My Scot, My Surrender (Lords of Essex)

by Howard, Amalie

Sorcha’s eyes widened, as if pleading with him to be quiet. He only smirked, his gaze trained on her. So much had passed between them since then…since that moment he’d first laid eyes on her, but Brandt would never forget the memory of her, ferocious and beautiful in equal measure. A virago in battle armor, flush with victory.

  “And yet, she bested her opponent with her skill. I was watching from afar when she pulled off her helm and I realized she was a lady, not a boy as I’d assumed.”

  Aisla gasped and grinned, turning to stare at Sorcha with awe. Callan huffed an impressed laugh and drew from his tankard.

  “I knew I had to meet her,” Brandt went on, Sorcha’s alarm setting the tips of her ears afire. “And when I did, I knew…she wasn’t just a swordswoman. She was a sorceress.” Brandt raised his tankard to her. “Because I immediately fell under her spell.”

  Sorcha’s tensed shoulders fell and, though her cheeks and ears stayed bright with color, she was breathing easier. Suddenly shy, she couldn’t seem to hold his stare. It wasn’t as though he’d strayed that far from the truth. He’d withheld only the specific terms of their agreement, but he had been mesmerized by her from the very start in that paddock.

  Athena, he’d thought her.

  Though now, as he had discovered, that comparison failed to come close to the reality.

  “Love at first sight, ye ken.” Aisla sat back in her chair with a sigh, a hand covering her heart and girlish stars in her eyes. “’Tis so lovely. So verra romantic.”

  Brandt saw Sorcha shake her head slightly, and he smiled. Their meeting had not been romantic in the least, despite his gawking, and he knew it was exactly what his wife was thinking.

  What was romance anyway? A collection of words, maybe, said to another person. Promises made. Though words were forgotten, promises easily broken. It was action Brandt admired. Loyalty and resolve. Sorcha was a stubborn, unflinching, maddening woman, and yet she would not give up. She’d proven her mettle in the last handful of days as they’d traveled, fighting Coxley and Malvern’s hired men at every turn.

  Laying herself bare to him at the river—that had taken courage, too.

  And he’d belittled her for it.

  Aisla sighed again, though the sound had taken on an edge of despair. “Truly, I only wish I could meet a man as ye did. With my luck, I’ll be married off to the Buchanans fer the sake of an alliance.” She scowled and then laughed. “Or a dog. Though I ken I’d marry the dog over Dougal Buchanan. ’Twould smell heaps better.”

  Callan snorted with laughter. “Aye, dunnae fash yerself, Aisla. Patrick and I would toss the Buchanan into the loch before he put one finger upon ye.”

  She stuck her tongue out at her brother. “I’d elope with a handsome Sassenach over that lout.”

  “Hush, Aisla,” Lady Glenross said with a nervous glance over her shoulder as if expecting her husband’s return any moment.

  “How did you and the duke meet?” Sorcha asked, and then clamped her hand over her mouth with an appalled look. It was well known how they had met, Brandt knew, and well rumored that the late duke’s death had been fratricide.

  However, the duchess did not seem troubled by the question. Brandt felt her gaze linger on him for a protracted moment before she answered.

  “I was married to his brother, Robert,” she said. “He died in a fall, and Rodric was there to share the burden of my grief. We married shortly after the mourning period had passed.” She shrugged delicate shoulders. “’Twas the best thing for the clan.”

  Brandt grasped at the opening. “That must have been hard for you and the laird’s sisters. Where are they?” he asked. “Did they grow up here at Montgomery? Were they of comfort to you as well?”

  He didn’t care if he sounded oddly inquisitive. He didn’t plan to remain under Rodric’s roof much longer, and he still wanted answers.

  “Aye. ’Twas a difficult time, but Jean and Una had already married. They visited, of course, and mourned their brother’s death, but they had their own lives. I was inconsolable, and Rodric was the only one there to pick up the pieces.”

  Brandt exhaled, his fingers clenching into fists on his lap. “Did Jean and Una have any children?”

  Lady Glenross blinked at the question, her pale brows coming together in concern. “Several. Why do ye ask?”

  “No reason.”

