She sighed and finished her tea and the piece of shortbread she’d picked up. The house was silent, which meant Malcolm must still be asleep. She was glad he had a chance to rest. It hurt to imagine what life had been like for him, as he’d searched as far as America for her and his son. No wonder he looked like he’d been tested to the limits. She was also glad that this Christmas had gifted her with the chance to discover the truth about those tragic events back in Dun Carron.
And perhaps, just perhaps, she might be glad that Malcolm was here on his own account, although she suspected her productive, quiet life on her farm might never be the same.
It took Rhona a bit more than an hour to organize the dinner. She’d done a lot of the preparations over the last few days. For most of the year, she had help in the house, but she’d sent the cook and the maids home for Christmas. Burnside Farm was prosperous, and Rhona had got used to having servants when she was in London.
How things had changed since she’d struggled to tend to her father back in their ramshackle cottage in the Highlands. Christmas in London had been a matter of giving orders to the housekeeper, overseeing decorations for the house, then playing hostess to the often riotous celebrations. These days, the holiday was much quieter, with just her son to share her festive table.
Except today for the first time, her family would be complete. Which made her wonder if Malcolm was awake. Even if he wasn’t, she should check the fire in his room. The storm might have blown out, but it was freezing outside.
She made more tea and carried a cup down the corridor, noticing the drop in temperature the moment she left her cozy kitchen. Carefully, she opened the bedroom door and padded into the darkened room. The fire had burned down but provided light enough for her to see that Malcolm remained unmoving under the mountain of bedclothes. He didn’t stir as she set down the tea and crossed to add some wood and stoke up the fire.
The tenderness that threatened to turn her good, practical brain to porridge surged. Last night, he’d been so weary. Too weary for a man still only in his mid-thirties.
She should leave him to sleep, but she couldn’t resist creeping closer to the bed. The roaring fire meant she could see him in perfect detail. He looked so much like Patrick that her silly heart flipped over and powerful emotion closed her throat. She reached out to smooth the untidy dark hair back from his forehead. When his thick eyelashes flickered up to reveal fathomless black eyes, she lifted her hand.
Unalloyed pleasure glowed in those eyes as they settled on her. A smile so sweet curved his lips, that her doubts melted away to gooey syrup. For this brief instant, he was once again the handsome, ardent boy who had held her heart.
“Good morning, Rhona,” he said softly.
The rich velvet baritone of his voice played a sensual melody up and down her spine. He reached out his hand and without thinking, she took it. The sure grip reminded her that she trusted him again and he’d never wronged her.
It also sent a shock of heat rippling along her arm and made her heart start to skip about like a spring lamb in the sun. “Good morning, Malcolm,” she murmured and couldn’t help smiling back.
Before she could question the wisdom of what she did, she fell to her knees and leaned forward to place her lips on his.
The kiss was fleeting, but the shock of it cracked through her like a gunshot. Lips tingling, pulse drumming in her ears and making her deaf to anything else, she pulled away.
For a long moment, she stared into heavy dark eyes, reading surprised pleasure there. His grasp on her hand tightened. He shifted up in the bed, and his other hand snaked out to catch the back of her head.
“Come here,” Malcolm whispered. With a gentle ruthlessness she couldn’t resist, he drew her up until his lips met hers.
Chapter 9
Malcolm knew he wasn’t dreaming. This was too good to be a dream. Most of his dreams since he’d lost Rhona had verged closer to nightmares. Horrid, haunting, terrifying fantasies of her lost or in pain or dying.
He shifted in the bed until he could slide his arms around her where she kneeled on the floor. She curved into his embrace and with dizzying swiftness, the kiss turned carnal. Her mouth opened and when his tongue slipped inside, she sucked on it with immediate eagerness. She tasted of cinnamon and butter and passion.
When she pulled away after far too short an interval, he bit back an agonized groan. He was already hard for her, and she must know how he burned. He’d burned for more than twenty years, most of that in frustration and misery.
