Chapter 20
Skye tore her gaze from where Mason and Leah huddled together in the cell, whispering. Evander was already striding away, in lockstep with Fergus. They climbed the stairs, and she hurried after them, the soles of her boots slipping on the wet steps.
She stepped after them into the hall upstairs, breathing in fresh, clean air with relief. It was shocking how stale and nasty the dungeon air tasted.
“We’ll speak more later,” Evander finished, clapping a hand on Fergus’s shoulder. “This must nae be rushed.”
“Aye, me Laird.”
The two men parted ways, with Fergus striding back the way he had come and Evander moving off in the opposite direction. Biting back a curse, Skye scuttled after him.
“Wait! Are we nae going to talk about this?” she puffed, trying unsuccessfully to match his pace. The man had giraffe legs.
“Talk about what?” Evander responded brusquely. “There’s nae much to talk about.”
“Nay? How about the name of the man who arranged me kidnapping?”
“That’s for me to take care of.”
She spluttered. “Are ye truly trying to act as though it doesnae concern me? This is me kidnapping!”
He sighed. “I’m going to take care of this for ye. I need ye to let me manage it, all right?”
“Nay. I daenae agree with that. We have to talk about it. And what about Mason? What will happen to him?”
Abruptly, Evander stopped in front of a heavy, iron-studded door. He pulled it back to reveal a tight spiral staircase, which Skye assumed led up to one of the towers.
A memory clicked into place.
“Ye look at the stars from up there, dae ye nae? And ye study.”
He glanced down at her. “Aye, I do. I’m glad that ye are piecing yer memories together. It must be a weight off yer mind.”
“It is. Daenae walk away from me!”
He ignored her and began to climb the stairs, taking two and three steps at a time.
Skye certainly could not match his pace here. Puffing and panting, and muttering with annoyance, she scrambled after him.
“I willnae be shaken off this easily,” she called.
“Ye never are. I’d expect no less,” he called from further above. Since the staircase curled in such a tight spiral, she’d lost sight of him.
A few more moments of heavy climbing, and she abruptly reached a small, round landing, with a closed door branching off it. She half expected him to have locked the door behind him, but it opened easily.
The room beyond was large and circular. Long, glass windows were set in the walls, providing an expansive view of the landscape beyond. It had begun to rain, she noticed with vague interest, the water sluicing lazily down the glass.
Books, maps, papers, paintings, and more assorted trinkets piled up everywhere. On tables, resting against the walls, even stacked up on the floor. The large space was just about dominated by things, and yet the room was not claustrophobic.
Evander stood in the center of the room, his face impassive, watching her.
“Ye really are determined to speak to me,” he murmured. “Before, ye always said that ye couldnae be bothered to climb all the stairs. Ye used to send a soldier or a poor wee maid up here to fetch me down.”
Skye bit her lip. “That… sounds like me. But this place feels familiar. I have been here, have I nae?”
“Aye,” he answered simply. “Just once. Ye came here to talk to me, and to tell me that a marriage between us would suit our clans very well.”
“Oh.”
Silence settled between them.
Skye inched forward, twisting her fingers together. “Ye said that ye would leave Mason in the dungeons while ye decided what to do with him. But he’s a victim too, is he nae? So surely he should go free. He’s innocent.”
“Innocent? He drugged and kidnapped ye. I feel sorry for him, having someone he loved threatened in that way, but it doesnae excuse his actions.”
She tasted copper, as if she’d put a penny under her tongue. Her lip began to sting, and she released it from between her teeth.
“Then what will ye do with him?”
He eyed her pityingly. “Ye ken what I do to traitors, lass.”
She gulped. “Ye cannae mean it.”
He tilted his head. “I am thinking of yer safety, lass.”
“Mason is me friend. Left to his own devices, he would never have done such a terrible thing.”
“Most men wouldnae do terrible things without a wee push from someone or something. That doesnae excuse the terrible things.”
“I didnae say that it would. And I disagree. Wicked men do terrible things. Mason is nae wicked.”
Evander glanced away for a moment. “I’ll think about it. I’ll nae make any rash decisions, daenae worry. But these decisions are mine, ye understand?”
She nodded, choking back a gasp of relief. Surely he would not execute Mason.
That thought was followed by a rush of shock that she knew somehow that Evander would not execute Mason. That he hated injustice and the sting of it all just as much as she did.
