“I suppose,” Grace said, watching the muscles flex in his exposed leg. “But a helpless woman has much more to fear than a warrior. We are easily captured, where mighty warriors are never trapped at all.” She watched him to see if his posture changed, warning her that he might be more enemy than savior.
His gaze met hers directly. “A warrior is trapped by his duty, his honor to uphold the dictates of his chief, the judgment of his people. It can consume a man’s life,” he said, his voice dropping lower, yet he didn’t look away.
All worry about his intentions faded at the hint of vulnerability Grace caught in Keir’s fierce image. “A woman, too, can be trapped by all those things,” she said. “It is a human affliction, I fear.” She leaned slightly closer. “Right now, though, there is no one to judge either of us,” she said. “I’m currently not plagued by fear, and you don’t have to do anything for your clan tonight. In a way, trapped here together…” She swallowed and inhaled. “We are free, holed up in this little house, surrounded by darkness and snow, with no one nearby expecting us to be a lady or a warrior.” Her voice crept softer with each word. “Just a woman and a man. No one to hear…if one of us was to say…” Grace shrugged one of her shoulders. “More.”
He stared at her for a long moment, until Grace began to wonder if she’d actually spoken out loud or had only thought the powerful word. His gaze searched her face. “Ye are not afraid of me?”
She gave small shakes of her head. Could he see a hint of unease in her, like a familiar wound she wanted desperately to ignore? “No fear. No duty. Just the two of us.” Desire and thudding eagerness prickled up her skin. She could feel it under the fabric of her sleeves, making her hands tingle and her body come alive. It was like fire curling out from her middle to heat her, awakening places within her that Keir had only started to unearth when she’d kissed him earlier in the snow.
Keir’s intense gaze shifted over her as he pressed forward. “And ye know what happens between a man and a woman? When they are alone?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Not personally…but I’ve watched two people…tupping.”
His brows rose slightly, as did her blush. “Ye spy on people tupping?”
She opened her mouth and closed it with a little huff. “My sister—”
“Ye’ve watched your sister tupping?”
“No!” She huffed. “She and I were going to the barn on Somerset Estate, and we came across a maid and a groom together…alone.” She moved her hand instead of adding more.
“And ye stayed to watch.”
“No, well…yes. They were enraptured of each other.” She shook her head. “Their pleasure was so fierce it seemed almost painful.” She swallowed. “Perhaps the same way Icarus felt in the heat of the sun.”
He brushed her cheek with his thumb. The simple touch shot tingles down through Grace. “Icarus felt hot and melting,” he said.
“Oh…” Grace curled her fingers into the blanket under her. “The maid and groom were quite flushed.” She wet her lips, looking away for a moment to give her rational mind a chance to decide if she was actually going to give in to the adventure her body was craving. Would regret haunt her if she surrendered her body to this powerful, kind man? Rather, if she walked away without tasting the pleasure he offered, she’d wonder about it her entire life. Looking back, she met his stare. “I think ‘more’ encompasses all of that,” she whispered, mesmerized by the desire in his gaze.
She gave a small nod and wet her lips, watching his gaze dip to them and return to her eyes. “Yes, Keir. I am asking for more.”
As if a wild stallion had been allowed out of his gate, Keir pulled her in to him, his mouth melting over hers. Her heart leaped inside, her toes curling to prop her up, meeting him there on bent knees. She threaded fingers into his soft hair, raking his head and slanting against his mouth. Wild. Passionate. Free. Grace lost herself quickly, releasing her confined heat into the kiss. Pressing against him, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, clinging to him while they kissed. Her nails raked down Keir’s back, feeling his shoulder blades move under the fabric of his shirt. She wanted the shirt gone, wanted his skin on her skin.
With a small growl in the back of her throat, Grace yanked on the edge of his shirt, freeing it from the waist of his kilt. Keir’s large hands clasped her head as he tasted her. When she slid her hands underneath his shirt, along the hot skin of his chest, he groaned, rubbing his hands down her to squeeze her backside.
