If it were truly a mystery at all. Surely Auld Donell didn’t possess such reach as to influence the inscription on the treasure he’d sent her to find. Pondering the odds, she idly fed the bulk of her supper to Rab who lay draped across her feet. It was possible that Donell planted said treasure in an attempt to trifle with her more than he already had. A smart woman would confront him straightaway and demand he finish with the bullshit once and for all. Too bad for her, because another woman was too deeply in lust to abandon her excuse to stay.
For the time being, at any rate.
Donell’s challenge may have been nothing but a ruse. As it turned out, it hadn’t been an utter waste of her time. In fact, she could imagine no better way to while away the hours than in Finn’s bed. Her ability to concentrate on anything else was hampered by the disheveled and utterly heart-stopping version of Finn who joined her at the dining table. He’d stopped by his room to wash and change into dry clothes. He’d forsaken his tightly tied cravat and waistcoat for the night, donning his jacket over a white linen shirt. His short, wet hair was combed back on top only to stand on end as it dried with a rather modern vibe. With the light scruff darkening his jaw as it tended to by the end of the day, and the open collar of his shirt revealing a hint of chest, he was beyond sexy.
And when Finn smiled….
She heaved a different sort of sigh. There were no smiles and sunshine tonight. In fact, the Furrow of Fury had returned with a vengeance. Something was eating at him, and she needed to figure it out before they retired for the evening if she were to get lucky. Because to her surprise, she hadn’t had near enough of him yet.
A warm weight rested on her lap and Aila looked down to find Rab’s head resting in the dip between her thighs. Ears erect, he stared up at her with dark pleading eyes. With a roll of her eyes, she reached down and scratched his ear. “Have ye no’ had enough?”
His ears fell back and his tongue lolled. Unable to resist, she caved to his adorableness and passed down the remainder of her meal one bit at a time while the men continued to converse. As the topic hadn’t veered from clan mottos, she figured it would be a safe guess that Finn remained engrossed by the fluke of the Marshall maxim being engraved on the medallion. She was more disconcerted by the saying itself. Truth Conquers or Prevails — the two men had argued that point to exhaustion without coming to an accord. Applied to her case — assuming it wasn’t a coincidence at all — the two interpretations had drastically different implications. Her truth could lead to triumph against someone or something.
Or the truth, i.e. something she knew, could help her overcome a problem either here or one of her own. Hard to say which. She was overflowing with problems, most of her own making.
There was no discreet way to propose as much to Finn or Ian when Finn, at least, was already suspicious of the link between her and the axiom. Best to turn the conversation to another topic. Thankfully, she had one handy — the primary one on her mind behind the implications of the treasure and the mindboggling appeal of Finn’s casual attire.
“How is it we never see Mr. Derne frequent the servants’ hall?” The man had been on her mind through the afternoon as had Mr. Boyce. She couldn’t help but wonder how he’d fared after his unexpected visitor’s departure. “A steward is a servant of sorts, isn’t he?”
“I’ve heard say he only comes about when the duke is in residence,” Ian offered as he swallowed down his whisky and poured himself another. His borderline alcoholism might be a subject to revisit if and when she got to know him better.
“Derne is a bloody lobcock.” Finn rotated his glass, much as he rolled his eyes. The whisky sloshed up the side before he raised it to his lips for a wee nip. “Sets himself up in one of the guest rooms and dines alone in the hall like he’s the duke himself.”
“Only to scurry back to the service hall like the rat he is the moment Argyll returns, so I heard,” Ian put in. “The man puts on airs far above his station. Good thing for me, I suppose, as the man disnae ken I’m here. I’ll have to be on my way when he resumes his proper place.”
“Then I hope the duke stays wherever he is.”
The two men shared an inscrutable look at her comment.
“Aye, might be better all around if Argyll never returned,” Ian said, pushing his drink aside. “Bad gone to worse, if ye want my opinion.”
“I dinnae,” Finn grouched, and tore a hunk off the last piece of bread on the platter they shared.
