A new determination welled within him. He would take her to France and together they could both start anew, surrounding themselves only with those they chose. He would take his bonnie bride and give her the one thing she needed most. A home and someone she could trust.
"We’ve one more thig to make this day," she said softly, her light touch skimming the back of his hand.
"Who have we left to see, lass?" he asked, more attentive to the emotions that played across her face, than he was a moment before.
"The Earl of Argyll requested he be last on our rounds this morning."
Ian leaned forward on his powerful legs and rose from his chair.
"Then let’s go."
Her lips curved upward in a small smile that stole his breath away. His skin heated in response. Ian decided he liked her full lips even more when she smiled and vowed to see more of it before they left on their journey across the ocean.
They walked up to the young earl’s quarters above the stairs, and Ian knocked at the thick door.
"My lord, my wife and I have come to collect a thig from you."
"Enter," Argyll called.
Ian opened the door and let her walk in ahead of him. The chamber was simple, but still grand enough to be appropriate to the lad’s station.
"Am I the last then?" The earl took both of Sorcha’s hands in his own, rubbing them lightly with his thumbs.
"Aye, my lord," she replied, smiling at him and placing a chaste kiss on his cheek.
Ian’s gut tightened in response even to the innocent intimacy between them. What he wouldn’t give to be gifted by one of her radiant, full smiles such as that.
"What have you for us, my lord?" Ian stuffed his irritation down.
The earl pulled forth a sheaf of papers. "I’ve purchased a horse for Sorcha from the Earl of Sutherland."
Ian shoulders tensed. It was a gift a suitor, a lover or father would give, not a young ward. Was there more between them than he had yet noticed? Perhaps his attentions were not needed, merely his service, as the laird had stated.
A flicker of uncertainty glinted in Sorcha’s eyes. Had he not been watching her so intently, he would have missed it. Something about the gift had disturbed her. Perhaps she too was aware that the gift bordered on inappropriate.
"Archibald, you should not have done anything so lavish."
Ian’s suspicions grew a little more when Argyll grasped her hand gently and his eyes fixated on her in a way that spoke of intimacy.
"It was to be a birthday present, but your marriage happened sooner than I anticipated." Argyll glanced at Ian, their eyes meeting, and he instantly let go of his hold on her. "I was hoping you and Hunter would be willing to go with me to fetch it. We and a few of the other lords have been invited to hunt at Lord Moray’s estate in Abercariny, and I could certainly use an extra pair of eyes to guard my back." He looked at Ian, his eyes somber despite his smile.
A gut awareness hit Ian that Argyll was using the expedition for the horse and the hunt as a cover for more serious, political reasons. His senses came to full alert, but were redirected as Sorcha briefly laid her hand on the young earl’s cheek.
"We would be glad to accompany you, my lord. When did you plan to leave?"
"In three days."
Ian grasped her about the waist and brought her close to his side, sending the unmistakable message of possession to Argyll.
"In the meantime, my lord, did you still wish to begin your lessons at arms?"
"Aye, that I would." He turned his gaze to Sorcha. "Would you allow me to take your husband for but a few hours this eventide?"
"Certainly, Archibald."
The unguarded familiarity between them pricked at Ian, leaving him feeling edgy and in need of some physical activity. He had seen the signs of infidelity with Mary and had ignored them at his own peril. Now he was keenly aware. He would not be the fool twice.
He forced himself to remember his rule. He should focus on completing the contract, grab the gold and make sail for France. She would go as his wife and after a time they would suit each other well. Underneath, a deeper interest in her burned that had nothing to do with rational thought or consequences and everything to do with touching her. He tried to quash it by focusing instead on the physical release training would bring.
Late that afternoon he approached Argyll in the empty bailey. Ian drove the sword hard, knocking the lad to the ground with the force of the blow. It felt good to get his aggression out with the physical effort. He’d learned to like the smell of oil on metal, of damp leather and honest sweat.
"Going at it a bit hard, aren’t you, Hunter?"
He noted with satisfaction the sweat dripping from the young man’s brow.
"No harder than you’ll see in earnest battle, my lord." He held a free hand out to lift the lad off the dusty ground. The earl grasped him firmly and rose, still a bit wobbly on his feet.
"I’ve grown soft these past few months, without the daily training." The lad chuckled halfheartedly as he rubbed his shoulder, then swept his sleeve over his face.
Ian braced his feet apart.
"Shall we have at it again, my lord, or have you finished for the day?"
The boy’s eyes flashed with challenge, his attitude cocky despite the setback.
"Yet again, Hunter. And this time I’ll be ready for you."
Ian lunged forward, his arm swinging the blade with brutal force downward. The clang and ring of metal on metal echoed off the stone walls of the bailey as the two matched blows. Each breathed harder as the lesson wore on.
Ian stepped back, preparing to turn and swing, but he was distracted by a movement in the battlement above. Sorcha, her hair still unbound and billowing in the wind like a dark storm cloud behind her, watched their efforts.
His swing faltered, making a half-hearted thud on the earl’s leather shield. A surge of jealousy heated his skin, and he doubled the power behind his next thrust, easily knocking the earl into the dust. He glanced up to see Sorcha retreating from his view.