Ravenous. Grace hungered for the sensations whipping around inside her, pooling to ache down in her pelvis. She kissed him, working his shirt higher until he finished the task by shucking it, throwing it off toward the door. She inhaled, her eyes fastened on his glorious bare chest. She grasped his shoulders, sliding her palms down along his skin and moving muscles. “Good Lord, you are beautiful,” she said, making him pull her against all that hot skin to kiss her, his hands sliding along her neck to her scalp.
Kneeling, Grace held herself level with his face. Keir’s hands rucked up the back of her skirt, baring her legs, caressing the skin, teasing it and rubbing. Without a smock to work around, he had immediate access to all her naked flesh. His hands found and cupped her rounded backside.
“Touch me,” she said against his lips and inched her legs apart. He answered her with a growl that filled her with fluttery anticipation. “Touch my heat,” she said. The words that filled her head instantly came out on her tongue. Honest words of passion and want. Whispered things she’d fantasized about all afternoon and while she’d bathed. “I want you, Keir Mackinnon. I want you to feel how wet I am, how hot I am inside.” Did people talk while fornicating? It didn’t matter one way or another. No one was present to hear, and every word she said seemed to drive Keir more and more frantic. Speaking them aloud licked passion up through Grace.
Working down under her hips, Keir’s fingers slid along her intimately, and Grace leaned into him. “Oh God, yes,” she breathed, arching her back and opening to him. Strong, gentle fingers filled her, pressing and stroking. Grace kissed him, opening her mouth as much as she opened her body to him. Running her hands down his chest, she reached under his kilt to capture the heaviness she’d felt pressing against her stomach.
Large, hot, and heavy, he filled her hands. Velvet soft over the hardest of steel, she stroked up and down to the rhythm he’d begun. He groaned in her mouth, and they slanted against each other, wild with unleashed passion. Keir left her lips to trail kisses along her neck and over to her ear as he stroked her backside, cupping and stroking below. “Ye smell like flowers and hot, wet woman,” he said, his voice a whispered rasp.
“That’s because I am a hot, wet woman,” she said back.
He breathed against her. “Aye, ye certainly are, and I like hearing about it.”
She looked into his face and saw only sincere appreciation and passion. She grinned. “Good, because I seem to really like telling you about it.”
His fingers worked to loosen her bodice until it gaped away from her breasts. With a small shrug, Grace slid off each sleeve, baring her arms, and pulled the bodice away to fall on the floor. Her breasts fell heavily before her, nipples hard and completely open to his view. Part of her couldn’t believe she was baring herself to a man she’d met only a week ago, but a much louder part of her mind couldn’t believe she’d waited so long to discover what it felt like to be with a man. And not any man, but a chiseled, brawny, fiercely passionate man like Keir Mackinnon.
He whispered something in Gaelic, something that sounded reverent. Grace lifted her breasts with her hands, pinching her nipples like she did when she fantasized alone in her bed. Watching him view her made it even more erotic, and she reached down to ruck up her skirts in front.
“Och, lass,” he said. “Ye are exquisite.” He reached forward to cup her one breast while pulling her back in for another heart-pounding kiss. Lost in the feel of her nipples brushing against the light hair sprinkling his chest, Grace felt cl
enching below. Keir followed her own fingers, finding her sweet spot without her even having to tell him about it.
Grace breathed hard on a moan as he rubbed, feeling herself grow hotter by the heartbeat. “More, Keir. I want more.”
“Bloody beautiful,” he rasped. “Ye are soaked, lass. I want to taste ye.”
She kissed him boldly. “You are,” she said against his lips.
He smiled wickedly against her mouth. “I want to taste more of ye.”
“You may feast on any part of me,” she whispered.
Keir pulled back, and she watched the firelight carve across the planes of his face. “Every word ye say amazes me,” he said.
She rubbed her breasts against his chest. “Every touch you give amazes me.” Her lips curled up as she narrowed her eyes in a seductively teasing glare. “Touch me until I burn like the sun.”
“Aye,” he said, wrapping her in his warm arms, kissing her senseless. When he broke away she nearly cried out, but the promise in his eyes thrilled her anew. Palming and teasing her breasts, he lowered his mouth to one peak, and Grace gasped at the hot, wet tug that seemed to stretch down through her body. “More,” she said out loud, but he continued his slow tease. Each kiss, each tug and lick coiled tighter inside her middle, until she bent her knees, exposing herself. Reaching down his hot skin, she rubbed against his huge length, stroking until he groaned.
