Chapter 14
“Icannae do it!” Ailis protested. “I simply wasnae made to float!”
A soft sound that might have been a chuckle rumbled in Killian’s chest, but she couldn’t see his face to see if she was right. Her eyes were squeezed shut to stop the saltwater from splashing into them and bringing back her nightmare.
“Everyone can float,” he insisted. “Ye’re already halfway there; ye just need to spread yer legs a bit.”
At that, she spluttered and began to sink like a stone.
Killian’s strong hands underneath her prevented her head from going under, lifting her by her neck and the small of her back. She flailed regardless, knowing he wouldn’t let her drown, but still too afraid of having her face under the water to be able to develop rational thought.
They had come to learn, together, that that was the part of her fear that she couldn’t yet overcome: the sensation of water over her head, preventing her from breathing. It didn’t matter if the surface was just half an inch away; her visceral reaction was the same.
In her nightmare, that was always the worst part—not being able to breathe. Of course, there was panic in kicking and swimming as hard as she could, but it was the water filling her mouth and nose that scared her the most.
“Nae bad at all,” Killian said as he tipped her upright.
Standing in front of him, breathing hard and wiping the water from her face, she knew she had come a long way already. If someone had told her that morning that she would soon be floating in the sea without feeling like she might die of fear, she would have laughed.
“But I sank,” she protested.
He shrugged. “It was yer first time learnin’. And ye only sank half the time. The rest, I wasnae even helpin’. I just had me hands underneath ye, in case.”
She knew it was true. A few times, she had felt the comforting press of his palms against her skin drift away. It had made her heart beat quicker each time and her blood pound in her veins, but just knowing that he would catch her again had kept her from panicking too much.
“That’s the thing,” she said quietly, moving instinctively into his body for warmth. “I daenae ken if that was me first time learnin’ how to swim.”
He brushed a damp lock of hair from her face. “What do ye mean?”
“In me nightmare… I’m always swimmin’,” she replied hesitantly. “I’m in a cove like this, and I’m… swimmin’ for me life. But I’m nae gettin’ anywhere, and the sea starts to cover me… and I cannae breathe… and…”
Just the memory of her dreams threatened to unravel the progress she had made.
Perhaps sensing it, Killian wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her tight against him, his other hand coming up to cradle the back of her neck. Holding her almost as he had been holding her in the water.
“I’m here,” he said softly. “Ye’re nae in yer nightmare. Ye’re in the sea with me, and ye’re safe, and ye daenae need to swim to shore. Ye can walk there, or I can carry ye. Ye’re safe, lass.”
Tightly gripping his arms as he held her, Ailis focused on the steady rhythm of his breathing, letting him anchor her once more.
If she was hurting him by digging her fingernails into his flesh, he didn’t mention it.
He just stood there with her, allowing her to do whatever she needed to overcome the wave of fear.
Soon enough, however, she found herself focusing a little too much on the sound of his breathing. It was shallower than earlier, as if he had been running, the quickened rhythm of it quickening the rhythm of hers.
In all her life, she had never been so aware of someone—the gooseflesh across his arms, the bob of his throat, the salt on his skin, the intensity of his blue gaze as he searched her face to make sure she was all right; the way his hand splayed at the nape of her neck, his fingers barely sliding into her hair; the way his hand rested on the curve of her hip.
And those short breaths that did something peculiar to her, stirring up sparks that warmed her from within.
Slowly, she tilted her head up to meet his searching gaze.
“Are ye cold again?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“Then why are ye tremblin’?”
She smoothed her palm up his shoulder and down to his heart, feeling the quicker beat of it against her hand. “I daenae ken,” she whispered.
“Are ye scared?”
Swallowing thickly, she shook her head again. “I likely should be, but… nay.”
“Why should ye be scared?” He frowned, his eyes flitting to her lips.
“Because… I’m alone with ye, far from anythin’ and anyone,” she replied, a breathy gasp slipping past her lips as he pulled her closer.
And I cannae seem to remember that ye’re me enemy. Indeed, ye’ve made me believe that ye nay longer are.
And that was a dangerous position for her to be in.
“Aye,” he said silkily. “Ye are.”
The moment his lips brushed hers, there were no more tranquil waters, but the thrashing storm of desire crashing through her, threatening to unmoor her.
She ran her hands brazenly over his chest, moaned against his mouth as he slid his palm over the swell of her backside and pushed her hips into him, wanted to dig her fingernails into his flesh, to claim him as her own with a mark on his skin.
He responded in kind, kissing her with an intensity that stole her breath and fear away.
His arms crushed her to him, his hands exploring, his teeth raking across her lower lip to coax a gasp from her, half pleasure, half pain, all glorious.
When his tongue danced with hers, she pulled his head down, her fingers running through his damp hair.
She simply could not get enough of him.
Not once did she think about her nightmare, Killian’s fervent kiss doing more for her nerves than half an hour of floating ever could. Indeed, it was creating a new sensation, a new experience that blotted out the bad, at least temporarily.
Pressing herself closer to him, acutely aware of his bare skin and the fact that there was nothing but a thin, wet shift between them, she savored the warmth that seeped into her.
Gasped as his hand smoothed over the swell of her breast, his thumb brushing over her nipple.
Moaned against his mouth as she felt his hardness poke her below the water, seeking out the heat that pooled between her thighs.
His fingertips traced a tingling line down the valley between her breasts, his palm gliding down her stomach and over the swell of her belly, inching lower.
