As Quinn watched, Maggie brushed it away from her face, and then turned onto her back and lifted both arms above her head, stretching, pulling the soft pink material more tightly across her breasts. The “pajamas” she wore were very thin and lay like silk upon every curve of her body. One of the buttons on the front of her blouse had come undone, exposing the plump curve of one breast.
Suddenly he wondered what she would do if he lifted that soft pink fabric and caressed her with his tongue. She had been yielding beside the campfire. Would she yield again? She opened her eyes without warning and blinked, then smiled lazily. Quinn almost reached for her, but managedto control himself.
“Hungry?” he asked, his voice soft as he brushed his hand lightly across her face. Maggie’s eyes widened, and she accepted a mug of wine and the cheese and bread Bittiehad found for them. She drank the wine greedily, and as he watched the tilt of her head and the movement of her throat, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to sleep beside her this night, no matter if it was the safest place.
“Easy,” he cautioned, “ye will have a head in the morningif ye drink too much.”
Maggie dragged the back of her hand across her mouth and smiled up at him. “I’ve had a hard day, Quinn MacIntyre.I deserve a little relaxation, don’t I?” She leaned against him and he steeled himself against her warmth.
“Aye,” he said. “Here, eat some bread and cheese.”
She took the food and devoured it. Her tongue darted out from time to time to catch crumbs of bread, driving him insane with longing, until finally she finished eating and lay back on the hay, full and content.
Ah, lass, he thought, but I could make ye more content.
“I’ll leave ye to yer sleep,” Quinn said, but didn’t move.
Maggie pushed up on one elbow, frowning at him. “Where are you sleeping?”
He shrugged. “In the woods likely.”
“Don’t be silly,” she said, and lay back down, patting the hay beside her. “Just stay here.”
In another moment, she was asleep. Quinn watched her for a moment, watched as her soft lips opened and closed slightly. Then, his heart pounding, he slid down beside her and gathered her to him, one arm beneath her shoulders, the other curved around her waist. She moved easily, turningtoward him, repositioning her head upon his chest, moving one hand to rest there, too. And when she cuddled closer, he almost groaned aloud.
One kiss, he thought. If I can but touch her lips to mine one more time, that’s all I ask.
He cupped her face with his free hand, stroking her cheek with his thumb. Maggie shifted, her leg rubbing against his erection in her sleep. Quinn swallowed another groan and slowly lowered his mouth to hers, the warmth of their breath mingling as he touched her lips with his.
She stirred, pressing more tightly against him as she opened her mouth and kissed him back. Her hand slipped away from his chest, across his belly, and down to rest upon the hard length of him, and this time he did groan out loud.
Quinn trembled as he deepened the kiss, his tongue darting to collide with hers, his fingers trailing down her neck and over her collarbone to find her right breast and finally, finally, caress the softness there.
Maggie’s eyes flew open and she stared into his, but there was no fear mirrored there, only a heat that matched his own. He gazed into the burning blue of her gaze, and suddenly knew that she would not stop him if he continued to seduce her. She was tired and half drunk and half asleep, and vulnerable. He had never been the kind of man who took advantage of a woman.
Reluctantly, he released her. “Go to sleep, lass,” he said. “Before we do something we will regret.”
Her half-closed eyes opened, full and wide, gazing into his with complete clarity. “Would you regret it?” she whispered,her mouth very close to his.
“No, but—”
“I wouldn’t regret it,” she said.
Quinn slipped one hand into the wealth of her hair. “No?”
Maggie shook her head, wordlessly, and Quinn lowered his mouth to hers again.
She sighed and leaned against him, and he began trying to remove the curious blouse she wore, still confused by the strange images of crudely drawn cat faces upon the soft cloth. But not confused enough to forget what he was doing.When the blouse parted, he lowered his head and kissed her just where her breasts began to curve, letting the tip of his tongue touch her. Maggie shivered, and he drew in a sharp breath.
Heat coursed through him, making him harder, draining the blood from his face. When he lowered his head and touched his tongue to the sensitive pink nub, Maggie gasped and then moaned aloud as he drew her into his mouth.
