Chapter 16 #5
Watching Ewan, Waryk felt strangely sorry. He needed work, training, but he might have been a man who could have held this fortress for the king.
“I’m sorry,” Waryk told him.
Ewan shrugged. “Be good to her, sir. If she rants and raves, let her talk, and her temper eases. She’s strong, and courageous, and—”
“Ewan?”
The man flushed. “Your pardon. I’ve known her since she was a child.”
“I’m aware of that, and I don’t want to be reminded.”
Ewan smiled and nodded.
“Go on about your business tonight, MacKinny,” Waryk said. “It has been a long day for us all.”
“Aye, Laird Lion.” Ewan started out. He paused, turning back. “You are, sir, more than I expected. It will not be such a hardship, serving you.”
He walked on out. Waryk drummed his fingers on the table for several long minutes, then shivered, and remembered he was cold. He rose, and returned to the master’s chambers. His rooms now, to be shared with his wife.
He entered quietly. She wasn’t in the bedroom, and he walked to the archway.
A bath had been brought as he’d ordered.
It was old, of Celtic design. The heavy oak was carved all the way around with Celtic faces.
It was deep, and even longer than the one he had brought for himself. Steam rose above it.
Mellyora rested within it.
Her hair trailed over the rim of the tub, and she lay back, her head laid upon the wooden rest. The water smelled pleasantly like a newly mown field. The water covered the length of her, yet it was startling to realize just how cruelly such a sight of her tormented the length of him.
She opened her eyes suddenly, as if she sensed him there. She sat up, staring at him.
“The water certainly appears hot,” he told her.
“Aye.”
He sat upon a trunk and discarded his scabbard, weapons, hose, and boots, then did away with his surcoat, the short mail he had worn, then his tartan.
She looked away all the while, at the fire, at the soap, at the water.
Then she was forced to stare at him, her eyes widening with alarm or incredulity, as he stepped into the tub with her. She gripped the edges, ready to fly.
“No,” he told her, catching her wrist.
He could see the way her heart was pounding in the vein that thundered madly at her throat, and no matter what torment he was in himself, he wanted her where she was. He smiled. “I just had a conversation with young MacKinny,” he said.
“Oh?” she inquired, but the sound of her teeth gritting—meant for him to hear, he thought—didn’t take away from the concern he saw in her eyes.
“I like him.”
“Do you? How generous.”
“Here, take the soap. Wash my back.”
“I thought you meant to sleep elsewhere.”
“I’m not sleeping; neither are you. Wash my back.”
He gave her the soap, and turned, amazed at the size of the tub. The Celts must have had strange rituals within the thing, he mused.
She didn’t touch him. He wondered if he were being wise, sitting with his back to her. “Mellyora, if you please …?”
The soap touched his back. He lowered his head, knowing the meaning of agony and ecstasy. Her fingers worked upon him, covering the expanse of his back, lightly kneading muscle and flesh. “Indeed, I actually admire young MacKinny.”
“He is admirable.”
“Aye, I like him very much.”
“Good.”
“I did, however, do the fair thing, and warn him that I’d kill him if he so much as brushed by you.”
Her fingers ceased their movement. He remembered the weapons displayed on the walls in the room. He turned suddenly, and saw that her fingers were vised tightly around the soap.
He took it from her.
“Turn around.”
“What?”
“Turn around. I’ll wash your back.”
“It isn’t dirty anymore.”
“I’ll just make sure …”
He manipulated her around, catching the length of her hair, curling it into a ball at her nape.
Then he touched her flesh with the soap, and his fingers.
She tensed against him, but didn’t protest. He worked the soap over her shoulders, her neck, and moved his hands down to her ribs.
He could feel her shaking, and after a moment she said, “You don’t want anything to do with me right now, remember? ”
“Aye.”
“Then … then what are you doing?”
“Exploring the prize,” he said dryly, and he inched closer; he couldn’t help himself. He gently ran his hands down her shoulders again, over her back; then he slipped his hands forward with the soap, covered her belly, then her breasts.
She didn’t breathe.
He didn’t breathe himself. He cupped the fullness of the mounds, rotated the soap over them again and again, felt the pebbled hardness of her nipples, and the erotic depth of the valley between them …
Sweat, having nothing to do with the water, popped out on his brow. What the hell was he doing? He didn’t give a damn about the future, a dynasty, his name …
His name. His father’s name. A child’s name.
He closed his eyes and dropped the soap.
“Get out!” he told her hoarsely.
For once in her life, she did as she was told. She was up and gone in an instant.
And he was left, trapped in …
Trapped in the great prize he had coveted so dearly.
Time, he told himself.
He had only to bide his time.