by Gwyn Cready
“Why?” He laughed.
“I want it to be us.”
The mirth left his face, replaced by a searching vulnerability. “Then you’ll have your wish.”
He pressed her firmly to the cool earth. The stars hung in a halo around his head.
“I want you,” he said, drawing a thumb across her collarbone.
Her heart beat like a rabbit’s, pounding hard enough to muffle her hearing. Surely he felt it. “Here?”
“Do you dare?”
“Yes. I want you so much.”
He stroked her cheek. “And I want you. Here, pinned under me. And there as well.” He made a gesture that seemed to encompass the rest of the world.
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.”
And she did. Bound together, one way or another. It had been so long since she’d thought of Axel that way. She could feel the wall toppling that had separated them for the last five years. The struggle to make it happen was allconsuming—forgetting had been a matter of survival—and the tremor in her voice was evidence of it.
“I want it, Axel. I do. But how? I mean, my God…”
So much hurt. So much to forgive. On his part as much as hers. They would be starting again wounded and wary. It was the worst possible position from which to try to salvage a relationship.
“Stop worrying about what comes next. Let’s only think of now.”
His hand had found her hip, and she could feel the primitive stirrings begin. It was this damned hill. The reverberations of a millennium’s worth of midnight joinings hummed in the air. They shook her bones and loosened her desires. Whatever had happened here still carried its power. Axel’s hand tightened slowly, and she arched without thinking.
Even in the dark, she could see the rise at the corner of his mouth.
He resettled his weight along her side and she turned to meet him, hip to hip. She let her hand run down his thigh, to the end of the kilt. His skin was warm and the hairs there brushed her palm. Then she followed the trail back, this time under the wool, to his smooth, flexing buttock, answering the question that had burned in her thoughts since the moment she’d seen him in that bathroom.
“A true Scot,” she said, impressed.
“You should see my tip jar.”
She laughed. She could feel her breaths coming faster and knew that, soon, the time for words would be over. She brushed a lock from his forehead. His hair smelled of apples. “I’m so sorry, Axel.”
He caught her hand and kissed it. “I wish I had been there when you needed me.”
Unspoken promises floated in the air like seeds from a dandelion. Stop worrying about what comes next. Let’s only think of now.
Did Axel have it right? Could it be that she’d spent all this time fighting his philosophy of life, only to find out that he’d actually known what he was talking about? She let out an amused exhalation. It would be just one more thing she’d have learned from him.
He ran his thumb under her sweater, just skirting the edge of her aureole. The touch tightened both nipples and elicited a satisfied mewl of approval from their owner. Perhaps she’d taught him a thing or two as well.
She caught him by the neck brought his mouth to hers, teasing him with her tongue. He opened her sweater, grinning when he saw what the demure angora had hidden.
He loosened the halter straps with a practiced hand.
“You know this isn’t how I would dress on my own,” she said.
“Do I?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, I do. But I like it anyhow.”
He brushed away the fabric and caught a nipple between his thumb and forefinger, drawing it into a rosy peak. “Don’t get me wrong: I’m happy to undress you out of anything. But I have particularly fond memories of a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt that suited you very well.”
She thought of that night in the Warhol. Oh, what a good night it had been.
“This dress, on the other hand, looks like it’s for a woman who wants the boots put to her in plain sight of every Scot between Edinburgh and Glasgow.”
She stretched her legs till her feet were touching his and was reminded he would, in fact, be putting actual boots to her. “It’s night. No one can see,” she said, and he laughed.
“And a good thing.” He lifted the handfuls of tulle and disappeared under the skirt.
She swallowed a gasp as he twisted her panties out of the way and applied his mouth to her bud. He was world-class at this, and time had only polished his skills. She damned the years she’d let him waste this gift on others. She anchored herself in the grass and shifted her weight, trying to govern the fire that danced between her legs.
“Be still.”
But the rising heat made that impossible. He grabbed her wrists and pulled them under her hips, rocking her open to him. The tulle sizzled like butter on a hot skillet.
“This isn’t fair,” she said.
The glorious ministrations halted. “Then answer.”
“Answer? Answer what?”
“The question.”
His question. “Say it again.”
“I want you. Will you have me?”
“Yes.”
“Here?”
“Yes.”
“And there? Forever?”
“Yes.”
The actions that followed set her legs to trembling. Her feet found purchase on his granite shoulders.
The heat was coming in waves, like blasts from a furnace, and the stars overhead seemed to pulse and twinkle. She could smell the loamy earth under them and the faint smoke of a fire in the distance. He released her hands and clasped her hips.
“Oh, oh, oh.” The waves were growing stronger.
Suddenly, she wanted Axel beside her, to look in his eyes, to know his thoughts.
“No, come,” she said, scrabbling to an elbow and tugging at his shirt. “Come here.”
He rose obediently, wiping his mouth on his palm.
“Be with me,” she said. “In my arms.”
He rose to his knees. She could see the pulse beating in his throat. With the cool blue moonlight framing his dark locks and flooding over his considerable shoulders, he looked like an ancient Norse god.
She felt very small, and very underdressed.
