The Highlander's Wicked Ways, page 22
The silver quaich was brought forth, filled with sweet mead. Munro took it first, raising it to his lips before passing it to me. I sipped from the same side, the ancient ritual sealing our bond. As I handed the quaich back to Father William, Isabella whispered near my ear.
Love him as I did. Heal him as I could nae. Be the mama my lasses need.
“I will,” I said. The priest frowned at me, and Munro cocked his eyebrows. “Isabella,” I whispered and tapped my ear.
Munro’s smile was that of a man who was at peace with his loss now, and a great sense of peace settled over me as well.
Father William raised his hands and said, “Ye are as one now, joined together in body, vow, and spirit.”
Munro’s hands cupped my face with exquisite tenderness, and then his lips claimed mine in a kiss that spoke of promise, of passion, of a future I had never dared imagine for myself. The chapel erupted in cheers and applause, but I heard only the beating of my heart and Munro’s whispered, “Mo chridhe,” against my lips.
I returned his kiss with the fiery passion blazing through me and whispered back, “My heart.”
Later that night, after the wedding feast and celebration, the heavy oak door of our bedchamber closed behind us with a soft thud that seemed to seal away the rest of the world. I stood in the center of the room, suddenly shy despite everything we’d already shared. Candles flickered in iron sconces along the walls, their golden light dancing across the stone and casting long shadows into the corners. The hearth fire crackled and popped, sending a wave of warmth against the evening chill. Munro moved to stand before me, his eyes reflecting the flames as he gently reached up to remove the small flowers from my hair, each touch deliberate, reverent.
“We are husband and wife now,” he murmured, his voice a low rumble that sent a shiver down my spine. “I can scarcely believe it.”
“Nor I,” I whispered, my chest squeezing at the thought. Though we had lain together before, tonight was our first as one.
Munro’s fingers worked the pins from my hair, releasing it to fall around my shoulders. “I dreamt of this last night,” he confessed, his gaze never leaving mine as he set the pins aside. “Of taking ye as my wife, in our chamber, in our bed.” His hand cupped my cheek, thumb tracing the curve of my lower lip. “Without ghosts between us. Or secrets. Nae any bargains born in shadows.”
I leaned into his touch, my eyes drifting closed for a moment. “Nae more careful plans,” I added softly. “Only this. Only us.”
When I opened my eyes again, the raw emotion in his face nearly stole my breath. Gone was the guarded man who had first regarded me with suspicion. Gone was the guilt-ridden da who had kept his daughters at arm’s length. Munro was fully present and willing to lay his soul bare for me alone to see. I was humbled and grateful.
His lips found mine in a kiss that began gently but quickly deepened with hunger. I responded in kind, my arms winding around his neck as I pressed myself against the solid warmth of his body. Unlike our first time together, when need and desperation had driven us, this was unhurried, each touch an exploration rather than a conquest.
My fingers fumbled with the brooch securing his plaid, and he helped me remove it, the heavy wool falling away to reveal the tunic beneath. I placed my palm against his chest, exhilarating in the strong, steady beat of his heart through the fabric.
“I can feel yer heart,” I said, looking up into his eyes. “It matches mine.”
His smile was tender as he reached behind me to begin unlacing my gown. “’Tis how it will always be,” he said. “I would give my life for ye,” he vowed, the words fierce.
The gown loosened beneath his skilled fingers, then slipped from my shoulders to pool at my feet in a whisper of fabric. The shift I wore beneath was thin enough that I might as well have been naked. The way his eyes darkened as he swept them over me sent pleasure rippling through me.
“I do nae want ye to give yer life for me,” I said, lifting his tunic to press my lips to his thundering heart. “I want ye to share yer life with me.”
“Aye, I plan to, lass,” he said, a devilish smile coming to him. “I’m going to share my body with yers every day of our lives as well.”