Half a second before he touched a part of her that pulsed and throbbed, a sparking source of intense anticipation, nature saw fit to play a cruel trick on them.
A great wave suddenly smacked into them, icy cold to douse their ardor. The top of it crashed over Ailis’s head, and her exploring hands shot up to grab his shoulders, clinging on to him for dear life.
She was under for a moment before Killian’s arms lifted her up and out. Her legs locked around his waist, and she buried her face in his shoulder and looped her arms around his neck, not caring if she accidentally strangled him.
“Ye’re all right,” Killian crooned. “Ye’re all right, lass. I’ve got ye. I’m nae lettin’ go of ye.”
He began to wade toward the shore, one arm sitting snugly beneath her backside like a shelf, his other hand between her shoulder blades, holding her to him.
Curse ye, she muttered silently to the sea.
Just when she had started to have a good experience—a great experience—in the water, the waves had ruined it.
Ailis clung to him like an oversized limpet until he reached the sand, and even then, she slid down slowly. A grimace of displeasure twisted her mouth as her feet touched the wet, grainy sand again.
“We’ll come back tomorrow,” Killian said, leading her over to the rock where she had set her dress down.
There, he urged her to sit, and she put up no fight.
His dry shirt was lying in the sand beside the rock, and as she shivered, the water cooling on her skin, his gentle touch startled her.
He kneeled in front of her and took her foot, carefully dusting off the sand with his shirt before he slid her foot into her shoe.
He repeated the process with her other foot, his hand curving around her ankle as he blew and brushed away the irksome sand. The touch was so intimate and unexpected that she forgot how cold she was and just stared at him, studying the lines of concentration on his handsome face.
“There’s nothin’ so irritatin’ as sand in yer shoes,” he said by way of explanation, lifting his gaze to hers.
She noted that his attention briefly drifted to her breasts, his eyes darkening for a moment. Despite the temperature and the mood being shattered by that wave, she looked back at him with her lips slightly parted, willing him to touch her again.
Instead, he got up and tossed his shirt into her lap. “Dry yerself as much as ye can. Have one of the maids take yer dress to the laundry as soon as we return, so it doesnae stain with the salt.”
Astonished and bewildered, and not for the first time, it took Ailis a minute before she did as he asked.
All too soon, they were making their way back up the cliff—Ailis clothed and shoed, Killian bare-chested and barefoot—leaving the confusing sea behind them.
She wasn’t sure if it would make much difference to her nightmares, but as she heaved herself up the last few steps and turned back to look at that sparkling water, the nerves and the sickness and the abject panic didn’t come.
There was a minor current, but it merely flowed through her, rather than trying to drag her down and sweep her into a fit of terror.
Manageable.
“How do ye feel?” Killian asked, his hand pressed protectively to the small of her back.
Either that, or he meant to push her. But he had sworn that wasn’t something he wanted to do.
She shrugged. “I daenae ken. Better, for now, but I doubt I’m miraculously cured after a few hours.”
“That’s why we’ll come back tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after,” he said. “The more ye get used to it, the less yer fear will trouble ye. And once yer fear of it has ebbed, maybe the nightmare will stop too.”
She admired his optimism. “I doubt that. I’ve had the same nightmare since I was a bairn, and I’m twenty now. I think I’m probably stuck with it, even if I become the finest swimmer there is.”
“Was there somethin’ that started it?” he asked, steering her away from the edge of the cliff and back toward the path to the castle.
It was a question she had asked herself a thousand times, fighting to remember some memory or other that might explain the nightmare. But she couldn’t.
She sensed there was a memory buried deep in the recesses of her mind, but it was like someone had built a labyrinth to protect it, and she kept making wrong turns, unable to get to the center.
“I honestly daenae ken,” she replied. “But… thank ye for today. I daresay I needed to do that, but I wouldnae have done it if ye hadnae encouraged me.”
He offered her his arm. “I told ye, I cannae have me bride terrified of the sea.” They walked a few paces in silence before he continued, “Ye said ye thought ye might ken how to swim. Do ye think ye almost drowned while ye were learnin’? Can ye recall who taught ye?”
She really didn’t want to talk about it. Then again, she really hadn’t wanted to go into the water, but it had helped.
“Me faither wouldnae have bothered,” she said, sifting through old memories.
“Me braither, on the other hand, might have tried to teach me. He’s always ridin’ off to the coast to swim.
Skye is desperate to learn, but he refuses to take her with him.
Doesnae bother with her at all, which breaks her wee heart, but…
she’ll soon have me again, and… maybe ye can teach her how to swim. ”
A soft smile graced his lips, such a beautiful thing to behold that Ailis stopped walking altogether and was almost dragged by the pull of his arm.
“I’ll teach ye both,” he promised. “Is yer braither ever in yer nightmares?”
That snapped her out of her awe. “Nay, but he was there when I was found.”
“Found?” He frowned.
“I daenae remember it, but the old housekeeper said I was found on the beach. Me braither found me,” she replied.
“I daenae ken if I was washed up or nae. I was just there. So, if there’s somethin’ that triggered me nightmare, it’s probably whatever happened before that.
Maybe I waded into the sea on me own and couldnae swim, and that fear has been with me ever since. I daenae ken.”
Killian nodded while listening to her, until his head snapped to the right. Something was coming through the trees—many things, in fact. A group of riders, and one with an all-too-familiar face.
A different nightmare had just turned up.