Perhaps I ken him better than I thought I did.
A minute passed, the seconds dragging by. They stood opposite each other, neither one making a move to either back away or walk forward.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Evander lifted his head. “Sorry? What are ye sorry for?”
“I… I feel responsible. I brought Mason here. I arranged our wedding. Me coming here is the catalyst for all of this. I ken how hard ye worked to bring peace and stability to yer clan. And now it’s all ruined.”
He eyed her, his eyebrows drawing together. Gingerly, he took a step forward, then another. Slowly, as though afraid she might bolt, he lifted a hand to her face. Warm fingertips ghosted across her cheekbone.
Closing her eyes, she let the sensation sweep over her as he tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. The touch lingered, as if he could not bring himself to draw his palm away from her warm cheek.
“If anything, the fault is mine,” he murmured. “The danger and disloyalty came from within the keep, nae without it. This marriage has been nothing but a trial to ye.” He lifted his chin, letting his hand drop. “Ye will be relieved when it is annulled.”
Skye flinched. “What? I thought I had a month to decide.”
“I have made the decision for ye. This marriage doesnae suit us. It has only brought danger. So I will annul it.”
“But why?”
Did he hear the note of desperation in her voice?
Skye shifted, a little surprised by it.
A few days ago, was I nae convinced that I wanted the wedding annulled? I wasnae even sure that there’d been a wedding. Now I daenae want it to end. When did that happen?
“Well, ye daenae want it,” Evander responded, with a tight, not-quite-sincere smile. “And I cannae be chasing after a bride while me clan is in an uproar. I must focus on me people. I need to root out traitors and settle me council.”
“And the council hates me, I take it? That’s why ye are getting rid of me.” Bitterness laced her voice.
Skye hated the way she was whining like a child, but she couldn’t quite manage to regain her composure.
“Nae because of the council, nay,” Evander responded firmly. “Because I willnae put ye in danger. It’s for the best, annulling it now. I thought ye would be pleased.”
Pleased?
Skye wanted to bark out the word, high and hysterical. She wanted to do something mad, like jump out of the window and fly, or order a horse to ride straight to her brother’s keep. She wanted to storm out of the room and never see Laird bloody Bryden again.
But all that would involve leaving him, and that, wildly enough, was something she did not want to do.
Turning on her heel, she strode over to the window. It was set in an alcove, with a curtain at the side. His eyes burned into her back, but she kept her gaze fixed on the horizon.
The sun was going down. Golden-pink light filled the world, a brief hour in which the forest was fairyland and Evander’s study an enchanted library. In sixty or seventy minutes, however, twilight would be here, stripping away the magic and replacing it with menace.
There were good reasons to avoid walking in the forest after dark, and not just because a person might risk twisting their ankle on a shadowy path.
“I suppose I should have expected this,” she muttered. “I assume that I am nae the kind of lass ye would have chosen for yerself, and were it nae for the lass swap part of the treaty, we would likely never have looked twice at each other.”
The low creak of a floorboard behind her was the only warning that he had crossed the room.
“Daenae ye dare speak like that,” he hissed breathlessly. “Saying that ye arenae the kind of lass I would choose for meself. Skye, ye are the only woman I would ever choose.”
Tension coiled in her chest, thrumming in time with her heart. She lifted her chin, still staring out at the scenery. As the sun sank lower, it seemed to spill molten gold on the distant mountains.
“Ye daenae mean that,” she whispered. “Ye shouldnae say things ye daenae mean.”
“Ye think I am in the habit of making up stories? Believe me, Skye, ye have tortured me day and night.”
“Ye say that I am the woman ye would choose, eh? Ye have a funny way of showing it, considering that ye are sending me away.”
He was silent for a moment.
Skye held her breath, listening. Had he crept out of the room? She was just about to turn around and check when a warm, broad chest brushed her back.
Heat jolted through her. She gasped, loudly enough that he must have heard.
“Hush, lass,” he murmured, his lips inches from her ear.
She could feel his hot breath on the junction between her neck and shoulder. The skin broke into goosebumps. One arm snaked around her waist, while the fingertips of the other danced across the front of her throat. Sensitive skin shivered.
He pulled her back against him, firmly pressing their bodies together. His palm cupped the column of her throat, just for an instant. Closing her eyes, Skye tilted her head back.
