Seducing the Highlander (31 page)

“It would be my pleasure,” he said huskily, and rolled to his back. Arms crossed behind his head, gloriously nude and aroused, he gave her a lazy smile that made his face more compellingly handsome than ever. “Do what you like, my sweet wife. I am at your disposal.”

Gillian rose up to her knees and shyly ran her hands over his broad chest, marveling at how sculpted and defined it was, not an ounce of fat on his lean body. There were a few scars, the silvery healed flesh indicative of a man who had seen a battle or two. His nipples were small and flat, but actually hardened slightly as she brushed them with her exploring fingers.

“I like that,” Adain said in a husky tone, lounging nude and unself-conscious against the pillows. His cock jutted upward, rigid against his flat stomach, a light dusting of dark hair trailing from his navel to his groin.

Tentatively, she touched his erection.

It was hot, magnificently hard, and so long she could not quite believe it would fit completely inside her. At the tip, there was a small opening, and as she ran her fingers up the velvety skin of his rigid sex, it leaked a few drops of a sticky clear fluid. At the base, there was a soft sac and she cupped it, feeling the soft weight with wonder.

Her tall husband made a sound, like a low groan. She glanced at his face and saw he watched her fondle his cock with glittering half-closed eyes, and his chest lifted rapidly. It pleased Gillian to think she had his complete attention, for she felt a small, irrational jealousy that he had loved the woman who had broken his heart so completely.

And maybe still loved her.

However, there was no question he was pleasured and distracted from dwelling on what he’d lost when they were intimately together. If she could do nothing else, she could offer him whatever he wished in bed. After all, he had just married her to protect her.

Aunt Eugenia’s words drifted back, and while Gillian had been shocked at the time, she was now glad her progressive-thinking guardian had been so explicit.

Adain just might be glad also.

Leaning forward, she slowly took the swollen tip of her husband’s cock in her mouth, her lips sliding over the engorged crest. It felt both alive and silky smooth.

Adain’s intake of breath was an audible hiss of both surprise and—she didn’t have to guess—enjoyment.

It was certainly not possible to take the entire thing, so she slid down as far as she could, tasting the salty essence, brushing the swollen tip with her tongue.

“Lass, what are you doing?” His voice was raspy, and long fingers slid into her hair, tangling in the strands.

It was a little difficult to answer with his shaft in her mouth, and she sucked gently, much as he liked to do at her breasts. It was immensely wonderful when he did it to her, and she had no doubt at all that he liked this equally well, because his breathing changed and from under the veil of her lashes, as she peered up, she saw his eyes drift shut.

Delighted to have such a dramatic effect on him, she continued, not certain of what she was doing exactly, but he seemed pleased enough, and that had been her goal. Before she and her uncle had departed on their fateful journey, she had been given a stern lecture on being a dutiful wife.

This, she supposed, was being very dutiful indeed, but she highly doubted it was what her uncle had meant.

“Gillian, stop. I need you now.” With urgency, her husband pulled his swollen shaft from her mouth and moved over her in one lithe, fluid motion.

She parted her legs and his hips wedged them open wide as he thrust deeply inside her. Their joining was so wonderful she couldn’t help but moan out loud as he began to move in long, powerful strokes, unlike the tender care he’d taken with her earlier.

In moments, she felt that telltale rise, the escalation incredible and out of her control. If Queen Anne herself had walked into the room, she could not have stopped the inarticulate sounds she made with each delicious pumping motion of Adain’s lower body. He shared her wild hunger, for while she was much too distracted to concentrate on anything but her own pleasure, she knew their goal was the same.

When it burst, it was like a shower of sparks, the flame exploding in a maelstrom of physical joy that left her gasping and shaking. Her release triggered his climax as well, and Gillian could feel the rushing pulse as he filled her passage with his seed.

Heart pounding, her arms still wrapped around him, she was beautifully content and acutely replete in a physical sense.