  And Brandt had none. None that would be acceptable. He had no way to ask outright if either of the Montgomery girls had been ruined by her friend, the stableboy, and given birth to a son some twenty-five years before. He wished that Monty had given him more to go on, a name even. But the names Jean and Una were not familiar. Brandt was certain Monty had never mentioned either of them.

  “What was yer father like?” The soft question came from the duchess.

  “Monty?” He smiled, noticing that Sorcha had also leaned forward in interest. Brandt didn’t see any harm in talking about his father now that Rodric had left.

  “He was a good man. Brave. Principled. Believed in the inherent goodness of men, and that one did not need to be born a nobleman to be noble. He managed the Duke of Bradburne’s stables for years, and when he died, I took over.” Nostalgia for the old codger crept over him. It had been a long while since he’d felt such a sharp yearning to see him again.

  “Was he kind to ye?” The duchess was focused on her hands that were knotted tightly together on the table, but she waited intently for his reply.

  “Yes, he was. Monty didn’t have a malicious bone in his body.”

  “And yer mother?” she asked, her voice wobbling slightly. Her bloodless fingers weaved and cinched together as if in agitation, though her countenance remained rigidly composed. “Was she there with ye in Essex?”

  “No,” Brandt replied, not curbing his bitter tone. “My mother remained in Scotland while my father raised me on his own. I was born a bastard.”

  Aisla gasped, as did Sorcha. Callan watched him with interest. But it was the duchess’s response that stunned Brandt the most. Her shoulders curled backward as she gave a short bark of laughter, and then leaned across the table to meet his stare directly.

  “Ye’re no’ a bastard.”

  The furious intensity of her reply hit him first, but Brandt couldn’t breathe. All the oxygen was sucked out of the room the minute her eyes connected with his and held them. They weren’t dark as he’d initially assumed.

  They were hazel, flecked with gold and green. Fey eyes.

  His eyes.

  Everything tilted on its axis. The floor, the hall, his entire world. Brandt lifted narrowed eyes to the woman seated across from him. “Who are you?”

  Lady Glenross’s mouth opened and closed, but then she stood. Tears replaced her laughter and streamed down her cheeks as she rushed from the hall. Brandt’s chest felt too small to contain his hammering heart. But if he had her eyes, and he looked like the dead duke, then that would mean…

  Good God, it was impossible.

  No. Monty was his father. His mother had to be the laird’s sister. It was the only thing that made sense. Unless Monty had lied. The room spun in tune with his brain as Monty’s broken parting words came back to haunt him.

  I never told…you…truth. I’m no’, no’…

  His father. He’d been about to say not your father.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The torches had all been lit and the fire stoked by the time Sorcha and Brandt returned to their room. As she’d promised, Morag had sent a few maids in to clean and tidy during sup. Neatly tied sprigs of bog myrtle and thistle lay on the pillows, and Sorcha smelled freshly laundered sheets along with the soap she’d used during her bath, rather than the musty, closed-up air of the room as they’d first found it. Though she’d barely touched her food, she didn’t feel hungry. Her stomach churned, but it was from unease, and the silence Brandt had wrapped himself up in ever since Lady Glenross had fled the great hall.

  Their conversation had gone from pleasant and polite, to murky and barbed wit
hin moments, it had seemed. Who are you? Brandt’s question had sent Rodric’s wife running, with tears in her eyes. Aisla had excused herself to follow her mother, and soon after, Callan had also bid them a good night.

  All the while, Morag’s hushed and fervent advice to Sorcha and Brandt earlier, to leave as quickly as they could, that it wasn’t safe here, and that devils roamed these lands, repeated in the back of her mind. There was something wrong with the Montgomery, and as Sorcha toed off her slippers and felt the shock of the cold stones against her feet, she wanted only to lock the door and stay safely tucked away in her room with Brandt.

  He went to stand before the hearth, his jaw screwed tight just as it had been since the great hall. She watched the shadows play over his profile—the strong, sharp lines of his forehead and nose, the concerned furrow of his brow—and wished she could read his mind. She had her suspicions; all the talk about Monty had likely dredged up memories. Though before, when speaking of his father, there had been a softness to Brandt’s expression. A softness that was not there now.

