Lord Keeper

by Tarah Scott

“You like this?”

  “Aye.”

  “Why?”

  “Perhaps because a man married but four days should take exception to the fact that his wife has not even bothered to kiss him.”

  “’Tis a kiss you want, then?”

  His groin pulsed. “For a start.”

  “I see,” she said in a voice that revealed she knew exactly what he meant. “A kiss is not enough. You want more?”

  “Aye, lass, I want more.”

  “What is it you want?”

  The question surprised him, and Iain wondered if he had been mistaken in thinking she comprehended his meaning. “I want you,” he said in all honesty.

  “What happens when you cease wanting me?”

  He halted as though hitting a stone wall and lowered her to the ground. She gazed up at him and, for the first time in his life, he felt the desire to put as much distance between himself and a beautiful woman as possible.

  “You are my wife,” he answered. “I will always want you. If I had not, I would not have married you.” He started toward the village. A sense of unease settled deeper in the pit of his stomach when she hurried alongside him.

  “’Tis not always so.”

  The reply startled him, and all he could manage was “Huh?”

  “Husbands often do not want their wives. Oh, at first,” she gestured with her hand, “they often appear content. But after a while they spend less time in their wives’ company, less time in their beds and, before long, the women are forced to content themselves elsewhere.”

  Iain spun in her direction. “Elsewhere?” He reached for her, but this time she sidestepped him, hurrying several paces ahead.

  “You never told me why you wanted me in the first place,” she said. “It is clear you decided from the beginning to marry me—or so you said.”

  A rush of indignation propelled him forward. “Are you saying I lied?”

  Victoria shrugged.

  “I made good on my promise,” he answered with genuine heat.

  “Aye.”

  Her tone was far too noncommittal.

  She stopped and faced him. “There are any number of women who would have welcomed you as their husband. Why me?” Her gaze bore into him, and he couldn’t escape the feeling he was being stalked in much the same manner that he had stalked her.

  “Why not?” he asked for lack of anything better to say.

  “Why not, indeed?” she murmured.

  Iain was close enough to see the shrewd glint that appeared in her eyes and wasn’t pleased with it. He drew abreast of her and lengthened his stride so that she was forced to run in order to keep up with him.

  “I think my question—”

  Iain whirled and yanked her against him. “I believe, sweet, we were discussing my wanting you.”

  “But—”

  He cut her off with a kiss. She still tried to speak, but he slid his tongue into her open mouth. She started to pull back, but he slid a hand down to cup her derriere and pressed her against his erection. Her body melted against his, and he knew all silly questions were forgotten.

  He drew back and leaned his forehead against hers. “I think the real question is, how soon can we find a place to be alone?”

  Victoria raised her head. “Nay, my lord, the question is, why will you not answer me?”

  A woman’s shriek sounded around the bend ahead of them. Victoria’s eyes widened. Iain released her, and they raced around the corner in time to hear a round of shouts go up. A crowd of people stood around a watering hole, and Iain elbowed his way through them. He stopped short at sight of two women rolling in the mud, locked in womanly combat. Iain watched in fascination, intrigued by the grunts and growls made by the combatants before turning to one of the bystanders.

  “What started it?”

  The man leaned close, never taking his eyes from the spectacle. “Sally caught Rita there,” he pointed to the woman currently on top of her opponent, “with Phillip.”

  “Hyram’s son?”

  “Aye.” The man nodded.

  Iain snorted. “I wonder if Sally knows Rita is not the only lass young Phillip has been known to dally with.”

  The old man grunted. “Aye, she knows. Sally is no fool. But I expect Phillip has no chance of escaping her anyway.”

  Iain sent a questioning look at the man.

  The man shrugged. “Only the good Lord knows what makes a woman decide she wants a man, but heaven help the fool if he tries to flee once she has.”