Ian ground his teeth. He had been harder with the boy than he needed to and now felt a twinge of guilt. Rightfully his brother Malcolm deserved his anger. Everything he had seen thus far had been innocent enough. He was jumping to conclusions. Argyll was familiar with her, but nothing more, and he did not deserve to bear his misdirected wrath.
"That is enough practice at arms today, my lord."
"Aye." Argyll lifted himself from the ground and wiped his dripping brow yet again. "I’m afraid I’ve much to learn."
Ian chose to encourage him as a way of making up for the harshness of his lesson.
"Not as much as you think, my lord. You did well against some of my most common battle moves. Those will stand you well in any confrontation."
The young earl nodded, but was breathing too heavily to respond.
Both of them looked up at the sound of Sorcha’s light, quick step on the hard-packed earth of the bailey.
"Archibald, a bath has been prepared for you. There is also a poultice that you should place upon your shoulder to ease the pain." Ian quickly interpreted the message in the accusing glare she leveled at him. Her displeasure was evident in the stiff set of her shoulders and the firm line of her mouth.
"A bath waits for you as well." Her voice held a note of disdain.
He nodded and turned back to the earl, bending in a bow.
"Until tomorrow, my lord."
Sorcha waited until the lad had walked out of hearing, then she rounded on him.
"Do you plan to cleave him in half on the morrow, or is that lesson three?" she asked, her chin tilted upward.
Why did women always forget when to cut the ties to their skirts? The earl was nearly a man, a young man, but not an infant to be coddled. Did she hold him close to ease her own loneliness, or was there more?
"He is not a child." His tone was harsher than need be, but she needed to see sense. He slipped his sword in the scabbard and lashed it with the shield.
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Her skin flushed with angry color. "Well I know, but— "
He looked up at her, trying to gauge just how much his mind was conjuring on its own out of spiteful memories.
"Do you now? And what else have you noted about him? Do you wish it was he and not I you married, despite his youth? Would his services have suited you better? Does his title appeal to you?"
Her eyes turned into hard, glittering sapphire orbs.
"Would it matter to you?"
She had evaded his direct questions, which infuriated him all the more. The thought of being married to a woman who craved another made his skin crawl with revulsion. He dropped his shield and sword to the dirt and took a step toward her. This was a matter he needed settled before he would ever touch her the way a husband should.
"Do you or do you not care for him?"
She pursed her mouth, as if he were an idiot for having asked the question, and crossed her arms.
"I care for Archibald as a foster mother and friend, but not with any romantic notions. I am responsible for his health and your training seems to jeopardize that."
So she wasn’t attracted to Argyll. He released the air in his lungs that he didn’t realize he’d held.
"The rigors of training are good for him."
"Rigors? Is that what you call beating a lad to his knees time and again?"
Ian bristled. What did she think him, a barbaric animal? She was going to have to learn that he knew best when it came to matters of battle and safety.
"A little hardship isna’ going to hurt the lad. He’s too soft by a half, but his mind is quick enough to make up for it, if he works hard." He stamped forward, planting his full height before her. "Are you questioning my training or my intentions?"
The blue in her eyes softened, the veil of her emotions clouding the clear brightness of a moment before. The soft heathered fragrance of her skin drifted up to him, making him intimately aware of how close she was, which sent his pulse beating as fast as it had while he was at swords.
"I am merely concerned for my ward’s health, Hunter, no more, no less."
"And I am concerned with my wife’s devotion." He grasped her to him, cupping the back of her head with one hand and claiming her mouth in a searing kiss. He wanted to brand himself upon her; to know that even though she had not given herself freely to him, she was in a measure still his and always would be, until her last breath.
Under the intensity of his touch he felt her soften, melding into him. He pulled her away from him, knowing that his arousal would be all too evident against the breeches he wore, and she might believe him even more animalistic because of it.
"Did you say a bath was waiting?" he asked, hoping to dispel the tension in the air between them.
She nodded, her soft, pink tongue brushing over her slightly swollen lips. Ian stifled a groan.
"Aye," she said.
"Then take me to it, wife."
Sorcha gulped. She knew he would ask her to assist him as a chatelaine’s duty. But could she? At a loss for words, she nodded mutely and walked ahead of him through the bailey.
Only a moment before, she had been so angry with him she wanted not to give him a bath so much as pour a bucket of dirty wash water over his head for his treatment of Archibald.
She touched her fingertips to her lips as she walked toward their shared chamber. How was it with one kiss he had washed her fury away so that all she felt now was the need to possess him? He had a power over her that was dangerous. It would make her forget her vow to protect him. In her mind she put her armor firmly back in place, taking up her role as shrewish wife with new fervor to combat the alarming feelings he ignited in her.
Taking in a deep breath, she paused before the door, then pushed it open.
"Here is your bath."
He stepped past her then grasped her hand and pulled him into the room with him.
"Will you not assist me?"
"Nay." She turned to leave him.
"And why not, wife?" His voice became smooth, coaxing.
