A Faerie Fated Forever

by Mary Anne Graham

  He shrugged. "I could have resisted the shove, but I really wasn’t trying very hard." Humor lit his eyes as he continued. "My big head knows the risk in taking you here, but the little head is in charge right now and it seems to agree with you."

  Her golden eyes donned a wicked spark. "Then you're in trouble, sir." His tarse twitched forward and started thrumming when she crooked her little finger. “Up with the kilt my laird. I would see what I have bargained for. I would see that which every female in the ballroom would give years of their lives to experience.”

  Nial’s navy eyes blazed his need, as his hands reached to flip up the kilt, obeying the command of this one woman without question. He displayed the rigid extent of his desire and her golden eyes caressed him in a slow sweep from his balls to the head of his erection. Her gaze was a touch he felt physically and as it kindled hotter and hotter, and swept up and down his expanding length he thrust against it. She gathered her gown around her waist, showing him her drenched readiness. His gaze lingered on the wet brown rainbow of curls, and she thrust against it once before she lowered herself over him.

  He retained the mental prowess to make a single comment. “No drawers? I should beat you for dancing with other men like that.”

  She moaned as she felt him enter her. “Would you beat me, my love?”

  Whether it was her moist, tight heat enveloping him, or the fact that she had casually used the endearment, he couldn’t truly say. But words were nearly beyond him. She waited for an answer, and he gave it to her, in a harsh grating tone that attested to his need. “Love of my life, if I place a hand to your firm bottom, I can promise that striking it will be the last thought in my mind.”

  He tugged her bodice down and had a ripe cherry in his mouth the second the silk shifted. He suckled it as hard as he wanted to thrust but she set the pace. He refused to alter her tempo although the shallow way she rode him nearly drove him insane. He tried to distract himself from the urge to grab her hips and pound into her by fixing his attention to her breasts. Even so, the very instant that she came he grabbed her and forced her fully down upon him and he exploded in that single thrust.

  He kissed each breast as he pulled the material back up. He shifted restlessly under her as she planted kisses over his face. When she bit his earlobe and flicked her tongue within, he mimicked her thrusts with his renewed arousal. He moaned as he said, “My love, you cause me to regress to a state of primitive craving. It must be those claws of passion, for there is no outer limit to my desire for you. But we should stop, surely we have already tested the boundaries of our luck.”

  The wanton temptress was firmly in control and she preferred to ignore boundaries. It was, after all, the temptress within her that made her the mate for the sensual man she rode. The temptress wanted to play. She enjoyed controlling the mighty laird with the power of his need and it was a never-ending source of amazement that she was only beginning to accept that it was for her alone. The temptress called the tune, but soon enough she became entrapped within the melody and the play ceased. As she immersed herself in the physical expression of the magic they made together, she cried her love for him, and his voice joined hers, to create a symphony of love eternal.

  Some time passed before she rose to straighten her gown. Nial flicked his kilt down and stood behind her, gathering scattered hairpins and awkwardly playing maid by placing them at rather random spots amidst her hair. He bent to kiss her neck as he swept the locks up. “Love, I’ve been in England far too long to suit me. I would wed you at the kirk at Kilcuillin at the soonest date we can possibly arrange. Are you yet ready to put behind you the carefully-crafted make believe world of the ton?”

  She turned to him as she said, “Yes, my love. It is time to go home to Skye.”

  He stepped back to survey her appearance. "Your gown is rumpled, your lips are full and swollen. I fear that my best efforts at styling your glorious hair leave much to be desired and," he paused and leaned close to sniff her neck, "You smell of me."

  He saw that he had left his mark on her right breast that began at its curve, above the neckline of her gown and continued far below the fabric. He traced it with a finger, and smiled at the goose bumps that followed. “I fear I’ve marked you most openly, sweet. Yet I wish to announce our bond to your father and I wish to crow it loudly to Badgerton and your would-be suitors. Will you mind?”

