Chapter 31
Donall again gathered up a handful of Isolde’s hair, and this time he pressed his lips against the thick and glossy strands.
Here, within the enclosing walls of her bedchamber, he would not fight his need for her.
He was done resisting the desire that raced through him almost every waking moment, and had for so long.
He would take what she’d give him.
Everything she offered.
And so he slid his hands over her shoulders, down the bared softness of her arms, then around and up her back. Sliding his fingers again into the smooth curtain of her hair, he caressed the silky warmth of her nape.
He breathed deep of her wildflower scent, awed by how the room seemed to fade away, leaving only the two of them. “A knight’s kiss, then. And a thorough one.”
“Is there any other?” She smiled, her tone teasing. “I should hope not.”
“Then all is well.” He looked deep into her eyes as he eased his hands down her back. Searing need twisted inside him. Gripping her hips, he caught her to him, as close as he could without taking full possession of her. “I will no’ disappoint you.”
“I doubt you could,” she said, lifting her hands to clutch his shoulders. “You come highly praised.”
“Hush.” He lowered his head and nipped her ear, then nuzzled the side of her neck. “You are forgetting what I told you. No other women exist for me.” He spoke low, his lips only a breath from her skin. “There is only you.”
“So you say.” She’d been kneading his shoulders, but now lifted both hands to stroke his hair. “Why do I think you mean it?”
“Because I do.”
He did.
Her touch alone quickened his pulse. He raised his head to lock gazes with her and for a long moment they each watched the play of light and shadow across the other’s face.
Then, patient no more, he dropped a kiss to the lone freckle on her cheek, and then slanted his mouth over hers in a deep, hard kiss.
Not lightly and tender as before, but a ravenous plundering. He kissed her hungrily, taking her mouth, her breath, and her tongue, in a ferocious onslaught of rough kisses again and again. He’d never lost control like this, found himself unable to stop, wanting and needing so much more.
He knew why…
He’d never loved.
“Isolde…” Donall frowned.
Was that ragged voice his?
Knowing it was, he cradled the back of her head and angled her face for even deeper kisses. Openmouthed kisses with all the hot, swirling and tangled mating of their tongues that he needed to give her.
That he craved back from her.
“I cannot bear this,” she gasped, opening her mouth wider, accepting the strokes of his tongue.
He tasted her greedily, drinking her breath as she clung to him, her lush body pressing into him with ever greater urgency.
He kissed her harder, his tongue now thrusting against hers in long bold sweeps.
He tightened his arms around her, crushing her against him, the intimacy of their joined breath and swirling tongues, gripping his heart, while her eagerness to match his passion hardened him elsewhere.
She finally noticed.
Jerking back, her eyes widened. She stiffened, but only for a moment. Then her soft, kiss-tender lips curved into a pleased and knowing smile.
“So you do want me?” She sounded surprised.
“Did you doubt it?”
“I knew I wanted you,” she said, enchanting him.
“Precious lass.” He framed her face, aware that he could never live without her.
She melted into him and he kissed her anew, consumed by a passion more fierce than any he’d ever known. Need flared and grew as he recognized the fire raging inside him. In that moment, he also recognized her.
Truly saw her at last.
Stunned, he pulled her so close that their hearts surely beat as one. Everything he knew and loved changed then. And he surrendered to the one woman able to set his MacLean heart aflame.
She’d ignited the famed love fires said to consume MacLean males when they’d met their true mates. Legend told of an unquenchable inferno, flames he’d thought he’d been spared. Now he knew the folly of his doubt. He simply hadn’t encountered his woman.
Until now.
And the knowledge almost brought him to his knees.
He gentled the kiss until his mouth moved ever so softly over hers. A tender rain of slow, sweet kisses meant to say things he couldn’t yet put to words. He nuzzled her neck again, and then lightly kissed the pulse beating so rapidly at the base of her throat.
At last, he lifted his head to look at her. Heat simmered in her eyes, revealing that her passion burned as powerfully as his.
“The blush of rose?” She glanced toward the little jar, knowing instinctively what he wanted.
He suspected she desired the same.
So he again grasped her face between his hands, needing to be sure. “Are you aware of what will happen if you do this?”
“What?” She lifted a brow. “Use the cream?”
