Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Cairstina
We make love until the sun rises, and I fall asleep sprawled across his chest. It feels safe here. Secure. He holds me to him like I bring him comfort. I hope I do.
The next day, he wakes before me, but I don’t let him out of bed.
I’m feeling more courageous now, more powerful, as I lift myself up on his chest and kiss him.
He weaves his fingers through my hair, rolls me over onto my back, and the familiar sensation of arousal threads through me.
My legs tremble, and my belly convulses, the nearness of him making me eager to feel him inside me again.
I never dreamed I’d be with any man, let alone a man like him, but when I think about it, it’s fitting.
Sometimes I imagine I’m just misplaced, like I’ve been taken from another time and transplanted in the present.
And if some omnipotent power could only find where I truly belong, I might slide into place like the last puzzle piece, completing the picture.
But I’m an alien creature. Outcast from the modern world, unable to communicate with this species, so deeply entrenched in the rich internal life I’ve cultivated that socializing and mingling with others is almost completely foreign to me.
I’m wild and misunderstood.
Like him.
He kisses me with the tenderness of a lover, his lips on mine a silent breathing of life into me. I never dreamed I could taste this, intimacy at its rawest. It’s more delicious than I ever dreamed.
Our bodies move as one. Skin to skin. Breath to breath. Heart to heart.
I part my legs, wordlessly welcoming him in. My whole world was nearly silent before him, and I think it’s the only wish I had now, that I could tell him what this means to me.
“You’re gorgeous, Cairstina,” he whispers in my ear as he slides on a condom and glides into me. His thick, hot cock pulses, and I close my eyes with a silent moan.
I may not be able to speak, but I hope he can tell how much I love this. How much I crave this. How badly I need him to make love to me.
My wrists in his grip, his body dominates mine, almost too heavy, almost too big, but never quite too much anything.
If I could moan, the sounds of my pleasure would fill the room, and I wish he could hear how much pleasure he brings me.
Maybe he notes my faster breathing, my fingers digging into his shoulder with every perfect, exquisite thrust. Harder and harder, faster and faster he thrusts until my head falls back, my grip tightens, and pleasure rips through me as he chases his own release.
“Perfect,” he whispers, kissing my cheek. “Bloody fucking perfect.”
We clean up in silent harmony, taking a shower like we did the day before. He wants to go to the house to check on his sisters, says he needs to talk with his parents. I bring the romance book with me, eager to finish that as well.
The day goes by the way I’d imagine any day does here.
I wonder sometimes if families take this for granted, the simple harmony of a good day’s work.
Islan’s working on an essay for a class she’s taking, and Paisley’s taken a sick day.
Their mum’s cooking a roast in the kitchen, the staff mostly off for the day.
Leith tells me she likes to cook for them all from time to time.
He has to meet with his men to discuss business and a trade, and I suspect their plans for dealing with what happened yesterday.
I shiver when I think of the way he and his brothers pummeled the other men. No remorse. No regret. They beat them mercilessly, and clearly wished they’d done more.
My stomach clenches at the memory of blood, broken bone. Violence. Have I left one world of violence for another?
I join his mum in the kitchen.
“Can you peel the tatties, lass?” she asks.
I nod, eager to help and text Leith a message. Please tell her I’m eager to help.
He looks at the text and smiles. “She says just because she can’t speak doesn’t mean she’s an invalid.”
My jaw drops open, and his mum’s eyebrows rise in mild surprise.
I smack his arm, and show her my phone. She reads the text, rolls her eyes, and smacks his other arm.
“fuckin’ tag teaming me,” he mutters with a chuckle, rubbing both arms as he leaves the room.
His mum smiles at me. “Not sure what it is about you two,” she says. “But I haven’t seen him smile so much in ages. Not since…” Her voice trails off, and it looks as if she doesn’t want to continue the conversation. “Well, not since my eldest passed.”
I wish I could comfort her, or give her some sort of consolation. I just pick up another potato, and watch as the peeler slices through the tough skin, revealing smooth, creamy white. The tendril falls into the pile with the others.
We work in silence for a bit, and she begins to hum. It’s a sad tune, one I don’t recognize, with a haunting melody. I wish I knew the words.
She slices the tatties into big, thick chunks, and douses them with olive oil.
