The Laird's Willful Lass (The Likely Lairds Book 1)

by Anna Campbell

  He played with her mouth until she was shaking and panting. In a silent plea for more, she raised grasping hands to knead the hard muscles of his upper arms. When he brushed his lips over her instep, she jerked against the bed, although compared to what he’d done to her breasts, the kiss was almost chaste. She attained such a pitch of hunger, every touch sent heat exploding along her veins.

  Fergus dropped a rain of kisses across her breasts before with impressive efficiency, he released her skirt and petticoats. He drew the garments down to reveal filmy drawers under the rucked-up shift. His eyes turned bright with hunger, as he undid his wide black belt and let it drop with a thud to the floor, followed by the soft rustle of his kilt falling away.

  His nakedness transfixed Marina. “What a superb man you are,” she sighed, her heated gaze tracing his powerful leanness, before focusing on the hard column of flesh rising from a nest of dark red hair between his legs.

  Her hands closed on emptiness at her sides as apprehension stirred anew. He was so very big. Per pietà, how would all that male strength feel as it moved inside her?

  “Thank you,” Fergus said, and he bestowed his rare, full smile upon her. Whenever he did, she always felt like he gave her a wonderful gift. Her fleeting fear vanished as if it had never been.

  Marina had imagined she’d feel nervous when a man saw her naked for the first time. She’d been nervous when he first joined her on the bed. But Fergus had built her responses inch by inch, until all she cared about was finding an answer to this endless desire.

  She sat up and, hands clumsy with eagerness, she tugged her shift over her head. Now only her drawers remained. The transparent material did little to hide the dark patch of hair between her legs.

  With glittering eyes, Fergus surveyed her body. Marina had a sudden memory of their first meeting when she’d wanted to spread herself before him and let him work his enchantment. The wanton thought had been a premonition.

  “You’re quite a sight yourself, lassie,” he said in a hoarse whisper, kneeling over her.

  Her skin tightened in anticipation as she waited for him to rip away her drawers and plunge into her, but there was just more of that tantalizing patience. His face stern with concentration, he explored her body, trailing fire across breasts and belly and flanks. Only when she was moaning and trembling against the covers did he touch her where she burned for him.

  He found the slit in her drawers and cupped her mound. An uncontrollable surge of liquid heat welled to greet him. She gasped in surprise and bowed up, wanting more but not understanding what that meant. Fergus met her helpless response with a guttural sound of approval.

  Per l’amor di dio, this encounter was a revelation. How she could burn to the point of immolation, then burn some more. How a man’s hands on her bare skin made her blood rush in a hot tide of demand. How desire could tease and torture to the edge of pain, yet remain the most exquisite pleasure.

  He kissed her again. He’d kissed her so often today, and every time it was different. This was a passionate exploration, so that when he started to caress her between the legs, it felt like part of the same act. This bold exploration of her most private flesh should shock her, but his careful seduction had carried her far beyond shyness. Blindly she reached for his arm, seeking some stability in a reeling world.

  Then thinking herself beyond shock, she discovered she wasn’t at all. Subtle pressure, and one long finger invaded her body.

  She shuddered at the intimate penetration, then cried out when he brushed his thumb over a place of tormenting sensitivity. A blast of pleasure shook her, then another and another, as he began to work his finger in and out. She was sleek with need already, but her uncontained female response to this invasion astonished her.

  Fergus watched the way his hand moved on and in her with an unwavering concentration that fired her arousal to wildfire. There was something bewitching about having all that blazing masculine attention focused on her.

  She shuddered anew when he stretched her with two fingers, then again when he curled the tips against a spot inside her and sent rivers of wild flame coursing through her veins. Her breath emerged in harsh sobs, and her hand clenched hard against his shoulder.

  “Now,” she said brokenly.

  The eyes he raised to hers were black with hunger. “Soon.”

  “Mackinnon, stop torturing me.” She dug her nails into his firm flesh. “I want you.”

  “Not enough.”