  “Tell me,” Sorcha whispered.

  Brandt turned his ear to her, not bothering to soften his reply. “Tell you what?”

  She flinched at the bleakness in his voice. “What was that with Lady Glenross?”

  The duchess had been appalled at Brandt’s confession that he’d been born a bastard. Affronted, even. The woman seemed to believe that he had not been born out of wedlock, which hinted to her knowing much more about Brandt than she’d led them to believe. But then she’d fled the hall like the very devils Morag had spoken of were at her heels.

  Brandt didn’t answer Sorcha’s question, only giving an abrupt shake of his head. Clearly, he didn’t wish to speak about it. And why should he confide in her? Her heart had swelled during sup, when Rodric had insulted her and he’d risen in her defense. But Sorcha also knew that had he stayed quiet, Brandt would have been pegged as a weakling. A man of no courage. Perhaps her husband had only stood in her defense to prove that he would not be trifled with.

  The excuse hurt, and it also rung hollow. She wanted to believe he’d meant his words, and that his defense had been genuine. But he kept changing his mind, this obstinate man, and the moment Sorcha thought she knew what he was about, he seemed only to go and prove her wrong. One moment, he couldn’t keep his hands off her. The next, he was walking away. She wanted him to at least talk to her, the way he had during their travels here. But most of all, she wanted to chase off the haunted look in his eyes.

  Sorcha went to him, her feet padding across the floor, swept clean by the maids and covered in spots by rugs and animal pelts that had not been in place when Morag had first shown them the room. Brandt seemed to sense her approach, and she saw the muscles in his back and shoulders tense.

  “You should get some sleep,” he told her without turning around. “Take the bed, and I’ll take the chairs here. It will be hours yet before I will be able to close my eyes.”

  Standing so close to him, she couldn’t stop her hands from reaching for the knots of tension in his shoulders. He inhaled audibly when she touched him, her fingers pressing firmly into his bunched muscle.

  “Don’t be daft,” she replied. “That bed is big enough for the two of us and our horses.”

  “I don’t think Morag would appreciate that mess.” She caught sight of his profile again as he tilted his chin, and saw his lips break into a smile. Sorcha massaged his shoulders some more, and his head lolled back, a soft groan expelling from his throat. Her thumbs dug into the muscled flesh beneath the soft linen of his shirt, kneading and rolling, until she felt the largest of the knots start to loosen.

  “You have strong hands,” he murmured.

  “Sit,” she told him, gently leading him into one of the cushioned chairs in front of the hearth.

  “Sorcha—”

  She pushed the heels of her palms into the tops of his shoulders. “Let me do this for you, leannan.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Sorcha hadn’t realized what she’d called him. She felt herself flush. “It’s a silly Gaelic term of endearment; it means nothing.”

  Without giving him a chance to protest her touch or react to her stupid slip calling him sweetheart, Sorcha sank her fingers deep into the muscle tissue just above his clavicle, wringing a deep groan from him as she squeezed firmly. She kept the pressure on while following circular motions with her thumbs along his upper back. She worked for a few minutes in silence, punctuated only by the sounds of pleasure escaping his lips.

  The small moans tugged at places deep inside her own body, but Sorcha kept herself focused on the task. She wasn’t able to stifle a small gasp when she slipped her fingers inside the neckline of his shirt to palm his warm skin. She loved to touch him, the feel of his bare skin against hers. Any part of her. His muscles leaped reflexively beneath her touch, but she calmed them with wide stroking oscillations. She wanted to press her lips to the hollow where his neck met his shoulders, follow in the path of her fortunate fingers, and trail her lips along the length of his spine. Sorcha marveled at the texture of his skin. He was steel overlaid with silk, strength wrapped in tenderness.

  Her fingers crept into his soft hair as she massaged his scalp, threading through the long burnished strands. Brandt sighed with pleasure again, and this time, her entire body responded. The more she touched him, the more she craved. Sorcha kept going, even after she’d felt the tension dissolve and his flesh became malleable. She was only torturing herself, she knew, but she was so drunk on the sensation of him that she couldn’t stop if she tried.

