“Avoid it? I thought you sailed through regularly. Canna is a favorite of yours.” Aidan shot Senga a wolfish grin as he waggled his eyebrows. Both she and Ruairí ignored his innuendos. When Aidan received no reaction from the couple, he carried on. “Neil MacLeod, the sodding bastard.”
Senga pressed her lips together to keep from agreeing that her uncle was not only a bastard in deed but in truth. He’d been born before her grandfather married his mistress after her own grandmother’s death. Despite his anger earlier, Ruairí pulled Senga’s hand back onto his thigh and covered it with his much larger one. She spread her fingers out from under his palm, and the tension eased from between her shoulder blades when Ruairí entwined their fingers.
“What’s he done now?” Ruairí inquired. “Besides sailing into your water.” Ruairí taunted Aidan, knowing that a pirate from the western coast had no business claiming the waterway between eastern Ireland and southern Scotland was his. But pirates were wont to claim all the seas as their own, even those waters they’d never entered.
“His sniveling maggot of a son, Alfred, will be far easier to control. He doesn’t have the same iron in his blood that his father does. It would be unfortunate for Neil MacLeod if he should die soon, and it would be unfortunate for the MacLeods of Lewis if Alfred should take the lairdship soon. But I fear fate has plans for just that.” Aidan’s laughter was rich and deep, and in another time and place, it might have stirred Senga’s interest. But his patronizing manner and news about her family soured any warmth she might have found in it. “Lady Senga, if memory serves me, it was this very Neil MacLeod who orchestrated the murder of your father and mother, isn’t that so?”
Senga’s stomach clenched as her heart lurched. She didn’t want to talk about her past, and she certainly didn’t want to remember the second-worst day of her life. The only day that exceeded the pain of losing her parents was the day her son died. She nodded her head but kept her gaze lowered to the food on the table before her.
“O’Flaherty,” Ruairí warned, but the Irishman threw his hands up in feigned innocence.
“I wasn’t sure if the lass was aware of what’s been happening in her home since she ran away.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Ruairí forced himself to remain seated and not draw his dirk as the Irish pirate baited him and Senga. It frustrated him that Senga opted to become shy that night, seeing how it drove Aidan to chase her, thinking she was playing a seductive game. The rational part of his mind realized that she didn’t understand what her evasiveness and reticence was doing, but another part wanted to shake her and remind her of how that exact manner landed her in danger twice the very night they met. He wanted to bash Aidan’s skull in for flirting with his wife underneath his nose and now taunting her. He never expected Aidan to be familiar with Senga’s past, and it unnerved him when Aidan mentioned Senga running away from home. It meant Aidan knew more about Senga than sat well with Ruairí.
“Has the Dark Heart never heard the tale of the MacLeod lass who chose to be a common farmer’s wife than marry a laird old enough to have sired her father? How the lass ran from her uncle when he tried to give her a poke?”
Ruairí placed both of his hands flat on the table before canting his head toward Aidan. To some, it might look like Ruairí had no intention of drawing his weapons, but Aidan shifted, recognizing a maneuver he’d used plenty of times to catch an opponent off-guard.
“Do you presume there is anything from my wife’s past that I don’t know? She is my wife, after all. We’ve had plenty of time shut away in our cabin to get well acquainted.” Ruairí kept his hands on the table but leaned toward Aidan, the menace clear in his tone and his gaze. “If you want my support to fight MacLeod, come out and say it like a man rather than trying to humiliate my wife. Dead men don’t fight, O’Flaherty. Where will your countrymen be when you no longer lead?”
Ruairí pushed back his chair and rose before assisting Senga from hers. He wrapped her arm around his bicep and guided her toward the steps that led down from the dais. Once they reached the floor, Ruairí spoke over his shoulder to Aidan. “Ask before we reach the door, and I will consider it. But if we leave and you don’t, then not only will I never aid you again, I will kill you the next time we meet.”
Senga forced herself to walk, even though Ruairí’s longer stride nearly made her trot beside him to keep up. She kept her chin high, adopting the mien of a laird’s daughter accustomed to others moving out of her way merely because of who she was. She realized being a pirate’s wife wasn’t so different from being the laird’s offspring with the respect and fear it garnered. They were nearly to the door when Aidan’s voice called out.
