by Shayla Black
Averyl felt his loss immediately. ’Twas more than the usual withdrawal of his body. A glance into his closed expression revealed the removal of his thoughts and feelings.
“Look at me,” she whispered again.
Several deep breaths later, he complied. His black eyes reveled naught, no want, no satisfaction, no contempt. Their flat depths crushed her heart.
Averyl rose and dressed in the silence, tears clawing her eyes. Drake would never love her, she realized. Any feeling he had, he would ruthlessly stifle, never admitting it to himself, much less to her. He would give her pleasure. Lord knew he could. He would see after her, protect her.
But as Averyl dressed, she knew Drake would never love her.
* * * * *
“Drake, I would speak with you,” she said the next day.
The gravity of Averyl’s voice behind him made Drake turn to her slowly in the fading daylight the next afternoon. Uneasiness slid through him as he lay his blade next to a pile of logs. The scent of wood hovered pungent about him.
Assuming a casual pose, he wiped the sweat from his brow. He tried not to notice her unsmiling regard. “Would you, my wife? About what?”
She cleared her throat. Folding her hands before her, she blinked several times, then wet her lips nervously.
Had she come to explain why she had turned away from his embrace three times last night, and again this morning? Never since succumbing to the flame between them had she refused him the sweet solace of her body—until now. Why?
“I would talk with you about the end of our handfast,” she said finally, interrupting his reverie.
“’Tis barely begun.” He scowled.
“Aye, but I would have you understand a few things.”
“Would you now?” he tossed back, little liking her tone.
She paced several steps before turning to him again. Shoulders tense within her muted blue gown, she stood fragile yet firm.
“When our handfast is at an end and I am no longer of any use to your revenge, I must insist that you give me the funds promised to save Abbotsford.”
Her home. She worried over its walls, its people. ’Twas in her caring nature. That quality that made her different from his greedy mother. Drake relaxed.
“As I promised.” He caressed her cheek. “Unless I have gone to my grave, I will find a way to give you all that Murdoch agreed to lend your father. You need not worry on that score.”
Averyl turned her face from his touch. Through narrowed eyes, he watched her tense fingers clench each other in a prayerlike pose again.
“I also expect that there will be no further contact between us, that you will set me free in every way.”
Glowering, Drake stared. Had he heard her correctly? She wanted nothing more to do with him? Everything within him rebelled at the thought.
Her greenish gaze crashed into his a moment later. She squared her shoulders, thrusting forward the firm mounds of her breasts. Of course he did not wish her gone. Too many of her body’s delights he had yet to sample.
He sidled closer, backing her against a nearby tree. “My dearest wife, you forget that the pleasures we have shared can often bring consequences.”
Through stiff lips, she replied, “This morn I awakened to the proof that I did not conceive. ’Twould be to everyone’s advantage if we kept it that way.”
Resistance and regret sliced through him. Alarm followed, winding through Drake’s body, centering in his suddenly tight chest. “Do you wish to deny me your wifely comforts for the better part of a year?”
“I wish to deny you the chance to use me at your will. ’Tis not me you desire, but feminine companionship, and we would both be better served to avoid further involvement. Until June next, I am your wife. Our marriage is consummated. Murdoch cannot dispute that. ’Tis what you wanted. You need no more of me.”
The inflectionless precision of her speech stunned Drake. Where was the passionate woman he’d grown accustomed to having beside him? When had the caring woman he’d come to enjoy disappeared? In her place stood an unfeeling enchantress—someone who suddenly resembled his mother more than he liked.
Turning away from her, he reached for his ax again and glanced blindly at the wood before him. An emptiness clawed at his belly, and he hacked at the branches to dispel the feeling.
“You will have your money or my death,” he snarled. “As for our marriage bed, do not imagine I will endure more refusals. I am within my right to take you any time I wish.”
“Use your conscience and leave me be.”
Her cool voice poured over him like salt on an open wound. “You’ve known from the start I am a heartless bastard without a conscience. When I want you, I will have you, wife.”
Averyl’s wide eyes dimmed with disappointment before she looked away. Drake stifled an emotion that felt too much like guilt for comfort. Long moments of silence ticked by.
Finally she raised her gaze to him once more, face somber. “As you will. But do not expect me to respond.”
Before his stunned mind could form a reply, Drake found himself glaring in incredulity at Averyl’s retreating back. She would cast aside their marriage? Just like that? Aye, he’d never wanted the arrangement permanently, but never had he intended to treat it as callously as she.
“By God, you will respond to me, Averyl,” he called after her. “You will respond every bloody night!”
She paused, turning until the last of the day’s rays cast a halo at her back. Lengthening shadows of dusky pink accentuated her fair coloring, her luminous beauty. He wanted her. Now.
Drake took two steps toward her. She threw up a hand to stay him.
“Though you tell me you are a heartless bastard, I know better.” Her voice quivered. “Think well on the fact that if you make me respond to your touch, I will only hate you for it.”
With that, she turned and disappeared into the cottage.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
A week later, Averyl woke slowly, warm and languid—and aware of a heated tingle in her womanly core. Soft lips plied magic in the curve of her neck. On instinct, she arched toward them, seeking pleasure. She was rewarded her with a hot hand upon her breast.