He nodded. “There will be no stopping then. I’d have you know that now.”
She didn’t blink. “I wouldn’t want you to stop.”
“Then so be it.” He pulled her back to him, then slanted his mouth over hers, again kissing her deeply. Making her his, and his alone. “We will go where this leads us.”
“This?”
“You ken what I mean,” he said, sure that she did.
She didn’t answer in words, but her eyes said everything. It was enough – and perhaps too much for he was now more certain than ever that he would never let her go.
Not from his heart, anyway.
So he kept his gaze on hers and smoothed her hair off her shoulders, taking care not to leave a single strand to hide her near-naked breasts.
“Sweet lass, you take my breath,” he said, not sure how long he could maintain his control.
She smiled at the praise, and he would’ve sworn she thrust her breasts forward a bit. As if she ached for his touch, was eager for the pleasure he was about to give her.
“The paint…” He crossed to the window and took the vermilion from the ledge. In a beat, he returned and pressed the little earthen pot into her hands.
“Open it,” he said, and she did.
“And now?” She held up the jar. “You truly want me to use it?”
“I do.” He placed his hands on her shoulders.
“Your breasts are so lush and perfect,” he said, lowering his gaze to admire them.
“Their peaks are a beautiful dusky rose. They are perfect buds, thrusting toward me through the sheerness of your chemise. They do not need enhancement, yet…” He lifted his gaze.
“They’ve tightened because they ache to be touched.
Perhaps they burn to wear the paint? To celebrate your passion? ”
“That may well be.” She didn’t blink, simply stood before him, proud and unafraid.
“The truth is, sweet, every inch of you begs attention.” He smoothed his hands upward to caress the soft skin beneath her ears. “I ache to give you such care.”
“I will not stop you,” she said, her encouragement spearing straight to his groin.
He looked down at her might-as-well-be-bared breasts, then placed his hands over their fullness, stroking and rubbing her through the thin cloth of her chemise. “In all Scotland, there cannae be a woman more desirable than you.”
“Nor a man with smoother words.”
“I speak the truth, lady. You know it, too.”
She hesitated. “I want to believe you.”
“Then do.”
He let his gaze drop to the green folds of her half-discarded gown.
Still bunched about her hips, it competed with her loosened chemise to form an irresistible frame for her bounty.
Even the chill night air conspired, the cold tightening her nipples.
Or perhaps her earthy passion didn’t require such assistance?
Either way, he knew one thing…
It was time.
“Pull down your chemise, lass.”
“Now?” Isolde knew that doing so would reveal her nakedness, but rather than shame, shivers of pleasure sped through her.
He nodded. “We have waited long enough.”
“As you wish,” she agreed, slipping her arms out of the chemise’s shoulder straps. The bodice dipped, but the silky gauze clung to her breasts, snagged there by the tightened tips.
“Is this enough?” Tingling warmth blossomed inside her, the slow pulsing at her womanly place almost unbearable. “Will this do?”
He shook his head. “Pull it all the way down. Free your breasts.”
The night wind quickened then, sending more chill air into the room, stirring the wall tapestries and raising gooseflesh along her skin. She hardly noticed, feeling instead as if he’d set her aflame.
In truth, she supposed he had.
“Come,” he urged her. “Let me see you.”
“Will you kiss me again if I do?”
“I will give you so many kisses you will no’ remember a time when we weren’t kissing.”
Her chin came up. “I shall hold you to your word.”
“I will hope it.”
She nodded, but felt a sharp pain in her heart for – to her surprise – she wanted this to be more than a lustful mating, the spawning of an heir between them.
Even more daunting, while she’d accepted her feelings for him, she did not think she could bear letting him go.
But she would worry about that on the morrow.
Now, this night, her body and her passion demanded something else.
And so…
She curled her fingers around the top edge of Evelina’s borrowed chemise. With one yank, she tugged it down so that nothing stood between her bared skin and the MacLean’s gaze but the cold night air and heady pleasure.
Touch yourself.
His words came so soft and low, she thought she’d imagined them.
“Do it for me.” He nodded to the jar of vermilion she’d picked up. “Put that down for moment,” he said, and she did. “Now lift your breasts, Isolde. Hold them toward me.”
Very slowly, she placed her hands beneath her breasts, but didn’t move them. She simply stood, holding them, feeling their weight against her palms, not sure what to do next.
