

His eyes widened. Had he heard her correctly? “Aye?”

“Aye!” She kissed him again, more lingering this time. And when she pulled away, there was such a glow about her eyes and cheeks, and a flushed happy smile on her face that Gregor could not help his answering grin. “When Mother Superior, my Aunt Aileen, sent me to Melrose. She said there was a path I had to follow. I didn’t know what she meant at the time, but I think she’d received a message of some sort, from an angel, or maybe she prayed I’d find ye.”

For a moment, his happiness faltered. “Are ye all right with leaving the church behind, because I’d never want to force ye—”

Kirstin laughed and playfully tugged his ear. “Gregor, I love ye. I always have. I never forgot ye, and even if I felt ye’d abandoned me, I couldn’t ever stop loving ye, despite how much I wanted to. This is the right path for me. Ye are what I want, what I need.” She slipped from her chair, kneeling in front of him, and wrapped her arms around his neck. “The man I desire. Make love to me. It has been far too long.”

Gregor slipped one hand around her waist, caressing the line of her back, the subtle feel of the knobs of her spine. His other hand he tucked against her cheek. God, how he loved her. He gazed into her eyes, admiring the blues and greys, the way her pupil’s dilated.

“I love ye so much,” he whispered, his chest swelling.

He brushed his lips against hers, breathing in her sweet scent, tasting cinnamon and wine on her tongue.

“I love ye, too.” Kirstin’s hand came up to touch his, stroking the back and then down his arm. She gripped onto his upper arm, squeezing, before moving up his shoulder to massage the knots of muscles there, then to his hair. She tugged at the leather thong holding his hair back, discarding it, and threading her hand into the hair at his nape. Kissing him deeper. “I missed ye so much. I dinna know how I even survived so long without ye.”

Gregor slid his hands around her hips, to cup her behind, and then he stood, her legs wrapped around his waist and he carried her to the massive four-post oak bed that had been provided to them. He gently sat her down on the edge of the mattress, lips sliding over her chin to her ear.

“I’m not sure I did survive. A part of me died, and ye’ve wakened me from death,” he whispered, biting her earlobe, fingers skimming over the collar of her dress.

Her skin was so soft and warm.

“We need to get ye out of this gown,” he murmured. “I want to see all of ye. I want to touch and kiss every inch.”

Kirstin grinned, and tugged at the ties at the side of her gown, loosening it enough that he was able to gently slide it off of her arms, revealing the thin chemise beneath, all the way to her hips.

“Lift up,” he whispered.

She leaned back on her hands, her feet braced on the wooden base of the bed and lifted her hips as he slipped the gown down her legs, over her feet and then tossed it over a chair. Beneath the thin chemise, he could see the dusky pink of her nipples—taut against the fabric.

“Ye, too,” she said, reaching forward, pulling the brooch free at his shirt. Then she tugged at the ties of his shirt until it was unlaced, exposing the skin over his heart. “Take off your shirt.”

Gregor yanked it over his head, her gaze on his center, the place where his plaid was lifted by his engorged cock. Damn it had been so long since he’d actually been able to sink inside her. He wasn’t certain he’d be able to last as long as he wanted, as long as she deserved. Well, he was going to make certain to satisfy her over and over again. He dropped to his knees, hands circling her ankles.

“I’ve missed ye,” he murmured, winking at her.

Kirstin licked her lips. “I’ve missed ye more.”

He slid his hands up over her calves dipping into the indentation behind her knees, sliding halfway up her inner thighs. He edged forward, reaching up and winding his hand into her hair, pulling her down for a searing kissing, tasting, licking, loving, until she was panting. He scraped his teeth along the column of her neck, over her collarbone, and then over the gauzy fabric of her chemise to her taut nipple. He flicked his tongue over the puckered tip, fluttered around until she moaned softly, arched her back and begged for more. The sounds she’d made. He’d dreamed of hearing them again over the years. It was all so overwhelming, he could have wept, but instead, he kissed her hard, claiming her, loving her.

“I want ye,” she crooned. “Now, please.”

Gregor could never hold back with her, he always wanted Kirstin to have whatever it was she desired. But he also liked to tease her. Tempt her. With his teeth, he untied her chemise, the lace-ties going near to her waist. He nuzzled the fabric open until both of her beautiful breasts were exposed, then he buried his head between her breasts, kissing and licking the skin from one breast to another, and finally suckling on her nipples, paying each equal homage. She tugged at his hair, moaning softly, panting.

He wanted more. All of her. To taste her very core.

Gregor glided his mouth lower, over her abdomen, over her hipbone and her thigh where he’d bunched the hem of her chemise. He glanced up at her catching the look of anticipation in her eye. He grinned. A knowing, teasing grin.

They’d been down this road many times, and he knew just how much she liked it when he put his mouth on her. He skimmed his teeth up over her inner thigh, feeling her legs tremble, and her breath quicken.

“Och, lass, I love the scent of ye,” he said, reaching the apex of her thighs and breathing in deep.

Kirstin whimpered, her hand in his hair tightening. Gregor chuckled right over her mound, nuzzling the soft flesh just over the soft curls, below her navel, teasing her folds with his hot breath. But he wasn’t simply teasing her, he was also tormenting himself. He had to taste her.

Splaying his hands on her inner thighs and opening them wider, he dove in to kiss her hot, slick folds. Kirstin cried out, collapsing onto the bed.

He tucked her legs up higher, then used his thumbs to separate the folds, exposing her silky pink flesh to his eyes and his tongue.

“Sweet like honey,” he murmured over her tiny nub of pleasure.

He licked from her center up and over the taut bead, drinking in her essence and groaning. Kirstin writhed beneath him as he kissed her, licked, sucked. He was relentless in his pursuit of her pleasure. Until he felt her thighs tighten around his head, her body shuddering against his mouth. A fresh rush of desire slickened over his tongue. And her cries of pleasure, of release, made him shake.

He kissed her hot sex until her trembling subsided, and then he stood up, gripped her thighs and tugged her toward him. A swift flick of his belt and his plaid dropped, his cock pressing against her glistening sex.

“This is even better than I remembered,” he said.

“No memory can compare to the true thing,” she crooned, tucking her legs around his hips, she pushed up to sitting, scooting herself closer, hands on his hips, and then boldly reaching back to grip his arse. “Take me.”

“Oh, aye, now, and forever.” He palmed his cock, notched it at her entrance and thrust home.

Both of them cried out as he sank deep, the feel of her heated muscles wrapping around his turgid flesh. Gregor fell forward, bracing his weight on his arms, and kissed her, hard. Demanding. Carnal. Claiming.

She was his.

And he was hers.

He withdrew his tongue and shaft at the same time, making love to her with his body as his kiss mimicked the movements. Blast, but he couldn’t get enough of her. She felt so damn good. And the way she was moving beneath him. How could he have ever hoped to get over her? Kirstin was inside him, just like he was inside her. No one could replace her, not now, not ever.

Their cries echoed in the room. The bed scraped against the floor with the force of their heated lovemaking. He could feel himself getting close, but he didn’t want to it to end. Then Kirstin was pushing him, and he was rolling over onto his back, her climbing on top of him, her fingers scraping over his chest, her eyes glittering with wicked intent and tempting passion. She ground herself against him, riding him fast and hard.