He braced to hear her tell him that she wanted to stop, that kissing him was a mistake.
What came out of her mouth wasn’t an outright rejection, at least. “Wait,” she said in a choked voice.
Wait? He felt like he’d spent his whole bloody life waiting. As he let her go, he stifled another groan.
Rhona rose and for one brief, vile moment, Malcolm expected her to walk out and leave him. Life hadn’t encouraged optimism. He pushed back until he sat up against the pillows, the quilts pulled to his waist. If Rhona caught a glimpse of how rampant he was, he feared that she’d run away screaming.
She unwrapped the shawl from her shoulders, then fumbled with the flannel nightdress. The billowing white garment was designed more for warmth than seduction, although he was powerfully seduced.
As he watched her, every drop of moisture dried from his mouth. Could this be? He didn’t dare speak, for fear that he might make her change her mind.
With dazed eyes, he saw her tug the nightdress over her head and discard it on the wooden floor. When she stood naked before him, his breath stopped and his voice jammed in his closing throat.
Her skin was still as white as milk, and the fiery hair on her head matched the fiery triangle of curls below her flat belly. Her breasts were fuller than he remembered, and crowned with beaded rose-pink nipples he’d never forgotten.
As his eyes feasted on her, his blood pounded like a wild ocean. She was beautiful, rounder and softer than the girl she’d been. But how he loved the womanly shape of her. He wanted to stare at her until he filled his memory with every inch of her lovely form.
Her cheeks turned pink, as she stood trembling under his hungry gaze. It turned out that she still blushed.
“Move over,” she said in a strangled voice.
As he cooperated, still trapped in stunned silence, she dived into the bed. He caught her in shaking hands and twisted her until she lay flat.
Startled green eyes flashed up to stare at him as he rose above her. Unable to resist, he lowered his head to kiss her again, teasing her soft, lush lips. She reached up to bury her hands in his hair and hold him still for a kiss of such incendiary passion, he feared he was about to dissolve into smoking ash. He’d imagined if he got Rhona into bed, it would be an encounter awkward with all their time apart. Full of hesitations and uncertainty. But she met his ardor with heart-stopping generosity.
She pulled away, panting and flushed, and her hand slid down his body to fit itself to his throbbing hardness. As sizzling arousal shuddered through him, he groaned. He shifted to the side to give her better access and rose on one elbow so he could watch her expression.
He loved that she wasn’t shy. This was a woman who met him without demur or doubt. Her mature passion was a heady wine indeed. When his cock swelled under her touch, a gloating smile lifted her lips. He couldn’t resist kissing her again, brief and hard, as she fiddled with the fastenings on his breeches.
When her hand closed around his naked length, he groaned again and angled his hips forward into her grip. He cupped her breast and she gasped and tightened her hold, making stars explode behind his eyes. Dipping his head, he drew her nipple into his mouth. He teased it with his tongue until her breath emerged in sharp little huffs.
Malcolm was shaking, starving for her. After so long, he wanted to savor every second, draw out the pleasure, but the heat between them already rose to scorching levels. This would be no leisurely loving. He’d yearned for
this union. Now he could brook no delay.
He moved over her and settled between her thighs. When she stared up at him, he caught a shadow in her beautiful eyes that made him pause.
“This doesn’t mean anything, Malcolm.” The edge in her voice contrasted with the soft ease of her body under his.
Since that first astounding kiss when he’d awoken to find her watching him with such tenderness, speech had deserted him. Now he found himself responding with a short laugh, full of affectionate amusement. “Of course it does, you muddleheaded lassie. It means everything.”
Before she could protest, he thrust forward and claimed her body. She cried out and dug her fingernails into his shoulders, and her eyes turned opaque with swift pleasure.
Malcolm lowered to press her deep into the soft mattress, and he buried his face in the curve of her shoulder. Her body offered him a hot welcome. She was sleek and tight and ready for him, despite the hurried preliminaries.