“Even though we’ve a staff that works the kitchen, I admit I like to come in from time to time. Give them the night off, prepare food for my family myself. I enjoy it.” I wonder what else she enjoys. And is it just her way of caring for her family, or is it her way of regaining some control?
I imagine we’re the staff, working for this powerful, dangerous family. Never knowing what will happen next, what travesty or danger will come. I’m Cinderella, slaving away in fear of her stepmother’s wrath.
I don’t have a way to talk to her, so I only nod quietly. Even if I could text her, she’s elbow-deep in cooking and can’t reach for her phone.
“Do you like cooking, Cairstina?”
I want to believe this woman is warm and kind, and there’s a part of me that does. But I note a hardness in her eyes that makes me hesitate. Does she hold herself aloof for a reason?
I give a little start, when I realize she asked me a question and I haven’t answered. I shrug. I don’t know if I like to cook or not. I’ve never really had the chance.
“Islan enjoys it, but Paisley…” She laughs as she slides the tatties from the cutting board onto a roasting pan. “The girl is lucky if she doesn’t burn her toast.”
I smile, my thoughts going to Paisley. What will the brothers discuss today when they meet?
Are Leith and the others going to seek revenge?
Will they kill the men who hurt Paisley?
I remember the graveyard. Leith’s strong hands on the man’s head, the sickening snap, the way his body slumped to the ground.
Why is it so easy for him to take the life of another? Should he hesitate?
I see how a look comes over him, sometimes… it’s like a lens is flicked, and his vision becomes blinded with another reality. This one, where he has friends and allies and a reason to laugh. The other, where everyone’s an enemy and everyone he loves is in danger.
He needs more than a woman like me, who has her own broken past and handicaps. He’s used me to warm his bed, and I won’t lie and say I haven’t enjoyed being with him. No one’s ever made me feel like he has, but I don’t know how the two of us could ever be more than two ships passing in the night.
I suspect he’s satisfied I won’t snitch or cause trouble, but the question remains, what next?
“There now,” his mum says. “It’s a good bit of food, but the boys work hard, and they eat like bloody truck drivers.” She gives me a wink.
The door to the kitchen swings open, and Islan enters. “Hey, Mum. Oh, hi Cairstina.” She’s got Bailey on a leash, and my heart soars. The moment he sees me, he runs to me. I drop to my knees and give him a huge hug, and he licks at my face.
“Och, someone misses his mom," Islan says. “I wonder if my brother will let you have him back yet.”
I don’t ask, not sure why I wasn’t allowed Bailey to begin with. For now, as long as Bailey’s happy and here, I’m happy.
"We've been taking the very best care of him that we know how," Islan says.
"But he does spend a lot of time at the windows, presumably looking for you.
" She scratches behind his ears affectionately.
"Dad's never let us have a dog, even though we've been asking for years.
So many thanks for circumventing that one. "
Bailey lays down by my feet and looks up to me with large, doleful eyes.
I wave to Islan and gesture to my bag. I show her the book.
“Almost done, then?” she says with a smile, and I nod eagerly.
Flora seasons the roast, smiling, but her brows draw together with concern. “I finished the first book and started the second. Did you, Is?”
“Aye,” Islan says. “But bloody hell, Mum, I don’t know if I can talk about them with you. That scene in the little woodshed by the graveyard…” she cringes.
Flora rolls her eyes. “Och, aye, lass, I gave birth to six children by immaculate fucking conception.”
Ha. I like this woman.
Islan winces and shuts her eyes, speaking in a heated whisper, “My mum didn’t just say that. She did not!”
I can’t help but smile to myself as I sit at the large kitchen table and open to the part where I left off.
“It’s just… well, it’s disconcerting, isn’t it?”
Islan nods. “I know exactly what you mean. It’s like you can’t help but wonder how the writer knows so many things about…” her voice trails off, and she bites her lip as she chooses her words. “Like, what it’s really like, you know?”
“Aye,” her mum says, wiping down the counter and loading the dirty dishes into the dishwasher. “Do you know who she is?”
“That’s the thing, Mum,” Islan says, her eyes widening as if she’s got a brilliant secret to tell her mom.
"No one knows who she is. She's completely anonymous.
Not a picture online, not a single identifying characteristic but a pen name.
I suppose romance writers use pen names so they can have some privacy.
I mean you probably don't want someone reading about your orgy in the middle of a vineyard, and then talking to you about it when you're in the schoolyard picking up your kids from school.”