“Keir, watch me,” she whispered at his ear. She felt his shoulders contract, and he sat back.
One hand on her own breast, one hand down below, her fingers moving and diving, he gritted his teeth, his own fist riding up and down over his bared member. “Bloody hell, Grace,” he said, joining her in working her tender flesh.
Grace gasped. “Oh bloody… Oh good God,” Grace called out as she felt her insides grow with a tide of passion.
“Och, Grace. I want to taste ye.”
“Yes,” she nearly yelled, and he lowered his mouth.
Bam! Bam! Bam! Someone pounded on the outside door.
Grace gasped, a scream flying from her already open mouth.
Chapter Eight
Keir leaped off the bed, ignoring the cramping pain in his thigh and his aching yard. Grace rolled to the back, nearly falling off the bed as she scrambled to reach the cover of the blanket in the back corner. Where was his bloody sword?
“Keir Mackinnon,” called the arsehole outside the cabin. “Are ye in there?”
“Bloody bastard,” Keir said, his curse seething out from behind clenched teeth as the familiar voice registered in his mind. “Brodie,” he yelled back.
“Aye, what’s going on in there? I found your saddle near the boulders and then Cogadh in the barn, so I knew ye must be about.”
Keir retrieved his sword by the door and lifted the bar. It swung inward with a gust. “What are ye doing here?” Keir asked in Gaelic.
Brodie’s gaze scanned the interior of the cabin. “Looking for ye.” He raised one eyebrow at the pile of lady’s sleeves and bodice near the hearth. “Thought I heard something…interesting,” he said and glanced down at Keir’s tented kilt.
“And yet, ye knocked anyway,” Keir said, his words low and lethal as he adjusted himself.
Brodie smiled broadly, unfazed by Keir’s deadly stare, and walked farther into the room. “What a cozy cabin,” he said in English. “It’s the one we passed before the storm turned terrible. I could have sworn I heard a woman scream.” He tramped to the hearth, tracking snow.
A movement behind the blanket screen pulled Brodie’s gaze. “I saw a mouse,” Grace called out. “I always scream when I see a mouse. Silly really, but I do.”
Brodie looked at Keir’s shirt on the floor, his brows raised nearly to his hairline. Keir shrugged, grabbing it up. “I threw my shirt at it.” He tossed it on over his head.
“Who’s the lady?” Brodie asked in Gaelic.
“An answer to Rabbie’s prayers,” Keir continued in their language.
Brodie pulled off his heavy wraps. “You found Mairi Maclean?” His eyes went wide. “And you tupped her. Rabbie’s friend isn’t going to be happy about that.”
“What’s being said?” Grace asked, her face peeking around the blanket. “Hello.”
Brodie gave a little bow, his smile almost leering when he saw how beautiful Grace was. Called Keir’s nicer twin, the good warrior to temper the brutal warrior, Brodie often loved the lasses who were too frightened by Keir. Brodie was as tall and broad as he, with pigmented crosses etched on his back, though only half the number as Keir.
“Hello, lass,” he said.
“She isn’t the one we sought,” Keir said in Gaelic, hoping Grace didn’t know more than curse words in their language. “But she’s a talented healer and will do. The other is wed to the Wolf of Kisimul and about to birth her first bairn.”
Brodie nodded. “Milady, I’m sure the mouse was more frightened of you.” He laughed. “Usually, Keir is the scariest creature in a room. He eats mice for breakfast.”
Keir shoved Brodie as he walked toward the blanket, but before he could reach it, Grace stepped out wearing what little was left of her smock. The linen hung right above her knees, exposing the long, shapely legs that should be locked around his hips at the moment. Sleeves torn away, a low neckline and short skirt made the ensemble arousing as hell.
“I was changing out here,” Grace said, pointing to her skirt pooled by the bed. “While Keir waited like a gentleman behind the screen. I screamed when I saw the mouse, and he came out to rescue me.” She smiled sweetly. “I am Grace Ellington, lately of Aros Castle on the Isle of Mull. My sister is the new Lady Maclean, and your friend rescued me from the storm at the expense of his leg.” Grace took a full breath and continued while both men stood in silence. “I used my smock to bind his wound and the hock of his horse, leaving me with very little in which to sleep.”