The sight of it turned Aila’s thoughts away from the steward and back to Boyce. She’d heard Niall ask Boyce earlier what else he milled. The answer hadn’t truly registered until now. “How is it we eat bread like this when the only mill about grinds oats and nothing else?”
Finn grunted in contempt and tossed the remainder of the bread back on the platter as if too disgusted to finish it. It rimmed the edge like a ball in a hoop and skittered along the table and over the edge where Rab happily gulped it down. “Derne ships in wheat flour from England for the duke. The pair think they’re too lofty to eat an oatcake like the rest of the country. Only one of them has the excuse of being a bloody Sassenach.”
“If ye hate him so much, why do ye work for him again?”
Ian smirked at her question and lifted a brow to his friend. “Aye, why is it ye work here?”
It was in no uncertain terms — and a few foul ones — that Finn told Ian where he could go. Another few to Aila with apologies for his language.
She didn’t have a problem with the language he employed. God knew, her normal vocabulary was far more colorful. What she did add to her arsenal of things to contemplate was the true reason Finn had taken the position here in Inveraray.
And why he refused to speak of it.
* * *
A short while later, Aila returned from taking Rab for a turn around the empty bailey to find that, having finished their meal, the men were ready to retire for the evening. It couldn’t have been past nine, and she wasn’t used to such early hours. No telly to kill time. No music since her phone battery had died. With only one book with her and no better way to pass the long hours, the previous night prior to Finn’s arrival had proven tedious despite Rab’s comforting weight stretched out alongside her. Tonight would be another long night.
Alone, if Finn didn’t come around again.
The shepherd led the way down the passage, stopping along the way to sniff at the bases of the statues. Finn was close behind. Aila found that odd as the men tended to have a ladies first approach to such things. Ian trailed behind her and asked her to name the statues for him with the explanation that Finn had told him about it earlier. She named them as they passed by with one of Ian’s rare smiles as her reward.
Whether Finn smiled or not, she couldn’t see. He didn’t slow his pace until they’d reached the top of the stairs.
“Game of whist, Ian?”
“Nay, no’ tonight.” Ian shook his head. “I’m still reeling from the twenty pounds I lost to ye last night.”
They played cards while she’d settled for a hundredth reading of Agatha Christie’s The Murder at the Vicarage? As much as Aila loved that book, envy shot through her. She crossed her fingers that Finn would ask her to play even though she didn’t know the game. Unfortunately, his brooding gaze passed over her with no such invitation. He bid his friend good night and left them both on the landing.
“He likes ye.”
Aila scoffed at Ian’s hushed observation. “Oh, obviously.”
Finn entered his room and closed the door without a look back. With a sinking heart, she glanced up at Ian only to find a smirk on his lips. “What?”
“Ye like him as well.”
“Maybe.” She punctuated the word with an evasive shrug.
“I beg ye to go after him.” The quiet desperation in his voice surprised Aila. If anything, he tended to lean toward sarcasm or indifference in his normal tone. He glued his eyes on the ceiling, studying the roughhewn planks as thoroughly as she studied him
.
“Finn and I have been friends for as long as I can recall. We were schooled together, traveled together, and attended university together. He is my son’s godfather, and I, his. If I were inclined to talk about my feelings, the greatest would be my concern for him.”
He dipped his chin to look at her, his brown eyes unsettled. Running a hand through his hair, he looked down the hallway to Finn’s door. “He’s traveling down a path from which there may be nae return. Dinnae let him lock himself and his troubles away. He’s been doing so for far too long. Ye’ve accomplished in days what I could nae in months. Ye’ve taken his thoughts off vengeance and given him hope.”
Aila shoved aside the leap in her heart in favor of clarification. “Vengeance for what?”
He shook his head. “That isnae my story to tell. All I ask is that ye dinnae let the darkness continue to call him. He’s a much better man when in the light. We all are.”
Sadness pulled at his features. Ian had a story of his own to tell. He’d been driven to do murder by a mixture of grief and anger. A crime of passion that clearly hadn’t eased his misery. Or was it guilt that troubled him? Someday, if she were here long enough, she might get it out of him. Given his shuttered expression, this wasn’t the night.