She arched against him, and Quinn went a little mad, suckling her, caressing, moving his hands over her body, wanting to please her more than he had any other woman. He moved back to her mouth for a moment and slid his tongue between her lips, possessing her, burning with his need and his intentions, until she trembled in his arms.
Then she was touching him, her hands sliding across his chest and over his shoulders, her nails sharp against the cloth of his shirt.
“Touch me,” she whispered.
“Here?” he asked, sliding his hand beneath the strangely stretchy waistband of her soft breeches, diving into the velvet warmth hidden there. Touching her ever so softly.
“Yes,” she sighed. Maggie pulled his head back down to hers, kissing him with uninhibited passion as she yielded to him, shifting to give him better access to all that she was. “Especially that,” she said against his mouth, arching her hips and gasping as he slipped two fingers inside of her. “Esp-ec-ial-ly there.”
He moved to take her breast again, and she cried out as he nibbled and bit her tender skin, and continued to caress her below. The lass clung to him, her breath rapid, precious in its longing, until suddenly he could wait no longer. He released her and sat up. Maggie moaned softly and reached for him, whispering, “Don’t go.”
“I’m going nowhere, lass,” he said, “unless I take ye with me.”
With two quick movements, he pulled his shirt and plaid from his body and then returned to her. She had shed the breeches and blouse and lay back on the plaid, completelynaked. Quinn covered her body with his own, desperateto feel his flesh against hers, groaning as he stretched atop her and felt the tips of her bare breasts rub against the curling hair of his chest.
He kissed his way up her neck and then back to her breasts again. He felt his control slipping and took one nippleroughly, hoping he hadn’t hurt her, smiling against her skin as she cried out in obvious delight.
He pressed his mouth against her ear and murmured gentle endearments, as he revelled in the touch of her skin against his. She was more than ready, more than willing as she lifted her hips, coaxing him.
“Come inside,” she whispered, “out of the cold.” She pressed her hips upward, parting her legs for him.
Quinn entered her with one thrust, slipping into the fire, losing himself in the slick heat of her body, moving in and out, he hard and thick, she soft and yielding. He filled Maggie again and again, but as sweet as the feel of her body beneath him was, the look in her eyes was sweeter.
Her gaze caressed him, devoured him, enveloped him, and he knew then that her need matched his own. As he moved inside of her, feeling the ecstacy that was Maggie, he watched her watching him. She looked into his eyes in wonder and soundlessly shuddered beneath him as Quinn took all that she gave, and gave all that he had, until at last she cried out, her rapture shaking him to the depths of his soul.
Then he was soaring, plundering Maggie mindlessly, as the world shattered and disappeared, sending him spiraling into sweet oblivion. He collapsed against her, spent and amazed.
Trying to find his breath, Quinn rolled to one side and sprawled flat on his back, his arm thrown across his eyes, his heart pounding. When the stars dancing in his head began to dissipate, he raised up on his elbows to look at her.
She was magnificent. Her auburn hair lay free and
flowingover her shoulder, across one bare breast. Her skin gleamed with a fine sheen of perspiration, and in that momentshe looked like some otherworldly being, a nymph or faery, or perhaps a selkie captured from the loch, drawn to the shore to give her love to mortal man.
Maggie’s arm came down and her eyes flew open, meetinghis in startled hesitation. She shivered, and he pulled the plaid around her and then gathered her into his arms, holding her tightly.
“Och, lass, ye are an amazing woman,” he whispered against her hair as her arms slipped around his waist. She didn’t speak, and concerned, he pulled back a little and looked down.
She was staring at his chest, one hand resting there, her breathing as ragged as his. He tipped her chin upward and she glanced up at him, the blue depths filled with an emotion he couldn’t name. “Are ye all right? Did I hurt ye?”
Maggie shook her head and looked away, then leaned her face against his shoulder. “No,” she said softly. “And you’re the amazing one. I’ve never—it’s never been—” She broke off and kissed his collarbone. “You’re amazing,” she repeated.
Quinn stroked her hair back from her face and she looked up at him again. How had this happened? How in the space of a few impassioned moments had this woman become so precious to him? He’d bedded many a lass, but he’d never felt like this. Never felt so—protective.
