Aileen went to find out, removing the cork from the top of one of the little barrels. “Whiskey,” she reported after opening it. “And…” She uncorked the second. “More whiskey.”
“God bless Scottish huntsmen.” Henri laughed. “Whiskey, wool blankets, and wood for a fire. All the essential male comforts. I tell you, this place was tidied up by hunters, not by fairies.”
“Mayhap.” She did not sound entirely ready to concede on that point. “Are there any cups?”
They both looked around.
“There.” Aileen pointed to the mantel over the hearth. “Cups for the whiskey. Rather nice ones. And candles as well.” There was a trio of short, fat candles, the wax half melted. She picked them up one by one and lit them in the hearth, then placed them back on the mantel.
“Milady, I believe we will survive until our rescuers arrive on the morrow.”
“Aye.” She sighed, sounding as relieved and pleased as he felt. She stepped into the warm circle of firelight he had created. “’Twill only be for…” Her voice trailed off as her gaze met and held his. “One night.”
Sudden silence fell in the chamber, broken only by the sounds of the icy wind outside and the blazing flames inside. They stared at each other, separated by only a few paces.
Henri abruptly became aware of his heart beating fast and hard. Of all the blood in his body pulsing in a particular direction. He swiftly reminded himself that he had promised to honor her betrothal to Lord Alsh.
And to keep his hands to himself.
He was not entirely certain, however, whether such vows were binding in an enchanted place. Such as this one. And there did not seem to be any fairies about to consult for guidance.
Aileen blinked, smiled a bit nervously. And started shivering again. “I-I should…y-you…w-we…”
“Need to get out of these wet clothes before we freeze,” he finished for her. “Both of us.”
Turning his back, he began to disrobe, yanking his icy, wet tunic over his head, unbuckling his belt.
He could hear her setting her boots to one side…then peeling off her homespun leggings…
“We are safe here for the night, Aileen,” he said reassuringly, feeling a need to fill the silence with something other than the sounds of garments landing on the floor. “We are three hours from Castle Glenshiel, mayhap a bit more with all the snow. Darach and your father and brothers will set out to find us in the morn, as soon as the storm ends. We will be back tomorrow in time for the Christmas feast.”
“Oh, aye…” Sadness slipped into her voice. “After all that has happened today, I-I had almost forgotten. Tonight is Christmas Eve. There…was to be dancing.”
“And I regret that you are missing it.” He looked around for something to wear, bent to grab a length of plaide. He wrapped the long, soft woolen fabric around his waist, tying the ends in a knot.
“I was going to wear a special gown Laurien lent to me,” she said wistfully. “Red with silver embroidery…to match the necklace you gave me.”
“I would have loved to have seen you in it.” His throat had become hoarse.
He turned to find that she had indeed taken off her boots and leggings and woolen stockings and placed them all by the hearth…but she still wore her heavy, rust-colored gown, melting ice dripping off of it and puddling on the floor at her bare feet.
“I-I will…need…” She blinked once, slowly, as she looked at him in the firelight, her attention drawn downward. “Help with m-my laces…”
He felt her regard like a touch, tracing over his bare shoulders…the muscles of his arms…the mat of dark hair on his chest that narrowed as it trailed over his ribs…his stomach…the loose plaide that threatened to slide off his hips.
By the time her gaze rose to meet his again, her sapphire eyes had darkened, her expression one of wonder…and wanting. Her lips parted, as if she were having trouble catching her breath.
All at once, she turned her back, pulling her long hair over her shoulder and out of the way. “Please.”
It took him a moment to realize that she was still talking about the laces.
Taking a steadying breath, he stepped toward her. For a moment, he stood very still, looking down at the curve of her neck, her shoulders. He brushed a few damp, wavy strands of her hair to the side. Then he reached for the laces knotted at the top of her gown and began to untie them.
The crackle of the fires in the hearth and the braziers suddenly sounded extraordinarily loud.