She stepped forward with a tilt of her lovely head. “And you are?”
Brodie stood as if stunned for a moment, his mouth open. Was he looking at Grace’s naked arms and legs? Keir strode past Grace and yanked the blanket from the hooks in the walls. Walking up behind her, he wrapped her in it.
Brodie had closed his mouth and found his grin. “I am Brodie Mackinnon, second-in-command of the warriors at Dunakin Castle.”
Grace pulled the blanket around her shoulders to grasp in front of her. She stared back at his friend as if she were a regal queen in her ermine-lined robes. “And you also know Mairi Maclean?” she asked. She glanced at Keir. “I heard him say her name, and you told him about Kisimul.”
The lass was quick. She looked between them as if trying to decipher a riddle. Brodie glanced to Keir, obviously not sure how much he could reveal. “Aye,” Keir said. “Brodie and I were journeying down to Aros to ask her to return with us to cure my nephew, like I mentioned.”
“Perhaps,” Brodie said, glancing around as if for a chair. He ended up lowering to sit against the wall. “Ye could return with us to help poor Lachlan.”
“I’m afraid I cannot,” Grace said, her gaze moving to Keir. “I am expected on Barra Isle, and I left an ill man back in Kilchoan.”
“At the inn?” Brodie asked.
“Yes. You were there?” she asked.
Brodie nodded. “The maid was taking soup and bread to him when I inquired about a room. Said she was taking care of him, and he was doing quite well.”
Ballocks, Brodie. Don’t push the explanation too far. But Keir couldn’t say anything, and crossed his arms over his chest, his gaze on the angel standing in the center of the small room.
“Truthfully?”
Brodie smiled. “Aye.”
Grace sighed, her shoulders lowering a bit. “That is fortunate. So, the roads are passable now?”
“Nay,” Brodie said, crossing his big feet at the ankles as if he was settling in for the bloody night. “For horses, but not carriages.”
“Did ye put your horse in the barn?” Keir asked.
“Aye. Th
at’s when I saw your charger looking quite cozy and well fed.”
“’Tis a cozy place for ye to sleep, too,” Keir said. “We can talk in the morning about…plans.”
“Little Warrior is lame, and Keir can’t walk far with his wolf bite still healing,” Grace said, sitting on the edge of the bed. She scooped up her skirt and lay it across her lap.
“Little Warrior?” Brodie asked. “Wolf bite? Those can turn foul.”
“Very,” Grace said. “Luckily I had the makings for a poultice that pulled out the taint and some feverfew to brew. Keir was unconscious for three days with fever.”
“Ye seem hardy now,” Brodie said. “Fully functional again.” His dastardly grin told Keir that he meant tupping and not walking.
“Weakness still plagues him,” she said.
“It does not,” Keir replied immediately.
She ignored him. “He still can’t walk long distances, hence the problem if Little Warrior is lame,” Grace said.
“She calls Cogadh Little Warrior because he’s too sweet to be called War,” Keir said.
“Sweet? I’ve seen that horse kick a man’s teeth out.” Brodie stretched and rolled forward to stand. He picked his heavy cloak from over the iron poker and shrugged into it. “I will go bed down with the horses, and I’ll let the two of ye get back to…hunting your mouse.”
Grace’s lovely lips opened in dismay. “Oh, Keir will join you soon. Once he was fully up and vigorous, I mean awake…he’s stayed in the barn with his horse.”
Bloody hell. He was being banished. Instead of a glorious night of heady passion with a deliciously vocal angel, he’d be tossing in the cold hay next to Brodie. If Brodie smiled at him, he’d end up with his teeth at his feet. Realizing his danger, Brodie nodded and slipped out the door without anything more than a neutral grin.
Keir lowered the bar across the door and turned to Grace. He shot his fingers through his hair to cup the back of his head. “I can stay.”
“What will your friend think?” Grace whispered, clutching the blanket around her so that only her face stuck out.
The Devil of Dunakin Castle (Highland Isles) Page 6