Perhaps she’d take his advice and work on Finn instead. If for no other reason than she, too, was far happier when pulled from dark thoughts. Finn was her own brand of light.
She parted ways with Ian and found her way to her door. When she opened it, Rab slipped inside and made himself comfortable on the bed with a wide yawn. There was no reason not to join him and get a good night’s sleep after two with little rest. Taking a moment to second guess herself, she closed the door and went to Finn’s. She knocked a trio of light raps. No answer. She considered knocking again. Soft as they were, though, her taps had resonated in the silence. He had to have heard them. She should respect his wish to be alone and walk away.
The door was unlocked when she turned the knob. Nudging it open, she peeked into the dimly lit room. He hadn’t lit a candle so there was only the light provided by the dwindling flames in the fireplace to illuminate the space.
It was enough.
He’d shed his coat. He glanced at her over his shoulder, his expression inscrutable, but made no comment upon her uninvited intrusion. She had no idea what he was thinking. It wasn’t what he’d been thinking about this time the previous night…or the night before that. Bloody hell, that wasn’t even what she’d been thinking about five seconds ago.
Reaching up, he grasped his shirt and pulled it over his head. Any thought of contrition and vengeance fled her mind with every valley and rise of his rippled abs that were revealed. Her hands knew the terrain of his body. Seeing it sculpted into sharp shadows and mouth-watering highlights set her fingers twitching and ignited a fire of longing deep in her belly.
She swallowed. Hard. Pure magnificence.
His biceps bulged and pecs contracted as he bunched the shirt into a ball. He rotated at the waist to toss it aside, shadows crafting hollows of his hip bones and the well-defined vee that disappeared into the waistband of his trousers.
A little shudder shimmied down her spine and settled into her knees. One look at him — one nearly obscured by the poor lighting — and she was weak with lust. “How do ye people get on without proper lighting?”
“I thought ye said ye were no’ afraid of the dark?”
“I’m no’ afraid of it, I would simply appreciate less of it.” Less dark and more light to better see him. Though her fingers itched to caress every inch of him, she also wanted the chance to look upon him like the work of art he was. Bernini would weep, she was sure of it.
In the shadows, he reached for the button at the fall of his breeks and her feet rooted her to the floor, decision made. She waited…waited…
“Ye huvnae a maidenly bone in yer body, do ye?”
She tore her eyes away from his hands to meet his gaze, imagining a hint of aggravation there. He wanted her to blush and look away. To act as a lady of this time was expected to act. Aila spent her days blending in here. It took concentrated effort to toe the line. She wasn’t going to do that with him. In this one thing, if nothing else, there would be honesty. “I told ye, I’m no’ ashamed of wanting ye.”
To her satisfaction, the shadowy outline of muscle shifted and flexed at the admission. His infamous frown reappeared more fiercely than before, as if he were as far from pleased by his body’s reaction as she was thrilled by it. “Who are ye, Mistress Marshall?”
“Ye ken ye only call me that when ye’re displeased?”
“Dinnae evade my questions.”
“That was one question,” she pointed out. Then sighed under the weight of his unwavering glower. Stepping into the room, she closed the door behind her. In her recent ponderings, she had imagined what his room would look like. What it would say about the man and his life. For the most part, it was lost to inky obscurity, not that she managed to tear her eyes away from him to look around. “Ye ken who I am, Finn.”
“I dinnae ken a thing. What is yer purpose here?”
Aila had a question of her own. How could he expect a logical response when he played havoc on her ability to summon a rational thought?
“The only one I can think of right now is ye.” Normally such an admission would cost her a measure of her dignity. Now, it felt right. She wanted him to know the truth. As much of it as she was able to reveal.
A muscle jumped in his cheek. His hands fisted at his sides. She could only hope it was to restrain himself from reaching out to her as she took one step, then another toward him. Not anger.
