Chapter 9
Oscar lifted his mouth from Ceana’s, and cooler air kissed her lips.
His hand slipped from her hip as he slowly pulled away, taking with him the heat of his chest and the hardness that had poked her belly.
When his forearm came down from beside her head, space opened around her before she was ready for it.
He could not retreat far. Her fist still held the front of his shirt.
Ceana looked down and found the fabric crushed between her fingers.
She had gripped him hard enough to pull the fastening loose, and the wrinkled fabric offered plain evidence of how eagerly she had drawn him closer.
Oscar waited without touching her while she forced her fingers to open one at a time.
Once she released him, he stepped back until the width of the passage separated them.
His breathing remained too deep for calm, though he straightened his shirt with slow movements and tucked both hands behind his back.
He looked her right in the eyes, avoiding her lips such that she became painfully aware they were swollen.
Her body had yet to understand that the kiss was over. Her pulse beat hard beneath her skin, and her knees shook a little. Oscar had already re-assumed the posture of the laird who had negotiated their marriage as though nothing intimate had passed between them.
“Forgive me,” he said, his voice still a little rough. “That shouldnae have happened.”
Ceana stared at him.
Was he sorry that he had kissed her, or did he regret discovering how willingly she had kissed him back?
She could ask whether their separate lives were meant to exclude every touch, though the answer might leave her feeling more exposed than she did now.
His arousal had been unmistakable against her belly.
He could not pretend that desire belonged to her alone.
“I will see ye tomorrow, Lady Ceana.”
Lady.
The title put more distance between them than his retreat had tried to.
Ceana drew a breath to say his name, and one foot shifted before pride stopped her from following. She did not yet know whether she wanted an explanation or another kiss. Calling him back while she remained uncertain would place every vulnerable part of the encounter in his hands.
Oscar lowered his head and turned away. His pace remained even as he retreated down the passage, yet his right hand closed tightly at his side before he reached the corner. He released it only when he thought himself out of sight.
He never looked back.
Ceana stepped into her chamber before a servant could pass and find her standing there with loosened hair and swollen lips.
After closing the door, she kept her hand on the handle.
The metal became warm beneath her hand, and she withdrew from it with immense irritation that she could do nothing about.
Near the fireplace, the mirror showed a woman whose carefully composed appearance had been thoroughly disrupted. She had reddened lips and bright eyes, while the color across her cheeks had yet to fade.
Ceana smoothed down parts of the gown that Oscar had gripped, then removed the pins that were already slipping from her hair.
The ordinary movements should have distracted her thoughts. However, they only reminded her that his fingers had held her with far less care. And she couldn’t tell if she wanted more… and what it would mean for them both.
She poured water into the basin and pressed a damp cloth to her mouth. The coolness soothed the tenderness for a moment, though each pass over her lower lip made her remember when Oscar had caught it between his.
She set the cloth down.
She had wanted him. No part of the kiss could be dismissed as something he had imposed upon her.
She had released the handle when she could have entered her chamber, and she had lifted her face after gripping his shirt.
When his mouth opened over hers, she had pulled him closer and let him press against her.
He had known exactly what she wanted before he walked away.
She turned away from the mirror and took the book left beside her bed.
She sat with it open across her lap, determined to occupy herself until her heartbeat settled.
Once she reached the bottom of the first page, she realized that she could not name a single event described there.
She began again, only to reach the same line without understanding it.
Closing the book gave her hands little relief, so she picked up the shawl folded at the foot of the bed. She refolded it along the same crease and placed it back where she had found it.
The bargain had seemed easy for some reason when Oscar offered it. Tommy and Paisley needed someone who would value them, while his power would shelter Daphne from any man who meant to force her home.
As Lady MacKane, Ceana would hold a respected place in a household where the children had already begun to seek her company. She could be useful here in ways she had never been useful at home.
That promise had concealed a danger she understood only now.
Oscar might entrust his children to her and allow her to govern his household, yet he would still bar her from every part of himself that required trust. Their marriage would leave her surrounded by people who needed her each day, only for night to bring her back to her chamber alone.
Knowing that he wanted her would make that solitude worse. His body had answered hers with a passion that no apology could disguise, and he still had chosen retreat over remaining with her.
Ceana set the shawl down with greater care than it required. She would not abandon the marriage before asking him what his retreat meant, and she would not permit his brief apology to decide the meaning of the kiss for them both. He had participated fully before control reclaimed him.
She prepared for bed while straining her ears.
Every faint sound beyond the door drew her attention from the task at hand, and more than once she paused with her fingers on a ribbon.
However, no footsteps returned to the corridor.
Not then, not later in the night, and definitely not when she fell asleep.
The next morning, the sound of hoofbeats struck the courtyard below and pulled her upright in bed.
For one confused instant, she listened for the measured tread that had not returned during the night.
However, the guards’ calls soon stopped that thought as a carriage rolled beneath her window and Morrag colors appeared among the men escorting it.
She had already reached for her gown when a maid knocked to announce her parents’ arrival.
She dressed with little care for the rest of the pins slipping through her fingers, then hurried into the passage as servants carried trunks toward newly opened chambers.
Mairi, the head maid, directed them from the landing while the guards below led the tired horses away.
