The Striker (18 page)

Watching the pleasure of her release play over her features was the most beautiful thing Eoin had ever seen—and also the most erotic. He had to be inside her.

Dropping a tender kiss on her mouth, he moved over her. Hands planted on either side of her shoulders, he looked into her eyes until the haze faded. “I need your vow, Margaret.”

Her mouth curved into a slow smile that wrapped around his chest and squeezed. “I, Margaret, take thee, Eoin, to be my wedded husband, to death do us depart, and thereto I plight my troth to thee.”

He repeated the vow, and with one purposeful thrust, consummated the vows they'd just spoken.

And then he stilled. Savoring the sensations. Savoring the moment of overwhelming completeness and of rightness.

It was done. They were married. Bonded by God as man and wife.

The poignancy of the moment was not lost on either of them. It seemed to be thick in the air—and in his chest.

She looked into his eyes, searching his face for a long time. He could see the emotion in her eyes and wondered if they reflected some of his own.

“No going back,” she said.

“No going back,” he agreed.

She smiled. “You were right.”

“I was?”

She nodded. “It doesn't hurt as much the second time.” She bit her lip. “You feel good.”

“So do you, sweetheart,” he groaned, “God, so do you.”

He began to show her just how good with long, slow strokes that gave voice to the emotions inside him. He loved her, and he told her that with every kiss, every touch, every thrust. And when he'd brought her to the peak and followed her over, he told her with words as well.

“
Tha gaol agam ort
.”

It was a long time before either of them spoke. Eoin lay there with his new wife curled up against him—her soft cheek pressed against his chest, her hair spilled over his skin like a silken veil, his arm holding her close—feeling more content than he'd ever felt in his life, watching the room grow dark, and wishing they never had to leave.

But they had to go. The sun filtering through the hole in the roof was almost gone. As much as he wanted to stay here and delay what was bound to be an unpleasant return to the castle, they'd been gone for a couple hours and someone would have noticed their disappearance by now. People would be commenting on it, which was the last thing she needed. And soon someone—her family most likely—would come looking for them.

For her family to find them here like this would make an already precarious situation much worse. Eoin did not delude himself. Despite their marriage, he'd be lucky to come out of this without a dirk in his back. If not from Dugald MacDowell, then from one of her
eight
brothers. Though the youngest among them was probably still only a lad, they were a bloodthirsty bunch.

He didn't want to think about his own family's reaction.

Margaret propped her chin on his chest to look at him. “Did you mean it?”

He didn't pretend to misunderstand. He swept a few red strands of hair that had tangled in her thick lashes to the side, but it was only an excuse to run his fingers over the curve of her cheek. He wondered if he'd ever get used to the baby softness of her skin. “Aye,” he said. “I meant it.”

The happiness shimmering in her eyes and the smile that lit her face warmed the chill that had crept into the darkening room with his thoughts of what was to come.

“I love you, too.”

Though he'd guessed as much, hearing the words filled him with pleasure—and not a small amount of satisfaction.

“I'm glad of it,
a leanbh
.” And he was. Their feelings would help to make the shite storm they'd just unleashed worth it.

He hoped.

But seeing her naked limbs entwined with his, her hair tumbling around her shoulders in wild disarray, and the boldly beautiful features turned to his, he couldn't help feel a twinge of doubt.

Fin's words came back to him.
Attention
 . . .
Demanding
 . . .
Wild
.

Nay. His friend was wrong. Margaret might speak and act a little outrageously at times, but that was simply because she didn't know any better. Despite the unusual freedom in how she'd been raised, there was something oddly sheltered about her—almost innocent.

She was ignorant of social mores, that's all, not wicked. Well, maybe a little wicked, but as he suspected that would keep him well satisfied in the bedchamber, he didn't mind.

With everything else, his mother would help. Once Margaret spent some time at his home with his mother and sisters, she would learn what was appropriate and expected of her as his wife.

If something about that didn't sit quite right, he pushed it aside. It would all work out.

She'd lowered her face back to his chest, and was tracing little circles through his chest hair with the tip of her finger. “I wish we could stay here like this forever,” she said. He thought she might have picked up on some of his worry until she laughed. “Although as many times as I imagined what my wedding would be like, it was never like this.”

“You wanted a big wedding?” Of course she did. Didn't all lasses? Damn it. “I'm sorry.”

She shook her head. “That isn't what I meant. I just never thought my marriage would be so romantic—or that I could be this happy being so wicked.” She grinned mischievously. “Although we might want to come up with a different story to tell our children.” His heart jammed.
Children
? “I don't think ‘Father ravished Mummy against a wall so he had to marry her' is exactly the kind of lesson in courtship we want to impart.”

He couldn't help it; he laughed. She
was
outrageous, and damn if he didn't like it.

“Although I suspect I'd have a hard time convincing anyone of it,” she added.

His brows drew together. “What do you mean?”