Heat bloomed in my cheeks at his open admiration, but I didn’t turn away or try to shield myself. Instead, I pulled his tunic upward more, and he leaned over to aid me in getting it off him. Once I dropped the tunic, I kissed his chest again, but this time I trailed my tongue along his hot skin, which made him suck in sharp breath. “I nearly lost ye,” I murmured against his skin. “And will nae ever take for granted the gift of yer life entwined with mine in bed,” I said, winking, “and out.”
His arms encircled me, drawing me against him until my cheek pressed to his chest and I could hear the quickened rhythm of his heart. “Ye saved me from my grief, from the man I was becoming,” he said, stripping away his last bit of clothing. I took his lead and shed my shift. My nipples hardened instantly with desire, and I thrilled when his body responded in kind.
With a growl that contained the hunger strumming through me, he lifted me and, cradling me against his chest, he carried me to the bed. It dipped under our weight as he settled me gently in the soft furs, then came to straddle me. Encased by his powerful thighs, he leaned down and caught one of my nipples in his mouth. I hissed with the extraordinary sensations the simple circling of my nipple with his tongue caused me.
Fire shot from my nipple to every part of my body, and instantly, I wanted that pleasure he’d given me before. From the wicked chuckle he released, the devil knew I wanted him. I curled my fingers into his thick curls, as he sucked first one nipple and then the other until I was moaning and writhing beneath him, and begging him to take me. I burned and throbbed everywhere. When he started to move lower, I tugged him up. “I want ye in me,” I panted.
“Ye’ll get me in ye, lass, believe me, but first let me pleasure ye.”
“Nay,” I replied. “First ye will claim me as yer wife, and then, by all means, bring me more pleasure.”
“Greedy wench,” he said, coming up to spread my thighs in a swift but gentle motion. “I love ye,” he whispered against my skin, the words punctuating each touch of his lips as they traveled down my neck, across my collarbone. “I love ye, Murieall. Mo chridhe. Mo bhean.”
My hands roamed up his chest to circle to his back, where I pressed him toward me. “And I love ye, husband, but if ye do nae take me now, I shall perish of need.”
“Well, I can nae have that,” he said, entering me with one exquisite slide. My body welcomed him immediately, and we began to find a tune only we could hear. He slid gently in and out as he lowered his head to suck my nipple as he moved. The dual pleasure of his moving in me as he sucked my breast was almost more than I could take. Each thrust of his hips and flick of his tongue drew me as taut as a bow, until I released with a deep thrust of his. As hot pleasure poured through me, he growled and stiffened, finding his own release.
For a long moment, we lay together, bodies hot and slick, him pressing me into the bed, our panting breaths mingling, and simply drank each other in. When our panting quieted, and I could feel his heart had slowed as mine had, he rolled off me, rose, went to the water basin, and came back to gently clean me. The way he cared about me, how he showed it with such a simple gesture, brought tears to my eyes.
“What’s wrong?” he said, setting down the rag on the stand beside the bed, before settling beside me, pulling the covers up to my chin, and stroking my hair as I nestled against his chest.
I smiled, blinking away the tears before they could fall. “There is nae anything wrong. I’m just happy. The way ye love me, well, it humbles me.”
“Oh, aye,” he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Then ye need to prepare to be verra humbled the rest of yer life, because I plan to love ye with all that I am.”
My chest ached with the love it held for him. I set my hand on his cheek and said, “I’m happy to be humbled by yer love, and ye should ken I will love ye with all that I am.”
He brushed a strand of hair from my face, his touch infinitely gentle. “I already ken it, lass.”
We fell silent then, the only sounds the crackling of the fire and our own breathing, gradually slowing further as sleep beckoned. The voices of the dead whispered at the edge of my consciousness, but they did not disturb my peace. Instead, they seemed to sing a lullaby of sorts, gentle and soothing.
As I drifted toward sleep in Munro’s arms, I thought of the frightened girl I had been, so certain that deviating from my careful plans would bring only pain. How wrong I had been. The greatest joy I had ever known had come from embracing the unexpected, from surrendering to love rather than fear.
“Sleep, mo chridhe,” Munro murmured drowsily, his lips brushing my temple. “I’ll be here when ye wake.”
