Devil in a Kilt by Sue-Ellen Welfonder
Chapter 16
Many hours later, in the gray and quiet time between midnight and daybreak, Linnet stood before the narrow arched windows of her bedchamber and stared out at the night-darkened landscape. Far below, Loch Duich lapped gently at the sturdy castle walls, the loch’s surface tranquil and smooth at this late hour.
In the light of a slim crescent moon, the water resembled a polished silver mirror set down and forgotten in the midst of the wilder landscape of rugged mountains rising around its shoreline.
Pressing her forehead against the damp coolness of the window’s stone tracery, Linnet closed her eyes and breathed in the sharp smell of sea tang that seemed to permeate every inch of her formidable new home.
How like her husband were his lands of Kintail. Cool and unruffled on the surface, yet beneath, she sensed a man of brute strength, capable of deep emotion. A man whose anger was no less dangerous to the unwary than scaling the peaks of Kintail’s mountains would be to a Lowlander unaccustomed to treacherous terrain.
Winning his heart, his love, would be a triumph as rewarding as reaching the summit of a high mountain after a difficult climb. A victory she wanted, and one she’d fight to achieve.
Linnet smoothed the tips of her fingers along the cold stone at the window’s edge. Its chilled dampness was undeniable, a tangible thing, yet come a fine summer’s day filled with warmth and light, the stone would grow warm and glow beneath the transforming rays of the sun.
Hope burgeoned bright in Linnet’s heart. As the sun was always there, even on days turned gray and forbidding, so, too, thrummed the fire of her husband’s passion beneath the self-erected barriers he thought were so inviolable.
Resting her cheek against the molding of the arch-topped window, Linnet let the brine-laden night air cool her face. Doing so was necessary, for anytime her thoughts turned to Duncan MacKenzie, fierce yearnings shot through her, bolding sweeping away any maidenly reserve she may have possessed and flooding her with a need that demanded to be quenched.
A need the strong-passioned Black Stag seemed determined to ignore.
A burning urgency she suspected raged as strong as the raw sexual hunger that swelled her husband’s manhood each time she’d had the pleasure of glimpsing it.
Linnet blew out an agitated breath and pressed her thighs together in an attempt to suppress the arousing tingles dancing over her woman’s flesh. Like a thousand fired needles, the sensations ignited a blaze of pleasure across her tender parts while, from within, came an exquisite heaviness, a deep pulsing ache.
Then, with slow but persistent success, irritation conquered the stirrings that bedeviled her. Disappointment and annoyance at her husband for not wanting her. Anger at herself for desiring him.
Gradually, another type of ache made itself known. Exhaustion bore down on her, but she welcomed its diversion. Reaching her arms high above her head, she stretched her entire body, seeking relief for the stiffness in her limbs and the red-hot knot of tension between her shoulders.
She’d spent the day and most of the evening tending to poor Thomas’s head wound and trying to offer solace to the Murchison survivors. They’d arrived at the keep tired and shaken some hours past. The tales they’d told had unsettled her more than she cared to admit.
Weary, she pressed a hand to the small of her back. It was no wonder exhaustion robbed her of the energy to do more than stand and gaze out the window, engaging in fantasies. Elspeth and Fergus had fair dragged her to bed, insisting she rest, contending she’d done more than she possibly could until the morn.
Even so, sleep eluded her.
And not because of her bone-aching fatigue.
Worry stole her rest and sent her thoughts to her husband. Alarm had eaten away at her ever since she’d returned from the abbey and discovered that Duncan, Sir Marmaduke, and Eilean Creag’s best fighting men had ridden in pursuit of Kenneth MacKenzie and his band of undesirables.
She’d tried to use her sight, to focus on her husband and glean a sign of what had happened, but she’d been unable to catch even the slightest hint. Her efforts met an impenetrable wall of reddish haze. A representation, she knew, of fury and outrage.
Unfortunately, she could discern nothing else.
Having seen the crazed look in Kenneth MacKenzie’s eyes, and after learning of the vile acts he and his followers had committed at the Murchinsons’ small holding, terror had accompanied her every breath and still did.