  The shouting grew louder and the crowd began making bets on the winner. Iain turned to leave the domestic fight to its own end when a firm hand on his back sent him sprawling into the mud hole. Cool, thick mud enveloped him. A collective gasp went up, then the sound was drowned out by a heavy weight rolling over him. Iain reared up out of the mud, sending the two women on top of him flying backward.

  He shook the mud from his hands, then wiped his eyes and began scanning the crowd with an intensity that nearly gave him a headache. The throng had grown quiet, the eyes staring back at him frozen with palpable fear. There wasn’t a soul he could place that would have dared take such action against him. Then it struck him that the one person who should have been outraged wasn’t in sight. He climbed out of the mud, parting the crowd, and spotted Victoria in the back of the throng.

  “My lord.” She circled him, a look of horror on her face. “What in Hades has happened? Did you slip?” She tilted her head, looking up at him with wide-eyed innocence.

  “Nay,” he answered.

  Victoria glanced at the women who, though they had ceased fighting, hadn’t ventured from the mud. “Was something amiss?”

  “Nothing of consequence,” Iain replied.

  Her mouth dipped. “Then why jump into that mess? Have you nothing better to do?”

  “Nay,” he answered once more.

  Her frown took on an accusing quality. “What sort of game are you about, my lord?”

  “’Twould seem a very dangerous one, my lass.”

  * * *

  Iain looked down at Victoria. She sat on the grass, eyes closed, face turned up toward the setting sun. He dropped his gaze to the slow rise and fall of her breast as she breathed deep of the fresh autumn air. He privately congratulated himself on insisting they stop in the meadow on the way back to Fauldun Castle. She had put up a small argument, but the feeble excuse that the hour grew late didn’t disguise the fact she feared being alone with him.

  “Do you regret having married me?” he asked.

  Her eyes flew open, and Iain couldn’t help a mental laugh at the obvious quandary in her eyes. On the one hand, she would just as soon consign him to the devil, but on the other hand—and he thanked God for that other hand—the bruised heart longed to answer the stirrings of her body. He lowered himself to the ground and pulled her onto his lap.

  “Perhaps, sweet, I should remind you of at least one of my more redeeming qualities. I thought perhaps to do that earlier, but my little…mishap”—Iain was sure he felt a quiver in her body—“forestalled that moment.”

  Pushing back the hair that tumbled down her shoulders, he nuzzled her neck with velvet like caresses. Despite the subtle stiffening in her body, the embers that had burned since waking that morning flared to life in him. Iain ignored the vision of her rising to her knees and bringing her supple body down onto his erection. He shifted her off his lap, pulled her into the crook of his arm as he stretched out on the cool grass, and laid her hand over his heart.

  She began tracing tiny circles on the clean white shirt he had changed into after a quick bath at the village. Warmth wound through him and he closed his eyes. Memory drifted back to Montrose Abbey, to the fire in her hair, the gentle sway of her hips…and the startled look in her eyes when he bore down upon her.

  He had taken her by force, then compounded the folly by making her choose between him and the other man she had fled. He had trapped her—and she knew it. His chest tightened. Could she forgive him�
��love him, or would she remember only the brute who had torn her from refuge?

  “What happens when you cease wanting me?” she’d asked, but what if she had never wanted him?

  Sun blurred his vision as he propelled back in time to a soft voice that warned against unseen shackles, forced marriages, and the withholding of the thing dearest to any man or woman: freedom.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  A chill washed over Iain and he shuddered. At the sound of voices, he snapped open his eyes. A shadow fell across his body. He blinked, the setting sun blaring in red streaks behind the figure standing over him. His arm curled around thin air where Victoria should have lain beside him. Alarm shot through him and he started to rise, but halted at the sword point that appeared a hair’s breadth from his heart.

  “Iain!”

  He jerked his head in Victoria’s direction. She struggled in the hold of a Robertson warrior. His heart pounded against his chest as if to break free. Iain pushed upward. The sword bit through the thin fabric of his shirt, gashing the flesh above his breastbone. He jerked back and dropped his attention to the wound, confused by the lack of pain despite the red spreading in a small circle on the snowy-white shirt.