  In answer, she quirked a finger to bid him to lean down, which he did without protest. She fastened her lips to his neck just above his hastily tied cravat, and sucked and bit with all her might. She leaned back to survey her success. “Now I have marked you most openly as well. Will you mind?”

  He laughed as he led her back inside. “Not at all. Mark any area of your choosing with your passion. However, I fear that our appearance announces to all what we have been doing. ‘Tis perhaps just as well that the words follow so soon.”

  They made their way through the embracing couples on the terrace and entered the balcony door just as the music of that dance ended. Nial rapidly sent away the series of dance partners angry at missing their chance to hold the lovely lady close. “Heather shall not dance with other men from this evening forward. I suggest you seek other, available, targets. This one is mine, and I don’t share.”

  He spotted Carrick and Bonnie and shepherded her towards them. Their progress was met with murmurs of commentary upon their appearance that started quietly and rose to a dull roar by the time they stood before her parents. His arm around her waist held her next to his heart and the wide grin on his face spoke for him before he said a word.

  Carrick broke off his comment to John to join his wife in a shrewd and correct assessment of the meaning of their appearance. Bonnie found her voice first. “It is ever so interesting to see a man leave a party garbed as a Sassannach and to have him return as a proper Highland laird. And arm in arm with my disarrayed and glowing daughter as well.”

  Laird MacIver refused to wear anything other than Highland garb and he snorted. “A change for the better if ever there was one. Yet I believe it is the triumphant hunter with his prize I see before me. Tell me, son, was there a recent occasion that required the withdrawal of the famed faerie flag? ‘Tis my understanding that such would decree a need for proper Highland attire as well.”

  He held forth Heather’s left hand to show the ancestral Maclee stone on her ring finger. Then he looked in her eyes as he swept the hand to his lips for a kiss before he turned to her father and said, “Aye, Laird MacIver. Your daughter has done me the extreme honor of accepting my proposal of marriage. So now I put my request to you. May I have your permission to marry your daughter?”

  “As though my denial of permission would affect you one whit. Of course you have it. Need I remind you that in this matter I saw the future first?”

  John interrupted, centuries of English breeding at the formalities attendant upon a proper betrothal prompting him to protest. “This is not at all proper, Laird Maclee. You are bound to meet with her father and his solicitors to agree upon details of her dowry in contract before any betrothal is arranged or announced.”

  Nial quirked a smile, which grew at Carrick's loud chortle. “Lord Standings, the dowry I require is the lady herself. Laird MacIver can keep every coin he possesses and give me Heather without so much as delivering her clothing with her and I will count myself as the single most fortunate man in existence. All I need to guarantee my future happiness is this lady bearing my name and sharing my life.”

  The lady spoke up at that point, the quiver in her voice and the tears at the corners of her eyes betraying her overwhelming emotion at his public proclamation. “My love, poor specimen that I am, still, I am and shall ever be yours. My heart bids that it be so and I am Scot enough to listen well to its command.”

  With a joyful laugh, and ignoring the sea of watchful eyes that judged, Nial gathered her close for a kiss as Boz jumped on the nearby platform and signaled the musicians to cease. The interested crowd fell silen
t quickly. Geoff had begun angrily making his way over through the crowd at the sight of the kiss, and was only inches away when Sedgewick's words rang out.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I propose a toast to the happiness of a betrothal made just moments ago. To my kinsman, Laird Nial Maclee and his faerie fated forever, Lady Heather MacIver. May the light of their love shine eternal and may it be fruitful. I have no doubt that such fruit will be plentiful.” He quirked a brow as he bowed mentally to the Sedgewick sixth sense, the completely untraditional nature of the union already recognized by the families and his own offbeat humor in glancing at Heather’s tummy, as he proclaimed, “I also expect that the first fruit will be promptly presented.”

  Nial choked on a sip of champagne and dropped his glass as he glanced at his cousin, who winked and nodded. His eyes suspiciously moist, he bent in full view of the assembled crowd to place a tender kiss on Heather’s tummy. He glanced at her father when he stood. “Laird MacIver, I’m sure you know that the Sedgewick sixth sense is never wrong. That being the case, I’m for Skye as quickly as we can make arrangements. I would have your daughter before our priest at the Kilcuillin kirk with all due speed.”

