Chapter Nineteen #3
‘I don’t prefer him,’ she said, looking him in the eye.
‘Good.’ Cullen took Lowri’s hand and led her away from the tavern.
‘Where are we going?’
‘I have some anger to walk off.’
Cullen could not speak again until they had walked a good way from the tavern and reached a little kirk perched atop a hill overlooking Larne.
The sound of the tavern was torn away by the wind, and the sea looked silver in the moonlight, its roar gentler than usual.
Cullen rubbed his thumb into his palm. Lowri looked miserable, and he couldn’t blame her.
‘Am I in danger, Cullen, from Butcher?’
‘Aye. That is why I should not have brought you here to Ireland.’ He bit his lip, feeling the full extent of his folly.
‘I thought you would get with child quickly, God knows, I have tried, and I like trying.’ He smiled at Lowri, but she didn’t smile back.
‘I meant it when I said I would set you free, for I’ve no wish to cage you in this marriage. ’
‘Maybe I am barren,’ she said quietly.
‘Or perhaps I do not please you abed, lass. Maybe your misery makes your womb wither.’
‘You know you please me abed, Cullen.’
‘Butcher might be a better bet. He is very wealthy. He might enjoy the company of cutthroats, but he has houses all over Ireland, coin too, well hidden. And he is handsome. Though once he gets what he wants, he will discard you, for he bores easily. Lasses are nothing to him. They never touch his heart. But if you want him then…’
Lowri took hold of his arm. ‘I don’t want him. I want you.’
Cullen gave a bitter laugh and shook his head. ‘If you were free, you would leave me.’
She did not reply, and Cullen’s heart sank. ‘I don’t know that I would,’ said Lowri, and it bounced back up.
‘What are you saying?’
‘I don’t rightly know. It’s just that I want you, Cullen. Only you.’
‘What if it is just lust between us?’
She shrugged. ‘Maybe that’s enough, and it’s more than many people have.’
Cullen took her in his arms. She was so lovely – all wide brown eyes and wind-blown hair.
He wondered how many men had ever got this soft side of Lowri instead of the snapping, mistrustful lass he’d first met.
At that moment, he did not care. He kissed Lowri hard and pressed her back against the wall of the kirk, seized by a need to stamp his ownership on her.
When he swept up her skirts and freed himself, she did not protest, only clutching him tighter.
He lifted her onto his manhood, and Lowri gasped.
She was not ready, but Cullen took her in a frenzy of lust, jealousy and affection.
His heart was too full, his lust too strong to take his time.
They came together violently, nails digging in, biting, scratching, clinging to one another in the shadow of the kirk.
He felt her tighten around him as she cried his name to the wind.
It was blasphemous, glorious and a blessed release. Afterwards, they clung to each other as if an invisible cord bound them together. Cullen forced out the words. ‘I kept something from you.’
She pushed him back off her and rearranged her skirts. ‘What?’
‘I sent a man to look for your friends, to find out where my father is keeping them,’ he said. ‘I should have told you, but I didn’t want you to get your hopes up.’
‘And?’
‘I came here tonight to meet with him. He came in on the Alainn. He found no trace of the lads, not at Scarcross, or anywhere around there.’
‘What do you mean, no trace?’
‘My friend kept his ears open for rumours, but there were none. No one was talking, and those lads weren’t seen. He has a friend at Scarcross, and he reported no comings and goings to the hole you were kept in, no sign of prisoners kept there.’
‘Are Donnan and Rory dead?’
‘I don’t know.’ Cullen put his hand to her cheek. ‘I sought to free you from your misery, Lowri. I tried, I swear. But I am no further forward than when we left Scarcross.’
‘Do you want me gone? Is that why you sent a man?’
‘No.’
‘You want rid of me. Why else would you do that?’
‘Don’t you know, lass?’ He crushed his mouth to hers in a rush of feeling. ‘I seek your bed not to get a bairn, but because I can think of nothing else but holding you, being inside you, wanting you.’
‘I don’t understand.’
He took her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. ‘I’ll not force you to be with me. I want you here of your own free will, because I could come to love you, lass.’
The words were out of him now. He was a fool, and he may as well have handed Lowri a knife to cut his heart out, for she said nothing, just stared out to sea distractedly. Then she looked down at her boots.
‘I think I could come to love you, too, Cullen.’ The wind blew her hair over her face, and he brushed it back and kissed her. Lowri pushed him off.
‘But I wish I didn’t, for that way holds only misery for both of us.’
‘That is not true.’
‘Oh, Cullen. Don’t you see? With all the bitterness, lies and hatred between our clans, we don’t stand a chance.’
There was nothing he could do with that, so he did not argue, or plead or tell her she was wrong. He let her walk ahead of him, down the hill to the inn, feeling doom descend on him like a black shadow.