The lilting cadence of her voice flowed over and into him, soothing him, even as its sweetness fired his blood.
He looked deep into her eyes. “And if I do?”
She held his gaze, her eyes pure molten gold. “Then I would ask you to oblige me.”
“Oblige you how?” He wanted her to say the words.
Her cheeks bloomed scarlet, but she pushed to her feet. Though she held her back straight and her chin high, the glowing blush staining her creamy complexion revealed the cost of her boldness.
“Tell me what you want of me, Isolde of Dunmuir.”
She lowered her gaze, but the haunted look he’d glimpsed in her beautiful eyes just before she had, sank into him like the sun’s caress on a warm summer day, wrapping itself soundly around his heart.
Squeezed hard and unrelenting, yet with a gentle grace that shamed him for pushing her.
Cursing himself for the way his fool heart reacted to her, thumping hard and steady in his breast, he stared at her bowed head, a cascade of emotions tumbling through him.
Unwelcome emotions, every last one of them.
Saints, but she was beautiful.
Light from the cresset lamp bathed her with a luminous glow, glossing her coiled braids to a fine, richly burnished bronze. Her bodice once more gaped free, baring the elegant column of her throat, the soft shadows formed by the hollows beneath her collarbone, and other enticements as well: the lush swell of her breasts rising sweetly above the edge of her camise.
Breasts yet to know the pleasure of man’s touch.
A camise wrought of transparent, filmy fabric such as he’d ne’er seen.
Donall shoved a hand through his hair. He could scarce breathe. And, by God’s bleeding wounds, when had the chamber grown so warm? A film of moisture dampened his forehead and the back of his neck burned hotter than if a fork-tongued firedrake crouched behind him spewing him with flames!
He swallowed hard and rubbed his nape.
To no avail.
The dryness in his throat and the heat searing him inside and out remained. She looked up at him then, her eyes wide, shining, and so filled with trepidation he felt like ten kinds of a rotting varlet for what he was about to do.
As if the devil himself had absconded with his last shred of chivalry, he cast down the half-eaten frog leg and stood.
“Tell me, Isolde,” he said, his tone a command. “What is your will?”
“I want you to take me,” she said softly.
Donall drew in a sharp breath, not as prepared for the expected answer as he’d thought. “Take you?” he mimicked, knowing he sounded like a simpleton, but unable to stay his tongue.
She nodded. “I wish to forge an irrefutable union with you in the hopes of ensuring lasting peace.”
His jaw hung embarrassingly slack as he stared at her, but she stood firm, her lifted chin declaring her strength of purpose.
She wanted peace.
He wanted out of her clutches.
And he wanted her.
Donall swore and snatched up her tankard. A few dregs of ale remained, so he tilted back his head and let them slide down his throat. “Lady, you are full mad,” he said, slamming down the empty drinking vessel.
“I wish you hadn’t eaten those,” she said, staring at the platter of frog legs, the cryptic words proving her addled state of mind.
Totally flummoxed, and sorely agitated at the way his heart still pounded, Donall glared down at the foul-tasting mound of roasted frog meat.
Would that he found the wench as unpalatable.
Would that he could have her and his freedom.
Unbidden, the image of her redheaded cousin rose in his mind. The frog legs loomed into sharp focus, too, while the giant’s words, spoken to the strange lad called Lugh, rang loud in his ears.
He wants naught but a few frogs from the sacred well.
He’ll hie hisself out of here once he gets what he’s after.
For the first time since he’d been taken, true hope surged within him.
As did rampant desire.
Donall let his gaze roam over Isolde from head to toe. His hands ached to do the same. Something fine, warm, and bright began to pulse deep inside him. Aye, giving her what she wanted might hasten his escape.
The beginnings of a smile touched his lips. Mayhap he could have her and his freedom. What better way to win her confidence than by bedding her?
Bedding her well.
