The women broke into another round of giggles. “See?” Aishlinn told Nora. “Only let him think he’s the master of his castle. Ye’ll ken the truth!”
Wee William approached, crossed his arms over his chest and stared at the women. “What are ye tellin’ me wife?”
Isobel cleared her throat and tried to look serious. “Nothin’ much, Wee William. Just some marital advice.”
“What kind?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
Mary slapped Wee William on his arm. “Now don’ ye go fashin’ yerself over it, Wee William. We were just telling her to that she must always listen to ye and do as ye tell her.”
The women cast knowing glances at one another before breaking into more laughter.
Wee William seriously doubted that these women were telling his wife any such thing but he decided to play along.
“Well then,” he said as he scooped Nora up into his arms. She squealed, much to his delight. “If that be the case, we’ll be leavin’ now!” He raised his eyebrows and cast a wink toward the group of giggling women.
From across the room, Rowan and Black Richard, well into their cups shouted at Wee William. “Do ye ken what yer to do now, Wee William?” “Don’t be frightened Wee William! I’m sure yer wife will be gentle with ye!”
Wee William chose to ignore them as he carried his wife out of the gathering room and out of the castle.
Nora’s smile warmed his heart. “What are we doing, now William?” she asked.
“We’re goin’ home, lass,” he said as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I believe it be time to make the marriage official.”
Nora’s smile quickly faded. She could only guess, from the devilish look in his eye, that he meant one thing and one thing only: it was time to consummate the marriage. A wave a fear washed over her and she was glad they’d stepped into the black of night, for then, he could not see the utter fear she knew her eyes must hold.
How he found his way from the castle to their cottage in the dark she had no idea. She had hoped he would get lost somewhere along the way, thereby delaying what she knew to be inevitable. But find it, he did.
Their home was not far from the castle. The soft glow of candle light burned from within and the closer they got the more her heart filled with dread and her limbs trembled.
“Yer cold,” Wee William said as he felt her shiver in his arms. “Do no’ worry, we’ll have ye inside where it be warm, soon enough.”
Moments later, he pushed open the door to their home, wondering who had hung it because he hadn’t done that before he left. It mattered not at the moment as he carried his bride across the threshold and into the light. “I see the women folk were here,” he said as he looked about the room. Candles were lit along the mantle of the fireplace. Rugs had been placed on the floor, dried lavender, lilac, and heather hung from the rafters. At the moment, he only cared about one room -- their bedchamber.
He crossed the kitchen and opened the door that led into their bedchamber. Thankfully, the women folk had adorned the bed with clean sheets, pillows, and warm furs. A low fire crackled in the fireplace, more rugs had been spread across the floor, and more dried flowers were placed about the room.
He turned his attentions toward his wife. She looked positively terrified. “Lass, ye look as though yer scared to death!”
Nora swallowed and tried to pretend she was anything but terrified.
Wee William finally set her on her feet and wrapped his arms around her. “Lass, ye tremble. Are ye cold?”
She shook her head as it rested against his chest. She couldn’t answer him.
“Nora, are ye frightened?”
Frightened. Mortified. Nauseous. Scared out of her wits. She remained mute. How on earth could she explain things to him?
Wee William ran a soothing hand up and down her back. He knew a terrified lass when he saw one. “Lass,” he said as he pulled her away and lifted her chin with his thumb and forefinger. She kept her gaze averted as she fought back tears.
“If we want our marriage to be a good one, then we must always be honest with one another.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Now, ye must tell me what yer thinkin’.”
Nora swallowed hard again. She could only hope he was right. She did want their marriage to be successful. She knew a big part of it would be what would be taking place in their marital bed. The last thing she wanted was to upset him or make him regret he married her.
Wee William waited patiently for several long moments. He could see that she was fighting some inner battle and his heart began to feel quite heavy.
“Lass, ye can talk to me. I be yer husband after all. We can talk to each other about anything. Now please, tell me what has ye so frightened.”
She took a deep breath. She could not put it off any further. “What if,” she began, taking another deep breath, “what if I cannot please you in there?” she said as she motioned toward the bed.
He wanted to laugh, but resisted that urge. “Lass, the only way you’ll ever not please me is if yer no’ honest with me. Ye’ve been pleasin’ me since ye threatened to marry Rowan if I did no’ kiss ye!”
She finally gained enough courage to look up at him. Lord above, the man was handsome! She looked into his eyes and saw nothing but genuine concern and adoration and that made her feel all the worse. She wanted to be a good wife, in every sense of the word. “But, William,” her voice was so quiet he could barely hear her. “I was never able to please Horace in our marital bed, and I worry I’ve not improved.”
It was all he could do to contain himself at the mention of her former husband’s name. He never wanted his name spoken in his home, least of all the bedchamber he was going to share with Nora. His jaw tightened, he counted to ten in four languages before he finally spoke.
“Nora, do ye see that bed there?” he asked, nodding in the direction of the bed. Nora glanced at it before turning to bury her face in his chest again.
“How many people do ya think it holds, lass?”