She shivered with longing, the contemplation of his touch taunting her. Oh, he was the very devil to tempt her so. She must not let him know how he affected her. She crossed her arm and pinched herself to snap her back into her role of wifely shrew. Tilting her chin, she locked her gaze on his dark eyes.
"Precisely that. I am no wife to you."
With practiced ease he began to undress, removing his boots and peeling the shirt from his skin to reveal a broad chest, dusted with dark hair and a chest and arms beneath thick with corded muscle. Sorcha turned away, but the quick glance had been enough.
Warmth, like heated honey, drizzled and flowed, pooling low in her. Heaven help her, the breeches, tight as they were, left little to imagine. She took a breath to steady herself and turned back to him. He had the beauty of a wild animal: strong, rare and lethal.
"Surely, you’ll not play the distressed maiden with me."
He was so compelling, his magnetism rooted her to the spot. Sorcha put her hands behind her back, squeezing them in an effort to regain her composure.
"In case you’ve forgotten, Hunter, I still am a maid." Her protest sounded weak even to her own ears.
His breeches and undergarments fell to the floor. Her heartbeat thrummed loudly in her head, and her stomach lodged itself in her throat. He sauntered toward her, his movements leonine and fluid, his skin a thin covering over the hardened muscles that rolled beneath.
"All the better reason you should assist me," he growled low.
Her breasts felt heavy and tender, sensitive to the corset fabric that bound them. He pulled her slowly to him, his kisses light and enticing along her neck. His breath warmed her hair and sent sparks shooting through her blood.
"How convincing can you be as a married woman if you haven’t even bathed your husband?" His husky voice slid hot and soft against the curve of her ear.
His fiery fingers touched her lips then trailed down her neck, pulling back her dress to bare her shoulder and loosen the laces on the front of her corset. The heat of his palm burned as he reached beneath the corset and cupped her breast. She gasped, unable to control the response to his touch. His thumb gently traced the swell of her, then reached to rasp against her aching nipple, making white-hot bolts of pure sensation shoot down to her toes.
He teased her. Driving her insane with want.
"Have a care, Hunter," she whispered.
His hands reached down, testing the softness of her bottom, kneading it as he pulled her against his hardness.
"Ah, Sorcha, you’ve already bewitched me," he breathed against her. "There is nothing you can do to cause me pain, save deny me."
She could feel him moving closer, the air becoming saturated with his heat, and the musky sweetness of his scent. Only but mere moments before his lips touched her, she began to feel the heat of his mouth.
His kiss was fire, demanding ever more fuel from her, raging through her, burning away her common sense. She melted inside, a throbbing pulse building deep within her that she’d not felt before.
‘Twas only to be this between them. Nothing more. She would not let the powers that bound her take him, yet she could not resist the temptation he offered. The heat between them intensified.
A flash of memory, vivid and burning assailed her. The flames were soaring above the rooftop of the small hut in the woods. Even now, she could feel the scorching waves singeing her eyelashes and blistering her cheeks. She held up her hands against the flames.
Sorcha shoved against him, pushing away, shaking her head. He caught her in his embrace and held her gently against him.
"No. No more. Please— " she sobbed.
He tensed. "What’s wrong? Have I hurt you?"
Sorcha opened her eyes and crumpled against him, weeping.
"They’re gone," she sobbed. "My fault, they’re gone."
She remembered so little of her mother and siblings that at times they seemed more dreams than reality from he
r past. And when she did remember things, they were odd bits and pieces, some bright and others frightening. She would see her mother laughing in one instant, calling to her, then hear her mother screaming her name in the living flames the next.
He wrapped his strong arms around her, cradling her against his hard chest.
"What happened?"
"They burned because of me—a fire in the cottage in the woods—all of them." She was mumbling between rattling sobs, then went suddenly still.
"You’ll be next," she breathed against his chest, letting his hair brush softly against her damp cheek.
Ian cradled her head in his large hand, forcing her to look up into his eyes.
"‘Tis not so, Sorcha. Nothing can keep me from you. Only you have the power to do that."
She curled tighter against him, fighting the wave of guilt that always accompanied the memories and willing them back into the black abyss from which they came.
The hardness of his chest was at odds with his gentle demeanor of the moment, causing her heart to contract again at the loss of him, even though he was not yet gone. At once, she was aware of his touch. A touch too tender, too caring and too close. She pulled herself away, withdrawing from the comfort he offered. Only the loose circle of his arms kept her near him.
"We can talk of this another time," he murmured, his words hot against her hair as he released his hold on her. "Go and rest, now. You’ll need it to prepare for our travels."
She nodded mutely, her arms curled tightly about herself.
She shuffled from the room, the door falling shut behind her. He glanced at his cooling bath water. Ian raked his hands through his stiff, sweat-plastered hair and blew out a frustrated breath. All the better. Cold water is what he needed most. That, and a tub full of ale.
* * *
Henna’s sharp ears heard Sorcha leave the room. She smiled. She had yet a hold on the girl’s memories. That would be to her advantage. She held Duncan back in the shadows until they reached the Earl of Argyll’s rooms, then knocked thrice upon the door.
"Enter."
Aye, he was young and full of himself, but that would serve her well.
The Spellbound Bride Page 9
