Highlander Ever After

by Paula Quinn

  She spared him an incredulous glare before she set her eyes straight ahead…on nothing. “Yes, Adam, I’m trying to make myself ill in the hopes that one of you will pen my father and I won’t be dead before he gets here. If he comes.” She slid her gaze back to his for an instant before she slipped it back to what she’d been staring at before.

  But it was enough time for Adam to see the mist across the green expanse of her eyes. Her jaw tightened. She was trying not to cry again. He wanted to reach out and run his fingertips over her cheek. Damn it, he wanted to comfort her.

  “Does it even occur to you how my life has been turned upside down?” she asked. “Taken right out of my hands before I could stop it? I’m sorry I cannot pretend to be happy when I am not!”

  First, he liked how his name sounded on her lips. She spoke with a slightly Germanic accent. He knew she was angry, and he understood why, but hell, the sound of her voice was like music on the moors.

  Second, how did she manage to shout at him without raising her voice? Without even sounding truly angry? He didn’t like it. It wasn’t real. Her shouting in the church was real. It wasn’t beneficial for anger to simmer and stew beneath a mask of etiquette. Still, the power and control she possessed to maintain it astounded him.

  Several wisps of her hair fell around her face and caught the light in the dips of its curls. He wondered what would happen if she weren’t so proper.

  He did understand, in part, what she was going through. If anyone understood, it was him.

  “I’ve been thoughtless,” he admitted, softening his gaze. “I should have known my mother would do something like this. She likes merriment.”

  “I like her,” his wife said softly and closed her eyes.

  Everyone who met Davina liked her. Still, Adam was surprised to hear Sina confess it.

  “Have ye been on yer feet the entire time, as well?” he asked her.

  She smiled without opening her eyes. “Yes, ’twas another of my plans for my knees to lock up so that I couldn’t sit down unless I was forced.” She squinted her eyes open and let her smile remain. “It worked.”

  She closed her eyes again and he watched her try to stay awake, but despite the clamor on every side, she nearly slipped from her chair and into his arms.

  He gathered her up and left his seat.

  “No!” she cried out briefly.

  Was that wine he smelled on her breath? He lifted her closer and decided she weighed nothing at all. Had she been drinking all day?

  “Shhh, ’tis all right, lass.” He carried her to the entrance, then turned to his kin. “She hasna slept since she arrived—probably before that. She’s afraid and powerless. Let’s no’ judge her too harshly, aye?”

  Satisfied with everyone’s agreement, though many appeared shocked at his thoughtfulness, he turned and headed for their chamber above stairs.

  His eyes kept a constant vigil on her lowered lids and the lush spray of her deep gold lashes. Her plump, parted lips beckoned him to bring her closer, smell her, taste her. The sweet coral blush of her cheeks tempted him to rub his face against her skin and feel its velvet softness.

  He was mad to let himself be taken in by her sublime beauty, her saucy, sweet mouth. He didn’t want to be with her to fulfill some required duty. He didn’t want to be married, tied down, a slave to a lass’s desires. But damn it, he was and there was no changing it. Either he won her heart, or he’d be the only one in Camlochlin whose marriage was miserable. He looked down at her. He couldn’t run from this. He couldn’t run from any of it anymore. But still…he wanted to.

  He continued on toward the bedchamber door with a groan. How was he expected to remain faithful to a heart that would never be his? The weight of it already felt crushing.

  He brought her to their marriage bed and refused to look down at her again. He looked at his dear bed instead. How he missed it. The few hours of sleep in his chair had done him little good. After a long day in the saddle and a celebration to top it off, he was ready for sleep.

  He set her down on the bed and didn’t try to remove any of her clothing. He wouldn’t force himself on her. He stepped over Goliath on his way to the other side, pulling off his léine as he went and tossing it over his chair. He missed. He kicked off his boots next and then whatever else was clinging to him and got into bed beside her.

