by Megan McCoy
The prisoners were transferred to prison cells. Colin had left Doctor Montgomery behind in Scotland. He needed, he said, to talk with his superiors to find out if the man would face charges. If so, he would go back for him. But for now, Colin was focused on Honoria and Freddy.
“You have a big story for the newspaper,” Fergus said. He put his arm around Gabby and held her close.
“Mariella will write it,” Gabby replied. “I feel I’m too close to the situation. She can be objective.”
She snuggled against her husband. She wanted him inside her, but she knew the two of them were so tired it wouldn’t be the best time for sex.
“Happy Christmas,” she whispered.
“To you, too,” he said. “Shall we exchange gifts?”
“What sort of gifts?” she asked. They’d yet to blow out the candles, and she could see the sweet look on his face. They’d had electric lights installed in the lower part of the house, but had yet to have it done in their personal rooms. Instead they’d gone for indoor plumbing, which was the better of the two to her.
“I have two,” he said. “One for us, and one for you.”
“I’ll take the one for me first.” She sat up and let the sheet fall away. “You know how selfish I can be.”
Fergus got up and took a package out of his wardrobe. He sat on the bed and offered it to her. “Happy Christmas, my love.”
Gabby tore at the paper, then she said, “It’s a copy of The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe.”
“A first edition signed by the author upon its publication in 1794. It took the dealer forever to find it.”
Tears filled her eyes. She opened the book and ran her fingers over Ann Radcliff’s signature. “Fergus, this is perfect. I can’t believe… My favorite novel.”
“Can you count the number of times you’ve read it?” he asked.
“No.” She laughed softly. “But I will never read this one. It will have a place of honor on my bookshelf.”
Gabby gently placed the worn book on the table near her side of the bed, then straddled her husband and kissed him deeply. He knew her so well. She was afraid her gift would not compare. To stall for time she said, “What’s the second gift?”
“Electricity for the top part of the house,” he said. “They start after the first of the year.”
Gabby clapped. “That is fantastic! We’ll make it into the next century with all the modern conveniences.”
“Undoubtedly.” He stroked her arm. “And now, do you have something for me?”
“I do.” Gabby stood, shrugged into her dressing gown and ran from the room. She was back moments later with a small package, one that fit in the palm of her hand. “For you.”
She straddled him once more and watched as he carefully opened the package. Inside the paper was a box, and he lifted the lid and pulled out a queen from a chess set.
“What have you done?” he asked.
“The board is carved into a table in the library,” she said. “The set was carved from wood and is hand-painted. It’s beautiful, if I do say so myself.”
He turned the queen from side to side and said, “If this is any indication, I believe you’re right.” He kissed her gently. “Tomorrow, let’s move the set to the bedroom, and we can play up here at night.” The seductive look he gave her made her nipples tingle. “When you lose a piece, you lose a piece of clothing. How does that sound?”
“It sounds as if chess is going to be my new favorite game,” she said.
One that she would want to play every night.
The End.
Melinda Barron
Melinda Barron loves to explore Egyptian tombs and temples, discover Mayan ruins, play in castles towers, and explore new cities and countries. She generally does it all from the comfort of her home by opening a book.
Melinda loves to lose herself between the pages of a book. The only thing she loves more is creating stories from the wonderful heroes and heroines that haunt her dreams and crowd her head. She believes love is for everyone, not just those who are a size 2. Her books are full of magic, suspense and love, in all sorts of shapes and sizes.
Mel currently lives in the Texas Panhandle with two cats and a file stuffed with new ideas to keep her typing fingers busy and your heart engaged.
Mel also writes as Maura McMann.
Visit her blog here:
http://barron-chronicles.blogspot.com
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Iron and Mistletoe
12 Naughty Days of Christmas - Book 10
Aycee Masterson
Published by Blushing Books
An Imprint of
ABCD Graphics and Design, Inc.
A Virginia Corporation
977 Seminole Trail #233
Charlottesville, VA 22901
©2020
All rights reserved.
No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The trademark Blushing Books is pending in the US Patent and Trademark Office.
Aycee Masterson
Iron and Mistletoe
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-64563-851-3
v1
Cover Art by ABCD Graphics & Design
This book contains fantasy themes appropriate for mature readers only. Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the author's advocating any non-consensual sexual activity.
Chapter 1
All Elena Isarnon wanted was a happy Christmas. The day called Cristes Mæsse - the Mass of Christ - was an unpleasant one for her growing up, and she usually preferred to let the whole holiday season pass by as quickly and with the barest amount of courtesy that she could spare. The date was an unwelcome reminder that winter was in its infancy, that the days would be getting colder and darker; already, through her bedroom window, she could see the sun was setting. In a few hours, Cristes Mæsse would be here. But this time, things would be different. Elena was determined to make it so.