Since the day she’d left Dun Carron, the world had carved away his soul piece by piece. Rhona gave him back that soul. He felt like weeping. He felt like dancing. He felt like going on his knees to an Almighty he’d cursed too often over the years. Now, he wanted to beg forgiveness and offer up a profound gratitude.
He’d had no home for so long, but here, buried deep inside Rhona’s body, he was home at last. Through his quaking pleasure, he felt her urgent grip on his shoulders relax into caresses.
She began to stroke him, long, exploratory touches across his taut shoulders and along his back and arms. Everywhere she touched, she lifted away another small chip of bitterness and left warmth and acceptance behind.
After a long time, he kissed her with all the love overflowing from his heart. Claiming Rhona all those years ago had been an act of joy and sunshine and hope. But the years of absence and sorrow and seeking lent tonight’s encounter a significance that reached to the edges of eternity.
“Thank you,” he said, his voice thick with emotion so powerful that it verged on pain.
When he raised his head, she looked stricken, even as she tightened around him with a breathtaking eagerness that made his heart crash against his ribs.
When he first joined his body with hers, he’d basked in the sublime stillness. But the urge to move was becoming irresistible. Still he clung as long as he could to this radiant connection.
She smoothed his hair away from his forehead, her hand trembling. “I’d…forgotten.”
His lips lifted in a smile. “How it is between us?”
“I thought I must have imagined the way you make me feel like part of you, like you’re part of me.”
His smile intensified. “You’ve always been part of me.” Before she could argue or try to talk herself into dismissing this transcendent connection between them as a matter of mere physical release, he spoke. “Now let me show you pleasure.”
“Yes, please,” she murmured and bucked up her hips with an enthusiasm that made his heart waltz with joy.
The change in position smashed through him like a blow. He closed his eyes and began to move, circling his hips until her moans told him he’d found her center of pleasure. He struggled to extend the delight, but he’d been too long without her and he wanted her too much. When he knew the inevitable moment approached, he lowered his hand to find the place between her legs that would send her over into ecstasy.
With a husky cry, she shook and clenched as rapture gripped her. His movements became wilder, before he released a guttural sigh and spilled into her womb in a gush of surrender.
Gasping, he slumped over her. He’d given her every drop of the man he was and the man he’d been. When he was a boy, she’d carved her name on his soul. The years since had only etched that possession more deeply into him. What they’d just done confirmed the truth that had dominated his life. He belonged to Rhona Macleod. Away from her, his life wasn’t worth the air he breathed.
He wanted to stay crushed against her like this forever, but he must be squashing her. When he shifted, she caught his arms in frantic hands. “Not yet.”
Her voice was laced with tears. Had what they’d just done touched her emotions as indelibly as it had touched his?
“That was glorious,” he murmured.
“It was.”
“I must be suffocating you.”
“I don’t mind.”
Appalled, he thought of something beyond the joy he’d just experienced. “Dear God, I forgot about Patrick. What will he think?”
At least that chased away her tears. Malcolm felt Rhona’s low laugh through his entire body. They were still joined. “He’s singing at St Margaret’s all morning. He won’t be back for a couple of hours yet.”
Malcolm rolled off her and shifted higher against the pillows. “Come here.”
He appreciated how willingly she wriggled up to curl into his side. Sliding an arm around her, he kissed her with all the weary joy that glowed in his heart.
She was warm and loose-limbed in his embrace. Lazy pleasure swirled in his blood as he recalled the unparalleled bliss of pumping into her. He’d been so young the last time they’d lain together. The experience had been marvelous enough to set the pattern for the rest of his life. But in the blind fever of first love, he’d imagined he could look forward to Rhona in his bed for years. His older self knew better than to take anything for granted.
“So you’re mine for a little while longer yet.”
She smiled without a trace of the wariness that had marked her dealings with him since he’d arrived yesterday afternoon. “At some stage, I need to check the animals and turn the goose in the oven.”
“But not now.”