“Meet me at dawn, and we will plan what comes next. The O’Driscolls will want in.” Aidan’s words might have sounded like a command if there hadn’t been a conciliatory tone in his voice. Ruairí nodded but didn’t slow their pace as they exited the Great Hall.
“Do not speak until we reach our chamber, Senga,” Ruairí hissed as they stepped outside. Senga kept her mouth clamped shut; her jaw ached from how tightly she clenched it. She understood Ruairí’s anger directed toward Aidan, but she didn’t understand why he directed any of it toward her. She had asked if they could leave ages ago, but it had been Ruairí who decided they would stay. Aidan had revealed nothing she hadn’t shared with Ruairí on the night they met. It wasn’t as though he discovered a secret she’d kept from him.
The rocking of the dinghy as Snake Eye rowed them back to the Lady Charity knocked Senga into Ruairí more than once, but he never wrapped his arm around her like he normally would. She shivered, but it wasn’t from the cold air; it was from Ruairí’s frigid demeanor. She followed his order, but the moment she heard the bar drop to secure their cabin door, she spun on him.
“What is the matter with you? What’s happened?” Senga demanded. Ruairí barely glanced in her direction as he tore his leine over his head and threw it across the cabin. His long legs made pacing in the confined space difficult. He looked like a caged lion with his blond mane shining in the candlelight. His anger simmered, and Senga grew uneasy the longer he ignored her. She wasn’t sure he even intended that; his mind seemed somewhere else. “What it is, Ruairí? You’re scaring me.”
Senga’s softly spoken words permeated Ruairí’s fog. He swung around to glare at his wife, but he had a moment of contrition when he saw genuine alarm in her gaze. Guilt niggled at him; he had sworn he would never do anything to incite fear of him in his wife, but anger once more got the better of him. He stalked across the chamber, backing Senga against a wall. He tunneled his hand into her hair, keeping her in place but not touching her in any other way. She had space to duck away, and he would let her if she tried, but she trembled before him even as her eyes met his.
“What’s wrong? I watched my wife flirt with another man right before me tonight. Do you find him attractive, Senga? Do you want him?”
Senga narrowed her eyes, her own temper flaring. “Would you have me lie just so you can punish me? If I say I don’t consider him attractive, then you’d recognize it for the lie it is. Of course, I do. He is. But so is Rowan since you’re practically twins, but never once have I desired him. So is Kyle, but I never once looked at him as anything more than a friend. I do not desire Aidan. I can barely tolerate him. I’m the one who asked to leave, but you decided to stay. What did that accomplish? Nothing but my own humiliation. Don’t you dare blame me for this.”
“So you don’t believe your little performance when we arrived on the beach wasn’t what started all of this?”
“What performance? I stood by your side. I assumed I made it obvious that I was only interested in you.”
“By pressing against me and smiling like a dockside whore?” Ruairí slammed his mouth shut, knowing he’d gone too far.
The color drained from Senga’s face so rapidly that Ruairí feared she might collapse, but then it returned in a fiery blaze. “How dare you speak to me that way
? I swear to you, here and now, Ruairí. If you ever, ever speak to me like this again, I will jump overboard and swim back to shore like Caragh did. I’ll take my chances on my own rather than remain with a man I love but who could speak to me like that.”
“You are not going anywhere, Senga. You’re my wife. Mine.” Ruairí growled before pressing his mouth to hers. The kiss was punishing and brutal, but Senga opened to him. She was livid about his vile words, but she wanted Ruairí to claim her as much as she wanted to show him that she would never want a man other than him. He nipped at her bottom lip, taking it between his teeth and tugging enough to make her moan. He lifted her off her feet, and her legs wrapped around his waist as he pressed her back against the wall. “I’m going to fuck you, little one.”
Senga ground her sheath against his rod, frustrated that several layers of clothing separated them. “Not until you take back those hateful words.”
“You think to give me orders?”