She rolled her eyes. “You hardly ever crack a smile, Eoin. I doubt anyone will think you've been swept away by passion.”

“Looking at you right now they might,” he said wryly.

She grinned unrepentantly. “Do I look as wonderfully and thoroughly debauched as I feel?”

“I think I should be the one who looks proud about it, but aye, you do.”

“Ooh, I wish I had a looking glass.”

He wished he could paint a picture. He would carry it with him forever, and never tire of looking at it.

Christ, she was turning him into a lovesick troubadour. Soon he'd be composing sonnets and singing songs about her beauty.

Sliding her up his body, he lowered his head and kissed her on the lips one more time, and then on the forehead. “We need to go.”

Her gaze locked on his. “Must we?”

He nodded.

The sudden trepidation in her eyes made him think she wasn't as oblivious to the knowledge of what lay ahead of them than he'd thought.

“Will it be so horrible, do you think?” she asked.

He lied to her for the first time. “Once the initial shock is over, I'm sure it will be fine.”

E
OIN WAS WRONG.
There was nothing fine about it. Even more than a week later, Margaret was still reeling from the aftereffects of their arrival back at the castle.

The dreamlike bliss of the cottage had been left decidedly behind the moment they'd ridden through the portcullis and been confronted by her brothers, who were preparing to ride out in search of her.

She didn't know what had been worse, watching her brothers coming to physical blows with the man she loved, or later, seeing the cold rage of her father and his, as she and Eoin—blood still running down his nose from the brawl with her brothers—stood before them in the king's solar and announced what they had done.

War between the two clans might have broken out right there had Eoin's mother not intervened. While the men shouted, issued threats and ultimatums, and exchanged names of relatives, hoping to find a connection that would provide an impediment to annul the marriage, Rignach MacLean had calmly told them it was too late for that. Margaret could already be carrying a child, and her first grandchild would not be branded a bastard. They would have to make the best of an “unfortunate” situation.

Despite her intervention, however, Margaret did not delude herself that Eoin's mother would be her champion. Lady Rignach could not hide her disdain as her gaze quickly swept over her—as if lingering too long might sully her. She looked at Margaret as if she were beneath her, as if she'd seduced her son, and forced him to do the only honorable thing.

Margaret wished she could say that once the initial shock and anger had passed it was better. But it wasn't. Her family's disappointment was just as bad—maybe even worse. No matter how far-fetched the idea of a betrothal with John Comyn might be, she felt as if she'd let her father down. She tried to make him understand, but he wouldn't hear her explanations. Indeed, he barely said three words to her in the days leading up to her departure.

Even Duncan looked at her as if she were a traitor, marrying “the enemy.” But Eoin wouldn't fight against them now . . . would he? It was the one thing she hadn't fully considered in those dreamlike moments in the cottage, and the thought of being on opposite sides from her family were war to break out was too horrible to contemplate. She vowed to do whatever she could to convince him to fight with her clan and the Comyns if trouble came. The prospect of having her husband's considerable talents on their side had been the one thing to ever-so-slightly mollify her family.

Eoin's mother had thought it best that Margaret and Eoin remove themselves from court and return to Gylen Castle on the Isle of Kerrera as soon as possible to staunch the gossip. Margaret suspected it had more to do with his mother being unable to withstand the shame of Eoin marrying such a “backward,” “heathen” creature from the godforsaken corner of Scotland.

Even though Margaret agreed it would be best for her and Eoin to go, it didn't make it any easier to say goodbye.

Only Brigid had tried to be happy for her. But something was wrong with her friend, and no matter how many times Margaret asked, she would not confide in her. She had a clue though when Brigid said she admired her for “following her heart” and “not letting anyone stand in the way when she loved someone.”

Had Brigid fallen in love without Margaret realizing it? She wanted to be there for her friend, but instead she was saying goodbye, knowing that it would be some time before they saw each other again.

If
they saw each other again.

The heartache of losing her family and best friend in one blow, of being sent far away from anything she'd ever known, might have been easier to bear had Margaret been able to share it with Eoin.

But since that day in the cottage they'd spent little time together. He'd been locked away most days with his father—and the Earl of Carrick, she couldn't help noticing. Nor did they share a bed at night. A private chamber at Stirling could not be arranged, and everyone—except apparently her—thought it better that they did not add to the “scandal.”

Margaret didn't give a fig about the scandal. She just wanted to know that Eoin was all right, and that he did not regret marrying her after all.

Any hope that they would have time alone together on the journey west, however, vanished when she learned that his mother, sister, and foster brother would be accompanying them—along with half his father's household men for protection.

By the end of the third day of traveling, when it was clear that once again she would be forced to share a tent with his mother and sister—and not her husband, who was apparently bedding down by the fire with some of the other men—she didn't know whether to cry or strangle him. He was either the most uncaring of bridegrooms or the most obtuse. Whichever it was, she wasn't going to let it continue. She'd never felt so lost in her life and needed to know this hadn't been a horrible mistake.