If a man was honorable, brave, devastatingly attractive, and a wonderful, considerate lover, was it wrong to fall in love with him in less than two days?

Probably, she reminded herself with an inner shiver of dismay, if he was still in love with someone else.

M
alcolm Graham stared at the captain of his father’s troops in unconcealed dismay. “The devil you say, William.”

The other man, bearded and thickset, with the shoulders of a bull and a ferocious will to fight to match, nodded grimly. “By all accounts, the girl is with Adain Cameron. They stopped to rest and refresh themselves in a small village, and the stable boy who tended his horse knows him. He recognized him from the description, and apparently the young lady is quite memorable too, and as beautiful as Lorin promised. The keeper of the inn confirmed it when pressed and given a few coins.”

“Fucking hell, this will not please my father.”

“That,” William said with a humorless smile, “is why
you
can tell him. I decline the honor, sir.”

Malcolm paced across the courtyard and then back. “Tell me, what do you know about Cameron?”

“Good with a sword and cool in battle. An able leader since his uncle’s death, also. He was suspected for a while to have had a hand in Laird Cameron’s murder, but those rumors were proven false. He must be an honorable man, for though all the evidence pointed to him, most did not believe it, and he was never charged. Other than that, what I know is that taking on the Camerons will not be an easy task. He has a loyal clan and, if we go after the English lass, also the advantage of being on his own land.”

“Damnation, he must have taken her on purpose, for surely she told him about the betrothal!”

“No doubt she did, and he was moved to intervene by either her beauty or your father’s black reputation. Both the boy and innkeeper said she did not seem forced, quite the contrary. Without intent to offend, sir, who could blame her? Cameron is young and handsome, and rescued her once already. What young woman wouldn’t prefer him to an old man she has never met?”

“Since when has my father cared what anyone else prefers?” Malcolm could feel the bitterness over his bleak childhood rise like bile in his throat. Though she had never said so, he’d known his mother despised her heartless husband, and when she died, Malcolm had the solace of knowing she went to a life without suffering. He too had endured countless beatings as he was honed into the kind of warrior his father believed he should be. Had he not learned a long time ago to conform and not resist, he had no doubt he would also be dead, heir or not. What his father saw as weakness in him was more a sense of survival hard- learned early in childhood. With two younger brothers, Malcolm was expendable.

“I doubt we are going to have a choice but to try to take her.” Malcolm rubbed his gloved hand over his face roughly. “My father is obsessed with the notion of bedding the English girl. He has always been ruthless, but lately, I worry his reason is slipping.”

William stayed silent, but the expression on his broad face showed he agreed.

“If we do manage to retrieve Lady Gillian, she had better still be untouched, for her sake.” He knew his father, and Malcolm shuddered to think of what he would do if he found out she had given herself to another man first. He added somberly, “I doubt she would survive the night.”

“Cameron is not just going to hand her over. If he wanted to do that, he’d have simply found her an escort here.”

“I am sure you are right,” Malcolm agreed reluctantly, finding the notion of men dying over his father’s lustful greed unpalatable. “Yes, there is going to be blood spilled.”

 

 

Adain had an unsettling suspicion.

His new wife, so lovely, so innocent and ladylike—and also so generous and sensual in bed—was unusual in a way that had nothing to do with her entrancing blond beauty.

In fact, he was starting to come to the incredible conclusion that she could actually guess with fair accuracy what he was thinking. He’d never thought of himself as transparent to others, and he still didn’t. It was more that she listened and observed. Often enough he’d caught her watching him with a faint smile, or been the recipient of a thoughtful gesture that mirrored something he wanted or needed.

They had been married for a week now, and he had to say she had settled very well into the life at Castle Cameron. Even the housekeeper, Mrs. Dunbar, who had been there for decades and had a well-known aversion to both change of any kind and the despised English, grudgingly admitted that Lady Gillian was a pleasant addition to the household. His appearance with a new, unexpected bride in tow had certainly stunned his family, but they accepted her with a cautious politesse that was already thawing into liking.