  When he closed his eyes, he saw her face. And then he saw nothing else.

  Sina opened her eyes in the morning and pulled her earring away from her nose. Remaining still, she looked around, forgetting for a blissful moment where she was. Then she remembered and her heart faltered in her chest. At the edge of the world. In his bed.

  How had she arrived here? Had Adam carried her, put her to bed, left her fully dressed? The last thing she remembered was smiling at him. Too much wine and not enough sleep. It was the only reason she would turn traitor on herself…but he hadn’t mistreated her. He’d apologized for being thoughtless, and seemed concerned for her well-being. To make it all worse, the sight of him drew the breath from her body, sparked fires in her belly. But none of it meant she should smile at him. If he thought she was weakening—or if she began to weaken—and they consummated the marriage, there would be no hope of getting out of it.

  She could hear his breath close to her. He was in bed with her. Why hadn’t he slept in the chair? She remembered that he’d barely gotten any sleep the night before. She sat up with a sigh. Let him sleep, then. She wouldn’t wake—

  Was that his arse? Her eyes opened wider as they adjusted to the soft morning light. “You’re naked!” she blurted. He’d had enough sleep for one night. “Adam! Wake up!”

  “What the hell is it?” he asked, lifting his head off his pillow and coming awake.

  “You’re naked!” She pulled the blanket up to her chin for some ridiculous reason. It was he who needed covering. Thank God he was lying on his belly!

  He looked at her through hooded eyes, felt his bare parts, and then closed his eyes again. “I dinna remember removin’ my breeches.”

  His hand slipping down his body had drawn her eyes to follow. Her gaze had fallen over the carved contours of his back, the alluring curve of his hip, and then over his bare buttocks.

  She remembered being pressed against all that muscle and then tried to breathe and averted her gaze.

  “’Tis how I sleep,” he said into his pillow.

  He sounded more like a groggy bear than a man.

  “Well, you must stop sleeping this way immediately!”

  He grumbled something that sounded like marriage being a curse and rose from the bed before she had time to look away.

  “Do you mind!” she gasped and closed her eyes. But it was too late. She’d seen his buttocks and the backs of his strong thighs. She knew immediately that the image was forever emblazoned on her. How was it that a man could look just as alluring from the back?

  “Ye’ve never seen a man’s body before?” he asked from somewhere off to the side, sounding amused. “No’ even yer William?”

  She didn’t answer. Of course she hadn’t seen William. What did he think she was?

  “You can open yer eyes now, lass.”

  She didn’t know why she obeyed, save that his voice pounded in her ears like ancient drums.

  He stood in the light of a candle, wearing hose that reached just below his knees, and nothing else. The image that she thought emblazoned on her thoughts earlier was doused in the glory of this one. William could never look so pleasing in such scandalous attire.

  “No,” she managed and pulled up the blankets when he returned to the bed.

  His strength and the warmth of his body drew her for a moment before she snapped the blankets back and rose from the bed.

  And looked into Goliath’s dark, dreadful eyes.

  “Please,” she said, closing her eyes and trying to keep her teeth from chattering. “Do something about this beast.”

  She heard him mutter a word, and the hellhound retreated to i
ts master’s side of the bed.

  “He’s called Goliath,” the bear growled.

  She heard him moving about on the bed, snapping the blanket—around him, hopefully.

  “I don’t care what it’s called,” she let him know, rubbing her fingers over a scar on her arm and remembering the last run-in she had with a dog. “It frightens me,” she told him over her shoulder, chancing a glance at him.

  He was sitting up with the blanket gathered low at his waist. His black hair tumbled over his strong, shadowy jaw. His gaze glinted like cool steel in the growing light.

  “Well, ye had best care.” His tone was smoother than the rarest silk, deep and musical, resonating through her. “He’s my friend. He goes where I go.”

  “That doesn’t mean he will be near me.”

  He smiled, giving her the win, and folded his arms behind his head.