Fingers sizzled her skin as they caressed her through her smock, teased her nipple into a hard pebble. Something within her shouted warnings to withstand the artful mastery of those hands. Then she felt a mouth to her breast, and she moaned at the moist blade of a tongue upon her. Gasping, Averyl struggled to recall why she should resist this.
“Aye, lass,” the voice encouraged. “Feel me.”
Drake!
She opened her eyes to find his gaze fastened upon her, a hot black in the burgeoning light. Such utter male beauty never ceased to amaze her, nor did the depth of her desire. Swallowing, she fought the ache pulsing in her belly.
“This is good and right between us. We need naught else,” he assured, his voice coaxing.
Except love, her mind shouted. Love he possessed not for her. Love he would never feel.
Coming fully awake, she pushed against his shoulders until he eased away, frowning. Averyl clasped the sheet to her.
“Where is my dress?” she demanded.
He glanced at the floor. “’Tis an inconvenient habit you have of wearing too much clothing, my wife.”
Averyl espied her gown beside the bed as Drake leaned closer, allowing her the feel of the velvet strength of his chest. She closed her eyes, praying for fortitude.
For ten nights, she had rejected the arousing advances that curled her toes, the sensual suggestions that shallowed her breathing. Aye, how she wanted him, the sense of joining she always felt with him. ’Twas nothing less than torment to refuse that which she wanted so desperately, his attention, his tenderness, his touch. But her mind, her pride, refused her heart the bliss of surrender.
She would not become his whore, to be used and discarded
as he wished. Though with each day, each kiss, he became harder to deny. Not only did her body respond to his seduction but her heart responded to his seeming confusion at her refusals.
His dark hair brushed her cheek as he loomed closer. Before Averyl could turn away, his lips covered hers. The breadth of his hand encompassed her hip, wound around her thigh, raised her smock to her waist. Eyes closed, she clasped fistfuls of their sheets as she clenched her legs together to fend off the pleasurable onslaught of his nimble fingers.
“Do not touch me,” she whispered.
“Your words say nay, but your voice breaks and pleads,” he breathed, pressing his hot erection directly against her. Her arousal climbed.
Sweet mercy, he was naked. The warm expanse of his golden skin surrounded her, as did the scent of man, musky, wild, not to be denied, as he pressed against her again.
Averyl stifled a groan. How could she ache for him so badly when he wanted naught from her but her body? When he cared so little?
At the apex of her thighs, Averyl felt his fingers, gentle, insistent, coaxing. Her body felt as liquid as a river, her mind as empty as Abbotsford’s fields. She must resist, for her future, for herself. She must…
“I say nay!” She pushed against him again.
This time, Drake sat up and stared at her through a dark scowl. He was very unhappy, indeed.
’Twas no problem of hers. She had all she could manage resisting him, Averyl thought, rising to find her dress.
As she donned the garment, she felt Drake’s eyes upon her, intent.
“Averyl, why—”
“Hello?” called a vaguely familiar voice through the morn’s heavy gray mist, ripping through their solitude.
Drake stiffened and cursed a string of unkind expletives before rising to yank on his hose and tunic, then open the door.
On the other side stood Kieran wearing a lopsided grin.
Holding the door, Drake stepped back, jaw tight, silent.
“Hello, Drake.”
“Greetings,” he intoned, closing the door as Kieran entered the small cottage and sat upon a nearby stool.
“Mind you that I used the key to let myself past your gate?”
“’Tis why I gave it to you.”
Averyl winced at Drake’s abrupt answer. Kieran regarded him with a long look, then a raised brow in her direction.
“My lovely Lady Averyl, forgive my remiss,” said Kieran, rising to take her hand. “How fare you with this rogue?”
She cast an uneasy glance at Drake, whose dark expression did more than hint at his interest in her answer. She could not answer. “What of you, after your last journey here?”
His answering smile was deprecating and charming at once. “I live to see another day of battle and beauties.” Kieran began to raise her hand to his mouth. “Especially your beauty.”
Drake stepped between them, taking her hand from his friend’s and grasping it with his own. “I’ll thank you not to touch my wife.”
“Wife?” Kieran’s blue-green eyes widened as his mouth dropped open in incredulity. All attempts at teasing disappeared. “You wed her? You took her to wife?”
Averyl blanched, wondering if Kieran was surprised that Drake had married…or that he had tied himself to so homely a bride. She tried to pry her hand from Drake’s.
He resisted, placing a hand about her waist to bring her against him. “Aye. What of it?”
Kieran said naught for near a minute. Even the birds ceased their songs.
Finally, a wide smile curled his wide charmer’s mouth. “You rascal, I thought you would never take a bride, given Diera—”
“This is not a love match.” Drake released her abruptly.
Again, Kieran fell silent. He glanced between Drake and herself, his gaze measuring, oddly disappointed. “Then why?”
“Murdoch cannot wed her if I have.”
“Unless he kills you, you dimwit!”
“He will do all he can to kill me, regardless. But if Averyl should escape”—he pinned her with a gaze that consumed and accused her at once—“Murdoch cannot wed her.”