Heather Tulloch stood inside the entrance hall with dust on the hem of her traveling gown. The moment she saw Ceana, she crossed the remaining distance and wrapped both arms around her. Her embrace tightened until Ceana could scarcely breathe.
“Good day, Maither,” Ceana breathed into her mother’s shoulder.
“Let me see ye,” Heather said.
She drew Ceana toward the light and searched her face before turning over both wrists. Her fingers then brushed Ceana’s cheeks.
“Did he harm ye?”
“Nay, Maither. I am unharmed.”
David Tulloch approached more slowly, though his composure faltered when he gripped Ceana’s shoulders. He pulled her into his arms and pressed a kiss to her hair.
“We didnae ken which daughter he had,” he said. “The message named ye, though we feared he might have taken ye both.”
Ceana held him for another moment before drawing back. “So Daphne hasnae returned yet?”
Heather reached into her cloak and produced a folded letter. The sight of her twin’s handwriting across the front made Ceana’s fingers tremble as she broke the seal.
Ceana,
Are you well? I have thought of little else since I left.
I am safe, and I went willingly. I will not return to marry Angus.
I know what that may bring upon Father and the clan, but I could not bind myself to a man I feared simply to keep everyone else comfortable.
I cannot tell you where I am. The fewer people who know, the safer it will be for all of us.
You have spent too much of your life stepping into mine. We did it first with Mother’s blue ribbon, when you took the half I scorched so no one would discover we had traded places. You still have it, do you not?
Tell Mother I love her. Tell Father I am sorry, though I will not change my mind.
I am sorry I left you to answer for my choices. Do not risk your life again trying to fix what I have broken. Choose what comes next because it belongs to you.
Daphne.
The final lines blurred until Ceana wiped her eyes and read them again, a laugh escaping through her tears. She pressed the page against her chest, relieved that Daphne lived.
“How did this reach ye?” she asked.
“A trusted hand delivered it and left before we could ask questions,” Heather explained.
David looked toward the doors, where the last of their escort had entered. Traveling for so long had hollowed the skin beneath his eyes. “Her refusal has brought consequences. Bryce’s riders have been seen near our outer grazin’ land, and cattle have disappeared from there.”
“Has he sent his demands?”
“Nay. He wishes us to understand that he can reach Morrag land whenever he chooses.” David rubbed a hand over his jaw before meeting Ceana’s gaze. “I cannae protect our people with pride. An alliance with MacKane may give Bryce reason to hesitate.”
The speed of his answer revealed how often he had considered it. Shame flashed across his face, and he looked away.
“Did ye agree freely?” he asked.
“Oscar abducted me because he believed I was Daphne. Once he learned the truth, he offered terms, and I accepted them.”
“Did he threaten us to gain yer consent?” Heather asked.
“Nay. His promise to protect Daphne was one of the reasons I agreed.”
David’s shoulders lowered with relief. “In that case, I will welcome his protection. I wish the need for it hadnae fallen upon ye.”
The door opened before Ceana could answer.
Oscar entered in a dark coat fitted neatly across his shoulders, with his sword secured at his side.
Nothing in his bearing resembled the man whose mouth had opened over hers hours ago.
Ceana’s gaze landed on his lips before she forced it away, yet her fingers could almost feel the fabric she had crushed in her fist.
Oscar greeted her parents, then met David’s stare directly. “I imagine ye’ve already heard enough to ken how Ceana came here.”
“I heard she was taken from the festival,” David replied.
“Aye. Me men believed she was Daphne. I gave the order.”
David’s jaw tightened. “Ye ordered me daughter kidnapped?”
“I did.”
David stepped closer.
“And he kept me afterward,” Ceana added. Both men turned toward her. “The bargain came later, and the decision was mine.”
Oscar allowed the correction to stand. His gaze slid over her face while carefully avoiding her mouth.
When David mentioned Bryce’s riders again, Oscar’s attention sharpened.
“How many were seen, and did they cross yer border?”
“Six. They remained outside it.”
Oscar moved until he stood close to Ceana. Anyone addressing her now had to look past him. “Neither Ceana nor Daphne will be handed to Bryce as payment for peace. Any demand concernin’ Ceana comes through MacKane.”
The certainty in his voice seemed to calm her father much more effectively than courtesy would have.
“Oscar has already promised to protect Daphne,” Ceana said.
At the sound of his name, Oscar looked back at her. Her mother’s gaze shifted between them, though she said nothing.
Ceana glanced again at the lips she could still feel against her own, but Oscar quickly broke eye contact.
“The alliance will extend me protection to Morrag,” he said. “The marriage proceeds only if Ceana’s consent still stands.” He turned fully toward her. “Does it?”
Her parents waited for her answer with bated breath.
Daphne had asked her to choose a life that belonged to her, and Oscar had offered one through Tommy and Paisley. His retreat frightened her because she now wanted something from him that their bargain had never promised. Even so, it changed nothing.
“It does,” she confirmed.
“As does mine.” Oscar summoned Lennan from the passage. “Send a rider for the priest. He is to be here tomorrow.”
Lennan’s gaze flicked toward Ceana before he bowed. “Aye, me Laird.”
He left to carry out the order while Oscar restored the distance he had kept since entering.
Ceana had one day before he became her husband, and still no answer for why he had kissed her as though he wanted everything before apologizing for taking anything.
She wasn’t certain if she was ever going to get it.