She scarcely seemed to be breathing at all, her every muscle gone still as his fingers trailed slowly down her spine. He pulled at the laces, gently, exposing a wider and wider expanse of pale, soft, naked skin.
“Henri, I…I had planned to dance with you tonight, no matter if my father disapproved. Tonight might have been my only chance…my last chance to dance with you. Our last evening together. By this time tomorrow…I-I will be married to Lord Alsh.”
“Mayhap not, milady.” He resisted the urge to drop a kiss on the bare nape of her neck. “I had a plan of my own.”
She glanced at him over her shoulder. “What plan?”
After all that had gone awry today, he decided there was no point in keeping it from her any longer. “I have been working in secret with a few strategic allies. Darach, Malcolm, your grandmother—”
“My grandmother is one of your strategic allies?” She arched one coppery brow. “I suspected some mischief was afoot this morning.”
“There has been mischief afoot all day back at Castle Glenshiel,” he confessed, still working at her laces. “My plan was simple. I would spirit you away from the castle for several hours, while your grandmother rallied the ladies of your clan to our cause. She intended to use her considerable skills of persuasion to convince some other marriageable MacLennan lass to step forward and take your place as Lord Alsh’s bride.”
“I knew she had no interest in a blanket and a nap!” Aileen looked toward the hearth again.
“She seemed to relish the opportunity to take charge of a match-making scheme.” Henri smiled. “She wants you to have a marriage as happy as hers.”
“She and Grandfather were inseparable.” Aileen nodded, her voice becoming soft. “But not even my grandmother would be able to persuade my father to give us his blessing.”
“Mayhap not, but I deployed other troops in his direction,” He had reached the lowest part of the laces, at the point where her waist narrowed just above her hips. “Darach and Malcolm volunteered to break out Darach’s finest whiskey and have a long discussion with your father about my finer qualities. They seemed confident they could persuade Lochlann that I would make the better husband for you.” He had finished unfastening the gown, but his fingers lingered at the small of her back, at the tempting curve just above her derriere. “So by this time tomorrow, Lord Alsh would have a different bride…the MacLennans would have their alliance…and I would have you.”
She glanced at him over her shoulder again, her voice warm with admiration. “You put a great deal of thought and planning into this.”
“You are worth every effort, my sweet lass. But now…”
“What?”
He sighed. “Thanks to our misadventure today, I fear that my grand plan may have fallen to pieces like the drunken monks’ bridge. Your father has always thought the worst of me—and he will no doubt assume that I intended to steal you away to this remote place, so I could have my wicked way with you. If he had a low opinion of me before, it will be even lower now.”
Aileen whispered an oath in Gaelic and turned to face him. “If not for the storm, your plan might have succeeded.”
“It still has a chance to succeed,” he said hopefully, his attention distracted by the fact that her gown was so loose, it would fall to the floor if she but shrugged her shoulders
For a moment, she remained still, her blue eyes large and luminous as she looked up at him.
Then she tilted her head, her tone curious. “And what might that o
ther bit have been like?”
“What…” His throat had gone dry. “What other bit?”
She reached out to rest one hand lightly in the center of his bare chest. “You…having your wicked way with me.”
His heart gave a hard thud against her palm. “Aileen…” he said in soft warning.
“Henri, I-I know that a lass like me—”
“Would you please stop saying that? Unless you mean a lass who is loving and wise and strong. You were not cursed at birth.” He reached out to stroke her left cheek, running his fingertips over the uneven, dark red mark. “I think you were kissed by the angels.”
Her eyes suddenly glistened with brightness. “But I-I know that I have to be…sensible…”
“Milady, I think you have been entirely too sensible in your life. What you need is to have hope. Abundant, extravagant, unbridled hope. No matter how bleak things may seem at the moment, you can never give up. Hope is what keeps your heart beating. Hope gives you a reason to rise every morning, even when the world all around you seems at its darkest.”