His body tightened at the thought. And once he’d conquered her affection, she’d slacken her guard and he’d make good his escape. Something akin to guilt pinched his conscience, but he brushed aside the damning notions before they could form, concentrating instead on the supple curves of her body and the gleam of firelight on her hair.
As if she sensed his capitulation, or by the grace of God, his victory, she raised her head and met his gaze full-on. “You have decided,” she said, the words a statement, her tone dull and flat.
Resigned.
For the space of a heartbeat, Donall considered relenting. But too much depended on his swift return to Baldoon. He had to assure the well-being of those dependent on him by any means he could, fair or foul.
His mind made up, he cleared his throat. Feeling master of his destiny once more, he reached across the table and cupped her shoulder.
“Isolde of Dunmuir, you have convinced me,” he declared, and the tiny smile that had been playing across his lips turned wicked. “I have decided to oblige you.”
Chapter Eight
THE WARMTH FROM Isolde’s shoulder seeped into Donall’s hand and spread through him with all the melting languor of the most rare and precious Tuscan wine. Exquisite, proud, and yet utterly vulnerable, she roused him to the very core of his being, her allure slipping past his barriers to curl and pool in the most unexpected of places.
His conscience.
Donall’s brow furrowed.
He attempted to withdraw his hand, but couldn’t. His fingers remained pressed firmly against her shoulder as if they’d magically acquired the ability to ignore his will.
A black oath crept up his throat but he thwarted its escape by coughing. Her shoulder began to tremble. Or mayhap it was his hand that shook? He coughed again simply for good measure.
“Are you ill?” came her soft voice, cutting through his improvised hacking with the surety of steel slicing butter.
“Ill?” Donall cocked his head, momentarily confused. She nodded. “You were coughing.”
“I swallowed wrong,” he said, fuming inside at the ease with which the lie had passed his lips.
Isolde MacInnes was a bad influence.
Her constant fibbing had him spouting untruths.
And the courage and grace she displayed when she wasn’t spinning fabrications inspired yearnings that could only lead to turmoil and disorder.
“I have taken my ease with many women.” The unexpected revelation leaped from his tongue before he could squelch it with another cough. “If you persist in following this . . . path, I must make known to you that although having you would indeed be a pleasure, it would not be a rare one, would not enable you to bend me to your will.”
Her eyes widened but she held his gaze. “You are a renowned warrior,” she said, a slight tremor underlying the calmly spoken words. “A man well traveled and . . . a-and pleasing to the eye. I would not expect you to have abstained from such inclinations.”
Pleasing to the eye?
His newly discovered soft spot warmed at the compliment, while his heart turned over, then began to thump with a slow, deep rhythm.
“An untold number of women, my lady,” he said, cursing himself for letting her praise affect him. “All sweet interludes I recall with fondness, but do not ask their names for I have forgotten all but a scant few.”
She stiffened and his hand came free from her shoulder at last. “Only holy men live a life of abstinence and fasting,” she demurred, her voice smooth despite the tension he knew rippled t
hrough her.
He steeled himself against the slight crease his illuminations had put between her brows. “There are some whose faces have also slipped my memory.”
She glanced away. “It is the way of men to partake of such t-things so oft and whene’er the urge befalls them. I doubt there are many who can remember every place they’ve lain.”
Donall rubbed the back of his neck. Frustration rode him hotter and heavier than a band of long-tailed and horned demons fresh from the gates of hell.
“Yet you profess to believe our carnal union will bless this isle with everlasting peace?” He paused, his lips curving into a skeptical smile. “Why should you not slip from my mind as easily as those before you?”
Her posture rigid with pride, she said, “I shall suffer the risk.”
Donall smothered a dark oath. Saints, did she not realize he was giving her one last chance to abandon the foolish course she seemed determined to follow? Could she not guess he sought to shock her maidenly sensibilities into withdrawal before she crossed the threshold she might soon regret?
Before he turned his back on what ragged shreds of chivalry he yet possessed and, meritorious no more, slaked his thirst for her only to abscond with his freedom?