  “Indeed, Nial. I’ve a need to shake off the Sassannach dust from my kilt without delay. Let’s…"

  Badgerton’s voice interrupted Carrick’s words. Geoff stepped forward aggressively. Nial anticipated the movement and thrust Heather a pace behind him.

  The Englishman sniffed loudly. “You smell of sex, Maclee. It appears that your failure to gain her consent to marriage must have prompted you to resort to rape. The poor lady surely feels shamed and compelled to agree to your suit.”

  Boz nearly leapt from the stage to the floor and he attempted to place a calming hand on his friend’s arm. “Don’t do it. She’s his. She has always been his. Her family knows that, which is why her father is not challenging him. Trust me, if this was an insult Laird MacIver would issue the challenge quickly enough.”

  Badgerton stiffened. "The bastard has stolen the lady I intended to claim. Bloody hell, man, I had claimed her. Ask any chap of the ton if you doubt me. I would have made her my countess. Heather would have reigned over the ton and outshone every lady in it. Now the bastard will drag her back to the outer boundaries of the universe and breed her like a farm animal. He could only have gained her compliance by force. Otherwise, she'd never have turned down the sort of future I could have given her."

  " You're talking like a egotistical fop, Geoff. Your damned title and fortune have spoiled you so that you have rarely been denied anything. Besides, again, I tell you that the only one with a right to challenge here would be her father. He won't do it. I understand he knew Heather was Nial's before my cousin knew it himself. Laird Carrick doesn't challenge him and you must let it be."

  Geoff raised his chin and glanced down his nose at Carrick. “A backwoods pretender to nobility, Heather’s sire is either a mewling coward too afraid of Maclee to challenge him properly or too stupid to appreciate the insult.”

  The Scottish contingent fell silent. The ominous silence grew as Badgerton continued. “Maclee is a villainous bastard who lacks honor. He used his phallus as a weapon against a lady whom honor should have bade him defend. Because he knew the weapon lacked heft and fire-power, he coerced his cousin into pretending to have some kind of ridiculous premonition that the seed he forced found fertile ground.”

  He slapped Nial across his cheek with the glove he removed from his right hand. “I stand for Heather where her father will not. I challenge Maclee to a duel, although I suspect that he lacks enough backbone to see the contest fairly met.”

  Nial raised his hand for silence when Carrick and Boz would have spoken. He felt Heather’s tug upon his jacket and turned to her. His smile was tender, so she knew the ire in his gaze was not for her but she feared it boded ill for the young Englishman she'd once had some fondness for. She reached up to whisper in his ear, “Nial, please don’t…”

  “My love, he accused me of being a dishonorable coward, and hurled the same accusation at your father. The blood of every Maclee and MacIver ancestor cries out from our sacred soil that such slurs can not be allowed to pass. I must meet him.”

  She reached a trembling hand to his lips and whispered, “Not to the death. I think there is hope for him. One day he may grow up to be a fine mate for some other lady. Please, for me?”

  He traced her trembling lips with a steady finger she kissed as he nodded. He then turned and faced Badgerton. “You have insulted the honor of my future father-in-law and of my kinsman, but you saved your vilest lies for me. You have no right or standing to challenge on Heather’s behalf, as you bear no relationship to her. Therefore, your challenge is not well founded. Further, you accompanied it with a blow.”

  He turned to the gentlemen assembled nearby. “I believe that makes me the injured party and gives me the choice of weapon and duel. Is that your understanding as well?”

  The elderly Lord Bassingate was a well-known student of the art and rules of dueling, and his was the authoritative voice that spoke for all. “Indeed, Laird Maclee. The choice is yours.”

  “I choose the sword and I choose to fight to first blood. I will not insist upon the death of the rash Lord Badgerton unless he continues beyond first blood.”

  The approving murmurs of the crowd indicated it to be a popular choice.

  Lord Bassingate asked, “Your seconds, gentlemen?”

