It was him.
She squeezed her eyes tightly shut as he approached. Niall’s arms encircled her, and he pulled her hard against his chest. Was she dreaming? Could dreams be so vivid, so overwhelming to the senses?
Strong, big arms, and his scent…musk and masculinity. He smelled like Niall.
“Aileen,” he said into her hair, “I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.”
His voice. Soft but edged with strength. A sound that would be formidable to any enemy. But this was not her enemy—it was her lover.
“How…how…?” Her voice dwindled. There were so many questions she wanted to ask him, she didn’t know where to begin. Finally, she grasped on to one of them.
“How did you find me?”
“I knew.” Pulling slightly away, he looked down at her. “I knew where you’d go when you needed to be safe.” His fingers drew little circles near the base of her spine. “Look at me, Aileen.”
Slowly, she opened her eyes. It wasn’t a dream. She reached up to press her fingers over the strong angles of his face and stared into his glassy eyes. “You’re real.”
He blinked hard. “I shouldn’t’ve left you.”
“You did what you thought was right.”
Regret streamed through him—she could see it in his taut facial expression, the tension in the muscles pressed against her. His lips twisted into a grimace. “’Twas wrong. So wrong. God…” Shaking his head, he pulled her into his arms again.
“You needed to salvage your honor, to make the right decision, to respect the oath you’d made to my brother,” she said, her words muffled against his broad chest.
“I left you to the wolves.” His tone was gruff with remorse.
“You did what you felt was right. That’s what’s important.”
“I put you in danger.”
She cupped his jaw in her palms. “You didna know.”
He pulled back. “How can it be that you dinna turn away from me? He hurt you. You could have died—” His voice broke, and he placed his hand flat against her belly. “The babe could have…”
Now Aileen tensed. She’d assumed he hadn’t been told of her pregnancy—but that was silly. If he’d known enough to follow her here, surely someone had told him of the child she carried. Did he know it was his? Did he know how she’d lied to the laird in that last vain attempt to free herself from the betrothal to Gilbert?
“But we’re both safe,” she said soothingly. “He tried to hurt me, but he failed. He didna hurt me, Niall.”
“Are you sure?” He gazed at her, his face twisted with pain and regret. “He married you. There was…a wedding night. He…raped you.”
She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her cheek to his chest to find a deep shudder resonating through his body. “Nay. He tried, but he didna succeed. I’m well. The babe is well.”
He pulled back again, searching her face with tortured eyes. “You’re not telling me this to soothe me, are you?”
“I wouldn’t lie to you,” she murmured. “I promise, mo chridhe. I promise.”
“Thank God,” he whispered on a low groan. “Thank God.” He touched his forehead to hers and pressed his hand against her abdomen again. “Why did you not tell me?”
“I didna know until a few days after you left.”
“My child,” he whispered, speaking the words with reverence.
He knew it was his, then. A smile twitched at the corners of her lips. “Aye.”
“I never believed it would be possible. All this time, everyone thought you were barren.”
“Evidently ’twas Walter who was incapable of planting his seed in me.”
“Aileen, Aileen…” The regret and fear in his eyes had given way to joy. “All my dreams, all my desires are right here, standing right in front of me.”
“As are mine,” she murmured, still reeling with the shock of him being here.
He buried his face in her hair. “I almost destroyed everything. I left you, first all those years ago with Walter Munro and then with Gilbert Dunbar. I’ve sinned against you. Twice.”
“But you’re here now.”
His lips brushed over the shell of her ear. “I thought it would be honorable to submit to my promise to your brother, that leaving you would be an act of self-sacrifice. For my laird and my honor. But ’twas selfish, Aileen. I sacrificed you as well.”
“Let us not think of the past. Think of the here and now.”
“I love you. I think I’ve loved you forever. When we were children I couldna define it, couldna understand my feelings, but I understand them now. I never went to Edinburgh. I encountered cutthroats on the road—death. I realized that I’d made a mistake, that I must give up everything and fight for you.”