She swallowed. “What now?”
“Show them to me.” His words sent a bolt of excitement through her. “Stroke and caress them, and dinnae forget to touch the crests, perhaps circling them lightly with your fingertips.”
She did that first and couldn’t hold back a gasp the moment her fingers brushed over the hardened peaks. Shivers of pleasure spiraled from her breasts to her belly and lower. Sensations so intense that her knees weakened and she swayed, but he caught her, pulling her tight against his chest.
“Can you go on, sweet?” He leaned back against the table, cradling her in his arms. “Would you enjoy satisfaction now, or shall we delay our pleasure a bit longer?”
She drew back to look at him. “There is more pleasure than this?”
“Much more,” he said, but then his brow creased. “You are aware that-”
“Of course. I know of the things we have yet to do – you would not be here otherwise. I mean…” She glanced aside. “I didn’t expect to feel such pleasure touching my breasts.
“I have done so every time I dress or undress, and yet…” She paused, surprised and embarrassed. “Never have I-”
“Never have you held and caressed your breasts before a man.” He smiled, his words assuring her that she’d been right…
She was wicked.
“There is no shame, sweet.” He gripped her chin, lifting her face so she couldn’t look away. “No’ in such pleasure. You enjoyed that, didn’t you?”
She nodded, excitement quickening her breath.
“My fine bold lassie,” he said, something in his voice, his eyes, making her heart sing. “Would you touch yourself for me again?”
“I would,” she agreed, now worried she might perish of her wanton ways, the intense sensations flaring inside her.
“That’s my lass.” He set her from him, his gaze lowering to her breasts. “Then pull on your nipples. Let me see you rub and tug on them.”
“O-o-oh…” She didn’t know if she could, especially with him looking right there, watching her as she did something so very, very brazen.
Yet…
She wanted this, too.
So she lifted her hands and began doing as he’d bid.
Her eyes drifted shut, so delicious were the feelings streaking through her.
Her hips began to rock, her thighs instinctively inching apart, the tingly ache between them begging for relief.
As if he knew, he stepped closer. She heard the table creak as he pushed away from its edge, caught his footsteps on the floor rushes as he neared.
She became aware of his heady male scent and his warmth.
Everything about him made her tingle all the more.
Then, before she knew what he intended, he reached between her thighs and drew his hand, full-palmed over the heat of her woman’s flesh. He caressed her through the silken folds of her gown, rubbing her in a way that half maddened and half thrilled her.
“Soon,” he promised, taking his hand away. “After I’ve had my fill of watching you touch your breasts. After I have done so, as well. Now caress them again, as before.”
And so she did, giving herself light touches with the very tips of her fingers.
Then soft circles, hardly skimming the ruched peaks, until, urged on by his words and heated looks, she splayed her fingers across the whole of her breasts’ fullness, rousing herself even more as she rubbed harder, her excitement almost unbearable.
“The cream,” he said then, his voice calling her back from the haze of sensation. “You are ready.”
No, she was dying.
But then, he took one of her hands and smoothed the cold, rose-scented cream onto her fingers.
“The blush of rose,” he urged her. “Use it for me.”
She blinked at him and felt desire surge through her as her womanly place grew so heavy she could hardly stand the exquisite tingles stirring there.
“Now, minx,” he encouraged her. “Apply the cream.”
“I am not sure…” But somehow her right hand, the one he’d smeared the blush of rose onto, drifted toward her breasts. She didn’t know how that happened, it simply did. Moving ever closer, her cream-laced fingers paused just above the straining tip of her left breast.
“Do it, my lady. You are so beautiful, so wondrous I can scarce breathe.” His words excited her, plunging her so deep into her own need, that she gladly succumbed.
“Let me watch you,” he coaxed. “Slow, gentle circles, a thorough rubbing to work in the color, and then…”
“What?”
“Do it and you shall see.” He leaned against the bedpost, and the heat in his eyes set her cream-coated fingers to work.
“My bonnie lass,” he said, flashing a smile. “Keep at it.”
She did, her gaze holding his. “And what shall you do, now that I am?”
“What any besotted knight would do.” He gave her a look that made her heart flutter. “I shall fetch down the moon and stars for you.”