by Julia London
Her cries sounded delirious; she writhed beneath him, her arms flailing, her hair covering her face as the extraordinary sensations washed over her in wave after wave of stunning delight.
She forgot everything but Grif, could think of nothing but returning that remarkable pinnacle of delight, and having no idea how to do it.
Grif moved between her legs, softly caressing the damp curls. “Anna,” he said hoarsely, and she opened her eyes, rolled her head to look at him. “Come to me now as a wife, as I will come to ye as a husband.” He came over her, pressed his thick erection into her sex. He found her hand, guided it so that she could feel how much he wanted her. “Grif,” she murmured helplessly.
He smiled, reached between them, felt her slick opening, and slowly, carefully slid into her.
Anna gasped softly as the tip of him entered her, but felt the discomfort ease as her body adjusted to him. And then he slid a little farther, the clench of his jaw the only outward sign of his restraint. Anna closed her eyes, let her head fall back, let her body feel her husband inside of her.
“Diah, I canna wait,” he said, his voice sounding as if he struggled to remain calm. “I want to be inside ye, to show ye how a man will give his wife pleasure so that he may know his own.”
With a smile, Anna opened her eyes. “Show me, husband.”
Grif slipped an arm under her back and lowered his mouth to hers. And as he kissed her, he thrust powerfully with his hips, breaking the barrier. Anna cried out, a mixture of pain and sheer ecstasy enveloping her, and she had the sensation of Grif sliding slowly into her depths.
“Uist, m’annsachd,” he whispered. He waited a moment, allowed her body time to adapt to him, then slowly, carefully, began to move inside her, sliding and plunging, sliding and plunging.
The sensation was astoundingly lurid and beautiful all at once, a strangely pleasurable pain, and when Anna began to move to meet his thrusts, Grif moaned into her flesh, his breath hot. She could feel her body tighten around him, drawing him in, just as she could feel the strength of his desire growing and the power of his body.
But then his strokes began to take on a new urgency, and she met him in perfect harmony as his body bucked beneath her. He slipped his hand between their bodies and began to stroke her in time to the stroking inside her. The fires began to build in her again, raging, white hot, and she realized she was whimpering with the sensational mix of pleasure and pain. Then, suddenly, she felt an overwhelming wave of fire flash through her and cried out.
Grif cried out, too, with one last powerful surge inside her, and she could feel his member convulsing, spilling into her, his life’s blood to hers. Panting, he collapsed onto her, his face in her hair. He gathered her in his arms and rolled to his side, holding her tightly to him, until he had caught his breath.
“I love ye, Anna,” he said at long last. “Diah, but I love ye.”
She smiled into the curve of his shoulder. “I love you, Grif.”
In the privacy of that room, their desire for one another sated for the time being, they lay naked together in candlelight, their bodies entwined, and on a bed of primrose and bluebell, watching the flames at the hearth slowly die, naming their future children, in complete peace.
And when Anna fell asleep in Grif’s arms, her lashes dark against her sun-drenched skin, he recalled what he’d once seen on a tombstone: “Here lie Leslie MacBeth and his loving wife, Aileen, together in conjugal felicity in death as in life.”
At the time Grif had thought it a rather odd thing to put on one’s tombstone. But tonight he prayed with all his might for conjugal felicity with the woman beside him, in life and into death.
Thirty
T he next morning’s light, bright and warm, streamed in the small window of their room at the inn. Grif had already arisen, was washed and dressed when Anna awoke. She sat up, stretched her arms high above her head, and yawned with pleasure. “My husband,” she said, smiling prettily.
“Wife,” he responded, grinning like a happy man as he walked around to the side of the bed to kiss her.
“You’ve risen so soon,” she pouted, her arms around his neck. “I had rather hoped you would show me again,” she said, smiling wickedly.
He was only a man, and he laughed as she tugged at his neckcloth, at last untying it himself in the interest of obliging his bride. It wasn’t until a maid knocked on the door that he extracted himself from the bed and her and reluctantly rose.