He cleared his throat and braced himself for one final attempt before he cast caution, hers and his, to the four winds. “Do you understand what I am telling you, Isolde of Dunmuir?”
She turned luminous eyes on him. “Aye, Donall of Baldoon, I do. You are wondering why I would esteem myself capable of holding your interest long enough to ensure the peace I desire for this isle.”
“No lass has e’er held my attention longer than the time it took to enjoy a few mutually pleasing tumbles.” He deliberately withheld the revelation that would seal his fate and end her virginal state faster than she could produce another of her funny little flasks of multidubbed potions.
The simple truth that, for her, he’d gladly abstain from any and all other amorous pursuits . . . and if he lived to a riper dotage than the lot of her graybeards combined!
Risking a resurgence of self-determining appendages, Donall stepped around the table and placed his hands lightly on her shoulders. “You still wish to pursue this . . . endeavor?” he asked, his heart already thumping roughly o’er the answer he knew she’d give.
“Aye, I do,” she said on the wings of a little sigh, then lowered her gaze.
Something wild and fine, hot and untamed, surged through him. He stared at her bowed head, his mouth too dry to speak. Her lashes, thick and lustrous, fluttered against her pale, creamy skin, their tips looking as if they’d been dipped in liquid gold.
His hands on her shoulders tensed . . . wanting more. Donall swallowed hard, losing himself and his resolve.
Gold-tipped lashes.
Eyes kissed with amber.
What other enticements would he discover when he embarked on the sensual journey she’d invited him on? Closing his eyes, he drew a deep, ragged breath. A sore error in judgment, for with the cool night air came her fresh, feminine scent.
The light wildflower fragrance swirled around him, wrapping him in her spell as surely as if she’d wound a length of sturdy netting ’round him and ’round him, then bound the whole with rope.
He opened his eyes to find her watching him, her face calm, her whole demeanor . . . acquiescent. Ready. Something inside him smoldered and melted.
But even the fierce longing he couldn’t deny did naught to dispel the queersome premonition seizing him in a relentless, cloying grasp.
A damning sense of being conquered rather than conquering.
Pushing the disturbing sensation aside, he took his hands from her shoulders and placed them on his hips. He narrowed his eyes at her and tried hard to see behind her mask of serene determination. “You are certain?” he asked one more time. “You truly understand what shall transpire if I avail your wishes?”
“Aye,” she reconfirmed without the slightest hesitation.
“Then so be it,” Donall said, his voice thick . . . husky.
Holding her gaze, he smoothed the backs of his knuckles down the petal-soft curve of her cheek. She blinked and a visible shiver rippled through her, but her wee quiver was tame compared to the raw need coursing unchecked through him. Too long were the months since he’d last seen to his manly needs.
And ne’er had he done so with a lass as fine as Isolde of Dunmuir.
Glancing away from her, he focused on the pattern of silvered light and dark shadows stretching across the floor where wide bands of moonbeams slanted through the unshuttered windows.
Saints, but he was a man split in twain.
“Lady, you are a most desirable maid, untouched, yet you would give yourself to me,” he said more to himself than to her.
She must’ve heard him, for she gave a soft sigh. “The loss of my maidenhead is a small sacrifice for the good I hope to reap by surrendering my innocence to you.”
Still staring at the dancing shafts of moonlight, Donall momentarily saw her as he had in his lascivious dream: not surrendering or innocent at all, but twirling in an erotic dance, garbed in naught but a length of silk, ethereal and shimmering as the moonbeams spilling into her bedchamber.
His body tightened in reaction. His spirit reeled in confusion. And he didn’t know whether he should feel exultant or ignoble. One part of him, though, was most assuredly not plagued by such qualms.
Keeping his back to the source of his quandary, he pinched the bridge of his nose until the sharp need pulsing in his groin ebbed and ceased.
The moment it did, he turned to face her. “What do you know of coupling?” he asked far too gruffly. “What knowledge do you have of men? Are you aware of what will happen if . . . when I mount you?” She drew a shaky breath at his bluntness and took her lower lip between her teeth, clearly allowing the pink stain tinting her cheeks to answer him.