And for the first time in years, I slept without a single worry about what tomorrow might bring.
Thank you so much for reading The Highlander’s Wicked Ways! If you love sweeping epic romances that take you on rollicking adventures through the highlands and have interconnected family stories, then you’ll love my eleven-book series Highlander Vows: Entangled Hearts, which starts with the USA Today bestselling When a Laird Loves a Lady!
And don’t miss my dark and sexy bestselling Wicked Willful Highlander series, starting with Highlanders Hold Grudges! He kidnapped her to save his clan, not to lose his heart.
If you’re looking for something sexy, sweet, and romantic, you’ll fall in love with my Of Mist and Mountains series, starting with Highland Hope! Sometimes the one you love is the very one you cannot have.
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Read below for an excerpt from When a Laird Loves a Lady…
One
England, 1357
Faking her death would be simple. It was escaping her home that would be difficult. Marion de Lacy stared hard into the slowly darkening sky, thinking about the plan she intended to put into action tomorrow—if all went well—but growing uneasiness tightened her belly. From where she stood in the bailey, she counted the guards up in the tower. It was not her imagination: Father had tripled the knights keeping guard at all times, as if he was expecting trouble.
Taking a deep breath of the damp air, she pulled her mother’s cloak tighter around her to ward off the twilight chill. A lump lodged in her throat as the wool scratched her neck. In the many years since her mother had been gone, Marion had both hated and loved this cloak for the death and life it represented. Her mother’s freesia scent had long since faded from the garment, yet simply calling up a memory of her mother wearing it gave Marion comfort.
She rubbed her fingers against the rough material. When she fled, she couldn’t chance taking anything with her but the clothes on her body and this cloak. Her death had to appear accidental, and the cloak that everyone knew she prized would ensure her freedom. Finding it tangled in the branches at the edge of the sea cliff ought to be just the thing to convince her father and William Froste that she’d drowned. After all, neither man thought she could swim. They didn’t truly care about her anyway. Her marriage to the blackhearted knight was only about what her hand could give the two men. Her father, Baron de Lacy, wanted more power, and Froste wanted her family’s prized land. A match made in Heaven, if only the match didn’t involve her…but it did.
Father would set the hounds of Hell themselves to track her down if he had the slightest suspicion that she was still alive. She was an inestimable possession to be given to secure Froste’s unwavering allegiance and, therefore, that of the renowned ferocious knights who served him. Whatever small sliver of hope she had that her father would grant her mercy and not marry her to Froste had been destroyed by the lashing she’d received when she’d pleaded for him to do so.
The moon crested above the watchtower, reminding her why she was out here so close to mealtime: to meet Angus. The Scotsman may have been her father’s stable master, but he was her ally, and when he’d proposed she flee England for Scotland, she’d readily consented.
Marion looked to the west, the direction from which Angus would return from Newcastle. He should be back any minute now from meeting his cousin and clansman Neil, who was to escort her to Scotland. She prayed all was set and that Angus’s kin was ready to depart. With her wedding to Froste to take place in six days, she wanted to be far away before there was even the slightest chance he’d be making his way here. And since he was set to arrive the night before the wedding, leaving tomorrow promised she’d not encounter him.
A sense of urgency enveloped her, and Marion forced herself to stroll across the bailey toward the gatehouse that led to the tunnel preceding the drawbridge. She couldn’t risk raising suspicion from the tower guards. At the gatehouse, she nodded to Albert, one of the knights who operated the drawbridge mechanism. He was young and rarely questioned her excursions to pick flowers or find herbs.
“Off to get some medicine?” he inquired.
“Yes,” she lied with a smile and a little pang of guilt. But this was survival, she reminded herself as she entered the tunnel. When she exited the heavy wooden door that led to freedom, she wasn’t surprised to find Peter and Andrew not yet up in the twin towers that flanked the entrance to the drawbridge. It was, after all, time for the changing of the guard.
