Highland Hellion Page 17

  Because she would be riding out with them.

  * * *

  “Ye do nae have to remain wed.”

  Marcus spoke to her from beneath lowered brows. He was displeased with her as much as with the situation he was attempting to remedy.

  “I apologize for riding out,” she began. “It was childish of me not to think about who would come after me.”

  Marcus contemplated her for a long moment before he drew in a deep breath and let it out. “Rolfe has had a good effect on ye.”

  Katherine shrugged, feeling suddenly shy as heat teased her cheeks. She shifted, causing Marcus to narrow his eyes at her. His expression darkened slightly as he tightened his hold on his sleeves.

  “Damn him.” Marcus spoke at last in a tight voice. “Part of me wants to thrash him for putting that look on yer face.”

  “You must not.” Once again her English accent was more pronounced as she became agitated.

  “And the other part of me wants to shake his hand.”

  Katherine smiled, feeling as if everything was suddenly right with the world. There was a storm on the horizon, but for that moment, seeing Marcus nodding with approval, everything that mattered was in its place.

  She ran toward him, jumping up to wrap her arms around his neck. He caught her and hugged her tight before setting her back on her feet.

  “I mean it, though.” His eyes were glittering with happiness now. “Just say the word, and I’ll have ye on yer way back to MacPherson land. Being foolish does nae mean ye should have to live with a marriage ye do nae care for.”

  “More than one foolish action has resulted in dire consequences.”

  Marcus’s lips curled a tiny amount. “Let others call ye hellion as an insult. For meself, I enjoy the frank way ye speak.”

  He beamed at her for a long moment before his expression went serious. “Ye’ll tell me, Kat, if ye change yer heart? For all that I did nae want ye for me own wife, I would no’ see ye unhappy.”

  “I was a child when Morton tried to force that match,” she said, defending Marcus. “He’s a monster, Morton is. You must convince Rolfe not to go to court.”

  Marcus stiffened.

  “He’s given his word to his father and laird,” Marcus responded. “I agree with ye. Morton is blackhearted, but honor is no’ something a man chooses when to uphold. I’d take ye home to MacPherson land, sheet or no soiled sheet, if Rolfe struck me as the sort of man who did nae keep his word.”

  He nodded, making it clear he considered the matter closed.

  She knew he would not change his mind.

  Why was it that all of the traits she loved about Scottish men were also the ones that threatened to take them away from her?

  Fate was still intent on toying with her.

  Marcus reached out and patted her on the shoulder. “I see ye care for him, lass. Go now, for he’s leaving at first light.”

  It was a test of whether or not she’d left childhood behind. Women straightened their backs and bid their men farewell with dry eyes and confidence in their safe return, when they knew very well the risks.

  Katherine sent Marcus a steady look before she lowered herself formally. It earned her a glint of approval in his eyes before he nodded.

  “I’m off to find some sleep.”

  She watched him go and felt an urgency to seek out Rolfe.

  Would he welcome her?

  She discovered herself needled by the possibility that having had her once, he might be content. Was their marriage really a service to his honor? A means of righting the wrong he felt he’d done her by taking her to his father’s land?

  Both possibilities burned in her mind like coals in a fire. Of course, there was only one way to know, so she turned and set her shoulders before leaving the chamber.

  * * *

  Rolfe was waiting for her.

  She enjoyed the sight, but not because she found pleasure in knowing she somehow controlled him. No, she was simply happy to see him. He was pacing back and forth across the passageway while she finished talking with Marcus.

  He turned and braced himself as she emerged, his jaw tight as he waited to see what she would say to him.

  “I wish you would not go to see the earl.”

  Perhaps she was wasting her breath, yet she could not have stopped the words if she’d known he’d cut out her tongue.

  “Morton will not deal justly with you.”

  “And what of ye?” Rolfe asked softly. “Will ye keep the vows ye made with me yesterday?”

  He’d moved nearer to her, closing the distance and stealing her breath with the same motion. It was so abrupt, the way she responded to him, as though her will was not involved.

  No, it had always been thus since she’d first encountered him. She responded with yearnings she’d never had for another.

  “I told them to take the sheet.”

  Her answer earned her a softening of his lips. He nodded. “It’s hanging in the hall.”

  Rolfe watched her to see her honest reaction.

  Katherine stared straight back at him. “If I wanted to be free of you, Rolfe, would it not be best for me to send you off to see Morton? You forget that I know the man. You have only heard about him. I have faced him, and I ask you not to go.”

  Now he smiled. It was a tender expression that warmed her heart with the way it spread into his eyes. Those green eyes were as rare as he was.

  “Come.” He reached down and captured her wrist. His fingers closed all the way around it as he tugged her behind him.

  He was taking her abovestairs to have her.

  What would have scandalized her just two days ago was now permissible. She discovered herself delighted by the vows that made it so.

  At last, Fate was delivering some treasures into her life.

  Ones she was eager to touch.

  * * *

  “Ye should thank me,” Duncan Lindsey remarked before he took another bite off a chicken leg. He chewed it as he turned and looked at Marcus sitting next to him at the high table while supper was served.

