Chapter Eight
‘I hope you don’t intend to use that ribbon to secure my gown when we leave this room,’ Ailsa said.
Raw with denied need, Rory felt like chuckling despite the fact his wife had somehow shifted their positions and turned partly on her side to make that comment.
She was still underneath him, but her legs were stretched so he straddled her long limbs. The move had bared her shoulders and breasts to him, showed the soft curve of her belly and hips and gave a hint of what was between her legs.
He felt the wet hint still on his fingers though he’d practically flung the ribbon away once her pleasure was done.
It didn’t help his need to free himself of that ribbon.
It only made him aware of how his fingers were now unbound so he could touch and reach every bit of her.
His wife, this night, wasn’t supposed to be like this at all.
They had started as enemies. They still were. Paiden was proof that this marriage wasn’t to be trusted.
He couldn’t even take comfort that he had somehow remained in control, that he remained clothed because that made this point in time all the worst. Damn politics and clans. To see her like this, how she responded, to know what they could be together...
Shoving away his need, forcing away the want for more, Rory knew he must extricate himself from this bed, from this room. He must pry himself from the woman. His loyalties couldn’t be divided, not when his friend’s life was at stake.
‘I’ve no intention at all.’ He hoped they found the ribbon and burned it before he forgot all his loyalties. ‘Does that please you?’
‘Please me?’
‘Because you don’t like laces.’
She smiled and it punched him in the gut. Her green eyes almost slumberous with the desire that wasn’t quite sated. He knew it wasn’t because they’d begun that flitting thing again, making him aware how bare he was to her still and how undone he must seem.
He was so undone.
‘I might have changed my mind,’ she said. ‘I might add more laces to my gowns now.’
He probably would be overcome with lust every time he saw one binding her body. The thought of her like that shuddered through him and his knees gave. Which was a mistake because it brushed that part of him that needed her against her stretched legs and her eyes widened and locked on him.
Ailsa thought she knew what happened in the marriage bed, but Rory had showed her otherwise. She thought there could be no more pleasure, but the burning heat of him against her leg proved that idea false as well.
‘I didn’t know it could be like this,’ she said.
He tensed and his gaze, which was now pointedly over her shoulder, glanced to her again and then slid away. ‘I’m glad I had the experience to bring you such pleasure.’
A sharp stab that she didn’t want to identify pierced her. Ailsa didn’t want to think of him with other women though it was foolish of her to think he hadn’t been. Even if he wanted to stay away from women, his status and looks would have women coming to him.
He adjusted his legs to sit beside her and she immediately missed the heat and feel of him there.
‘Why did you ask if I’d had another lover?’ he asked.
Did he hear that she didn’t want to think of his lovers? His tousled hair fell heavily along his jaw and shoulders, his eyes held just a hint of the heat they had before, but more of a puzzlement she couldn’t understand until she remembered his question.
‘I didn’t ask if you had another lover,’ she said. ‘I asked if you had seen the female form because I had seen the male as well.’
‘What do you mean, you’ve seen the male form? Do you mean naked?’
She shrugged. ‘Of course. I’m a healer. I’ve seen lots of bodies and their parts over the years.’
He raked his hand through his hair, controlling the wild locks she’d been admiring. ‘I don’t like it.’
She couldn’t have heard right. ‘The fact I’m a healer?’
‘The fact you’ve seen other males.’
Was he jealous as well? Could he be feeling the same as she did? If so, she’d ease his concerns. ‘I’ve seen females, too. I’ve tended children...animals. Any living creature injured.’
‘Your father, your clan, allowed this?’
Allowed. That wasn’t a word she appreciated. ‘Of course. It was either that or, when the old healer died, which she did, there would be no one to tend injuries. Would that be preferable?’
A rough exhalation and Rory turned away, so his back was to her and his legs were over the bed.
That was an answer as good as any. He obviously didn’t want to argue.
That was fine with her. There would be all the time in the world to discuss what she was capable of as a healer and a woman.
He seemed intelligent and, after her discussion regarding the benefits of her marriage, amenable to listening to her, but maybe now wasn’t the time.
Maybe their time now was for something else. She was struck by the definition of his back, the tapering of his waist, the fact that seeing him like this made her want him more. Ailsa propped herself up to touch his arm.
He flinched, but held still, and she took advantage of it to caress his skin as he had hers.
To watch him turn his head to gaze at her hand as she stroked his shoulder and traced her fingers down his spine.
He fascinated her. All of this fascinated her not as a healer, but as a woman discovering the different textures of a male’s skin and the fact his body didn’t give at all underneath her touch.
So wonderfully different than hers and the more she touched, the more different he became. No longer pulling away, but almost leaning into her touch as if he welcomed it.
She welcomed it though she’d found her pleasure. Simply curving her palm along the blades in his back had her needing more. Didn’t he need more?