  “Any more and I’ll explode.”

  “Och, you’re nowhere near that yet,” he said, and in her urgency, she hated his smugness, even as her body tensed toward some unknown end.

  “I want…” she stuttered as sensation rose to inundate her. “I want…”

  She expected him to smile, but he looked as if the fate of worlds hung on what he did to her. Still the powerful feeling swelled inside her. She was nearing some mysterious edge, when he eased his hand away.

  “Kiss me, Marina,” he said in a thick voice.

  She lurched up, linking her arms around his neck and pressing her mouth to his. “Touch me again,” she muttered against his lips.

  Instead of returning to that delightful torment, il cattivo, he went back to squeezing and touching her breasts. She was in such a fever that every brush of his fingers made her quake. When he began to roll and pull the tips, fireworks exploded behind her eyes. All of her thirsted for him to take her. She bumped her hips up until her cleft met his arousal. Instead of providing any satisfaction, that only spurred her need.

  “You want me, too,” she said, sounding as if she accused him of a crime.

  “More than my life, my bonny,” he said, rubbing luxuriantly against her sex, lingering in the satiny folds. They were both shaking after that.

  With unsteady hands, he untied her drawers and tugged them down her hips and off. She was in such turmoil, she barely registered that at last they were both naked.

  Marina began to touch him, running eager hands over his arms and shoulders, down that strong, flexible back, pressing into the firm globes of his buttocks. He groaned and scraped his teeth along her neck until she moaned and bit his shoulder in retaliation.

  He kissed her hard and pulled her knees up, opening her to him. She tilted her hips in immediate invitation, but he kept stroking her, bringing her again and again to the point where she must break apart, then easing back.

  Marina felt wrung out and exhausted, yet on edge and jumpy. She sucked in a breath that tasted of male musk and female desire and prepared to tell Fergus to stop teasing her. Then all conscious thought fled as the pressure between her legs became harder and hotter and more purposeful.

  “Fergus…” she whispered in welcome, as her senses dissolved in a mixture of discomfort and delight.

  He rose on his elbows so he could watch her face. The skin stretched tight across his chiseled features, and he struggled for every breath.

  Cielo, without him inside her, she felt empty. Instinct made her lift her hips to take him. With a smoothness that astounded her, he shifted forward. She cried out at the sharp sting as he took her virginity, then forgot the brief discomfort when Fergus seated himself fully within her.

  The experience ranged beyond her most extravagant imaginings. Fergus conquered more than her body; he claimed her very soul. Unashamedly possessive hands slid down his back, loving how the powerful muscles shifted under her caress. Her hungry gaze sought his. His gray eyes were dark and smoky and alight with joy.

  “You’re mine now.” She couldn’t mistake the masculine triumph in his words.

  A week ago, she might have contested that statement, despite being so obviously at his mercy. Today she stared into that remarkable face and found it in her to smile. “And you’re mine. Don’t try and deny it.”

  His gasp of laughter quivered through her. Every time she shifted, he moved inside her. The raw intimacy of this connection thrilled her as nothing else, even her art, ever had. In silent affirmation of his possession,
her body softened and settled around him.

  “Aye, I think you might be right.”

  His muscles tightened under the hands she rested on the small of his back. With his slow withdrawal, she gave a long, reverberant moan. Her eyes fluttered shut as pleasure engulfed her. Then opened wide in amazement when he slid forward again, stirring every nerve to fresh sensation.

  “Ooh,” she said on a gasp of happy discovery. “There’s more.”

  “Aye, much more.”

  “Eccellente.” She clenched around him in an instinctive attempt to keep him with her.

  Fergus gave a broken groan, and the eyes gazing down into hers turned glassy. “Devil take you, do that again.”

  She tensed on purpose, relishing how he trembled in response. How she loved the pleasure she gave him.

  This time when he moved, Marina rose to meet him. Seduction exploded into a fiery dance of bodies meeting and parting. Anticipation surged anew, spiraling inside her like hot, twisting wire. It was the way she’d felt when he’d touched her to the point of torture, but now, nothing stopped her climbing the wave that towered higher and higher.