Kieran groaned. “You have enraged Murdoch enough. But to wed her… He will take more pleasure in your death if he catches you.”
“Why?” Averyl broke in. “MacDougall cares naught for me.”
Kieran faced her. “Murdoch cares for no one but himself. ’Tis money he covets, which he stands to inherit a great deal of, but not unless he weds you before you turn eight and ten.”
The infamous will again. Murdoch had the power of the clan behind him now, but none of the funds, not unless he wed her soon. And only Drake stood between her and Murdoch’s plans. Averyl trembled as she realized the added danger her handfast husband had placed himself in by speaking vows with her.
“And what if you live?” Kieran challenged. “What of your wife then?”
“We are but handfast. In a year’s time, she will be free.”
Kieran sighed, shaking his head. “Idiot. Your quest for revenge all but ensures your death.”
“I knew such when I started.”
“’Tis utterly foolish!” she cried. “You cannot mean to see your life’s blood spilled over some dead man’s money.”
Kieran grimaced. “Lochlan was like a god to his people. Such was doubly true of Drake, his—”
“No more,” Drake hissed. “We are wed for the next year. No one, least of all Murdoch, can change that.”
She looked from Kieran’s chagrined features to Drake’s tense ones. Another secret. She could feel it, for the very words had hovered on the tip of Kieran’s tongue. How exactly had Drake and Murdoch’s father known each other to form a strong bond of friendship? And why did Drake want to keep the secret so badly?
As much as Averyl yearned to know, she turned away. Until Drake could trust her enough to speak his secrets, until he could care for her as she cared for him, knowing meant naught.
Certain her wishes were futile, she left the cottage.
* * * * *
Drake stared at Averyl’s retreating back, wondering why he should feel guilt for not sharing the shame of his secret with her. Aye, she was his wife now, but not forever. Nor, thank God, would she be witness to the fateful day when his past finally confronted him.
“Drake,” Kieran began, snaring his attention once more. “Guilford worries for you. He is an old man now—”
“Not so old he cannot manipulate you into watching me more ably than a nanny.”
“That is so,” Kieran said with a laugh. “But Aric and I worry as well.”
“Do not. Aric has a new life with Gwenyth, while yours is that of a traveling soldier. Think of that.”
Kieran scowled. “We did not rescue you from Dunollie’s dungeon to watch you die.”
“Revenge will make me whole again,” argued Drake.
“Revenge can do naught but destroy you. Murdoch grows desperate and ruthless as the days become weeks,” Kieran warned.
Drake paused. “Where is he now?”
Kieran grimaced. “I could not say. ’Tis as if Murdoch knows someone brings you information, for suddenly his lips stay as tightly closed as a nun’s thighs.”
That fact filled Drake with dread, for Murdoch had never been a fool. “And Firtha knows nothing?”
“Even less than I.”
Drake smothered a curse. “Were you followed here?”
“I think not, but Murdoch is anxious. He suspects everyone.”
Drake shrugged his dim thoughts away. “Mayhap you should go elsewhere for awhile before returning.”
“Aye. Mayhap you should consider the same as a safeguard. I overheard he has doubled the number of men searching for you.”
Digesting that news with a slow nod, Drake answered, “’Tis no less than I expected, since I doubt he will give up now.”
Kieran sighed in frustration
. “Nay, but what of you? Guilford and Aric think me reckless. But you, my friend, take risks I would not. Do you have naught else to live for?”
An image of Averyl in his arms this very morn, writhing against her own desire, flashed through his mind. Such was hopeless. She wanted what he could not give. She wanted love.
Gritting his teeth, he faced Kieran. “I have nothing beyond seeing Murdoch burn.”
Drake met Kieran’s disbelieving stare with a hard glare of his own.
“Then God have mercy upon your soul—and my hide. For when Guilford hears you mean to see this through, he will likely try to change the shape of my head with his mace.”
* * * * *
Kieran found Averyl sitting by the shimmering pool at the bottom of the ravine, throwing rocks into the clear blue depths.
Beside her, he eased onto the short grass and plucked a nearby wildflower. When she looked up in his direction, he handed the blossom to her. She took it without a word.
“This abduction has not been easy for you,” he began.
Averyl’s mouth pinched tightly, unhappily. She wore so many emotions upon her young face: hurt, hope, need, fear, anger. He hardly knew where one ended and the next began. Kieran wondered if she knew that herself.
And if what he suspected was true, Drake’s choice of a mate surprised him. But it pleased him as well. A woman capable of such feeling, and displaying them without caution, might be exactly what his isolated friend needed to find his soul again.
And that Averyl was lovely with her innocent eyes and fresh pink cheeks only made Kieran smile more.
“He makes such difficult, for both of us,” Averyl said.
“Of late, Drake has exceled in difficult, my lady. Fear not, he has a heart. He simply has trouble hearing it.”
Averyl’s head popped up and she turned her wide hazel gaze upon him. So much green. So much hope and sadness in so winsome a setting.
Kieran felt his interest stirring. He was, after all, a healthy man. Reminding himself this particular beauty was not his, he smiled.
Suddenly hope left her features. “He has no heart.”
