Surrender To Me (21 page)

G
riffin stared in amazement as spirited conversation erupted around him—conversation concerning him, his life, and most astounding, with whom he would live it.

Were they serious? Did they think he would permit others to decide his fate? That he ascribed to some medieval notion of arranged marriages? A man forged his own path in life. A man chose the woman with whom he wanted to share that life.

His grandfathers and cousin talked, droning on without pause, without consideration that he—or Petra, for that matter—might wish to choose their own fates. Both his grandfathers, bitter rivals only earlier, now nodded in perfect accord.

“’Tis right,” MacFadden announced.

“Aye, and she is a proven breeder,” Gallagher reminded.

“My Petra has the hips of a breeder,” Osborn quickly agreed, nodding eagerly.

Griffin shot a quick glance to Petra. Her head was lowered, eyes downcast, making it impossible to read her thoughts, to see if she felt as outraged as he over the discussion. He attempted to speak over the voices. “I’d like to say something—”

Osborn spread his hands wide in front of him in a generous gesture. “I must admit that I can now see the family resemblance to Conall.”

Griffin snorted, crossing his arms.

Osborn continued, “It relieves me greatly to know that my only child will marry the future Laird MacFadden.”

Griffin felt his lip curl with disgust. “Convenient,” he muttered beneath his breath.
Now
Osborn solidly believed in his paternity.

Astrid cleared her throat portentously. “It makes a good deal of sense,” she announced in that clipped way of hers.

Something dark and dangerous brewed deep in his chest.

Sense?

“A most practical solution,” she went on.

Practical solution?
This was his life. And Petra’s. Not some damned equation. And yet even Astrid discussed him marrying Petra as if it were a business merger to be negotiated with cool calculation.
Damned English. And Scots, for that matter.

Anger seethed through him like a prowling beast. He raked his gaze over the woman who had occupied far too much of his thoughts lately. So much so that he had begun to harbor doubts over returning home. That the woman to inspire such feelings should now inform him so matter-of-factly that he should marry another—that doing so was a most practical solution—went down in a bitter wash of betrayal.

Apparently his fascination for her was one-sided.

Apparently Astrid suffered no softer sentiments for him.

Not if she failed to blink at the prospect of him marrying another, but in fact encouraged it.

MacFadden’s voice penetrated slowly, worming its way through the anger clouding his head.

“…we’ll need the reverend.”

They had begun making arrangements, and all without a word from him. Or Petra. And they thought he would go along? He could have laughed at the absurdity of it all—if the maddening female beside him did not choose that moment to say, “It seems most sensible if the reverend were brought here. In her condition, Petra should not travel. Nor in such weather.”

The men nodded, murmuring their assent. Astrid, though unusually pale, nodded, too.

Their words vanished in a searing flash of rage. He’d had enough. With a curse, he snatched hold of Astrid’s wrist. Indifferent to the shocked stares, he dragged her from the hall.

“Griffin,” she hissed as she hurried to keep up. “What’s wrong with you?”

What’s wrong with
him?
What’s wrong with
her?
With all of them?

He ground his teeth, saying nothing until he reached the privacy of their room. Spinning her before him, he uncoiled his fingers from her wrist and slammed the door shut, the thick wood reverberating loudly, echoing in the stone-walled chamber, sealing them in, prisoners in a tomb.

She hurried to the center of the room, watching him with wide, wary eyes. Her fingers curled around one of the thick bedposts. Her chin went up in that infuriatingly indignant lift he knew so well.

“Why did you drag me out of there? What must Petra think?” she demanded, her fingertips turning white and bloodless where they dug into the wood.

He advanced on her, stalking her as a predator would. “I don’t give a damn what anyone thinks. Never have. Where I come from men live their lives according to their own rules. They certainly don’t allow someone else to pick their spouse.”

“How terribly convenient,” she spat, her thin nostrils quivering, “to live your life so recklessly, free of responsibility.”