“Oh, Niall,” she whispered. “I tried to let you go, but I love you too much. I couldna stop loving you. Not when you left, or when I was kidnapped. Nor when I married Gilbert, nor when I escaped from him. Never.”
Niall’s mouth descended on hers. When he slipped his tongue between her lips, she was not tentative as she’d been that first time at Dornoch. Instead, she opened to him, letting flow all the longing and desire for him that she had tried to squelch in the past weeks.
He pulled away. “Inside?” he asked breathlessly.
Unable to wipe the smile from her face, she tugged him inside, then shut and locked the door.
He took in the entire cottage in one sweeping look. “Your grannie’s house.”
She nodded.
“Ah—” He shifted his stance, clearly uncomfortable. “Where is she?”
“Gone. She’ll be back late tonight.” She smiled. “They say my grannie is a witch, you know. I think something in her blood told her that you were coming and that it might be for the best that she wasn’t here when you arrived.”
“D’you think so?”
“Aye, I do.”
Reaching out, he pulled her against his body. “Does she approve of me as the father of your babe?”
She tilted her head to look up into his face. “Aye. She remembers you, and she approves.”
They stared at each other. In that long gaze, something shifted. Aileen wanted—no, needed—him to touch her intimately. Not only touch, but see, feel, and taste. She could see in the swirling blue depths of his eyes and in the heightened color on his cheeks that he wanted it too, just as suddenly and intensely as she did.
She bowed her head. “I canna marry you. But will you take me as your mistress?”
He took her hands in his own. “Nothing could stop us from being together now. Not the laird, not—”
“I’m married,” she interrupted, her voice flat. “Gilbert Dunbar—”
The crush of his lips against hers stopped her short. He kissed her brutally, then pulled away just as abruptly, his lips glistening. “Dunbar’s dead.”
She blinked at him. “How do you…?”
“When your brother told me he’d taken you from Ellandonan, I left that day in pursuit. I went to Castle Aird.”
Aileen’s hands dropped to her sides like lead weights. She bowed her head. “You killed him?”
“Aye.”
Silence stretched, thin and taut. Gilbert had deserved to die, for what he’d planned to do to her babe, if nothing else. And she knew, from Iain and from the child she’d seen beheaded for stealing bread, that she wasn’t the only one he’d brutalized.
He’d deserved to die.
Still, a tear crested over her bottom eyelid and fell. She didn’t know why she was crying, couldn’t break down the complex reasons behind her tears. All she knew was that she wanted Niall. And now she was free to have him.
She looked up, biting her lip shyly, the tear still trailing down her cheek. “Will you marry me, Niall?”
She could scarcely breathe. The enormity of what she asked did not escape her. She asked him to betray his laird, to sacrifice everything he had spent his life working to achieve.
“Aye, Aileen, I’ll marry you.”
She blinked in surprise. “It wilna be easy,” she whispered. “My brother—”
“Nay,” he interrupted. “The laird’s given his blessing.”
She gasped as yet another surprise barreled into her like a punch to the stomach. “He…has? How could that be?”
Niall smiled wryly. “’Tis a long story. For another time. Let’s just say that I think the Mackenzie loves his family more than even he realizes. But for now…I brought something for you.”
“What is it?”
“Wait here.”
She nodded, and he disappeared out the door, returning a moment later hefting a giant birch log. Her eyes widened at the sight of it. “What’s that?”
He lowered it to the floor, then looked up at her, his blue eyes shining. “’Tis Christmas Eve, remember?”
She looked at the log, then back to him. “A Yule log,” she said softly.
He stepped around it to slip his arm around her. “I remember how sad you were that first year, when Munro punished you for trying to burn the Yule log. You said it brought good luck, but because he’d doused it, you’d never have good luck again. I don’t think you’ve burned a Yule log since then, have you?”
“Nay,” she murmured. “And I dinna think Grannie has, either.”