Life changes people. Life had changed Elena; perhaps not always for the better, but certainly for the wiser. She was nearly twenty-five, a quarter-century of heartache, heartbreak, uncertainty and hopefulness, and she was gentling a little more with each new day.
The L
ady Isarnon had eyes that matched the plain, mouse-brown hair that fell from her head and draped across both of her shoulders, and they were staring at the man standing at the foot of the bed. After six long months of pregnancy Elena noticed herself finally exhibiting that “glow” everyone had told her she was supposed to be having; her pale skin practically hummed with it. Her hips were wider, her breasts were rounder, fuller, heavier. Even her hair, plain as it might have been, was thicker now and had a bit of curl to it where it fell past her bare shoulders. The aches and pains that came with the growing life in her womb made it hard to feel good sometimes, but on that day before Cristes Mæsse, Elena wanted to feel good. She wanted to feel... pretty. That evening, as on so many others, she was a bubbling bundle of capricious hormones and barely-restrained emotions, and Elena decided that if she was going to get what she wanted, she was going to have to take steps.
She stared at the man, and he stared back at her. His eyes of weathered steel grey ran over her like a silken handkerchief at the end of a leather crop - a hint of sensory enticement with a promise of painful offense if she vexed him in any way. He didn’t look particularly vexed that evening. Instead, he seemed surprised, amused, even.
Of course, given how she’d presented herself, waiting for when he’d walk into their bedroom to find her there - room awash in candlelight, splayed on her back, her hair fanned across their pillows, one hand resting atop her round, glowing belly and, oh, completely naked - Elena wasn’t surprised at his, well, surprise.
“Elena.” Hugh Isarnon, her lord husband, known colloquially as the Iron Hand, was a tall, imposing man with a surprisingly quiet, gentle voice. He was broad-shouldered, with a wide chest of black hair streaked with grey, the same as the hair on his head and face. His fingers were so thick that just one of his hands could bind both of her wrists together. He’d done so on more than one occasion, but those were the sort of things a proper lady shouldn’t speak of aloud - not that Elena wanted to act proper just then. “I must admit... This... is not what I expected.”
“Husband.” Elena licked her lips, smiling. “I have been told that a woman in my ‘condition’ may be expected to spend as much time in bed resting as possible. So, as you can plainly see...” She waved her other hand across her body, watching as his eyes followed her fingers over her breasts, following the arch of her stomach, around the cocked curve of her upraised hip, dancing along the outermost edge of her darkened mound. “I... am resting.”
For the first time in quite a while, Elena’s husband was at a loss for words. Somehow, that made her feel even prettier. She rather liked the feeling of it. Elena slowly rolled from one side to the other, curling her legs up in the dark covers. She propped one hand atop her hip, rolling over just a hint further, letting him see the split of her bare bottom.
Taking the opportunity of Hugh’s silence, she continued. “As a matter of fact, it’s after sunset, getting darker... I’m in bed. You are...” she gestured at him, “next to our bed. What better excuse could there be for staying in than that?”
Hugh smiled, giving Elena a wicked little thrill. “Perhaps you should reconsider,” he said. “Tomorrow is Cristes Mæsse, after all; there’s a feast going on in the Hall downstairs. We do have guests expecting us, you know that.”
“I don’t want to reconsider,” Elena said, and meant it. She turned around onto her hands and knees, stretching out her back. She pushed her ass up and back towards him, just for the satisfaction of it, then turned and plopped back onto the pillows again. “Is it so wrong to be tired of responsibilities for just one night, husband? And it’s not like I don’t want the excuse to stay in: my feet hurt, my back hurts... I’m hurting in body parts I didn’t know could hurt these days. If my choices are to go downstairs and hobble my poor self around while the whole rest of the Hall and half the town are merrymaking, or to stay in bed enjoying the company of my beloved, well...” She sat up a little straighter, crossed her legs, shimmied her bottom a little deeper into the blankets and waited with a smile.
Hugh sighed, rubbing one hand against his cheek. “I suppose your mind is quite made up by now, then.”
“It is.”
The Lord of the House smirked, still looking amused. “And I suppose I only have myself to blame for that.”