  He looked like a languid lover waiting for her to come back to bed. She certainly wasn’t about to do that.

  “Can you not look at me while I dress?”

  “Ye’re my wife.” His husky baritone made her toes burn.

  “I don’t care.”

  He gave her a frustrated look, and she thought he might start shouting. He didn’t. “D’ye care aboot anything?”

  “Aye.” She went closer. She didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but she wanted him to know the truth. “I care about many things, but they are in other places. Poor William. He—”

  He started to turn away from her, but she sat at the edge of the bed, stopping him. “I know you’re against this. I know you are. Tell me why. What is this marriage taking from you that makes you as gloomy as I?”

  “Same as ye,” he said, staring out the window. “My choices.”

  She touched his foot and softened her gaze on him when he looked at her. “Then let’s try to win them back.”

  Chapter Six

  Adam was in the solar with Sina and his father. He didn’t know what the hell he was doing here. She’d asked him to come, so he had.

  He would have helped her dissolve this farce and to hell with the queen’s order, aunt or not. It would be to his benefit to send her home. Plans to make him chief would change and he could have his freedom back. But he wasn’t here to support her. He wasn’t sure anymore if he wanted her to go. He didn’t ever want to go through getting married again. It was done in the sight of God. Their fate together was sealed. There was nothing to be done.

  “You must let me write to my father,” she told the chief.

  “No one said ye couldna write to him,” his father replied. He leaned back in his big chair and folded his arms across his chest. “But the queen will no’ change her mind.”

  “The queen will not live forever,” she countered in a low voice.

  Adam fell into the chair beside her and rested his face in his hands. She didn’t know the queen was the chief’s beloved wife’s sister.

  “Yer father consented,” the chief said stiffly. “If he does no’ go back on his word and ye’re forced to live here—”

  She lifted her chin. “The marriage cannot be consummated. You must order that it be so.”

  Adam’s father looked suitably horrified. “Are ye mad, lass?”

  “I’d like to pen a letter too.” Adam smiled and tossed his legs over the arm of his chair. “To the queen. I’d like to thank her fer this.”

  “You’re free to pursue your passions elsewhere,” his wife said shortly, realizing finally that he was here for entertainment purposes only.

  “My mother was raised in a Catholic abbey,” he told her, his smile still intact, his voice wooden. “As if that weren’t enough, my grandmother has made it her life’s purpose to make Camelot oot of this place. My sins are already piled up. I willna add adultery to them—though ye sorely tempt me.”

  “Then you will have to be strong,” she muttered.

  “What?” He laughed. “I can tell ye right now no’ to count on that.”

  She stared at him. Her breath came short, flaring her nostrils. “You would force yourself on me?”

  “Dinna be a fool. I’ve never had to ferce myself on any woman. Ye willna be the first.”

  She clutched the arms of her chair until her knuckles turned white. But she kept her damned cool. He was used to fighting lasses with tempers forged in hellfire. But this woman exasperated him by hiding behind her calm façade.

  Adam wanted to unravel her.

  “I will never consent,” she promised tightly.

  “Nae?” he challenged, even as his father rose from his chair. “How aboot I write to the queen and tell her that ye refuse? What will the bishop think? What will yer faither think when the crown no longer has the loyalty of the Highlands?”

  Her large eyes narrowed on him. She turned them to the chief, who nodded at Adam and left the solar without another word.

  Adam loved his father for standing with him and not opposing anything Adam had said—and for leaving.

  He didn’t like threatening Sina, but if she thought he was going to remain celibate for a year, she needed to be set straight. “Ye dinna have to love me,” he told her coolly, feeling more like his usual self than he had since before his wedding.

  “Love you?” she said, turning away from him. “I don’t even like you.”

  Adam straightened his legs and sat forward in his chair. “What was that ye said? Hell, woman, speak up. Were ye taught to be a mouse at court?” A dark thought suddenly skipped across his thoughts. “I will never strike ye fer yer boldness. Is that why ye’re afraid of me? Hell, ye’ve met my sister and my cousins. I can take yer worst.”