She looked up at him, the fear returned to her face and she began to tremble as she thought back to the time Horace wanted her to not only share the bed with him, but one of his friends as well. Certainly not all men wanted their wives to do such things! She felt the room begin to spin.
“Lass, that bed has only room for two. You and me and no one else.”
Her shoulders relaxed and she let out the breath she had been holding and thanked the good Lord above.
“I will no’ have ye worryin’ over that man. He is no’ here, and I am no’ him.” Wee William could only imagine what hell Horace had put Nora through. He realized it would take some time for her to get over that and be able to trust him.
“I’ll no’ do anythin’ that ye do no’ want me to do. We’ll take as much time as ye need. We can talk as much as ye need to, Nora.” He pressed his lips to her cheek and brushed a tear away with his thumb. “Ye can ask me any question, ye can tell me anything ye wish to. I be yer husband, Nora, and I want nothing more than to make ye happy. Do ye believe me?”
She looked up into his eyes again. There was no anger, no frustration, only adoration and kindness in those hazel eyes of his. How was he able to calm her fears so easily?
Nora cleared her throat, nodded her head and placed her hands on his. “I can ask any question that I want?”
Wee William smiled and nodded his head. “Aye, lass, anything ye want.”
She cleared her throat again and took a deep breath. “I do have a few questions,” she said. “But I need you to promise you will not laugh at me.”
His smile widened. “Nay, lass, I’ll no laugh at ye.”
“And ye won’t get angry with me?” She needed his reassurance.
“On me honor, I’ll no’ get mad at ye.”
She studied him for a moment, praying that he could keep his word.
“Mayhap we should sit down?”
Wee William could not remember ever being so angry. It took every bit of willpo
wer he had not to saddle his horse and head for England. He was not angry with his wife. He was furious with the bastard who had done unthinkable things to her.
If Horace Crawford was not dead, he would kill him. And if he were dead, Wee William would dig up what was left of his body and hack it into pieces before setting it on fire.
They had talked for more than an hour, with Nora blushing with each question and blushing further with each of Wee William’s answers. By the time they were done, his face had gone from pale, to red, to purple. It took all that he had to keep his temper in check.
“William?” Nora asked from the edge of the bed. “Are you angry with me?”
“Nay, lass,” he said as he draped an arm across her shoulder. “I be no’ angry with ye. Ye did no’ know the way of it, so how could I be angry with ye?”
Well, she thought to herself, there were plenty of times during her marriage to Horace that he took his anger out on her, though she had nothing to do with whatever it was that was angering him. She didn’t think she should share that with Wee William. He looked upset enough as it was. She was growing worried that he might have an apoplexy, for his face was a very deep shade of purple and he kept flexing his jaw back and forth. She wasn’t that big of a fool.
“William, did you not say we must be honest with each other if we’re to have a good marriage?”
He could not look at her just yet. “Yes, I did.”
“So is it only me that has to be honest, or does that include you as well?”
He breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth. She was going to turn his own words on him. “Nay, it goes for both of us.”
“Then will you tell me what you’re thinking?”
He stood up and walked to the fireplace and added another log to it. He couldn’t very well tell her everything he was thinking and feeling at the moment. “I am thinking that I wish I had cut the bastard’s throat myself.” It wasn’t a complete lie.
“William?” she asked in a low voice that trembled. “Did Horace ruin me?” That was in fact her worst fear, now that she had learned that the things Horace had done were wrong.
He spun around to look at her. She was playing with the ends of her belt, her eyes cast to the floor. “If you’ve changed yer mind, and want an annulment, I’ll understand, William.”
He went to her then, bent to one knee and took her face in his hands. “Nay, lass, ye be no’ ruined and I do no’ want an annulment.” Nay, what he wanted was to hold her in his arms the rest of the night and reassure her that she was still, in his eyes, the most perfect and beautiful woman he had or would ever know.
“Are you certain?” she asked as she looked at him with tears welling in her eyes. “I would not hold it against you.”
He did the thing he had been aching to do for weeks. He lifted her chin and pressed his lips to hers. It was a tender and gentle kiss that made his heart swell with joy when he felt her return it. “Lass,” Wee William said softly. “I meant what I said earlier today. I want to spend the rest of me life with ye, and no other. Ye have claimed me heart, me verra soul. I will never want another woman as I want ye.”
Nora smiled, happy and relieved for she couldn’t see herself with anyone but this gentle giant bent on one knee before her.
“May I ask another question?”
He did not know if his heart could take learning anything else that Horace had done to her. He braced himself and nodded his head. “Aye, ye may.”
He saw a twinkle in her eye as she bit her lower lip. “Do you think you could kiss me, like you did in the storage room earlier this day?”
He blew a sigh of relief and pulled her into his chest. “I’ll kiss ye any way ye wish.”
Nora had no recollection of removing her dress or her chemise, but somehow she had lost all items of clothing and now she lay on top of her husband, naked as the day she was born. She remembered tugging William’s shirt over his head and throwing it somewhere over her shoulder. His skin felt hot against hers and the soft hair of his chest tickled her skin.