Elena motioned down the front of her body, gesturing in particular to her pregnant belly, as if that was enough to sum up his blame all by itself. It was a scandalous sort of thing, baring herself before his eyes like some kind of fresh harlot, but Elena wasn’t the same woman that Hugh had married more than a decade earlier. When they first met - he, the Lord of Corfe and Ealdorman of Dorset County, and she, an orphaned tanner’s daughter, born to obscurity and common status - she’d been distant, reluctant to allow her emotions to get in the way of her duty, to serve him as her lord and spouse. When they’d married, a union she’d never expected or asked for, she’d put that duty above her own desires or pleasures. For ten years, she’d minded his house and his possessions, while he’d fulfilled his lordly obligations, coldly remaining aloof whenever she could. For ten years, her fallow womb had failed to do the one thing required by a woman of her station - provide him with an heir - and more than once, she’d expected him to divorce her for that. Yet, the Lord Isarnon had done no such thing. Their marriage had been a tumultuous, precarious thing, yet he’d never taken another woman, nor strayed from their marriage bed.
“Yes, my lord,” Elena answered with a smirk to match his. “One supposes that you might do that very thing.” As a woman, she’d always viewed her body as the one thing she possessed that had power over her husband, and she was no longer the frigid bride or the cold husk of a wife she’d been until recently. His patient, steady devotion to her had thawed her heart until she felt like a girl all over again. Elena found herself finally falling deeply, fully, even madly in love with the tall, imposing, soft-spoken noble with the eyes of steel and iron, who possessed a patience that at times seemed superhuman. When Elena learned she was finally pregnant, it felt like a chance for a fresh start, an opportunity to coax new life out of the cold, barren earth.
She enjoyed the fact that he was watching her, eating her up with his eyes, like he couldn’t look away for even a moment. A small, fearful part of her expected him to be disappointed or upset with her desire to stay in, yet he had a faint smile on his face.
“I don’t see how I can disagree with that,” he said before heading for the door.
Elena repressed a sigh and felt a surge of disappointment, looking down into her lap. Perhaps it was only right that he return to the celebration, tend to his duties as lord, as that would be expected of him. He would be forced to make some kind of excuse for her, of course, and she could make some show of an apology later, use her pregnancy as the reason for not attending the celebration. Surely people would understand.
There was the sound of murmuring voices, as her husband spoke to someone standing by the door. Through the open doorway, Elena could hear the sound of voices, of laughing and music; likely as not, the entire house would be full to bursting with visitors. Elena’s heart sank as she heard the door slowly close. Yet, she froze in place when she heard the unmistakable sound of a deadbolt sliding home, and looked over to see Hugh hanging the key to their bedroom back into its place.
“Hugh?” So many questions, so much said and unsaid in one name, one word.
“Mmm?”
Elena stuck out her tongue at him. “Don’t you ‘mmm’ me, Milord Iron Hand Isarnon. Why haven’t you gone to attend to our guests?”
Hugh pursed his lips, shrugged one shoulder. “Seems that my wife is feeling under the weather, so I bade that another round of ale be offered to the diners downstairs, wished a happy Cristes Mæsse’s day to all, and now, I intend to retire for the evening. I should think that the rest of the house staff are capable enough to handle things without us for one night.”
She opened her mouth to respond, then quickly closed it. “Oh.” After all of her flaunting
and showing off, Elena had managed to get the thing she’d wanted, and she was suddenly struck that she had no idea what to do next. As Hugh sat down next to her on the bed, turning the full force of his dark, hungry eyes on her, her hands trembled for the barest of moments before she took a deep, calming breath and stared back without flinching. She had nothing to fear, not from him. Not anymore.
When he kissed her, Elena raised a hand, sliding her slender fingers into his beard, feeling its rough, coarse hairs coil around her knuckles. That kiss was long, slow, gentle, but with the same insistence that he always seemed to have when it came to her. Hugh Isarnon was completely besotted with her, and try as she might, Elena still couldn’t understand why.
“Perhaps you’ll flaunt yourself a little more for me, starling,” he whispered, “and show me what else I might be to blame for.”
Elena laughed, clapped a hand over her mouth to stop herself. “I was wondering if you’d enjoyed that, my lord.”
“Hugh.” He spoke his name aloud, leaning back to look at her. His chin dipped down, giving her the full force of his long stare. “Say it again for me, Elena.”
Something very warm and pleasant started humming in her lower regions when he spoke in that tone. He was a forceful man, strong-willed and -bodied both, and he’d never hesitated to turn Elena over and give her a good, strong reminder to her bottom of how forceful he could be, whether with the help of a leather belt or the callused palm of his hand. But he didn’t need physical force to remind her of his dominance, or how she craved it.