  Badgerton indicated two of his fellow rakes. “Lords Ricefield and Erving, sir.”

  Nial started to speak but his words were cut off when Boz strode to one side. “I will be a second for my cousin.”

  Carrick stepped to the other side. “Although I see this duel as mine by right,” Nial turned to him angrily, but calmed when he continued, “I cede my rights to my daughter’s betrothed. However, I insist upon standing as his second.”

  Geoff hefted his nose again and chuckled smugly. “I should tell you Scottish fellows what Sedgewick knows. I am a champion of the art of fencing.”

  Carrick snorted and Boz smiled. Geoff found the lack of concern irritating. The lack of respect from the duke galled him most bitterly for he should have known better.

  Nial raised a brow. “ A champion of the art of fencing, you say?”

  “Indeed,” Badgerton replied.

  “Then tell me, fencing champion, how often has your life depended upon your skill with the sword? How many times have you raised it against bloodthirsty warriors who plotted your death by means fair or foul? How many lives have you ended at the point of your blade, fencing champion?”

  Badgerton was silent.

  Nial said, “The seconds shall meet now to set the time and place and shall return to advise us of their decision.”

  The four men withdrew and Heather flew into Nial’s arms. He stroked her neck gently as he whispered, “Love, please don’t tell me that you are worried that I cannot best the English fop. I fear my manhood could not withstand such a lack of confidence.”

  She smiled tremulously. “This is all completely unnecessary and ridiculous. I cannot comprehend why Geoff has done this.”

  Nial looked down at the panther he held so carefully. She appeared deceptively tame at the moment because her wildness was reserved for him. He glanced at the flowers of English womanhood decorating the room and then back to his panther as he said, “That is the other reason I acceded to your plea that the duel not be to the death. I understand what motivates the man all too well. It is my understanding of his motivation that causes me concern about the duel. I hope he will let the contest rest somewhere short of his death. I know he will follow it beyond first blood.”

  “Why?” Heather was puzzled. “How can you state that with such confidence?”

  “Because if I stood in his shoes I would use every means at my disposal to see his death met. He faces life without you and for that I pity him.” He led Heather to the dance floor, and used the ruse of dancing to move with her closely in his a
rms. "As for me, I shall count the hours until I can don the ball and chain I once avoided so studiously. Love and faeries surely do work in mysterious ways."

  Across the way, Geoff stood tensely, his gaze rarely wavering from the door that the seconds disappeared through. Peter Crandle eyed Nial’s lack of concern and said, “I fear that the laird does not appreciate the seriousness of the coming duel, particularly with an opponent as skilled as Badgerton.”

  John laughed at his son. “You, young Peter, have a lot of living to do and much yet to learn. Nial is not concerned over the party game because he has played for real. Geoff is about to get an education on the difference between what he has learned playing with a sword and what Maclee has learned staking his life on his skill with the weapon. Yet Badgerton will probably survive the day, unless he insists on dying.”

  The door opened and the seconds emerged. Geoff fumed when Boz insisted that they would await Nial. A few minutes later, when Maclee joined them, he gave the announcement.

  “Tomorrow at dawn at Abbott’s field.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The MacIvers left after the seconds returned, and Nial departed for the Sedgewick mansion immediately thereafter. There was not one thing on earth save Heather’s presence that would induce him to attend a ton party. Boz agreed wholeheartedly and departed with his cousin. At his home, he had poured his first whiskey and barely seated himself to attend to some business correspondence when Nial’s loud, “Get the hell out of my room this minute,” rang through the house.

  Boz laughed and strode upstairs to find a lovely English rose sniffling in the hallway, wrapped in the fourteenth bedspread to grace his cousin’s room, and carrying the bundle of her clothes. “He doesn’t want me. I can’t believe he doesn’t want me. I came to offer comfort before his duel with the dastardly Badgerton and this is how he repays me!”

  Boz knocked on his mother’s door. She emerged in her dressing gown to peer disgustedly in the hallway. “Another one? We’re running out of bloody bedspreads.”