‘Rory,’ she said. Was her voice threaded with desire?
Must be since his riveted gaze locked with hers. ‘Ailsa.’
‘Yes?’
‘You keep...’ He gave a hard swallow. ‘You keep saying my name.’
‘I thought you wanted me to say your name.’
Brows drawn in. ‘The way you—’ He shook his head.
Oh, she wanted him to finish that thought. When he didn’t, she spread her fingers to reach more of his back, his skin, to feel the way his ribs curved around his side.
The way he imperceptibly shivered when she did so. Did he feel the desire like her? He must. They were strangers and newly married, yet here they could talk, they could know each other...discover each other.
She wanted that. Very much. So why did he turn away?
‘Why are you not touching me?’ She sat and released the quilt so she could feel the ridges of his abdomen, the narrow trail of dark hair. The way his—
He grabbed her wrist, which pleased her. He tried to stop her, but she’d felt his response to her touch and knew he was as affected as she. Now they could join and bind their marriage to make their vows to each other and their clans complete.
She lay down again and stretched her limbs. Since Rory kept hold of her wrist, he had no choice but to turn just that bit to see how she lay before him. To see how much she wanted him.
Like this she felt vulnerable and powerful as his deep brown eyes caressed her legs, her hips and breasts and down again. Slowly, she took his hand and laid it on her stomach and felt the warmth, the heat seep down deep into her. ‘Come lie with me now. I want you to.’
‘Ailsa, you don’t know what your words do... I can’t...’ A hiss and his fingers curled. It sent shivers through her and she wanted him more. ‘You keep...surprising me,’ he said, sounding puzzled. She wanted to ease his concerns.
‘You keep doing that to me as well.’ Something in her bubbled to the surface. They were strangers, but there was some connection between them. All would be well. ‘Come lie with me. Let’s complete our marriage vows. After all, it’s not every day I get married to the man who vowed to kill me.’
It was a mistake. Any confusion or heat in Rory’s eyes disappeared. Almost flinging her wrist, he launched himself off the bed. Chilled, she yanked the quilt around her.
‘Rory?’
‘Don’t,’ he bit out. ‘I need to see Paiden.’
If he checked on Paiden, she would remain a virgin. He couldn’t want that. Surely, after all she felt? All that he felt, too.
‘Don’t you want to...?’ She gestured around the bed and patted the space beside her.
Grabbing his tunic, he shoved it over his head.
He wasn’t understanding. Taking a breath, she continued, ‘I may be an innocent, but I know we aren’t finished.’ She paused. ‘I know you’re not finished.’
Carrying his boots, he sat in a chair. ‘You found pleasure.’
‘Except you—’
He looked up at her at that and something naked and raw surfaced before he shut it down. ‘It was pleasurable for me as well.’
‘You’re leaving the room’
He shoved his boots on. ‘Yes.’
‘Do you not intend to honour this marriage? Tonight they’ll expect...’ She clutched the bedsheets closer to her. ‘There’s no seed or blood.’
‘I vow I’ve never heard a woman talk as you.’
Ailsa bit back her retort. Arguing the benefits of an intelligent and verbal wife wasn’t the issue. The fact that if he walked out of this room without taking her maidenhead was.
‘You married me so that no blood would be spilled. I’m holding you to that.’ His eyes were almost murderous.
And she felt it, felt as if she’d been murdered, but she wouldn’t stand for it. ‘What of your political alliance?’
‘Maybe I would care for my alliance if my friend wasn’t poisoned mere moments after the announcement of our marriage.’
‘You insisted that we marry. Why are you doing this?’ And then she knew. ‘You agreed to marry me knowing this would be our wedding night. You never intended to make this a marriage in truth.’
‘Not right now,’ he said.
‘Maybe not ever?’ she said.
At his silence, Ailsa wanted to gut him with a thousand shears.
His friend was poisoned and could be dying, and there was still a part of her warning her to give him leniency.
But she had lost Magnus and still married the enemy of her clan, expecting to make a true marriage.
She was willing to make a true sacrifice for her clan, when he hadn’t intended to at all.
Because now she realised everything depended on who had poisoned his friend and whether he lived or died.
Her friend had been trampled. Many other McCrieffs had died since then.
If they didn’t make this a true marriage, then her vows to Rory, and her lying in his bed tainted all the loss and pain in her past. She wouldn’t allow him to do this to her.
‘Your friend sleeps,’ she said, lacing her tone with as much accusation as she could. ‘He’s not dead.’
The string of curses was more a growl than words, but she understood them all the same as he turned back to her again. Every bit of him was as menacing as when he had entered the courtyard that very morning. ‘Yes, Paiden does sleep, McCrieff. But will he wake or sleep for ever?’
She had no answer to that. None at all.
‘I thought so,’ he said, closing the door behind him.