“Here it is, then,” he said. “A new tradition for us, and for your Grannie. We’ll keep it burning through Twelfth Night, and ’twill bring us luck.”
“It’s time for my luck to change.”
“Aye, ’tis,” he said gruffly. He moved away from her and hefted the log. He took it to the hearth and knelt to start the fire.
And it was done. The tradition of her childhood reborn, thanks to Niall. And as flames flickered around the log, she knew it was true. Niall had brought luck back to her, and with it, her happiness. It grew within her, light and hope and desire, until she felt full to bursting with it.
When the fire was going strong, Niall rose and laid several plaids before the hearth. Then he returned to her, his gaze swiping over her body. His long fingers reached out to touch hers.
“I want to taste you by the warmth of that fire,” he murmured. “Every inch of your sweet skin, from top to bottom.”
She let her fingertips play against his. It was the only place they touched, and it was electric—she was surprised she could not see the joyful dance of the spark between them.
“I want to see your sex again,” she said. “I want to feel it grow beneath my lips, under my fingertips.”
“You will.” His voice was low and edged with roughness. The barest hint of danger that sent a thrill shooting through her. “You will see it again and again.”
“And taste it,” she murmured. “Taste your seed.”
The bond sparked and hummed between them.
“And take it deep within you.”
“Aye.”
Thick and heavy, need mingled with their connection. Aileen’s emotions floated, but her body was grounded, aching to feel her warrior’s body over hers.
She untied her belt and allowed her dress and shift to slip from her shoulders. In one flowing motion, he gathered her into his arms and gently laid her on the plaids. Rolling to her side, she watched him remove his boots. Then he pulled off his shirt and plaid, revealing a white bandage wrapped around his torso.
Aileen gasped “You’re injured.”
He shrugged. “A scratch on the belly and a stab to the side that didna pierce the muscle.”
Hatred and bitterness flooded through her. She knew who was responsible for this. “Gilbert.”
“Aye. But I’ll heal.” He must have seen the anger on her face, for he knelt beside her and gave her a gentle kiss. “Forget him. ’Tis over now.”
“But what if he had killed you?”
He laid his big hand over her shoulder, warm and reassuring. “He didna.”
But if he had… A hundred images flooded through her mind, not of the pain she would have endured had Niall been killed, but of all the ways she would have made Gilbert suffer for it.
The horrible images faded as Niall straightened to reveal his magnificent body. His shaft was within licking distance, and she remembered all those wicked things she had just promised to do to it. Leaning forward, she swiped her tongue from base to head, then smiled up at him.
“Are you ready?”
“Aye, mo chridhe.”
She nuzzled the smooth head of his cock, then opened her mouth to taste his silken, hard shaft.
“Aileen.” He gazed down on her with ocean-deep eyes. “My beautiful, fair Aileen. Mo chridhe. My wife. My love.”
And after she had sucked, licked, stroked, and learned every bit of the rigid, pulsing surface of his cock, he pulled away and laid her back onto the plaids to fulfill his own promise.
He tasted her, from soft tickles of her toes and thighs, to the aching area between her legs. There, he explored her, inside and out, sucking with his mouth, thrusting and stroking with his fingers, making her shake, squirm, and then finally moan with the most gratifying release she’d ever known.
“You are so sweet,” he murmured. “I could come from just tasting you.”
Then he continued upward, exploring her skin with reverence.
He teased her sensitive nipples until she was gasping and squirming again, and when his cock nuzzled the folds of her entrance, she was ready.
He stared down at her, his blue eyes open and clear. “I’ll never leave you unprotected again,” he promised her. “This is my oath to you. I swear, there will be nothing more to my world beyond you and our babe. I will care for you for as long as I live, and I’ll protect you both with my life. I love you, mo chridhe.”
And she believed him, because to Niall, honor was everything.
“I love you too,” she breathed.
Slowly, he tunneled into her welcoming body. Aileen gasped from the overwhelming pleasure of it.