Her lashes swept downward. “Have I mentioned that you sometimes sound more like a poet than a warrior?”
“All I know is that God can sometimes answer prayers when we least expect it. Those are what we call miracles.” He threaded his fingers through her damp hair. “Like the one we celebrate at Yuletide. Even after a long time of darkness…light can come into the world again.”
She moved closer, leaning into him, resting her cheek against his bare chest. “Henri, mayhap all the angels have worked together to give us this night, a few precious hours just for each other…while the rest of the world is so very far away.” She slid her arms around his ribcage.
“Aileen—”
“Nay, Henri, let me finish. Tonight, in this enchanted place…” She lifted her chin, looked directly into his eyes. “I want to be yours. Tonight may be my only chance to…to ever be with the man I love.” A tear slid down her cheek. “The only man I have ever loved or will ever love.”
Her fierce declaration stole his voice, made his eyes fill with dampness.
“I love you, Henri. Show me what it means to belong to the man I love in every way.”
“You are…still betrothed to Lord Alsh,” he choked out, grasping at his last shred of sanity. “If my grand plan fails, it would be wrong for me to—”
“Then let us steal this one night. Let us be wrong, just for a few hours. You are not taking aught from me. I am giving myself to you, with all my heart.” She shrugged her shoulders and let her gown slide to the floor. It pooled at her feet in a heap of damp fabric. “Someone wise once told me that Frenchmen are quite knowledgeable and skilled in such matters.”
“Whoever told you that was indeed wise.” His voice was ragged, his attention locked on the alluring perfection of her naked curves, pale and glistening in the firelight.
“’Tis a good thing, milord, because for the first time in my life, I dinna want to follow the rules of what a good lass is supposed to do.” She looked up at him, wearing naught but the necklace he had given her, the silver branch of a sacred rowan tree, the emeralds and rubies glittering in the glow of the flames. “For the first time in my life, I am asking for what I want.” She took a deep breath, her voice a husky whisper. “And what I want, Viscomte Wicked, is you. All night.”
Aileen held her breath, kept her gaze on his, half afraid he might refuse. He was a man of such deep honor. And she was betrothed to another. What she was offering him was sin.
Just the look of him in the firelight—all muscle and male power and battle scars—was almost enough to make her feel faint. A tingle of feminine awareness went through her, some instinct that might have been a warning. If she gave herself to this man, she would be his. Completely and forever. His eyes burned into hers, dark with hunger…with need…
All at once, his hand tangled in her hair and he pulled her close. “All night,” he growled deep in his throat.
And then there was no more time for words—and no turning back. His mouth claimed hers in a kiss that sent her senses reeling and her heart soaring. She parted her lips, welcoming the slow thrusts of his tongue. His other arm came around her and drew her nude body tight against him. She was no longer aware of the chill in the air, only the heat of his embrace.
He was naked but for the plaide wrapped around his hips. She could feel the hard steel of his arousal pressing against her hip, the evidence of how much he wanted her. She gasped at the size of him, but instead of making her hesitant or nervous, the thought of having him inside her filled her with undeniable excitement.
She reached up with impatient hands to learn every masculine texture and line and shape of his body. The thick waves of his dark hair. The hard edge of his jaw. The throbbing pulse at his throat. The power in his taut muscles, from the planes of his chest to his shoulders and biceps and sinewy forearms.
God’s mercy, she had never felt anything as tantalizing as Henri’s smooth skin over his hard muscles. Or noticed before how large his hands were. Her fingertips traced over the muscled expanse of his back, the ridges of his ribs…and his scars.
So many scars—marks of the dangers he had endured and the pain he had suffered while they were apart. Each one made her heart ache.