  He couldn’t help but notice Rolfe and Katherine were not in attendance.

  “A blind man wouldn’t have failed to see the way they wanted to tumble each other,” Duncan continued.

  Marcus sent him a narrow-eyed look. “Ye are speaking of someone I consider to be under me protection.”

  “So I should act as though they are no’ healthy and passionate?” Duncan replied. “See…” He shook the chicken leg at Marcus. “That is why I have no’ wed. Where is the woman who can be frank with me? I have no understanding of the need to hold conversations about everything except what I crave from a lass.”

  Marcus slowly grinned. “I see exactly why ye have no wife, man, if yer idea of courting is to walk straight up to a lass and tell her ye’d like to see her tits.”

  Duncan stretched his arms out wide. “Is that no’ honest?” He looked at his captains. “Is that no’ what is on all of yer minds when ye encounter a comely lass for the first time?”

  There was a round of chuckles in response. With no females at the head table, they indulged themselves in frank conversation.

  Duncan wasn’t finished yet. He leaned on his elbow toward Marcus. “Tell the truth, man. Would it no’ be a lot simpler if yer wife told ye exactly where she likes ye to finger her?”

  Marcus sent him an arrogant look. “When ye do it right, the moans tell a man so.”

  Two of the captains slapped the table as they laughed.

  “Unless yer wife is coddling yer ego, as husbands like their wives to do.”

  They all frowned because it was the Head of House who had spoken. She delivered her words in a clear, unabashed tone while filling Duncan’s goblet.

  “Which brings me back to saying send me a female who will be b
lunt!”

  Marcus grunted and took a swig of ale from his goblet. He wanted to drain it, that much was fact, but he set the goblet back on the tabletop. His brother had two daughters to look forward to seeing grow into women.

  Marcus was going to enjoy telling Bhaic how much he wasn’t going to like what men would say about his daughters.

  And then he recalled that Helen had told him she would have a daughter.

  His wife did tend to get her way.

  Marcus reached for his goblet.

  * * *

  “That was too fast.”

  Rolfe was still struggling to breathe.

  Well, it was fair to say that they both were.

  “I’m sorry, Kat,” he rasped out.

  “Do I sound…displeased?”

  Her new husband rolled over with a soft groan and peered at her from where he braced his chin on his hand as he leaned his elbows into the bed. He looked at her, his green eyes shimmering with satisfaction as he searched her features.

  “Women crave more than just the ride.”

  She felt her heart settling into a more normal rhythm, but her temper heated in response to his words. “And how many women have you enjoyed to know that?”

  His lips parted in a smirk. She let out a snort and grabbed a pillow that she swung toward his head. Rolfe blocked it far too easily for her pride. She rolled over and right off the bed.

  “I hope you enjoyed them,” was her tart reply.

  “Ye’re lying.” He sat up and contemplated her.

  Katherine suddenly felt exposed. There was a certain knowledge in his expression as he looked at her bare frame that told her he knew exactly what a naked woman looked like.

  And she didn’t care for how jealous it made her feel.

  So she found her chemise and put it on, earning a frown from her husband. He sat all the way up before standing and walking toward the small table in the outer chamber. He opened a bottle of honey mead supplied by Duncan and poured two glasses of it.

  “Her name was Gret.”

  “I don’t wish to hear about it.”

  Rolfe only offered her a glass. She glared at him, but he was unrepentant, so she took it and drew a sip of the sweet beverage.

  Rolfe was still bare as the day he’d been born.

  She really wished she didn’t enjoy the sight so much. It was undermining her efforts to be cross with him.

  “She was the widow of one of me father’s captains,” Rolfe continued. “A woman who had position, and therefore no reason to wed again and risk losing her freedom.”

  “Are you deaf?” Kat asked. “Or simply indifferent to my pride?”

  Rolfe grinned at her. “I’m trying to tell ye I am no’ the sort of man who keeps a mistress.”

  She hadn’t expected that. In fact, Kat realized she knew very little about him. She felt a teasing of heat on her cheeks as she sat down on a chair and waited for him to continue. They did need to learn about each other.

  “Gret caught me kissing a kitchen maid, when the girl had slapped me for following her.”

  “I hope she added a slap of her own.”

  He raised his glass to her in agreement before he emptied it.

  “She hit me with a pastry roller, and it left a bruise that didn’t fade for a month.” He grinned at the memory. “Warned me that she’d crack me skull if I ever failed to respect a lass’s wishes again.”

  “And still, she became your…lover?”

  “In a manner of speaking.” Rolfe held up his finger when she started to ask another question. “I learned from her that fucking and making love are two very different things. I was a very fortunate man to have a woman who took the time to instruct me.”

  He was moving toward her, plucking the glass from her distracted fingers and setting it aside before he gently raised her to her feet by cupping her elbows. It was such a tender touch, one he followed with a soft stroke of his fingers across her cheek.

  “A woman is more sensual than a man,” he leaned down and whispered against her ear. She felt his warm breath teasing her neck a moment before he pressed a gentle kiss against her nape.