The kilt was heavy, but it was no match for the object straining against it. He crawled over her, alternately kissing and tasting his way from her navel to her neck, settling himself at last on top of her.
He married his mouth to hers, and she tasted his smoky nectar.
“Mmm,” she moaned.
“Mmm,” he agreed.
He brought his palm between her legs and kneaded the mound there.
“Oh, Axel.”
“We are going to have to improvise,” he said, introducing his thumb slowly.
“Oh. Oh. Why?”
“I don’t have a condom.” The careful circles he was drawing grew smaller and faster. “And I suspect you don’t have one, either.”
She didn’t, and the sultry movements of his hand quickened.
“No,” she said. “No.” She wanted him thick inside her.
“Don’t worry, Pittsburgh,” he said, his breath warm in her ear. “I know how to take care of you.”
She shivered. Oh, God, he did.
“No,” she said again. “No. In me.”
“We can’t—”
“We can.”
He caught her chin and turned her toward him so he could search her face.
She thought about her fear and anger, and how useless it had all been in the end. But she had never not wanted him, and she had never not wanted a child of theirs.
“I want a child with you,” she said. “Again.”
He closed his eyes, face flushed with emotion, and she took his hand and held it against her cheek.
He rolled to his knees, gazing at her in fear and desire. In his eyes she saw every warrior, every berserker, who had fornicated on this hill, sp
illing his seed to strengthen the harvest or claim a battle’s spoils. He dug under his kilt, grabbed his cock and bent over her. With a grunt he entered her, and she inhaled sharply.
He was large, as large a man as she had ever known, and he filled her so completely, she thought she might burst.
Abandoning finesse, he began to pound the sensitive flesh. The waves, which he had already risen to white-caps, soared higher. She clutched his forearms, his tan, taut muscles flexing with each thrust. It was as if he were battering down the last vestige of concealment between them.
“Oh, oh, oh.” She shook with the force of it, trying to catch a breath. But there was more to it than the physical pleasure: There was a lightness in her she hadn’t felt in so long. She wrapped her arms around his like a seedling’s roots, as if she could extract the nourishing joy and give it back to him.
He rocked back on his heels and hooked her knees. With a husky moan he slipped even deeper inside. He was pummeling her womb, planting a future for them with a life-or-death fervor, and every movement seesawed her on the edge of searing pleasure.
“Here,” he said, willing her to respond.
“And there. And there. Damn you.”
She fretted and squirmed, but he held her tight. Desperate, she wrapped her legs around his buttocks and arched, bringing her breasts against his chest and crying out softly.
A look of shock came over his face, as if the end was overtaking him. She brought herself in close and he reared back, riding her for half a dozen masterful strokes until the surge took her and smashed her into a thousand pieces against an endless, pleasuring shore. At the same moment he jerked, filling her with his seed. He groaned and shook until he collapsed beside her.
“It’s this hill,” he said, rubbing his cheek blindly. “I have never ravaged a woman like that. Forgive me.”
“Forgive you?” She’d probably be numb for days, but an incomparable warmth suffused her, as if she’d been steeped in an ancient elixir. “Demand that you repeat it, perhaps. Not forgive you.”
“Oh my God, my balls feel like they’ve been smacked with a cricket bat.”
Laughing, she settled against his shoulder, tucking her head under his chin. She liked the feel of his strong, even breaths after sex and the earthy scent of his skin.
“I have some good news for you,” she said. “I can go with you to Pittsburgh—at least for a few weeks.”
He laughed, a short, ironic laugh and shook his head. “I have some bad news for you: There’s no Pittsburgh to go to.”
“What?”
“I lost the brewery. Outbid. Found out today.”
“Oh, Axel.” The only thing worse than the thought of him leaving New York was the thought of him leaving his dreams behind. “I’m so sorry.”
“And how is it that you can go to Pittsburgh?” He raised himself up on an elbow and looked at her, curious.
“Fired. Black is furious about the story I sent him. I don’t think he’s too happy with you, either.”
A look of shame crossed his face. “I have something I have to tell you—”
“I know.”
“You do?”
“About the deal you cut with Black,” she said. “I know. Kate found out.” Ellery gave him a gimlet eye. “Not very gentlemanly.”
“Sort of a theme this week.”
“And definitely not a smart bet.” She pushed his chin gently. “As if someone would know better than me what I should write.”
“It was stupid. What can I say?”
“I know what works best on paper. No one should mess with that.”
“Right. That would be like giving art direction to a photographer.”
“It was better in landscape.”
He laughed and drew her closer. “You’re right about your writing. It’s so damn good. You always surprise me.”
“Oh, Axel,” she said, giddy, “sometimes I even surprise myself.”
“Please, don’t say you mean that snoozefest I looked at earlier. There are some surprises that should be avoided.”
“Nope,” she said, grinning. “I rewrote it! I ended up writing a paean to romances, an abso-freakin’ valentine—”
She clapped a hand over her mouth, realizing what she had just admitted to.
“Pardon me?” He cupped a hand behind his ear.
She shook her head, refusing to say another word.
“Ha!” he cried, pumping a fist in the air. “I did it!”
“After the interlude we just had, that’s what you’re going to crow about?”