He caressed her with large, warm hands, and she felt both hot and cold at the same time. Every inch of her tingled with excitement and the roof of her mouth tickled again. She did not want his kisses to end. He could kiss her for the next hundred years or so and she’d not grow weary of it.
He was exploring her neck with his lips and tongue as he continued to caress her back. Her stomach fluttered and felt warm. Nay, she had never felt this way before.
“William?” she asked breathlessly.
“Hmm?” he murmured against her neck.
“Your sword,”
He was not paying much attention, lost he was in the softness of her skin. “What?” he asked as he nibbled on the other side of her neck.
“Your sword, William. It is poking me in the leg. Could you remove it?”
He quit kissing her and his hands stopped. The bed began to shake and it took a moment for her to realize it was shaking because her husband was trying to hold his laughter in.
“What is so funny?” she asked, wishing he’d go back to kissing her.
“Lass, that no’ be me sword.”
Was he daft? “Of course it is, I can feel it along my leg.”
He could no longer contain his laughter. Nora rolled her eyes before rolling herself off of him. “You see,” she began to speak but then realized she had in fact been wrong. That was definitely not his sword. Her faced burned with embarrassment and her eyes grew as wide as trenchers. She said the first thing that came to her mind. “It’s a tree root!”
Wee William could not speak. He shook with laughter.
He could see her thoughts as they played across her face. She looked both surprised and afraid. He finally managed to speak, “Lass, it be no’ that big!”
She looked at him as though he had lost his mind. Not that big? Was he insane? Did he really plan to put that, that, that thing where she now knew it properly went?
“Lass, ye needn’t worry it,” he said as his laughter began to subside. He was beginning to feel a bit guilty for laughing at her. “Certainly ye’ve seen one of these before.”
She shook her head. “Not one that is the size of a tree root! And why is it staring at me?” She buried her face in her hands, mortified beyond imagination, and turned away from her husband. She pulled the sheet around her body. This was not going to go well, she just knew it.
Wee William propped himself up on one elbow. Though he felt guilty for laughing, he could not deny feeling a bit proud. He did not want to terrify his wife to the point of distraction. He wrapped one of the long tendrils of her hair around his finger. “Nora, it will be all right. I promise.”
She thought of Horace’s tiny-in-comparison male member. He hadn’t even been doing it correctly and it had hurt beyond measure. How on earth would this thing not hurt as well and with a husband that was going to do it correctly?
Wee William touched her shoulder tenderly with his fingers. “Nora, there are all manner of things we can do, that will no’ hurt. We can do those all the night long until ye are ready.” He was trying to be as patient as possible with her, but his ‘tree root’ had been waiting far too long. He knew he had to take his time with his wife but it was not going to be easy. She smelled of lavender and lilacs and woman. Her long hair was tousled and tumbling down her beautiful back. The sheet that covered her did little by way of hiding those magnificent breasts of hers. He really had to stop drooling over those, lest she think him insane.
She finally looked at him, doubt awash in her eyes. “Other things?” she dared ask the question. “Such as what?”
A devilish smile came to his lips as he pulled her down onto the bed. He caressed her cheeks with the backs of his fingers very slowly. Her breath hitched and she closed her eyes. “How about I show ye instead?”
Nora could not think, she could only feel her husband’s hands as they caressed her body so tenderly. She felt pleasure in places she did not know she possessed
until this night. He’d explained it to her after the first wave of sinfully wicked, unbelievably delicious pleasure had come crashing over her, taking her breath away, making her eyes roll back in her head. She had almost pulled his hair out from his head and flew from the bed.
She apologized to her husband several times, for she hadn’t meant to kick him in his eye with her knee the third time he had taken her to heights of ecstasy. But what Wee William had been doing to her, well, she simply held no control over her own extremities. ’Twas his own fault really, and he had no one to blame but himself. But still, she apologized and thanked him. Repeatedly.
By the time she had experienced the fifth wave a pleasure, she was begging him to stop. She needed to breathe and she was certain she was going to die if he didn’t cease immediately. The tickling on the roof of her mouth would not cease and her tongue felt thick and swollen. Why he found that so humorous, she could not begin to fathom. There was a decidedly proud tone to his voice.
When he told her that he was going to burst if he didn’t get relief of his own, she didn’t, at that point, care what he was going to do with that tree root of his. As long as he allowed her to breathe in a more normal fashion and less like a wild boar that had been chased through the woods for days, she did not care.
Normal breathing would not be hers for quite some time. Especially when he began to do things the right way. Aye, at first it did hurt, but it wasn’t the kind of pain Horace had inflicted upon her. It was different and lasted only a few moments and was quickly replaced by a new wave of those unique, exciting, thrumming, gratifying pleasures.
Reflexively, driven by instinct, she had squeezed those new muscles she had discovered and it was now Wee William’s turn to beg her to stop. She took marvelous pleasure in hearing his heavy panting breaths, the growling in his throat, and the beads of sweat that had begun to form on his forehead.
Wee William's Woman, Book Three of the Clan MacDougall Series Page 24