She wouldn’t rest until she knew her husband and his men were safe within the castle walls.
When at last she heard him bolting up the tower stairs, the pent-up tension she’d borne all day left her in a rush so powerful she sagged against the window. Not for a moment did she doubt the thundering footsteps were his, for a red cloud of rage preceded him, warning her, letting her feel his anger, long before he approached her chamber door.
Nor did she concern herself that his wrath could be directed at her. She’d done nothing to rouse his ire. All beneath his roof would confirm she’d spent hours working hard to lessen and ease the damage caused by Kenneth and his raiding party.
But her confidence was challenged the moment Duncan burst into her room, slamming the door against the wall so violently she feared the heavy oaken timbers would splinter.
A daunting sight, he filled the open doorway. His powerful limbs were streaked with dirt, the plaid draped over one massive shoulder, bloodstained and torn, his dark mane of hair, wild and tangled about his unsmiling face.
* * *
“Thunder of heaven!”Duncan cursed, so expelling his relief upon knowing Linnet safe. “I thought I married a sensible lass?”
“And I thought I’d wed a man who’d make me his wife,” she had the cheek to counter.
Bloodlust still thick in his veins, Duncan crossed the room with swift strides, closing the distance between them before she could even think about letting loose another insult. Grasping her by the shoulders, he stared down at her, daring her by sheer power of will to vex him again.
“You are my wife and dinnae e’er doubt it,” he seethed, already regretting he’d so impulsively grabbed hold of her. Her unbound hair flowed thick and smooth over her shoulders, and he’d thrust his fool hands right into the silken mass of it!
His traitorous loins tightened in response while his equally faithless imagination hummed with a hundred different things he’d like to do with her lustrous tresses. Earthy, lustful pleasures, the very thought of which aroused him to near bursting. Her uncanny ability to bring him to his knees from sheer wanting her also fanned the fury that’d sent him storming up to her chamber.
“God’s bones, woman!” He tightened his grip on her. “Do you know the danger you placed yourself in this day?”
“You are pulling my hair, Sir Duncan,” she said, the impertinent tilt of her chin giving lie to the calm tome of her voice. “Please release me.”
“Be glad you are here to be held. Your foolishness could’ve ended much differently.”
“Well, I am here, so there is no need to grip me so tightly.”
“There is every need,” he snarled, but let her go.
Sadly, he immediately wished he hadn’t when she smoothed her flame-colored tresses off her shoulders, allowing the cascading mass to tumble down her back.
Thus freed of the shielding curtain of her hair, nothing save the thinness of her night rail stood between him and the sweet rounds of her full breasts. Their tips pressing against the near-translucent fabric of her gown. The sight of them near robbed him of the last shreds of his waning self-control.
A brace of tallow candles on the room’s single table cast a flickering pattern of light and shadows over her lush form, the candleglow scant but sufficient for him to see the darker shadows of her intimate places. And what he saw made his mouth go dry with pure need.
No doubt brazenly following his gaze, she needled him again, “Did you come to chastise my foolishness this day, my husband, or are you here to try and peer through the cloth of my gown to peruse what lies beneath it?”
“I will tell you why I am here!” Duncan tore his attention from the shadowy apex of her thighs to glare furiously into the depths of her amber-flecked eyes. “That tale-spinning graybeard, Fergus, and my entire household are singing your praises, my lady,” he said, barely containing his ire. “I would know if it was your sharp-edged blade or your tongue that bested my half brother?”
“Both.” She smiled, her chin still tilted at an angle – an angle perfect for kissing. “And both served me well.”
Guidsakes , did she not grasp how gravely she’d imperiled herself? The lad? Riled beyond reason, and not just with her, Duncan captured her hands and raised them above her head. Pure lust, base and raw, stormed through him. He burned to kiss her senseless, and to keep at it until he, too, was consumed by mindless and blissful release.
Saints, he ought do more than plunder her lips after having lived through this day. Naught else would better banish the loathsome images of the butchery at the Murchinsons’ cottage, unspeakable horrors that might have happened to her and Robbie had they not escaped Kenneth’s clutches.