  Iain startled from the strange trance at sight of riders emerging from the trees. How had they approached without so much as the snap of a twig?

  He sneered upon recognizing the lead man. “David Robertson.” The sword dug into his flesh. He shifted his gaze onto the sword’s owner, the lack of pain almost comical. “Take care, laddie.”

  The Robertson chieftain halted his horse beside Iain. “You had best be the one to take care. You may find yourself impaled on Callium’s sword and that would leave the lass to him.”

  David motioned to another man who stepped forward and withdrew the sword from Iain’s scabbard. Callium removed his weapon from Iain’s chest, allowing him to rise. Iain gave Victoria an assessing look. She had ceased her struggles, but appeared undaunted.

  Iain was shoved toward a horse and forced to mount. While his hands were bound to the pommel, Victoria was lifted onto on another horse. Eight men, he counted as they started forward; five surrounding him and three in the rear behind Victoria. He could overpower three, perhaps four before they were upon him, but no more.

  He glanced at the sun as Robertson motioned the party forward. Bare minutes had passed since he’d closed his eyes. How had he fallen into such a deep sleep and been caught unawares in only a few minutes?

  Instead of veering east to Robertson territory as Iain expected, David kept south on MacPherson land.

  Darkness closed in, but Iain recognized when they entered Menzies territory. He cast a glance at David Robertson’s silhouetted form in the lead. Why Menzies land? The MacPhersons had encountered no trouble with them since—his chest tightened—since the rumors that sent him to Montrose Abbey…the day he took Victoria.

  The temperature dropped, bringing a wind that chilled him to the bone.

  * * *

  They entered a village unknown to Iain. Impossible. He knew every village within ten day’s ride of Fauldun Castle. Clouds skittered low in the sky, and he studied the cottages illuminated by flashes of moonlight. All seemed small, shabby, cheerless. A shiver ran over him. Never had he seen a village so devoid of animation.

  A sudden halt, and Iain realized the cottage before them was their destination. Callium dismounted and approached him. Their eyes met and held as the warrior cut his bonds, then stepped back to let him slide from the saddle.

  “The woman,” David ordered.

  Callium cast a knowing glance at Iain before turning to do his laird’s bidding. His step faltered, however, with Iain’s whispered, “Careful, lad.”

  The warrior’s surprise turned to scornful amusement. Iain froze when the sneer twisted into a perverse grin like that of a wicked one risen to demand sacrifice for the Druid’s Samhain day. Iain blinked and Callium’s expression turned to one of suspicion.

  Another warrior pushed him in the direction of the cottage. Iain twisted to look at Victoria, and the man yanked his arm behind his back. Iain spun, but another man seized the other arm and propelled him through the door. He stumbled forward and onto his knees, then shoved up in time to catch Victoria as she was thrown into the room after him. Wood scraped across wood as the bar fell across the door from the outside.

  Victoria clung to him. “What are we to do?”

  An unfamiliar feeling of helplessness reached so deep, his bones ached, but he said, “It is plain they have plans for me. We are safe, at least for the moment.”

  He scanned the room. Moonlight seeped through boards that covered a window at the far side of the room. He distinguished a pallet in the corner and guided Victoria to the bed. When he gently pushed her onto the edge of the mattress, she tried to rise.

  He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze and eased her back down. “Rest easy, love, there may be a way out.”

  He crossed to the window. Placing a palm in the middle of the board at the top, Iain pushed. The board creaked against his weight. He braced his feet, taking a deep breath to lean his body into a heavy shove when muffled voices outside their door halted him. In four long strides he reached the pallet.

  The voices drifted off in the distance before Iain could discern the speakers. He lowered himself down beside Victoria and stretched out on the pallet. She curled up to his side. Iain slipped an arm beneath her neck and pulled her close, his concentration on the quiet outside. Had their captors bedded down for the night? Victoria pressed closer and gave his waist a gentle squeeze. Running his hand along her shoulder, his body jolted with the awareness of her feminine curves as he slid his palm down her side and along her waist. Christ. Now was not the time to bed his wife.