  Her fingers dug into his back as he took her in long, deliberate strokes. Each glide of his body heightened the yearning after something she’d never known but instinctively sensed awaited. Her breath emerged in harsh gasps, and she pressed up toward him as the wild storm loomed closer and closer.

  “Let go, Marina,” he crooned, his Scottish burr stronger than she’d ever heard it.

  His breath against her ear as he rolled the ‘R’ in her name added yet another element to the whirling magic. She shivered, and her arousal soared higher yet, without sending her tumbling over into relief.

  “I don’t know what to do,” she panted. “It’s like running after something I’ll never catch.”

  “You’ll catch it.” He lurched onto his knees and tugged her hips up. The change in position thundered through her. He plunged into her hard and high and slammed against some deep part of her that she hadn’t known was there.

  She convulsed into immediate climax. The world around her dissolved into white lightning, and she cried out Fergus’s name in wonder as everything flashed into blinding light.

  At last Fergus’s control frayed. The relentless, driving rhythm of his thrusts became choppy, and his breath escaped in great groans of pleasure. For what felt like an eon, Marina remained suspended at a peak of rapture so pure it dimmed the sun. Then as she floated down, he jolted in her arms and went rigid.

  With a guttural cry, he wrenched away to spill his seed in powerful spurts on her naked stomach. He clutched her hips, holding her in place as he found his release.

  Marina stared up at him in a sensual daze, while reality called her back from the edge of transcendence. Stupid to regret that he didn’t fill her. Stupid to feel empty and, despite all the pleasure that went before, disappointed.

  He’d sworn to protect her from a child, and he’d stayed true to his word. She should be grateful that he’d justified her trust.

  He drew a rasping breath, then another, and reached down to stroke her cheek. His tenderness had launched today’s journey. Now after Fergus had changed her world forever, tenderness returned to his touch and his voice to remind her of that sweet beginning.

  “You’re astonishing, Marina Lucchetti.”

  * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  * * *

  Through misty eyes, Marina watched Fergus walk across to collect a towel from the pile on the washstand. He returned to her side and with more of that heartbreaking gentleness, he wiped away the sticky mess on her stomach. Then he bent to kiss her. The kiss contained no passion, but a wealth of gratitude. He lingered long enough for the sweetness to seep into her bones and turn them to honey.

  She caught his wrist, running her hand down to his in a caress that communicated exquisite joy. What could one say after flying to the stars and back? Thank you seemed inadequate. What she’d experienced beggared description.

  He moved away to clean himself and wrap his kilt around his waist. His action reminded Marina she sprawled naked across the bedcovers. She sat up and scooped up her shirt, hoping it might restore a shred of modesty. It was long enough to cover her to her thighs.

  Fergus crouched in front of the fireplace and set the kindling alight. “I’ll heat some water, so you can have a proper wash.”

  “Thank you.” She felt tongue-tied and awkward with this transition from paradise to the prosaic. With unsteady hands, she started to button her shirt. Fergus must have shaved this morning, but her breasts and neck stung a little from his passionate attentions.

  He tilted his head to observe her uncertain progress. “Did I hurt you?”

  Ridiculous that she’d felt so free and bold when they’d made love, but now she blushed to talk about what they’d done.

  “No.” At his arched russet eyebrow, she stammered the truth. “A little. At first.” Even more unsteadily, she went on. “I didn’t think it would be like that. I didn’t think you’d be like that.”

  Frowning, he rose. “Damn it, did I let ye down, lassie?”

  He was a man so confident, it verged on a fault. This hint of vulnerability touched her. She gave her head an emphatic shake. “There was no disappointment, Mackinnon. You were…” She struggled for words to convey that matchless pleasure. “…marvelous.”

  He sat on the side of the bed, taking her hand. Immediately she felt better, more at ease.

  “So were you.” He gave her one of those half-smiles that she cherished. “I hope before too long, you’ll give me another chance to be marvelous.”