Grif dressed quickly. “I’d best find MacAlister,” he said, and kissed the top of her head. “We should press on, mo ghraidh, as soon as ye are bathed and dressed.”
She fell back against the pillows, looking marvelously sated. “I don’t ever want to leave here.”
“Aye, but we must. We’ve no money, lass,” he said, unable to resist the urge to kiss her again. “I’ll have a bath sent up and come for ye after a time, aye?”
“Very well,” she said, twirling a length of hair around her finger. “But go now, will you, so that you may soon come back to me.”
He laughed, kissed her once more, and grabbing up his hat, walked out the door.
He found the innkeeper and inquired after Hugh. The innkeeper, still flush from what Grif assured him was a successful wedding supper, seemed confused by Grif’s question. “Yer man, milord? Oh no, he didna keep here. We had only the one room, aye?”
That surprised Grif—he’d assumed Hugh had taken a room here. “Then where might he have gone?”
The innkeeper shrugged. “There’s a small public inn at the end of the high street,” he said. “Perhaps he’s there.”
Grif started in that direction, but paused and looked over his shoulder at the innkeeper. “Might there be gaming in the village? Somewhere a lad might find a bit of sport?”
The innkeeper shook his head. “Perhaps a game now and then at the smithy, milord,” he said, “but no’ more.”
The other inn, then. Grif walked on, ignoring the knot of discomfort in his belly. It was ridiculous to believe something had happened. What would Hugh have done with Miss Brody? If the Queen’s Head Inn had no rooms, of course he’d gone to the smaller inn.
He walked down the main village thoroughfare to the opposite end of the village, where the other, smaller inn was located. The innkeeper at this rather sordid establishment, a woman, grimaced when he asked after Hugh.
“Aye, I know of him. A friend of yers, is he?”
“Aye,” Grif said.
“Then ye be the same bad ilk!”
“I beg yer pardon?” Grif asked, taken aback.
“Yer friend and his Irish whore left without paying!” she spat.
Grif felt a knife of panic. “Left?” he exclaimed. “That’s impossible!”
“Impossible, is it?” she hissed. “The rotten bounder left in the middle of the night like a bloody thief, owing me six crowns!”
Stunned, Grif dumbly reached into his leather purse and handed her a five-pound banknote. “That should take care of yer troubles,” he said angrily, and left, stalking back into the village, feeling terribly confused. Nothing made sense—Hugh had left London with no more money than Grif, and probably had much less after last night’s celebration. Unless he’d been gambling… still it made no sense that he’d leave without the beastie—
He stopped mid-stride. No. No, no… Hugh was many things, but he was not a thief! Still… Grif hurried on, the panic taking hold.
Shop after shop, he inquired, and received the same answer. No one had seen a man resembling Hugh this day. Grif’s last call was to the smithy, and there he felt the deep, sharp pang of fear.
“Aye, he was here,” the smithy said, eyeing Grif. “He took his horses, he did, without bothering to pay for their keep.”
“When?” Grif asked, reaching for his leather purse again.
“In the dead of night,” the smithy said, snatching the banknote Grif held out.
“The lass too, aye?”
“Aye.”
Grif n
odded, and walked to the edge of the smithy’s barn. He put his hand on a post there, and tried to draw a breath.
He knew, of course. He knew what Hugh had done before he could even reach the inn and confirm it. The lad had betrayed him in the worst conceivable way.
Somehow he managed to stumble out of the blacksmith’s barn onto the main thoroughfare, his mind racing with sickening thoughts. Twice he had to pause and put his hand to the wall, and lean over, eyes closed, trying to catch the breath that had been snatched clean from him.
Grif staggered toward the inn, attempting to convince himself that he was jumping to conclusions, that it might have been someone else altogether. He even tried to believe Hugh was waiting for him now.
Yet his gut fear roared louder than his common sense, telling him that last night Hugh had used the excuse of readying their wedding room to take the beastie, and once Grif and Anna had gone up to their marriage bed, he and Keara Brody had taken the beastie and ran, making Grif to be a bloody fool.