From the underside of her chin, Evander’s questing hand slid downwards, his fingertips stroking and circling.
Down the column of her throat, between her breasts, and over her stomach, until it rested just over the apex of her thighs.
He pressed his palm there, and although there were several layers between his skin and hers, Skye felt a distinct pulse of desire.
“Evander,” she breathed, her voice hitching.
He pressed a kiss to the side of her neck.
“Torture,” he whispered. “It’s been torture.”
His weight shifted against her, just a little, just enough to make her lean forward, resting one knee on the wide windowsill. One hand came up to brace herself against the glass, while the other dropped to clutch at his forearm, wound around her waist.
“It nearly broke me heart when we met again and ye had gone back to calling me Laird Bryden,” Evander murmured, his breath hot against her skin. “Me name is Evander. Let me hear ye say it.”
His questing hand hitched up her skirt to her knees and easily slipped beneath. He let his knuckles drag up the inside of her thighs in a tantalisingly slow stroke.
Touch me, Skye wanted to scream, her hips bucking.
He must have noticed, because he chuckled low in his throat and pressed his cheek against hers.
With his fingertips only a bare inch from her wet heat, he stopped. One heartbeat, then two, then three, then Skye started to think she would go mad.
Shivering, she pressed back against him. Something hard pressed into the small of her back. Curious, she made to reach behind her with the hand not pressed against the glass. Evander growled, wrapping thick fingers around her wrist, firmly bringing it in front of her once more.
“Evander,” she breathed, and felt him smile against her neck.
At last, his fingers brushed against her.
The touch began almost careless, drawing a line to divide her.
Closing her eyes once more—when had she opened them?
—she leaned her head back against his shoulder, letting the sensations rush over her.
The tip of his finger circled her entrance, stirring something strange, new, and not unpleasant in the pit of her stomach. A tug, maybe.
“Come on, then, lass,” he whispered. “Let me hear ye.”
“H-Hear me?”
“Oh, aye. Ye are doing so well. So very well.”
The tug blossomed into something deeper and warmer. Gently, Evander’s finger sank deep into her. The new sensation made her open her eyes, and she blinked, considering it. He curled his finger, and pleasure shot through her.
She gasped loudly, stuttering out his name almost before she realized it was leaving her lips.
Evander!
He growled again, deep enough for her to feel the rumble through her body, pressed together as they were.
His movements sped up, his hand sliding against her and inside her. The jolts of pleasure smoothed out into one even, rocking wave, taking her higher and higher and higher. In a moment, perhaps less, she’d reach the summit, and—
Footsteps sounded on the stairs.
Skye’s eyes flew open, and she gave a strangled squeak.
Evander’s lips curled against her neck. Reaching behind them, he gripped the curtain and drew it across the alcove in one smooth motion.
Just like that, they were cut off from the rest of the room, with only Skye’s horrified face and his grinning one reflected in the glass.
The door opened.
“Me Laird?” came a female voice. “I have yer tea. Are ye up here?”
Skye held her breath.
It’s just a maid. She’ll set down the tea and go. She willnae linger. Then we can—
Her mind stopped working when Evander continued to stroke her. Her thighs quivered.
Stop! Nay… Nay, daenae stop. Daenae do that.
She swallowed thickly, closing her eyes and gritting her teeth.
The maid sighed, shuffling her way across the room. Skye could hear the creaking floorboards and the rustle of the woman’s starched apron.
“If ye are around, me Laird, I’ve set yer tea on the low table,” she called, and began to bustle back toward the door.
“What a good lass,” Evander breathed against Skye’s ear, his prickling-warm breath making her shiver.
The door closed behind the maid, and Skye let out a long, half-laughing gasp.
“Ye wretch,” she whispered, reaching back to cup her hand around his cheek.
He pressed a hard kiss to the spot beneath her jaw and began to move against her faster and faster.
Skye tilted her head back, letting herself moan the way she wanted, not caring if her voice traveled, or even if the wretched maid was listening outside the door—she wasn’t; Skye had heard the retreating footsteps—because nothing mattered, nothing but her and Evander and the climax hurtling toward her.
Evander held her tighter, his breath turning ragged against her neck.
“Come for me, lass,” he whispered.
She shuddered, climax crashing over her, her hand curling into a fist against the window.
For a split second, it almost seemed that they’d melted into each other, the two of them becoming one.
“Evander,” she breathed.