“No, not now.” She laid her head on his chest and placed her hand flat on the heart that spoke her name with every beat.
How appropriate that Malcolm found his beloved at Christmas, the time of miracles. The sweetness of this quiet moment smoothed a balm over the wounds he’d suffered so long ago. He had his love in his arms, and for once, the world seemed to be on his side.
There was still so much he and Rhona had to work out, so much he needed to persuade her to accept. But he refused to think beyond this heavenly ease. Rhona was here. She’d given herself to him with a fervent passion that had humbled him, and she showed no inclination to leave.
This might be a temporary paradise, but after all his years in hell, he meant to linger in Eden as long as he could.
Malcolm didn’t know how long he drifted in perfect contentment. He might have even dropped off into a fleeting doze. But at some stage, he became aware of Rhona’s hand stroking his bare chest.
With a soft growl of approval, he opened his eyes. “What are you doing to me?”
“Becoming reacquainted with the beauty sites I visited as a girl,” she said.
He smiled, enchanted anew. It seemed the whimsical humor that had been such a charming characteristic of her younger self hadn’t vanished altogether.
“Beauty sites? I’m a raddled old wreck these days.”
She raised her face until she met his eyes, while that devilish disturbing stroking continued. Now she was touching his belly, with predictable results. He was surprised at the speed of his recovery. In that fiery consummation, he’d given her everything he had. He wouldn’t have thought he retained such stamina.
Apparently love had its own magic. Love, and long abstinence.
“You were a beautiful boy, Malcolm. I used to look at you and go quite weak at the knees, even before I knew what you could do with your lips and hands and body.” She leaned far enough away to conduct a thorough inspection of his chest. It turned out that her eyes could work their own magic.
It was a good thing Patrick was away. Malcolm started to weave some interesting ideas of how he and Rhona might occupy the next little while.
The smile that curved her voluptuous mouth, red after his kisses, expressed unashamed hunger. “You’re still beautiful, despite a few extra lines and the odd bit of silver in your hair.�
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His lips quirked in wry disagreement. “The odd bit of silver? I’m almost as gray as Old Father Time.”
“You must know you’re still an attractive man, Malcolm.”
He liked that she found him pleasing to look at. “As long as you find me attractive, that’s all that matters.”
He was disappointed when a slight frown dimmed her smile. How he loved to see her smile. Every time she smiled at him, she set another star in the sky. His sky had been lifeless and dark too long.
“I can’t be the only woman in all this time who has fallen under the spell of the brooding Laird of Dun Carron, who carries his secret sorrow like a badge of honor.”
He shrugged. “I have no idea. If you’re asking if I’ve taken other lovers to my bed, the answer is no. I told you – I know what real love is. I wasn’t going to accept a tawdry facsimile. And I pledged you my faith. I’m a man of my word.”
Horror darkened her gaze. To his regret, she sat up and stopped caressing him. “Oh, Malcolm, you can’t have slept alone all these years.”
His mouth tightened. “I can, and I have.”
Moisture filled her eyes, and she cupped his jaw with a tenderness that sliced a jagged rift across his aching heart. “I’m so sorry I mistrusted you. I already knew you were remarkable when I loved you at Dun Carron. I had no idea how remarkable, though. Not a man in a million would keep true to a woman he thought was so long dead.”
Her awestruck admiration made him uncomfortable, and he shifted against the rumpled sheets. “It’s not so remarkable. You spoiled me for other women, Rhona. After what we were to each other, how could I replace you with an inadequate substitute?” He paused. “It wouldn’t be fair on the substitute anyway.”
Rhona stretched up and kissed him softly on the lips. During this last hour, they’d kissed often. Greedy, inflammatory kisses that fed their hunger for each other. This kiss spoke of sweetness and gratitude, perhaps even love. It cut deeper into his soul than the others.
Have Yourself a Merry Little Scandal: a Christmas collection of Historical Romance (Have Yourself a Merry Little... Book 1) Page 22