When he returned to the inn and the room where Anna was waiting for him, he leaned against the door, fearing he might be sick. He had just married this woman—and now he would tell her that their future was ruined? That he had taken her from the lap of luxury to certain poverty?
“Grif!” she cried happily from the basin, where she was winding her hair into some sort of coif, wearing a chemise. “I didn’t expect you so soon! I finished my letter home this morning, and told them everything. Well,” she said batting her lashes coyly, “perhaps not quite everything.” She laughed.
He looked at her, feeling nothing but a growing ache. What of his parents? Dear God, what of Mared? How could he possibly disappoint them all?
“And where is your valet this morning, hmm?” she asked gaily.
“Ye’ve no’ seen him, then?” he managed to ask.
She paused in the styling of her hair and looked over her shoulder at him. “Seen him? I should hope not sir, for I would have seen him from my bath!” She laughed again, and when Grif did not smile, she lowered her arms. “Grif, what’s wrong?”
“He’s gone, Anna. He and Miss Brody are gone.”
“Oh! Well, then,” Anna said, her bright smile returning. “They seemed rather comfortable, did they not? Perhaps they have sought the vicar—”
“I’ve just come from the vicar. And the innkeeper. And every bloody shop in this village. He left in the dead of night without paying his debts,” Grif said, and forced himself to shove away from the wall, to look in the satchel.
Anna stood there, watching him. “What are you doing?”
“The beastie,” he said, choking on the word, and tore open their small satchel.
“No,” Anna said sternly. “He’d not betray you so!”
But he would and he had. Hugh had brought their things to the room, and in his happy delirium Grif had forgotten to be vigilant. He’d forgotten the bloody beastie, and Hugh knew he would.
Grif tossed the empty satchel aside and turned around to face his bride. “’Tis gone.”
Her eyes widened with shock, and she looked wildly about, then suddenly ran across the room, pouncing on the bed, pawing through the linens. “No, no! I will not believe he betrayed you!”
Grif said nothing. She caught his hand, pulled him to the bed. “Think! Where would he go? Talla Dileas?”
Grif clenched his jaw and shook his head. “He’s stolen it, leannan.”
Anna collapsed onto her heels on the bed. “But… but why?”
Grif pressed a fist to his forehead to stave off the blinding headache he felt behind his eyes. “Money, I’d wager. He’s a gambler, Hugh.”
“But what of Miss Brody?” Anna demanded, near to tears. “She’s not a thief!”
“She’d have had no choice but to do what Hugh demanded,” he said with a shrug. “And she needed money for her family in Ireland, aye? Perhaps they thought of it together.”
Anna gasped softly; she sprang off the bed, began looking around. “I can’t just sit here! We must have another look about.”
Grif halfheartedly helped her, because he knew in his heart of hearts that they’d not unearth Hugh or the beastie. Nevertheless, they searched the room, top to bottom, and then went out, Anna vainly hoping that there had been some mistake, that Hugh was wandering the village.
But there was no sign of him or Miss Brody. And, in fact, they encountered the one person who had seen the couple after Grif and Anna had retired. Ealasaid.
Ealasaid brightened considerably when Grif asked if she’d seen Hugh. “Oh, aye,” she said, smiling broadly. “I saw them both,” she said, looking a little dreamy. “Looking into one another’s eyes and whispering sweet things. ’Twas a night for love, milord.”
“Did they retire?” Anna asked.
“Oh, I donna know, milady. They left, picked up their bags and left.”
“Left? And did ye see them leave town, lass?” Grif asked.
“No, milord, just the inn. I thought it’d be too dark to start a journey, but they took horses and rode on.”
Anna covered her face with her hands.
“Oh, there now, miss!” the girl said kindly. “There’s no shame in it, truly, for they seemed very much in love!”
Anna and Grif rode out that morning after posting Anna’s letter home. When Grif paused to look back at Gretna Green, Anna put her hand on his. “It’s no use,” she said softly. “He’s gone.”