“That?” he said with a deprecating wave. “That sort of sleight of hand I can whip up anytime. Reversing the direction of the USS Ellery Sharpe? Now, that’s an accomplishment.”
She laughed. It felt so good lying next to him. She ran a hand under his sweater, warming herself against the broad expanse of muscle.
“I’ve got a pocket full of money, Pittsburgh. Name your dream. I can definitely keep you entertained for a month, at least until the Lark & Ives thing starts.”
“Well, I’ve always wanted to see the Highlands.”
He moaned.
“I could always do a travel story.”
“You can’t sell a travel story without pic—Oh, boy, I really walked into that one. Would I get paid?”
“What’s money to a guy like you?”
“Well, there’s this little thing called rent.…”
“I’m not going to charge you rent. I mean, assuming the services-in-lieu-of-cash thing continues.”
“A kept man?” He scratched his chin, considering. “I like it.”
“Well, you wouldn’t forever,” she said, turning toward him. “I know that much about you. But I’m happy to take advantage of it as long as you do. Besides, we need to find you a brewery.”
“Well, there’s this thing I can set up in your spare bedroom—”
“Aaarrrgh.” She covered her ears. “What have I started?”
“What have you started?”
He laid a hand on her cheek, and the warm green of his eyes told her that whatever it was, he loved it too.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, “but it feels wonderful. No one will believe it.”
He snorted. “If they know me, they will.”
“That confident of your abilities, eh?” She gave him a dubious look.
He shrugged. “I got the girl. I got the article.”
“And the brewery?”
“Give me time. I’m on a streak.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Dining Room, Thistle Bed & Breakfast
Dr. Albrecht pulled up sharply, nearly spilling the contents of the breakfast tray onto the floor. “You’re still vairing your kilt?”
Axel, pink from a just-completed shower, cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Um. Writer request.”
Ellery, who had been allowed to sleep in after a long and rather glorious night and was now eyeing a crossword puzzle and eagerly awaiting the coffee on Dr. Albrecht’s tray, flushed. “I need some local color.”
“Mm-hm.” Dr. Albrecht placed the tray on the table and poured the coffee for her guests.
“Nothing for you?” Ellery asked.
Dr. Albrecht shook her head, eyes sparkling. “I’ve been up for a vhile.”
Another set of steps sounded on the stairs. Ellery turned and nearly dropped her cup. The white-haired gentleman from the night before ambled down, smiling happily and tucking his shirt into the top of his kilt.
“Ah,” he said, spotting Axel and lunging for a piece of toast. “I see we find ourselves in the same predicament, laddie.”
“Not quite, Reggie,” Dr. Albrecht said. “Axel has other clothes upstairs.”
Reggie’s brow rose puckishly. “I wasn’t talking about the kilt.”
This time both women flushed, and Axel and Reggie chuckled.
“Oh, my,” Ellery said and took a fortifying sip of coffee. Dr. Albrecht hurried off to the kitchen.
Axel said, “Ellery,
I’d like you to meet Reggie Sinclair. He owns the distillery next door. Reggie, this is Ellery Sharpe. She’s a literary critic and writer.”
Reggie shook her hand.
At that moment a man in a burnt-orange shirt that set off the singular color of his hair bounded through the front door. He gazed at the breakfasters, who were shifting in their seats and trying to keep from smiling. “What? What’s going on?”
“Nothing important, Duncan,” Axel said. “Just a crossword clue that got the best of us.”
“Oh, what?”
Axel reached for the cream, momentarily stymied. “A seven letter word for unlicensed.”
Duncan pursed his lips thoughtfully. “‘Illicit’?”
Axel pointed at him gratefully. “That would be it. Thank you.”
Ellery bit her lip to stifle laughter and stared deep into her cup.
“Care to join us?” Reggie asked, apparently already feeling host-like.
“Oh, no, thank you. I’ve already eaten. I’m here to help Dr. A. with her bathroom.”
“Oh,” Ellery said. “Are you a plumber?”
“A bond trader, actually. But I grew up in a house full of leaky toilets.”
“A bond trader and a Jemmie Forster impersonator?” Axel said. “Interesting mix.”
“A Jemmie Forster impersonator?” Ellery’s head swung around hard enough to make her cup rattle in its saucer.
“Settle down, Pittsburgh,” Axel said. “You’re taken.”
Ellery could definitely see the similarity to the image of Jemmie in her head, especially in the wide blue eyes and angled features.
“Och,” Duncan said self-deprecatingly, “just a way to help out my hometown. But I’m afraid they’re going to have to find another Jemmie soon.”
“Oh?”
“My firm’s transferring me to the New York office. Not as much call for a man in a kilt there, I should think.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised,” Ellery said, and Axel gave her a kick under the table.
“Who vants a fry-up?” Dr. Albrecht said, returning from the kitchen with an empty skillet in her hand. Reggie, Axel and Ellery all raised their hands eagerly.
“I see,” the sociologist said, smiling. “Must be something in the air.”
Duncan frowned again. “Reggie told me you two live in New York. I’m hoping for a local guide when I arrive. Perhaps someone who can introduce me to some people to do things with?”