Duncan blinked hard to rid himself of the images.
Blessedly, they receded.
But his desire raged on.
Indeed, it would aid forgetfulness and help him ignore his screaming muscles if he could but sink himself into the silken heat of her woman’s sheath – an act his men seemed convinced he’d already indulged in. Not that he recalled the pleasure.
Regrettably, now was not the time to refresh his memory.
Not with his lady wife all prickly and her tongue full of pepper.
Saints preserve him, he wanted her quivering in lust beneath him, her tongue sweet, eager, and doing delicious things to him.
He swallowed a groan as something raw and elemental in its intensity broke and twisted within him. Bringing his face to within inches of hers, he stared fiercely into her eyes, trying, by force of sheer will, to vanquish whatever it was that made her seek to vex him at every turn.
But instead of sweeping aside her obvious distaste for him, he only seemed to upset her all the more. She matched his glare, her eyes snapping in fury, her stubbornness apparent with every breath she took. After a long moment, she turned her face away to stare out the window.
“Mother of God, lass, cease bristling and listen to me.” He grasped her face with both hands and forced her to look at him. Leaning so close he could taste the sweetness of her breath, he said, “Never – I repeat never – leave these walls without my knowledge again.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Your warning is noted.”
“That is not an answer. Will you heed me?”
This time she nodded, and the motion caused the soft weight of her well-rounded breasts to rub against the sensitive skin on the inner side of his forearms. Desire, sharp and all-consuming, sped through him.
As if aware and affected by the unexpected contact as he’d been, she squirmed against his hold on her. In one valiant attempt to break free, she twisted her head to the side, and her mouth, her tender lips caught half-opened, slid across the palm of his hand.
The sensation rocked him, the honey-soft sweetness of her lips on his skin shooting straight to his swollen shaft and unleashing a powerful need not only in his groin but also in the secret place he kept locked, barred, and buried.
He suspected she’d felt something, too, for a quizzical look flashed across her face. Then she began to tremble, but not from defiance, he could tell. He also recognized the softening of her features as she gazed at him. When she parted her lips, he knew his instincts hadn’t deceived him.
His lady wife wanted to be kissed.
And he burned to oblige her. But, might the raging fires of hell take his accursed soul, he didn’t want to want her. If he gave in to the temptation she offered, he’d be lost, for he wouldn’t settle for a mere kiss.
He’d carry her to the bed, disgrace himself by the urgency of his need, and promptly lose the heart he didn’t have to give.
His passions ran too rampant, went far beyond her innocent desire for a kiss. Duncan dug his fingers into her fiery hair and choked back an oath. He couldn’t fall upon her like a rutting beast, wouldn’t take her while lust raced uncontrolled through his blood.
If e’er he took his ease with her – and he had no intention of doing so – he must be gentle with her, show her mating is more than his unremembered claiming of her maidenhood. Nor is it the wild abandon he’d unleash upon her should he give in to his baser instincts and mount her this moment.
Nae, she deserved a slow and thorough pleasuring.
But he wasn’t sure he was capable of initiating her in the finer pleasures of lovemaking even if he wanted to. Too distant was the memory of the last time he’d seduced a woman with tenderness. In truth, perhaps he never had. And he didn’t intend to learn with his wife. Doing so would only cause them both grief.
Drawing a ragged breath, Duncan stepped back. He placed his hands firmly on her shoulders to keep her an arm’s length away from him.
A safe distance and far enough for her not to feel the hard swelling beneath his plaid.
Steeling himself against the female scent of her and the intoxicating silkiness of her hair as it swirled over the backs of his hands, he willed all emotion from his face save the darkest frown he could muster.
“I will have your word, lass. Swear you’ll no’ venture forth alone again.”
“That was not the way of it.”
“Answer me.”
The tip of her tongue appeared, to wet her still-parted lips, and the sight made his loins tighten to a painful degree.
Duncan bit back a groan.
She didn’t blink. “I was not alone, my lord,” she stated, disagreeing with him yet again.