Senga froze. She looked at Ruairí and suddenly understood where his anger that night began. Aidan had taunted Ruairí that he took orders from Senga. He’d belittled Ruairí’s manhood from the start. She’d chalked it up to typical male posturing, but she suddenly understood that as the captain of a ship, a pirate ship, Ruairí couldn’t risk anyone questioning whether he was in charge. She didn’t doubt the men aboard the Lady Charity understood Ruairí was the absolute authority on their ship, but others might consider the Lady Charity was vulnerable to attack.
“No, Capt’n.”
Ruairí’s nostrils flared as he narrowed his eyes at Senga, unsure if she was taunting him now too. She lowered her gaze and rested her hands on his chest. Her sudden submissiveness made him doubt what was happening just as much as it made him want to thrust into her.
“Do you still demand an apology?”
“I want one, Ruairí. Your words hurt. They cut me deeply, and I don’t think I’ve ever deserved them. But I do think I understand your anger. I don’t think Aidan understood what I intended. I don’t think you did either.” Ruairí growled when she used the Irish pirate’s given name. “I saw how O’Flaherty looked at me, and my intention was to show him and his men that I only want you, that I’m yours and no one else’s.”
“You made yourself look like a tavern wench. It infuriates me that anyone should see you as such.”
“And that includes me acting in a way you don’t approve of.” Senga reasoned.
“You could have just stood still and silent. But no. You had to taunt Aidan with what he couldn’t have. What I have and he doesn’t. Don’t you get that’s exactly what makes a pirate attack? Then when you could have spoken up at the meal, you turned shy and evasive. He took it as you laying down an invitation to chase you.”
“He might have, but you must know I wasn’t.” Senga fisted Ruairí’s leine as though holding tightly would make him understand her sincerity.
“Maybe. Or maybe you liked the attention. Maybe you always liked the attention at the Three Merry Lads. You just didn’t like it when you couldn’t control it.”
Senga released her legs from around Ruairí’s waist and dropped to the floor. She tried to push him away, but he wouldn’t budge. “That was uncalled for, just like your earlier name calling. I’m not arguing with a man who acts like a child. Move.”
“A child, Senga? What child can stick his cock in your quim and make you scream his name?”
“You may have the body of a man, there is no doubting that, but you’re acting like a spoiled wean.”
“I’m acting like a man who watched another man drool over his wife all night.”
“That isn’t my fault!” Senga shouted.
“But it is, Senga.”
“I have no more control over that bastard than I do you. We’re all adults, or we are all supposed to be. We all choose how we react and behave. I can’t change him any more than I can you, despite how much I might want to change you right now. Let go of me.” Senga pushed away from Ruairí, and this time he moved. “I may have misjudged how to make Ai—O’Flaherty see I’m committed to you, but that doesn’t mean I deserve what you’re spewing.”
“Your misjudgment, as you call, risked your bonnie little neck. Or rather, your bonnie little body. What happens when he tries to take you? And mark my words, he will. What if I’m not at your side when that happens?”
Senga froze and looked up at Ruairí. His words from a moment earlier echoed in her ears, and she suddenly understood Ruairí’s anger. You had to taunt Aidan with what he couldn’t have. What I have and he doesn’t. Don’t you know that’s exactly what makes a pirate attack? It wasn’t anger at all. It was fear. The anger and hurt drained from Senga, and her body weighed too much for her to hold up. She sank to the bed and hung her head. She patted the spot beside her, praying Ruairí would take her invitation. Instead, he stepped before her and lifted her chin. She couldn’t meet his gaze as she licked her suddenly dry lips.
“I didn’t understand before, but I do now. You’re the only pirate I really know, and you’re different with me than with anyone else. I didn’t think Aidan—well, I just didn’t think like a pirate. I haven’t learned how to. Your words tonight hurt me. Deeply, Ruairí. But I entered a situation with no experience and assumed I had control of it. I should have stood still and kept quiet like you said. I risked more than just myself, didn’t I?”
“Yes, Senga. But you’re more important than weapons and gold or fighting your blasted family or making deals with that pirating bastard. You played a dangerous game and understood none of the rules.” Ruairí tilted her head back more until it forced her to look at him. “He angered me, but you scared me.”