He liked her himself.

Quite a lot.

Especially at moments like this.

A warm tongue licked his neck playfully, and Gillian’s lissome naked body rested on top of him, her bare breasts soft against his chest. Though it was midmorning, they were still in bed, and he knew he should have gotten up hours ago. “Adain,” she murmured, “that was wonderful.”

“For the fourth time,” he agreed, smiling, running his fingers down the graceful curve of her spine to gently cup one firm buttock and give a small squeeze. “You bewitch me, lass.”

She stiffened slightly. “I am not a witch. Don’t say that.” She shook her head firmly, blond curls moving across her slim shoulders.

“Gillian,” he said softly, the sudden fear in her blue eyes giving him true pause. “I did not mean to insult you. I was jesting, of course.”

The way she stared at him told him he was exactly correct about frightening her. She whispered, “You know what happened to my aunt, don’t you?”

Adain felt her tremble, their naked bodies so entwined it was impossible to miss. Puzzled, he couldn’t help but stare at her now ashen face. “No, I do not.”

Gillian scrambled off him, clutching the sheet to her chest. She knelt next to him, her eyes dark and her bare shoulders gleaming. There were tears gathered on her lashes like crystalline drops, and she turned her head away.

“Gillian,” he said gently, resisting reaching for her only by sheer will. “I meant nothing except that I find you entrancing to an unsettling degree. What’s wrong?”

“They accused her.”

The light dawned and Adain sat up straighter. He said carefully, “Are you telling me they accused your aunt of being a witch?”

Face averted, she nodded. “She was nothing of the kind.” Her voice was thin and reedy. “She was simply gentle hearted and she liked . . . people. She always told me that you could tell what a person was thinking if you watched their actions. The way someone holds their body, their posture, their gestures . . . Aunt Eugenia always said there were all types of people in this world, the bright lights and the quiet shadows.”

“She sounds quite wise.” Adain knew ridiculous charges of witchcraft were still brought up often enough, especially in the countryside. “What happened?”

His wife shrugged, but it was feigned nonchalance; he could tell by the unhappy set of her mouth. “She died before they brought formal charges. Some even said that was a sign of her dark powers, but in truth, she’d been having pains in her chest off and on for some time. I am glad she was spared the humiliation of a trial on such false allegations.”

“I’m very sorry, lass.”

“Then my uncle on my father’s side came for me. I suppose I was naive to think he’d exhibit the same gentle nature.”

Adain leaned forward then and caught a single tear on his fingertip from the corner of her eye. “I understand how it feels when people disappoint you.”

“Yes, I know you do.” All tumbled blond hair and enticing curves, she nodded, faint color coming back into her face. “From the moment we met, I could sense your pain, but it had nothing to do with magic. I simply felt . . . connected to your soul.”

Connected to his soul
. It was possible. Certainly he’d never seduced a woman so quickly, and then there was the indisputable leap to marriage the very next day. Perhaps their souls
were
connected.

An interesting thought.

She correctly read his expression in her usual disconcerting way.

“Can a woman not also feel desire?” Gillian demanded, lifting her chin. “Yes, I felt your pain, but it alone did not bring me to your bed, Adain. I am sorry you are hurt and feel betrayed by what happened in your past, but it is the least of why I went to you or why I married you.”

More than her words, the charmingly defiant tilt of her chin replaced his chagrin with relief and inner amusement. For such a dainty, feminine creature, his young wife had spirit, and he admired it as much as or more than her tempting physical appearance. He was twice her size, yet from the sudden light of battle in her eyes, he wondered if he wasn’t going to lose most of the arguments that were an inevitable part of any marriage.

Especially if she could practically read his damned mind.

“I see. All right, I’ll stand corrected if you demonstrate exactly how it is you do feel when you are in my arms.” He reached out and tugged at the sheet she still clutched to her chest, covering her nudity.

“I have been doing that for most of this morning,” Gillian argued tartly, but she released the sheet, and the set of her mouth softened.