“Lucifer’s knees!” Duncan exploded, fighting the urge to shake her so she’d grasp the danger she’d put herself and the boy in. “You were accompanied by an old man, a crone, a mute lad, and a nigh ancient dog! Do you not know what could’ve happened?
“Speak!” he commanded when she remained silent. “Do you ken?”
“I do now, aye, and so do all beneath your roof, for even the dead would hear such bellowing,” she pronounced, her expression as dark as he knew his own to be. “But for the sake of peace, you have my word, sir. It will not happen again.”
Duncan released her. “Faith, ’tis killed you could have been. And dinnae tell me about your show of bravery. I’ve already heard. The whole castle speaks of nothing else. But listen well to my words: my half brother was playing with you. Playing with you, do you hear?”
“Aye, that, too, I realize, my lord.”
“Had he wanted, he could have carted you off before you’d even had a chance to think of a pulling your dagger on him.” He scowled at her, hoping to drive in the gravity of his warning. “Do you understand me?”
“I do, sir.”
“Then come to me when you wish to ride out again, no matter where or for what reason. I shall see you are accompanied by my best guardsmen.” Wheeling around, Duncan strode to the door lest he abandon his control and ravish her upon the bare rushes as he was sorely wont to do.
But before he left the room, he had one more issue to settle with her. It was only a small thing, but of a sudden it mattered a great deal.
“Linnet?” he called, his voice husky despite his effort to keep it neutral.
“Yes, my lord?”
“My name is Duncan. Not ‘my lord’ or ‘sir,’ but Duncan. Please use it.”
Then he left her alone before the foulness of his mood caused him to say more, to reveal feelings he hadn’t known he still possessed and certainly didn’t care to set free. The anguish he carried within was painful enough. Letting loose its poison upon his innocent bride, pepper-tongued or nae, would be a grievous act beyond pardon.
A burden he had no right to place upon her shoulders, regardless of her status as his wife. Besides, he was nowise certain she would e’er be willing to care for a man said to be so unblessed as he, much less endeavor to help him past the ache in his soul.
* * *
Much later,Duncan stood upon the battlements and scowled down at Loch Duich’s silent waters. After leaving his wife’s bedchamber, he’d paced the wall walk for hours, glaring holes into the cloud-torn night, seeking answers but finding none.
Save one.
He’d remembered something his king had once told him. A great secret he could use oft and well if he so desired, the Bruce had promised.
Women go weak in the knees at the sight of a battlestained warrior.
Such was the most plausible reason his wife had appeared to want a kiss after her sweet lips had slid so temptingly over his palm.
At that moment, she’d indeed looked upon him with favor, albeit for a very fleeting instant. She’d gazed at him with the same moon-eyed adoration he’d seen upon the faces of young, and not so young, noblewomen at the tournaments he’d competed in years ago in France.
And he’d been too bewitched by the unexpected softening of her features to realize her look of admiration was not for him as a man, but for his warlike appearance and bloodied plaid.
He’d deceived himself, seeing nothing but what he’d wanted to see.
But fool that he was, he’d harbored hope.
Hope that the unexpectedly enchanting lass he’d wed – sometimes defiant, sometimes proud, and definitely more desirable than he’d imagined a woman could e’er be – could come to care for him, could teach him to care again.
Heaven help him, he’d wanted to believe that she possessed enough bravery to not only face down his half brother but to stand against the demons that ravaged his soul and feasted on the remnants of his heart.
Hope she’d assure him Robbie was his true son, convince him his doubts had been for naught.
And, even if he admitted it only to himself, hope she’d somehow make him whole again.
But for now, he wanted nothing more than to retire to his bedchamber, alone, and slip into in the deceptive oblivion of sleep.
Every fiber of his being longed to return to her, seek her bed, and lose himself deep inside her heated softness. A near-overpowering urge to have her force him to admit his feelings consumed him, but he crushed the unwanted sentiments as easily as if they were of no more substance than eggshells.
Pushing away from the stone merlon he’d been leaning against, he crossed the wall walk and let himself back inside the tower.
Then, as soundlessly as he could, he headed in the opposite direction from her quarters, making for his own chamber and the empty bed awaiting him there.