“Quinn—” she began, and stopped.
“What is it, love?” he asked. She gazed at him for a long moment and then bit her lower lip and shook her head. He slipped one hand through her hair and gently pressed her head to his chest again, where she sighed, her breath sendinga tremor across his skin. “Dinna fash yerself, darlin’. Ye’ve had a long day. Go to sleep, now.”
Maggie nodded against him, and in another few moments,she was asleep, her breathing regular and even, but Quinn lay awake for another hour, wondering if he had just made the best decision of his life or the worst mistake.
eight
Maggie’s eyes flew open. Above her was a large window without panes or screen. Stars twinkled down through what she realized, after squinting a bit, was a kind of hatch. She blinked. It was in the roof, but the question was, the roof of what? Where was she? She felt disoriented, groggy, and then suddenly wide awake.
Oh, damn.
Quinn MacIntyre was molded against her back, softly snoring. He shifted a little in his sleep, and Maggie’s eyes widened. She tried to be very still as she looked around.
Her clothes lay haphazardly beside her and she groaned as she felt Quinn’s hand splayed across her stomach and knew she was naked beneath the wool plaid draped over and under them. Beneath the plaid something scratchy made her want to shift, too. Apparently they’d spent the night together on a mound of hay.
Spent the night together. Maggie squeezed her eyes shut, fighting the sudden panic flooding over her.
Quinn. Last night. Naked. In her arms. In her.
Maggie clutched the plaid and stared up at the window. What in the world had she been thinking? She hadn’t been thinking at all. She’d been terrified by the realization that somehow, someway, she had traveled back in time. Even now she felt hysterical laughter threatening to bubble out of her.
Then his amazing touch and his even more amazing mouth had made her forget the whole time-travel phenomenon,and her five years of celibacy had seemed like a hundred and she’d fallen into bed—or rather, the hay— with him without a second thought.
Now she was having second thoughts. And a third, and a fourth.
Maybe if she tried very hard she could convince herself that it had all been a dream. A very impassioned, amazing dream. But no, Quinn was too real, too deliciously warm, and pressed against her, his arm draped across her waist, other appendages pressing elsewhere, and so she might as well face facts. She’d slept with a man she barely knew.
Rachel would be so proud.
Maggie giggled, feeling the hysteria start to build again.
Beside her, Quinn moved. She felt him rise up on one elbow and then his breath was soft against her cheek.
“Lass?” he whispered.
Maggie pretended to be dead to the world, keeping her breathing even. If he knew she was awake he would likely want to pick up where they’d left off, and she had to sort a few things out before that would happen again—if ever.
An imge of the night before flashed through her mind— Quinn leaning close to her, his gaze filled with a gentleness she hadn’t expected, Quinn painting a fiery path across her lips, the side of her neck, her throat, and most of all, Quinn joining with her in a way that had touched the very essence of her soul.
Okay, so she could be persuaded again—easily. That’s why she had to avoid being in close proximity to him, at least for a little while. She kept breathing, and after a moment,she heard him sit up and release his breath in a long, low sigh. Straw crackled beneath his feet as he stood.
Once she heard him walk away, Maggie opened her eyes the merest slit and was treated to the sight of a naked Quinn with his back to her, the muscles above his taut buttockstightening as he lifted his arms and slid his shirt over his head. Then he picked up his plaid and she watched untilhe folded the long piece of cloth and wrapped it around his waist, obscuring the view, and then closed her eyes. He was beautiful.
She tried to slow her breathing back to where it should be. A few minutes later she heard the sound of his boots hitting the rungs of the wooden ladder that led to the loft, and then heard him call out to someone.
Quickly Maggie grabbed her pajama pants and top and shrugged into them, then dropped to her knees again and crawled to the edge of the hayloft to peer down. Quinn was not alone. A large, burly man stood with his back to Maggie,his hands on his hips, as Quinn began to pace back and forth in front of him, speaking intently.
“Do ye have the garb?” Quinn was saying as he dragged one hand through his tangled hair. The bigger man handed him a bundle and shook his head.