“I wish you’d just said that rather than everything else.”
“I do, too. I’m sorry, Senga. You deserve that apology and much more. I never should have said such hateful things, but…” Ruairí shook his head as he ran his thumb over Senga’s jaw. “I already felt weak compared to Aidan after I saw the look of appreciation you gave him when you first saw him. Rather than admit to my fear and how it made me feel even weaker, I lashed out.”
Senga drew open the laces to Ruairí’s leggings, but he covered her hands and shook his head. She batted them away until she was able to push the leggings down over Ruairí’s lean hips. She moved her feet wider, so he could step into the space between her legs. She didn’t hesitate to sink her mouth onto his rod, drawing him deep within her mouth. She moved along his length, humming with appreciation as he lengthened and thickened within her. Ruairí worried he might go cross-eyed from the sensation and view of her bobbing head as she worked his throbbing cock. When Senga tasted the first hint of his seed, she pulled away, grinning when Ruairí groaned in what sounded like agony.
“I believe you owe me a good fucking. At least, that’s what you promised earlier. Are you up to it?” She stroked his cock twice before he yanked her to her feet. Ruairí spun her around, and she felt a brief tug before her leggings suddenly slackened around her hips. She glanced back to see Ruairí toss a knife onto the table. He tore the tunic from her, her the leggings following suit.
“Issuing orders yet again?” Ruairí’s grin taunted Senga. She shivered as need coursed through her, leaving her core empty and achy. “Perhaps you have a lesson that needs learning.”
“Yes, Ruairí. Will you teach me?” Senga clasped her hands behind her back, pushing her breasts forward despite the submissive posture.
“With pleasure—for both you and me. Lay on the bed, Senga.”
Senga was quick to comply, scrambling onto their bunk and lying in the center of the bed. Ruairí kneeled between her legs, his arms bracketing her ribs before lowering his mouth to her breast. He flicked her nipple between biting down with an unexpected force. Senga cried out as her body bucked. Ruairí tugged and shook his head, elongating the punished nipple as Senga clawed at the sheets. She pushed her feet into the mattress, raising her hips in search of his cock.
Ruairí’s hand cupped her
mons, the heel of his hand rubbing against the nub that now throbbed. He plunged three fingers into her sheath forcefully enough that a wave of concern washed over him. He worried that he had been too rough, but Senga’s moan and rocking hips reassured him that his wife wanted him to carry on. He slid lower on the bed before hooking her knees over his shoulders. His mouth feasted upon her, his teeth grazing the button of sensitive nerves before sucking hard. When he felt Senga’s core begin to spasm, he pulled away, leaving her empty. She whimpered as her gaze flew to his. She gulped for air as a cool breeze circled around the heated flesh of her sheath. As she settled, Ruairí launched his attack again, repeating his assault and retreat until Senga was nearly insensate. She tried to reach for him, but each time, his hands pinned her wrists to the bed. She gave up and fisted the sheets as her body lurched toward the precipice, but Ruairí pushed her away from the edge each time rather than over it.
Ruairí watched Senga as she writhed in both pleasure and agony as his onslaught continued. He resolved himself not to give in to his own desire to bury his aching cock in her. They both tacitly accepted their dominant and submissive roles as Senga accepted Ruairí’s form of punishment, which brought its own type of gratification to them both. When Ruairí sensed Senga’s body was approaching the limits to her endurance, he flipped her over, spreading her legs as wide as she could. He shifted to kneel beside her before his hand rained down a punishing spanking that landed against her swollen and overly sensitive netherlips.
“You’re mine, Senga.”
Senga turned her head to gaze up at Ruairí. “I always have been. I always will be.”
“And if another man wants to have you just as I do?”
“He can go fuck himself.”
“You have a vulgar mouth that seems better suited to have my cock in it.” Ruairí shifted his aim and spanked her round backside. “Naughty lasses don’t get what they want.”
The Dark Heart of the Sea: A Steamy Fated Lovers Pirate Romance (Pirate of the Isles Book 2) Page 15