Isolde of Dunmuir knew little if aught of men.
The vulnerable area near his heart surged with undeniable triumph.
And . . . awe.
Ne’er had he bedded a virtuous woman.
“I may be of gentle blood, sir, but I am not ignorant,” she said at last, and like her blush, the tremor in her mellifluous voice revealed more than her words.
Donall struggled to keep his mouth from curving into a silly grin. Allowing himself to savor the taking of such a prize would only vex him later. Maiden pure or accomplished siren, his dallying with her could serve no purpose other than his escape.
“Ignorant?” He concentrated on the cold iron weighing down his right ankle and schooled his features into an impermeable mask. “Ne’er would I call you thus,” he vowed. “Sheltered mayhap, but of a certainty not unenlightened.”
“I am enlightened.” Her tone held a note of challenge. “The men of Dunmuir are not monks. I have observed more than one disappear into the shadows with a serving lass, and I have seen what they’ve done there.” Donall arched a brow. “So you know how a man takes a woman?” She nodded.
Taking an earthen jug from the table, he poured ale into a tankard. He glanced at her. “And catching glimpses of clansmen having their way with willing kitchen wenches is the summation of your knowledge?”
Her color deepened and something odd flickered in her eyes. She moistened her lips. “I have observed animals.”
“Animals?” A harsh laugh formed in Donall’s throat but he choked it back and relieved his astonishment by shoving a rough hand through his hair. “Old men diddling serving wenches in dark corners,” he muttered. “Rutting dogs. Think you I would handle you thus . . . even under these most unusual circumstances?”
Her expression hardened. “How you treat me is of little import, only that you do. It is the result that matters, not the means.” Donall swore under his breath and took a long, slow sip of ale. He watched her over the tankard’s rim. An unusual play of emotions flickered across her beautiful face, and plague take him, but he couldn’t decipher a one of them.
<
br /> Yet he knew she was lying.
Or hiding something.
He could taste the fibs and deceit hanging in the air between them. A needling sense of foreboding skittered up and down his spine, and his warrior’s instincts tensed with the certainty she wanted more than mere peace.
When the heat of his stare sent her hand to pluck at the wispy strands of hair escaping her coiled braids, he knew his intuition hadn’t failed him.
“I am not one of your feeble-brained graybeards, easily cozened, my lady,” he said. “Something deeper than your sought-after alliance troubles you.”
And being cast in the same kettle with doddering fools and ruttish dogs troubles me! his deepest masculine pride railed at her.
Her hands clasped demurely before her, she met his ire with a look more innocent than ten self-sacrificing virgins singing psalms. “Cozening you is the last thing on my mind, Donall the Bold. Nor did I lie about being enlightened.”
The corners of Donall’s lips twitched in response.
“I am,” she insisted, squaring her shoulders against his ill-veiled doubt. “Enlightened, I mean.”
“Sweeting, you are as enlightened about the ways of fleshly pleasures as the cold, thick wood of yon door,” he said, warming to the urge to show her exactly how erroneous her views were.
A flare of anger crossed her face. “You are not only tainted with the stain of murder, Laird MacLean,” she said, her eyes alight with agitation, “but you are a poor judge of women. I truly am well apprised of all aspects of carnal passion and learned in the art of seduction.”
“Your sister’s death soils neither my hands nor my brother’s,” he said, flinching, unreasonably annoyed by her persistence in laying the blame on him. Her other statements bordered on the absurd and roused his mirth.
Learned in the art of seduction!
He let his gaze traverse the length of her. “Well apprised of fleshly delights, are you?”
She had the daring to nod. “I have trained in the ways of pleasuring men,” she said, bold as day.
Driven by most unknightly urges, Donall narrowed his eyes and took a slow step forward. A predator about to pounce on a lamb. “Has no one e’er warned you to be careful of what you allow to pass your lips?”
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