  “That feels incredible,” he murmured.

  “Good, I’m glad. You’re as stiff as an old branch.”

  His chuckle was low and deep, striking a pleasant chord within her. “Stiffness seems to have become my Achilles’ heel these past few weeks.”

  “Perhaps you need to stretch more,” she suggested innocently.

  Brandt made a choked sound and then forcibly cleared his throat. “Are you volunteering your services, my lady?”

  A heated blush overtook her at the underlying innuendo, and she was grateful she was out of his range of sight. Their banter was most dangerous when combined with desire. She took the coward’s way out. “Only my fingers.”

  “I give myself over to your leisure, then,” he said softly.

  Cheeks scorching, Sorcha returned to the muscles around his collarbone, thinking of how his fingers had pleasured her. How his tongue and mouth had done the same. Pleasing him now, giving him the same sensation of complete release as she massaged the worry and stress he’d built up inside over the last many days, made her feel powerful. In the moments when Brandt had brought her to ecstasy, there had been nothing in this world she wouldn’t have done or given or said to be able to continue what she was feeling. In those moments, he’d held complete sway over her. He’d had the power.

  Now, as his head relaxed against the back of the chair, and her fingers delved under the collar of his shirt, she knew she was the one who held sway. For a tantalizing moment, she wondered if she were to walk around the chair and climb into his lap whether he would continue to succumb. The scandalous thought made her dizzy.

  The smooth feel of his bare skin was heaven and hell in equal measure. She wanted to lick his sleek neck. Bite into the corded muscle. Rub her breasts against his bare back in wicked abandon.

  I want you, leannan. I want you.

  Every rational bone in her body argued that she should move away, but she couldn’t stop. He needed this. He needed her, even if he wouldn’t admit it.

  She moved from his neck to his shoulders once again, the breadth of them and the heavy muscle under her palms strumming a violent chord of want inside her. It throbbed along the insides of her ribs and cascaded down to her thighs in molten ribbons. Her senses were so heightened it wouldn’t take much to push her over the edge…the same precipice he’d brought her to twice before. Sorcha squeezed her legs together, and her bre
ath snagged.

  Diah, what he did to her was beyond sinful.

  Exhaling somewhat shakily, she concentrated on rubbing her thumbs into the base of his neck and working them in slow circular strokes. She aimed for safer ground with serious conversation. “Do you think your Monty could have been the man Lady Glenross spoke of? The one she knew as Pherson?”

  A muscle jumped reflexively against her thumbs before settling down again.

  “It’s possible,” he answered. She’d put him at ease enough to speak to her about it, at least.

  “She spoke well of him,” Sorcha added.

  “Yes,” Brandt replied, his voice hitching lower. “It did sound as if she’d been fond of him.”

  Sorcha heard the suspicion on his tone, and the knots in his neck suddenly became harder to massage. She lowered her lips to his ear. “Tell me something about him. A memory.”

  Anything to direct his mind along a different path.

  He sighed, and she breathed in the warmed spice of his skin. This man drove her desire like nothing she’d ever imagined possible. Just the deeply masculine scent of him made her want to touch her tongue to his ear, press it against his neck, and feel his pulse leap. But she restrained herself. He needed more than one kind of release; Brandt needed to talk.

  “A memory,” he repeated, again turning pliable beneath her constant ministrations. “I was young. Maybe eight, and my stepmother, Anne, had just passed,” he started, his lashes having fluttered shut. “We didn’t make it a habit to celebrate birthdays, but that year, Monty attempted to bake muffins. He burned them to crisps.”

  Brandt chuckled, the sound reverberating up through Sorcha’s hands and into the small bones of her arms. “I managed to choke down two before he insisted we give the rest to the hogs. But even they refused to eat them, and hogs eat anything. He was a terrible cook.”

  She smiled at the lightness of his voice. “He sounds like he was a good man.”

  He opened his eyes, and from her vantage point, she thought she could see a flicker of doubt. But then he spoke, and the admiration he held for Montgomery Pierce, or Pherson Montgomery, was indisputable. “He cared for me, and I cared for him.”