They smiled at her as they put on their helmets and demi-gauntlets. They were an imposing presence to any who crossed the drawbridge and dared to approach the castle gate. Both men were tall and looked particularly daunting in their full armor, which Father insisted upon at all times. The men were certainly a fortress in their own right.
She nodded to them. “I’ll not be long. I want to gather some more flowers for the supper table.” Her voice didn’t even wobble with the lie.
Peter grinned at her, his kind brown eyes crinkling at the edges. “Will you pick me one of those pale winter flowers for my wife again, Marion?”
She returned his smile. “It took away her anger as I said it would, didn’t it?”
“It did,” he replied. “You always know just how to help with her.”
“I’ll get a pink one if I can find it. The colors are becoming scarcer as the weather cools.”
Andrew, the younger of the two knights, smiled, displaying a set of straight teeth. He held up his covered arm. “My cut is almost healed.”
Marion nodded. “I told you! Now maybe you’ll listen to me sooner next time you’re wounded in training.”
He gave a soft laugh. “I will. Should I put more of your paste on tonight?”
“Yes, keep using it. I’ll have to gather some more yarrow, if I can find any, and mix up another batch of the medicine for you.” And she’d have to do it before she escaped. “I better get going if I’m going to find those things.” She knew she should not have agreed to search for the flowers and offered to find the yarrow when she still had to speak to Angus and return to the castle in time for supper, but both men had been kind to her when many had not. It was her way of thanking them.
After Peter lowered the bridge and opened the door, she departed the castle grounds, considering her plan once more. Had she forgotten anything? She didn’t think so. She was simply going to walk straight out of her father’s castle and never come back. Tomorrow, she’d announce she was going out to collect more winter blooms, and then, instead, she would go down to the edge of the cliff overlooking the sea. She would slip off her cloak and leave it for a search party to find. Her breath caught deep in her chest at the simple yet dangerous plot. The last detail to see to was Angus.
She stared down the long dirt path that led to the sea and stilled, listening for hoofbeats. A slight vibration of the ground tingled her feet, and her heart sped in hopeful anticipation that it was Angus coming down the dirt road on his horse. When the crafty stable master appeared with a grin spread across his face, the worry that was squeezing her heart loosened. For the first time since he had ridden out that morning, she took a proper breath. He stopped his stallion alongside her and dismounted.
She tilted her head back to look up at him as he towered over her. An errant thought struck. “Angus, are all Scots as tall as you?”
“Nay, but ye ken Scots are bigger than all the wee Englishmen.” Suppressed laughter filled his deep voice. “So even the ones nae as tall as me are giants compared te the scrawny men here.”
“You’re teasing me,” she replied, even as she arched her eyebrows in uncertainty.
“A wee bit,” he agreed and tousled her hair. The laughter vanished from his eyes as he rubbed a hand over his square jaw and then stared down his bumpy nose at her, fixing what he called his “lecturing look” on her. “We’ve nae much time. Neil is in Newcastle just as he’s supposed te be, but there’s been a slight change.”
She frowned. “For the last month, every time I wanted to simply make haste and flee, you refused my suggestion, and now you say there’s a slight change?”
His ruddy complexion darkened. She’d pricked that MacLeod temper her mother had always said Angus’s clan was known for throughout the Isle of Skye, where they lived in the farthest reaches of Scotland. Marion could remember her mother chuckling and teasing Angus about how no one knew the MacLeod temperament better than their neighboring clan, the MacDonalds of Sleat, to which her mother had been born. The two clans had a history of feuding.
Angus cleared his throat and recaptured Marion’s attention. Without warning, his hand closed over her shoulder, and he squeezed gently. “I’m sorry te say it so plain, but ye must die at once.”
Her eyes widened as dread settled in the pit of her stomach. “What? Why?” The sudden fear she felt was unreasonable. She knew he didn’t mean she was really going to die, but her palms were sweating and her lungs had tightened all the same. She sucked in air and wiped her damp hands down the length of her cotton skirts. Suddenly, the idea of going to a foreign land and living with her mother’s clan, people she’d never met, made her apprehensive.