“I dinna like this, Quinn. Ye shouldna be takin’ such a chance. Let me go and—”
“Ye know they willna let ye inside the house,” Quinn said as he took the bundle. He gave the man a smile. “Ye smell of dung, Bittie.”
“Aye.” The one called Bittie turned to follow Quinn as he moved toward one of the stalls. His face was fleshy and jovial, his eyes a little vague and his speech a little slow. His voice grew somber. “But I will take a bath, Quinn, if it means ye will no be caught by the duke.”
Quinn laughed. “Nay, I wouldna put ye through that kind of sacrifice, not even for my life.”
As Maggie watched, Quinn shed his plaid and began to dress. She sighed. Apparently men in the past didn’t wear underwear. What a lovely custom. He donned a pair of black breeches and stood for a moment in thought, giving her a chance to take a long look at his broad, well-muscled chest and firm stomach. His upper arms were as big around as grapefruit, and her breath came a little quicker as she rememberedthe strength in those arms when he held himself above her and stroked in and out and—
Maggie closed her eyes again and rolled to her back, her heart pounding, heat burning into her face. Get a grip! she admonished. You are in a crazy situation. Don’t make it crazier by falling for a guy three hundred years older than you!
“Remember, Bittie,” Quinn was saying below, “dinna speak of this to anyone.”
Maggie scurried back to the edge to look down at the two men again. Darn it. She’d missed a good two minutes of ogling Quinn before he finished dressing. Now he wore a bright red jacket with gold buttons down the front and a black tricornered hat with a feather jutting from the top. It was some kind of uniform. She frowned.
“Aye, ye can count on me,” Bittie said and then paused. “What is it I should not speak of, Quinn?”
Quinn smiled and readjusted his hat. His dark curls tumbled from beneath it, and Maggie remembered that at one point in their lovemaking she had laced her fingers into his hair, expecting roughness, surprised by the softness there. His mouth had been soft
, too, gentle, and then roughly passionate, then soft again. She lifted two fingers to her mouth, remembering how it had felt to be so possessedand yet so cherished. Had it been that way for him, too, or was she just imaging such a deep connection?
“Ye must not tell anyone that I am here with the lass. No one must know.”
“Oh, aye. I willna tell a soul.” He frowned. “But ye dinna want to sleep in the loft every night, do ye, Quinn? T’will be too rough for such a fine lady as that.”
Quinn buckled a polished saber around his waist and nodded. “Aye, Bittie,” he said, “ye are right about that. Nay, and this is where ye can be of more help to me. As soon as I leave here, take the lass to Ian’s cottage.”
Maggie rose up a little on her elbows. Ian had a house?
“Should I no take her to Mary?” Bittie asked.
“We spoke with Rob last night,” Quinn said, his voice hard. “We are not welcome there until we learn what happenedto Ian.”
“Rob will no stay mad at ye,” Bittie said, his gruff voice confident.
“That depends on what I find out about Ian,” Quinn said. “But Ian MacGregor has more luck in his little finger than the rest of us poor beggars have in our whole bodies, so I’m bound to believe he’s alive. It won’t be long before he’ll be back charming the lassies.”
“Maybe ye’d best not let him close to yer wee lass, eh Quinn?” Bittie said. Maggie leaned over the edge a little farther to try to see Quinn’s face, but Bittie was in the way.
“She is not my lass,” Quinn said, and Maggie felt her heart sink. “Just a poor girl lost and alone. When I’m through here, I’ll get her back to her family.”
Bittie glanced up at the loft, and Maggie ducked down, holding her breath until he spoke again. “She’s a little thing, ain’t she? Kind of helpless, like a kitten.”
Maggie frowned. She was not helpless. Just because she’d gotten lost and sort of had a little pity party didn’t mean—
“She’s small, to be sure,” Quinn agreed, interrupting her thought and making her eyes widen. “But helpless isna exactlyhow I’d describe her. She stood up to Rob Roy MacGregor!” He chuckled, and Maggie smiled. “Aye, the lass has spunk!”
Highland Rogue Page 11