He slid into her with gliding thrusts, and she came again in long, sweet waves, quivering with bliss. After a few moments, Niall followed, shouting his joy until the rafters shook with it.
Finally, Aileen had achieved what she’d always longed for but never dared to hope for. Untarnished happiness. Oneness with the man she loved so intensely, it was as if the world didn’t exist beyond what they shared together. He was her Highlander…just in time for Christmas.
####
Also by Dawn Halliday
The Sweetest Revenge
Highland Obsession
Highland Surrender
Winter Heat
Twice the Night
Honeymoon Castaways
A Highlander Christmas (collection including the novella Winter Heat)
Jewels of the Nile IV (collection including the novella Midnight Seduction)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Dawn Halliday writes historical and contemporary erotic romance in Southern California, where she lives with her husband, three children, and an assortment of other creatures. You can learn more about Dawn at www.DawnHalliday.com.
Three Determined Women…One Fallen Man
The Sweetest Revenge
Copyright 2012 Dawn Halliday
When the Earl of Leothaid took Isabelle Frasier’s innocence, the resulting scandal drove Isabelle from Scotland to England in humiliating exile. Seven years later, she befriends Anna Newton and Susan, Lady DeLinn, two other women whom Leo has similarly debauched and abandoned.
Isabelle joins with Anna and Susan to seek vengeance on the man who ruined them. But when her friends choose Isabelle as the instrument of their revenge, she faces an impossible choice: stand by Anna and Susan, or betray them by surrendering to her reawakening feelings for the wicked earl.
When Leo lost the woman he loved, he sank into a life of depravity and vice. Now, nothing and nobody can seep into his hard shell of a heart. But when three mystery women abduct him and shackle him in a dark cellar, Leo just might rediscover his humanity…and a love that may lift him back into the light.
; Excerpt from The Sweetest Revenge:
The earl lay on the chaise longue near the wall, about three long paces away, curled as tightly as his bonds would allow, sleeping beneath a blue silk blanket.
A strip of linen blindfolded him. Susan had planned this—to keep him blindfolded and the ropes lashed to his hands at night in the event something should happen, or in the event one of them wished to make a nighttime call. At the time, Isabelle thought Susan’s decision extreme, but here she was.
She stared at the blindfold and remembered his eyes. Dark, stormy blue with hints of metallic gray that glimmered when he was angry…or aroused.
His wide lips parted slightly in sleep. Facial hair covered the edge of his jaw. She remembered running her lips over his jaw, up his hairline, across his forehead. She remembered stroking his torso, learning every muscle, every dip and curve of his form. She’d loved touching him. He’d told her he loved touching her, too.
But he’d lied. Just as he had lied to Anna and Susan and countless others.
Why?
Isabelle released a long, slow breath.
“Belle?” he said in a rough voice. “Is that you?”
She froze. How long had he been awake?
Silence.
She had to breathe or her lungs would burst. She inhaled shallowly, trying desperately to be silent.
“Don’t hide from me.” Awkwardly, he kicked the blanket away and shifted his body so he sat upright. The chain clanked on the floor, and Isabelle winced.
She could not peel her eyes away from him. He sat on the edge of the chaise, fully awake now, his body alert, so alert he reminded her of a lion studying a mouse, seconds from leaping on its prey.
When she was eighteen, she’d believed he was the handsomest man in the world. Since then, she’d privately scoffed at her immature infatuation.
She’d been wrong to scoff. He was beautiful. He was larger now than he’d been seven years ago—thicker through the shoulders and in the thighs. His muscles had grown to mouthwatering proportions.
He was a dissolute, spoilt rake. How on earth had he grown so strong?
She studied his feet, awed by them yet again. They were so big, so naked. The nakedness extended up his manacled ankles to the bottoms of his crumpled black trousers.
A Naughty Little Christmas (Cowboys, Cops, and Kilts: 8 Seasonally Seductive Romances from Bestselling Authors) Page 43