“I didn’t say that.” He took a steadying breath, fighting for calm, and the overwhelming urge to shake her until her teeth rattled. “Look, I realize you’re a product of an archaic society—”

“Archaic?” Her entire body quivered with indignation. She pressed a palm to her chest. “
I
belong to an
archaic
society?”

Unable to stop himself, his gaze dropped to the curve of her breasts trembling beneath her hand. His palms prickled, remembering the shape and feel of those breasts, the soft undersides so sensitive to his touch. His mouth dried as hunger swept over him.

Shoving the distracting thoughts from his head, he smiled grimly. “If you would pull your head from the sand, you would see that the world’s changing.”

“Indeed?” she sneered. “Is it changing here, then?” She waved a hand wildly behind her to the thick oak door. “Your own cousin sits below with another man’s blood on his hands. But all is forgiven based on an
archaic
system of beliefs.”

“That aside, the world
is
changing, Astrid,” he maintained, refusing to let her distract him from what he wanted to say, what
needed
to be said. “It’s actually a place where you might find happiness, freedom…if you would only take it.” His eyes drilled into her, and suddenly he knew he was talking about more than her arrogant presumptions regarding whom he should wed. He was talking about
them
. About what might happen between them if they would only let it. If
she
would let it…

“No,” she muttered, shaking her head and averting her gaze.

He made a sound of disgust. “Very well. Be stubborn. Only know that I’m in Scotland because
I
want to be, and I’ll leave when
I
want to.” He pointed to the door. “They don’t decide my fate. Nor do you.”

He inhaled, ignoring the odd tightness in his chest at the prospect of leaving and returning to Texas. He felt a connection, an attachment to this land and people. It felt like
home
. Even more, there was Astrid now.

Ever since the first moment he had seen her, an angel on a muddy roadside, he felt bound to her. His father’s disappointed gaze was fading, becoming a dim memory, paling altogether when he stared into her face.

“When I do marry,” he continued, “it will be because I decide to, because I can’t imagine living my life without a particular woman…” He angled his head, studying her. “You’re a fool if you don’t already know that much about me. And you’re an even greater fool if you don’t want the same thing for yourself.”

“I’ll never marry again,” she quickly retorted, her nostrils quivering. “Once was misery enough. I’ll not give away my freedom again.”

“But you’ll readily give mine away.”

Color spotted her cheeks and her dark lashes fluttered over her eyes. She gave a tight nod, an almost imperceptible movement of acknowledgment. “I’ve never been able to dismiss duty so lightly. It mystifies me that you can. This is your family, Griffin. Your home. Petra—” She squeezed her eyes in a severe blink, as if the mere mention of the girl’s name pained her. Opening her eyes, she stared at him intently, dark eyes glowing like polished onyx. “How can you not offer her the protection of your name?”

“The pity I feel for her does not mean that I should sacrifice my future—and hers. We deserve our own choices.”

She looked at him bleakly. “You think her father will give her a choice? I’ve known men like him all my life. If not you, he will choose someone else.”

“So it might as well be me?” he snapped, his anger bubbling to the surface at her determination that he should wed Petra. “You’re doing it again.”

“What?”

“Deciding someone else’s fate based on your own sense of right and wrong. Isn’t that your great sin? The very thing you did to your sister-in-law?”

She pulled back, the color draining from her face. Clearly his words struck a nerve. “I am not—”

“Yes,” he affirmed, taking a step closer. “You are.”

Reproach flashed in the dark depths of her eyes before the cold, familiar mask fell into place, blotting out all emotion.

A tightness pervaded her chest, prickly and hot. Itchy. She lifted a hand to her throat, rubbing the skin there, as if she could rub out the awful truth of his words.
She was doing it again.

Griffin’s hot gaze pinned her, probing, stripping away flesh and bone to all she hid, all she was. She swallowed, fighting the terrible thickness rising in her throat. A thickness that threatened to choke her as he stepped closer.