“Nay, that’s no’ whole truth,” she told him. “I have another purpose at present. I want to touch ye. Hold ye.” She inched forward, close enough to tease the light sprinkling of hair on his chest with her fingertips. He shuddered, a rash of goose bumps rippling over his chest and catching the faint light. “Did ye get like this from lifting stones all day?”
“Aye, and from swinging a claymore.”
That prompted a shiver of her own. “I want to make love with ye, Finn.”
Aila bit her lip. God, she’d never used that phrase before. Make love. She’d had sex, shagged, and fucked. Never had she felt comfortable with the more intimate phrase.
She wasn’t entirely certain she was now.
A groan rumbled deep beneath her fingers. It was enough to recall her focus to the moment. Finn bent his head to kiss her. Light, searching. Only that. The moment was achingly tender. That didn’t stop her heart from sprinting like a colt out of the gate. Blood rushed through her and sent her head spinning. As did the heat of his skin when she flattened her hand and ran her palm down his chest and along his ribs. He must have taken the caress for invitation, touching her at last. He circled her waist then slid up to cup her breasts. Even through the thick shirt, his hands were hot. Her nipples hardened, but she wanted more.
And he knew it.
With a tug of the drawstring, the neckline gaped. He slipped it over her shoulder to expose her nipple to the cool room only to heat it with his mouth and the flick of his tongue before he drew it between his teeth. A bolt of electricity sizzled through her, hot and thrilling enough to wring a hoarse cry from her. Her head felt back in a silent plea, her fingers curled in his short hair to beg for more. A vague pull at her waist was her only warning before her skirt, petticoats and pocket slipped to the floor.
The tickle of his rough, calloused palms grazing the backs of her thighs wrenched a squeal of shock from her before she melted under the sensual caress. His hands skimmed up her legs to fondle her bottom under her blouse. And lift her. Aila clung to him as he rotated, tumbled her onto the bed, and came down over her. Without conscious thought, she wrapped her legs around his hips and sought his kiss.
His breath teased her lips. No more. She opened her eyes.
“What is this?” The question was gruff, his brogue thick.
“What?” Her res
ponse was filled with dazed confusion. “This? I think it’s fairly obvious.”
“What are we doing, lass?” As serious as he sounded, his palms continued an erotic massage of her backside that made concentration difficult. “Ye’re an enthusiastic bedmate, yet ye say this is no’ something ye do frequently.”
“It’s no’.” She arched against him, eager for conversation to be set to the wayside. Sliding her arms around him, she raked her nails down his back. The light stroke drew a helpless moan from him, much to her satisfaction. Straining upward, she caught his earlobe between her teeth and whispered, “I told ye before, this is no’ normal.”
Another choked moan and he lifted his head out of reach to glower down at her, though his normal fury was now absent. “Please dinnae refer to it as an anomaly again.” He caught her hand and lifted it to his lips. “I prefer the other things ye called it. Genuine desire?”
“Did I say that?” She stared at his lips rather than wonder at the look in his eyes.
He kissed her knuckles one by one. “Taking yer pleasure?” He ran his teeth over the pad of her forefinger before drawing it into his mouth. Her breath hitched and he smiled, setting the digit free. “Ye might be the most temperamental lass I’ve ever met…. All of this might be the greatest blunder I’ve ever made in my life.”
“Yet ye cannae fight it any more than I.” She closed her eyes, unable to look at him.
“Aye.” The admission came with a low sigh against her neck.
“Then why try?”
Her whispered query was met with a moan of absolute surrender. Finn’s lips caught hers again, hot and needy now. The force of his ardor cascaded over her and Aila had no hope of holding back an answering wave of desire. Nor did she want to. She wanted this. Him. As much as she could before he was hers no longer.
His mouth migrated downward. Down her neck and over her breast and ribs when he tugged the blouse down further. Kissing, licking, sucking. He’d followed this path before, plying her with the nimble skill with which he’d proven most adept. Already he’d reduced her to a quivering mess. She knew if he continued downward to his goal, he would ravish her with his lips and tongue until he drove her to the brink of oblivion. God help her if his fingers got involved.
A Good Scot is Hard to Find (Something About a Highlander Book 2) Page 15