  She shuddered.

  Rolfe lifted his head, watching her response. What made her catch her breath was the way his eyes flickered with enjoyment, as though he found her delight pleasing.

  “And if a man is wise”—he caught the soft fabric of her chemise between his fingertips and started to draw it up her body—“he learns to awaken her passion.” The garment came between them, blocking him from sight as he pulled it up and over her head.

  “Strength has its place, too.” He caught her wrists while her arms were still raised high and held them prisoner in his large hands. “But tempered by an iron will.”

  He pulled her arms straight above her head as he came close enough for his body hair to touch her breasts. She shivered, gooseflesh rising on her skin as he held her gaze just as securely as her wrists. Her belly twisted with awareness. Of him, of his strength, of how much she wanted to feel it.

  “Any man can claim a woman,” he rasped in a voice edged with promise. “Only a lover can earn her passion.”

  He leaned down and scooped her up, cradling her against his chest as she settled into the embrace. It felt so very right.

  Secure.

  As though he was everything she might ever need.

  He moved slowly toward the bed, his bare feet making soft sounds against the floor. When he laid her among the rumpled bedding, the ropes groaned as they took her weight and then his.

  Her senses were heightened, feeding her all of the tiny details she had heard before when climbing into bed. Now, with Rolfe there, it all seemed much richer. As though she’d been swallowing her food without tasting it before.

  Rolfe leaned down and kissed her, lingering over the press of his lips against hers. He didn’t rush to part her lips, but took a long moment to taste her. It made her twist up toward him, slipping her hands along his wide shoulders and into his hair. The need to bind him to her was growing, like a newly lit fire. The flames began to lick at the wood before it popped and caught.

  Her skin was heating, making being nude feel so very perfect.

  “Do nae be jealous of Gret,” he whispered against her ear. “She taught me to respect a woman’s need to be aroused.”

  “That is…a puzzle…” Katherine rasped out as he stroked her sides.

  He’d touched the parts of her she considered intimate, yet now he drew his fingers and hands along her sides in long strokes like he might with a horse. She stretched, the sensation a rush of delight that awakened her senses.

  “It is,” he agreed.

  Her heart was speeding up again. But it was also thumping in hard, deep beats. She could hear the blood rushing in her ears as Rolfe drew his hands up to her shoulders and down to rest on her breasts.

  She craved having him cup those tender globes long before he did so. She hungered for it, feeling as though every moment was a tiny torment she must endure before he would deliver satisfaction.

  “Hmmm…” It was bliss when he finally put his hands to her.

  “Such perfect handfuls.” He leaned down, teasing one with a kiss.

  It wasn’t enough. She arched up, offering the puckered nipple. “Strength.” She ground out the word as she tried to pull him toward her. “Let me feel yours.”

  He lay down on her, holding her wrists pressed against the bedding above her head and letting enough of his body weight rest on her to ensure she was pinned beneath him.

  “I want to do that as well,” he told her, watching her while she absorbed how much stronger he was than her. “Part of me longs to ride ye hard and hold ye so tight that there is no way for ye to break free.”

  Something deep inside her responded to his words. She felt a leap of excitement and a wave
of heat washing through her. Her lips curled, just a bit, baring her teeth.

  He grinned in response, but it wasn’t a kind expression. No, it was menacing and bright with promise. Somehow driving home just how male he was while leaving her with certain knowledge that she was his counterpart, made to fit him.

  Apart, they would always yearn for each other.

  “Tonight, though”—he pulled away from her, stroking her once again—“I am going to prove I can be a man as well as beast in our bed.”

  He made good on his words, stroking her and then following his large hands with a hundred tiny kisses that felt like butterflies. She’d never realized her skin might be so sensitive. With only his delicate touches, she seemed to be focused more on waiting for the next kiss to land and, therefore, more aware of it when it did.

  She writhed against the sheet, unable to remain still, reaching for him, needing to share the bliss between them. She heard his breathing deepen, roughen, as he fought for control. She was already wet and aching for his possession, but he resisted the invitation she tried to make by parting her thighs beneath him.

  Instead, he slipped down her length, rubbing her as he went and driving her nearly insane with need.

  At least, she thought she was that far gone until he settled over her spread sex.

  “Rolfe William Brian McTavish.”

  He sent her a satisfied smirk in response, but flattened his hands on her inner thighs to keep them spread. “Did ye know the older women say a woman will nae conceive sons if she is no’ satisfied?”

  Katherine felt her cheeks burning with what must have been the hottest blush of her entire life. He was hovering right over her open slit, teasing the mound of her curls with his fingertips.

  Why had she never noticed how it felt to have those hairs touched?

  “That’s…preposterous.”

  He grinned at her and drove a little deeper into her curls, so that he was touching skin.

  “I like the way ye sound more English when ye are agitated.”

  She scoffed at him. “You don’t care for anything English.”

  One of his eyebrows rose. “No’ true, lass.” He drew his fingers lower until he was touching the little bud at the top of her sex. “I find I enjoy ye…quite a bit.”