His cupped the back of her head in one broad hand, taking command of the kiss, of her. She tasted him, breathed him, loved him. He kissed her until ’twas impossible to think or do aught but feel. The sensations he ignited inside her were intense, extraordinary…exhilarating. Like sparks cascading from her lips to her fingertips to her toes—everywhere at once. She was falling, falling into a storm of sensual pleasures, each feeling so new…and utterly irresistible. Sweet, hot, decadent.
If this was sin, she wanted more.
The scorching heat that burned between them seared away all memory of anything she had known in her past.
There was only Henri, only the two of them, only this night.
His arm flexed around her bare waist and he began to lower her down to the floor, taking only a moment to arrange the woolen blankets atop the sheepskin rugs before they fell together into the softness. She stretched out beneath him.
Fluttering wings of fire unfurled low in her belly as he poised above her for a moment, his breathing harsh. He looked down at her nakedness in the firelight, his gaze ravishing, possessive. The emotion in his eyes made her feel wanted, special, loved…and so beautiful.
He touched her face, traced the line of her collar bone. His hand settled over her breast and her nipple tightened to a hard pebble against his palm. She heard a moan, a soft sound of pleasure, and realized she had made it.
Groaning, he lowered his head and kissed her again, his tongue parting her lips and sliding into her mouth. Then he shifted to brush a kiss over her breast, his tongue circling the taut peak, teasing her nipple—before he drew her into the wet, velvety heat of his mouth. She cried out, the rough silk of his beard a tantalizing friction against the sensitive curve. She felt a warm dampness flowing like honey between her thighs. Felt a hollow ache low in her belly that made her want…more. More of this, more of him.
He lowered himself down onto the blankets at her side, one of his callused hands skimming over her belly. He parted her thighs and touched her, there, where she most ached for his touch. She groaned a soft sound of pleasure. A muscle flexed in his bearded jaw as he felt how wet she was.
He looked down at her, his gaze intense and possessive, while his fingers explored her soft folds, stroking her intimately. He flicked his thumb across the sensitive nub concealed within her russet curls and a bolt of pleasure shot through her. Then he slid one finger inside her, gently at first, then more deeply. Her lips parted on an aching sound echoed by his deep groan.
He murmured an oath, his eyes darkening as he pleasured her, his finger thrusting in and out while his thumb teased that delicate nub with slow circles that made her shudder and moan.
The fire within her burned hotter, h
igher, pleasure twisting through her until it threatened to consume her.
He brushed kisses over her cheek, her neck. Suckled her breast. She was breathing hard, shivering and hot all at once, the sensations almost too intense. She arched her back, wordless sounds of need tumbling from her lips. She knew no words for this. There were no words for this. Only feelings, only his touch, only surrender.
The unfamiliar fluttering low in her belly became a restless tremor that quickly bloomed into something more. She felt her inner muscles drawing tight, lifted her hips, shamelessly sought more of his touch. He pressed harder against that sensitive bud.
And suddenly the sensations inside her all knotted together—and snapped.
She shattered in his arms, her cry of release filling the chamber. Pleasure poured through her, astonishing in its power, flooding her with wave after wave of ecstasy that left her trembling, broken, whole, reborn.
She almost wondered if she had fainted. When she could summon the strength to open her eyes, she blinked up at him, awestruck. “That was…that was…”
“Only the beginning,” he promised with a flash of his wicked grin, before he bent his head to nuzzle his cheek against hers.
She started to wrap her arms around him, certain he would take her now. Wanting him to take her now. But he apparently had something entirely different in mind. He tugged free of her grasp and began to kiss a searing path down her body.
She gave in with a sigh as he explored the curve of her neck…nipped at the hollow of her throat…rubbed his silky-rough beard against her breasts. Then he moved lower, kissing his way down her ribs…lingering over the ticklish indentation of her navel.
And he moved lower still.
Surprised did not begin to describe how she felt. She grasped fistfuls of the woolen blankets beneath her, stunned breathless. Never had she even dared imagine…
Until he touched his mouth to her there.
His Scottish Bride - Shelly Thacker Page 8