  Heat that had nothing to do with embarrassment flooded her. She was shocked at her reviving interest. Per pietà, how could she summon even a spark of arousal after what they’d done? “Really?”

  “Aye, of course. If you’re not too sore.” He paused. “And if you’d like to do it all again.”

  Marina sent him a mock disapproving glance. “I don’t trust you when you’re accommodating.”

  “Take advantage of it while it lasts.” The half-smile lingered. “What is your pleasure, my lady?”

  You’re my pleasure.

  She bit back the words as too revealing, although after today, he must know that she couldn’t resist him. “Perhaps breakfast.”

  Fergus kissed her with more intent this time. By the time he lifted his head, she lolled bonelessly against the pillows. “Och, you’re a grand lass.”

  She summoned a smile, as her heart thundered fit to burst out of her constricted chest. “Just because I asked for breakfast?”

  “Just because you are.” The fondness softening his gaze was more dangerous to her equilibrium than his smiles. And they already made her as dizzy as a wheel. “Now tell me what ye meant when you said things didnae meet your expectations.”

  It was her turn to smile. “I’m not expressing any dissatisfaction.”

  “I’m pleased to hear it.”

  “After guarding my chastity so long, I imagined I’d rue the loss. But in your arms, it seemed so natural to let desire take its course.”

  Another purposeful kiss left her trembling. “So was that the surprise?”

  She made a helpless gesture, as she struggled to express herself. “I assumed after the long pursuit, that you’d be…”

  “Ah,” he said softly. “You thought I’d fall on ye like Macushla devours a bone.”

  A half-horrified giggle escaped her. “Perhaps not the comparison I’d choose, but all the same, I imagined you’d be more…”

  “Voracious?”

  “Yes.”

  “You were a virgin.”

  “So you were being considerate?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve never been one of those greedy laddies who gobbles his food and misses all the fine flavors for the sake of filling his belly. Ye were a delicious meal indeed, lassie. I wasnae going to rush a moment of feasting on you.” A sudden frown drew his auburn brows together. “Are you
worried about how much I wanted you? If you are, I’ll never call ye an intelligent woman again.”

  “No,” she said in a low voice. “I knew.”

  Indeed she did. His every action during that leisurely seduction had blazed with fierce desire.

  “Good,” he said shortly, before kissing her again. “Now let me look after you.”

  Independent, headstrong Marina Lucchetti nodded and lay back on the disordered bed. Dio, was she losing her spirit, now she’d discovered a man’s touch?

  Or was she learning a touch of humility at last and recognizing that sometimes there was no harm in relinquishing control to someone else?

  Especially someone as competent as Fergus. She’d admired his graceful efficiency from the first, when he’d dragged her and Papa from the wrecked coach. Even when she wanted to give him a good shake, she credited him as an unusually capable man.

  Now appreciation for his proficiency seeped through her, as she watched him fetch water and set it heating on the fire. He brought in the saddlebags and assembled an appetizing meal of bread with ham and cheese, cake and fruit on the gate-leg table in the corner near the hearth. She mightn’t require someone to look after her, but it was agreeable to watch a man work so diligently for her comfort.

  He raised his head from where he bent over the fire. “You look like the wee kitten who got the cream, lassie.”

  Marina smiled in unabashed delight. “Miaow.”

  He laughed in appreciation and rose with a cup and saucer in one hand and a small crystal glass in the other. “Some tea for you—and a wee dram to mark the occasion.”

  “Not that barbarous spirit?” She sat up and accepted the cup, while Fergus set the glass on the nightstand beside her.

  Fascinating laughter lines deepened around his gray eyes. Her fingers itched to capture that expression on paper. But her portfolio was outside, tied to her pony’s saddle, and for once in her life, she had something better than art to think about.

  “Aye. Try it. You might like it.”

  “Papa has developed quite a taste for it. When we go back to Florence, he’ll find our Italian liqueurs sadly tame.”