“Aye,” Grif said, and looked north, toward Talla Dileas, wondering what in God’s name he would tell his parents now.
Thirty-one
M ared, Ellie, and Natalie had taken it upon themselves to repair the old gazebo down by the loch. They had hammer and nails and a bucket of whitewash, and wore, over their worn spring gowns, old aprons. While Ellie and Mared hammered strips of maple they had lathed themselves, Natalie calmly painted one section of railing they had completed yesterday.
The gazebo was perched on a soft hill overlooking Loch Chon, and from the gazebo one could see portions of the road wending its way from Aberfoyle. It was a movement on the road that caught Natalie’s eye, and she glanced up, shielding her eyes from the sun with her paintbrush. “We’ve callers, Mother,” she said calmly.
Ellie and Mared both jerked their gazes to her, then looked to where she pointed. Mared instantly gasped and tossed aside her hammer, marching across the gazebo to have a better look. “Mary Queen of Scots, it’s Grif! I’d know the lad anywhere,” she said. “Dudley was right—he said they’d be less than a fortnight behind.”
“Grif!” Natalie squealed, running to Mared’s side as Ellie walked to the railing.
“Is that Mr. MacAlister, too?” she asked. “He looks rather small.”
“Aye,” Mared said, squinting a little. “Too small.”
“Perhaps he brought his wife home, too, Mother, like the captain brought you,” Natalie suggested.
Ellie and Mared both laughed heartily at that suggestion. “I think no’, Nattie,” Mared said, running her hand over the girl’s head. “Liam, well, he’s always had a soft heart, he has. But Grif… he prefers the company of many to one.”
“Then who might it be?” Ellie asked, and exchanged a look with Mared.
The three of them quickly put away their things and hurried off to the main castle, to warn Aila and Carson that Grif had come home.
It was therefore the reason that the entire family had assembled (Dudley included, for he was, thanks to his dear Fiona, quite improved) in the old great hall, nervously pacing, waiting for the riders to come all the way to the top of the mountain where Talla Dileas had once reigned supreme.
“He’s here, he’s here!” Natalie shrieked, running in from her post at the front entry.
Carson nodded at Dudley.
“Aye, milord,” Dudley said, and with a nod and a click of his heels, he strode smartly from the great hall.
They waited nervously for several moments, each of them stealing glimpses of the other, Natalie with her face
pressed to the windowpanes. And then they heard the voices. Nothing they could make out, of course, but enough that they gasped collectively and looked wildly at one another.
“It canna be,” Aila whispered.
“The hell it canna,” Carson said gruffly, and suddenly, as if they were one, the six of them were pushing one another out of the great hall and to the front door.
“They’ll think me a tart,” Anna groaned as Grif helped her down from her horse. “Will you look at me? It’s as if you dragged me behind all the way from London,” she moaned as Grif helped her adjust her clothing.
“They’ll think ye a bonny lass and they will love ye as I do,” he said, and tried to give her a reassuring smile, but his stomach was in knots. He could recall all too easily his own feelings of anger when Ellie had arrived on their doorstep in place of the beastie, but he put his arms around her and hugged her. “It will be quite all right, m’annsachd. Ye’ll see.”
“I wish I were as confident,” she muttered as he turned her around and gave her a bit of a push out of the way so that he could tether the horses.
Anna moved, walking into the middle of the green, looking up at the huge monolith of an estate. “My God,” she said quietly, peering up at it, and Grif laughed.
“Talla Dileas is no’ a fancy English estate, but she has part of every wee bit of Scottish history, both the good and the bad. Aye, she’s no’ bonny, is she? But she’s as strong as the mountain on which she sits!”
“It’s the most… fantastically bizarre thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” Anna said, almost reverently.
Grif tethered the last horse, walked to where Anna was standing, and slipped his hand around hers. “Ye donna have even a ring,” he said.
“I have no need for a ring, darling,” she said with a smile. “I have you.”