She shook her head as if she could shake off his words, his relentless stare. And yet she could not escape that gaze, those eyes that
knew
, the words that could not be refuted. Denial burned on her tongue.
You’re wrong. You don’t know me
. But the words would not come.

Somehow, in a short time, he was able to see to the core of her, to expose all her frailties, to take her past and fling it in her face with the accuracy of an arrow finding its target. But then that should not surprise her. They were the same, after all. Two souls punishing themselves for the sins of their past.

“Always dutiful,” he accused. “Always so damned proper. Do you never just surrender to your desires? Do what you want and say to hell with the world?”

The image of them naked, bodies locked, rocking against one another, wild and frenzied, more animal than human, flashed across her mind. A familiar hunger flared to life inside her, burning through her blood and weakening her knees. She curled her fingers around her throat to stop from reaching out. From pulling him toward her. To remind him that she had in fact followed her desires. More than once.

Blue fire lit the centers of his eyes, and she knew that he knew her thoughts, read them as clearly as a book splayed before him.

She closed her eyes, willing for strength, for the resolve to end this thing between them, to let him go. Because it was over. She could go. Leave. He wouldn’t stop her now. There was no reason he should.

Petra deserved him.

And Griffin? What did he deserve
?

She opened her eyes, the answer washing over her, bitter and true.

Not me
.

He made a move toward her. She stepped back as if fire lapped at her feet.

He cocked his head, a dangerous glint entering his eyes. “Astrid,” he whispered. His voice slid through her liked a warm wash of sherry.

She shook her head, her fingers tightening at her neck. Hurting.
Good
. Pain was good right now. It woke her up. Made her remember…

She could not have him touch her. One brush of his hand and she would crumble, succumb to her own selfish needs. Same or not, they could not have one another.

He closed the distance separating them, his expression hardening with resolve. Long fingers closed around her arms, singeing her through the fabric of her gown.

“You can push me away all you like,” he paused. “You can even encourage me to marry someone else, but you can’t run away from
this
.” His fingers softened, sliding up her arm.

“It’s not right,” she insisted, her voice low and desperate. “It’s not—”

He silenced her with his mouth.

She moaned. In defeat. In pleasure. She wound her arms around his neck, lost at the feel of his fingers, deft and swift on the buttons at the back of her dress. She moaned…even as she loathed herself for being weak, for seizing what she had no right to take.

In moments, her gown pooled at her ankles. He plucked her off her feet and wrapped her legs around his waist. She broke her lips from his to drag kisses down his throat and neck.

An invisible band squeezed around her chest. She felt elated, exhilarated to just touch him, to love him uninhibitedly—if only in the physical sense. If only one more time.

His hands flexed on her bottom, strong fingers digging into her yielding flesh as he carried her toward the bed.

“Griffin,” she gasped against his neck.

Desperate with need, she clawed at his jacket, shoving it down past his shoulders, eager to feel his supple flesh in her hands.

He lowered her down onto the bed, coming over her in a heavy wall of muscle, settling between her thighs with a familiarity that both thrilled and alarmed her.

Putting aside the latter emotion, she ran her hands over the solid breadth of his chest with feverish hunger, letting herself surrender to the madness of wanting him, temporary as it was…as it could only ever be.

“Astrid,” he whispered, sliding a hand against her face, his callused palm rasping her cheek, his eyes glowing blue fire. With a slight shake of his head, his mouth worked, preparing to say something. Something serious from the intent, soulful way he stared at her. Something her heart told her she couldn’t allow him to say.

Moistening his lips, he said her name again, “Astrid—”

She brought her fingers to his mouth, pressing them against the silken texture of his lips, stifling his words. Words that could change everything between them. She did not know for certain, knew only the stark way he stared at her now, full of emotion—a passion that threatened to consume her in a slow burn.

Whatever he would say, she would not risk hearing it, would not risk feeding hope to her heart.