  “But it is.” She brushed his jaw with her lips.

  “How did you—?” Iain began, but was cut off as she pulled his mouth to hers.

  What he intended as a chaste kiss turned hot when a soft sigh parted her lips and he tasted the recesses of her mouth. She tugged on his breacan and Iain consigned caution to the devil. He yanked at the ribbon that tied the bodice of her dress as he trailed wet kisses along her cheek to the spot below her ear where her pulse quickened. The laces loosened and, cupping a breast, Iain flicked her hardened nipple with his tongue until her soft cry brought him up for another feverish kiss. Her hands skimmed his chest. Iain jerked up her skirt and found the moistness between her legs. She arched and gave a low moan.

  Iain nuzzled her ear. “Take care, sweet.” He slipped a knee between her thighs. “We must not alert our jailers.”

  Quickening his caresses, he was soon rewarded with the brush of her breath on his neck as she clung to him in her release. With a yank of his kilt, Iain rose over her. He placed his palms on the bed, lifted himself up, and drove into her. Her grip on his shoulders turned fierce. Bracing himself on one elbow, Iain caressed her body until her muffled gasp told him she neared a second release. He quickened his thrusts until, at last, he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and brought the full measure of his weight down on her, thrusting deep and hard.

  “Bring me the magic that belongs only to you,” he coaxed into her ear.

  Her arms wound around his neck while she wrapped her legs around his waist. Another thrust, and she arched into him, her second climax closing around him. His strength ebbed and he shuddered before exploding in pleasure. He thrust again, held steady as the pleasure pumped his seed into her, then thrust one last time before collapsing on top of her.

  Iain rolled from Victoria and she curled up next to him. Fingers tightened on his shirt and he stroked her face until her even breathing indicated she had found escape in the freedom of sleep. He tied the laces of her dress in quick, deft moves, pressed a soft kiss to her shoulder, then rose and hurried to the door. Iain listened, but detected no sound. Was it possible they had been left unguarded? He crossed to the window, braced himself, and pushed on the topmost board. It bent, then snapped, the sound coming in un
ison with the approach of heavy footsteps.

  “Christ.” He barely reached the wall next to the door before the door swung open.

  Moonlight silhouetted the warrior who stepped into the doorway, sword drawn. Iain leapt forward, delivering a blow to his opponent’s jaw. The man fell back and Iain kicked as a heavy object struck his neck. A flash of light lit the back of his brain. He crashed to his knees and, with a hard shake of his head, fought the darkness that blanketed his mind.

  “A thick head that father of yours left you.” Iain recognized David Robertson’s voice. “But not so hard as the brunt of my sword.”

  Another sharp pain to the head felled Iain, but not before he reached toward Victoria.

  * * *

  Iain didn’t know what time or day it was when he woke, or if it was still the same night he’d been knocked unconscious. The ringing in his ears made it impossible to distinguish sounds in the darkness. The only thing he felt safe in assuming was that if the noise in his head indicated he was dead, heaven wasn’t his final resting place.

  The sound of approaching footsteps broke past the dull roar in his head. He rose on shaky legs, grasping at air for anything to steady himself as he swayed in response to the nausea that swept over him. The door burst open to reveal a large man outlined against moonlight. Iain lunged forward. He slammed against the unsuspecting figure, smashing them both against the wall a few feet from the door. Iain clamped his hands together and brought his fists down onto the man’s shoulder. Satisfaction shot through him when his opponent grunted and fell in a heap to the dirt floor.

  “Cease!”

  Iain froze. Hockley.

  He swung around. The earl stood inside the shadow of the doorway. Iain started forward, but halted mid-stride when a man moved in beside the earl, sword before him. The man circled wide around Iain to his back.

  “I should have known you would be involved in this trickery,” Iain ground out.

  “Save your breath, MacPherson. It was not I who brought you here.”