  “Of course you won’t strike me,” she told him quietly. “I will kill you if you do.”

  He smiled. She was no mouse. She was only disguised as one.

  “As for my demeanor,” she continued, “I was raised to behave as a lady, sober and well-mannered. I will speak my mind. I chose not to shout it.”

  “Good.” He moved in a little closer. “Because this matter between us needs to be discussed.”

  “Which one? There are many.”

  “The one where ye think I’ll be content to sleep in bed with ye fer a year and no’ have ye. Yer Lord Standoff—”

  “Standish,” she corrected. “William Standish.”

  “—might be better able to resist ye, but I’m no’. If I must work so hard at keepin’ ye happy, I’ll have somethin’ fer my effort.”

  “Your effort?”

  “Aye, my effort. This works both ways,” he told her, shifting his hand between them.

  “What is this?” she demanded, aping him. “This marriage? This farce? It means nothing to me! Or to you, but you’re too afraid to do anything about it.”

  “Ye dinna understand what’s at stake.”

  “I know what’s at stake for me!” she told him. “The end of everything I know and love.”

  “And it could be the end of everything I know and love if I send ye back.”

  “Then we will go on just like this,” she warned through tight lips.

  “That’s fine with me,” he said with a smirk. “I like lasses with some spirit. But ye will obey the queen and consummate this marriage or cause trooble to yer faither.”

  “My father will dissolve this marriage the moment he’s king,” she insisted on a shallow breath while she wrung her hands in her lap.

  Adam noted the shadow of doubt that crossed her features. “What if he lets it stand?” he asked her, softening his tone. “How long am I supposed to wait?”

  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, clearly trying to keep her composure. “Until you rot, for all I care.”

  He laughed. He liked her fire, gently issued though it was. “Trust me, lass, I’ll have ye long before that.”

  “You’re a savage!” she finally erupted, springing to her feet.

  “Ye’re an overindulged princess,” he responded calmly.

  She gasped as if he had struck her, then she leaned over the table clo
sest to her chair, picked up a chess piece, and flung it at him.

  He ducked, narrowly avoiding a queen to the eye. He bounded to his feet, glaring at her.

  Unfazed by his towering anger, she reached for a knight.

  “That is my faither’s favorite set,” he warned. “Put it doun.”

  She looked at the knight, dropped it, and picked up a cup instead.

  “Sina,” he warned.

  She pulled back her arm and let the cup fly.

  Adam had had enough. “I dinna know what ye’re used to.” He swooped down on her before she had time to pick up anything else. He pressed his shoulder to her waist and hefted her up over his shoulder like a sack of grain. “But I know things are goin’ to be different.”

  She could rant and rage all she wanted, but not in his father’s solar.

  Hell, she was ranting and raving now! Her punches to his back felt like sharp little needles. She kicked her heeled shoes, exposing her knees in front of him.

  As was usual in the morning, there were many folks coming and going throughout the castle. For the most part, he kept his eyes on the stairs, though he did spot his mother and his aunt Isobel watching him, along with others with pitying smiles.

  He sighed. The support didn’t help. The madwoman over his shoulder was his problem.

  But at least she’d finally shed that meek façade. She was fiery and she would be happier if she didn’t always try to control herself.

  She cursed him in German and in English and pounded on his back.

  Everyone else around her might be miserable, but she’d be happier—and that, according to Camlochlin’s unspoken laws, was how it was supposed to be, wasn’t it?

  Thank God. The stairs. Goliath beat him up them. Adam wasn’t far behind and pushed open the door to their bedchamber. He brought her to the bed and dumped her in it. He returned to the door, kicked it shut, and then ducked when he saw the small clay basin by his bed coming at him.

  It crashed into pieces against the door.

  She looked around for something else to throw.