Highland Song

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  As for Leith, apparently, Leith had always loved Alison, though he had somehow kept that to himself.

  Confused by it all, he started shoveling again, and Cat held her foot out, giggling as she teased him with those adorable toes. Och, but he had a mind to bite them—not hard, but just enough to show her how dangerous it was to tease a grown man—particularly one who was weak as he was. And he was most definitely weak; it was all he could do to keep his mind on his work.

  “Ye’re going to fall,” he warned.

  “Not me,” she swore, and perched herself even more precariously upon the edge.

  Suddenly, she gasped and fell right into the pit atop him, knocking him backward, straddling him as he fell against the wall. He pushed the spade aside, not wanting it to hurt her. She settled squarely on his belly, her sweet damp bits hot against his skin and his heart vaulted into his throat.

  She gifted him with a throaty laugh and he swallowed convulsively as she wrapped her lean limbs about his waist.

  Her lovely lips curved wickedly. “You saved me,” she declared.

  Gavin barely shook his head—barely able to. “There wasna much danger,” he reassured her. “Ye fell but just a few feet.”

  Gavin’s heart beat faster. His blood simmered as he gauged her reaction to him.

  He was hardly unaffected, and his body felt alive.

  He knew she knew it too and her smile hitched a notch higher, the curve of it sensual and impish.

  Gavin swallowed. “Och, ye have strong legs,” he offered weakly, feeling the nob rise in his throat.

  And that’s not all that was rising.

  His hands grew moist while his mouth grew parched.

  Gavin felt a shock of pleasure as her hand splayed across the skin of his chest. His body hardened completely as her fingers skipped across his nipples.

  “Och, lass,” he protested, but whatever he was about to say died in his throat as she leaned to place her lips to his bare skin—a hot, wet kiss that made Gavin dizzy.

  She peered up at him, smiling mischievously and his heart hammered fiercely.

  “You dinna know what you are doing to me,” he warned.

  She nodded slowly, her eyes teasing. “Oh, but I do,” she said, and squeezed her legs about his waist again, pressing her private flesh against his belly.

  Gavin fought another wave of dizziness. All his blood floated into his head—well, not all of it, Christ save him!

  Her hands disappeared at her back and she worked loose his breacan from his belt, pulling it aside and yanking it from between them, leaving Gavin completely without protection against her eyes and her wiles.

  If she reached back, just a little bit behind her, she’d find a pole as hard as the handle of his spade.

  She suddenly scooted back, brushing his erection with the crack of her arse, lifting up her—his—green tunic, and nestling his heat against her soft, hot flesh.

  Gavin felt suddenly as though he had a fever. His skin was on fire.

  To join their bodies, all he would have to do right now is lift her up, and move her back… just a wee bit… and place her gently upon his cock. The pit was small enough that he could brace his legs against one side and his shoulders against the other and let her ride him of her own accord.

  Sweat beaded upon his brow.

  His heartbeat roared in his ears and his blood sang through his veins.

  For a moment, they both simply stared at one another.

  Cat held her breath, recognizing the desire in his eyes, compelled by it, excited by it. It was exactly what she had hoped for, but seeing it now left her weak. Her heart beat furiously against her ribs and she lapped at lips gone suddenly dry.

  There was something about Gavin Brodie that sang to her heart—something that she had never felt with any other man.

  He looked at her as though she were perfect.

  She liked that feeling… she liked everything he made her feel… every shiver of her skin… ever tingle of her flesh… every word that came out of his mouth.

  And right now, she wanted nothing more than to feel him deep inside her. This is what she had saved herself for… this very moment. Every kiss she had ever denied, every touch she had forestalled… it was because she had been seeking this incredible feeling.

  And to think she had discovered it in the most unexpected of places—in the arms of a stranger.

  He opened his mouth—to protest, she knew, but she didn’t want to hear it. She lifted her finger to his lips.

  Swallowing a little, Cat nipped her lip and scooted backward, bending so that her arse lifted as she moved to kiss him.

  It was awkward at first, their lips touching gently as she lifted herself over his manhood and touched her most private lips to his hot, erect flesh. At the same time, she parted her mouth and he sent his tongue on a timid foray into her mouth. A shock of pleasure sidled through her at the intimate caress, the coupling of their mouths.

  Cat accepted him, sucking in a shaky breath as she lapped his tongue and without thinking much about it, without allowing herself to hesitate, she slid herself over his shaft, bearing down upon him.

  He shuddered violently, groaning fiercely, and so did she, as their bodies fused as one.

  Gavin groaned deep in the back of his throat, feeling such an ecstasy as he had never felt in all his life—not even that first time as a virgin had he felt such a rush of blood into his head.

  She whimpered and that was all it took.

  The shovel forgotten, the pit neglected—not caring where they were, their bodies began to move together in the most delicious accord. She rode him gently, without hurry, her body tightening about his shaft, milking him sweetly.

  Sweating, covered in grime, but unmindful of it, they kissed each other’s bodies. He laved her breasts with his tongue, tasting the salt of her flesh, suckling her nipples, worshiping her body.

  His feet searched for firmer support, finding purchase on the flat end of his spade, kicking it into the soil beneath him as she moved against his body in wild abandon.

  Och, God, but she was lovely.

  Every touch she gave was magik.

  Moving together in a dance as old as time, they moved together until Gavin felt her body convulse around him and it sent wave after wave of undeniable pleasure shooting through him.

  It was only when they both stopped moving at last, and she lay spent upon his bare chest, their bodies moist from exertion, that he realized he was suddenly ankle deep in water.

  He blinked.

  “Christ!” he exclaimed—but not just because he had ventured to heaven and back in her arms.

  They’d struck water.

  The well was filling with water.

  CHAPTER 7

  Unlike that first time so long ago, there was not an ounce of regret. Gavin felt only euphoria.

  Laughing, he kissed Cat soundly upon the lips, shuddering again.

  Three strange words fought to emerge upon his tongue, but they startled him and he held back.

  Her smile was so full of joy and her eyes fairly sparkled. Her cheeks were flushed and lovely. “I said tae have a bit o’ faith, didn’t I?”

  Gavin laughed again, lifting her up as the well filled to his shins.

  “Gaddamn!” he exclaimed. “You’re a witch forsooth!” he announced, though he said it with the biggest smile he could muster.

  She’d found water.

  Magik!

  The lass was magik pure and simple.

  Because more than having somehow found his water without much effort, she’d tapped another well that he’d thought long since run dry.

  Faith, she’d said.

  Aye, he was going to have a wee bit o’ faith—faith that she had been sent to him just when he needed her. Faith that she was exactly what he needed.

  Laughing together, he helped her up out of the well, patting her firm round bottom after he pushed her up and out of the pit. And then she helped him up, filthy and muddy as he was.

/>   Colin finished repairing his section of wall, and then he and Leith began to shore up the rest.

  “When the bastard said he was leavin’, apparently he meant right now,” Leith complained.

  Gavin hadn’t been about for days now. He’d left two days ago with one of the carts and had yet to return—not to sleep, to eat or to say “go to hell and take your bluidy wall wi’ ye!”

  Colin didn’t have much to say about that. Gavin was the one Brodie who was a slave to duty and conscience. That he had taken a rare moment to do what he pleased was a good thing, as far as Colin was concerned and Colin applauded him for it—even if it left the rest of them with more work to do.

  Anyway, if he was truly moving away to No Mon’s Land, they would not see him every day as it was. It was about time they learned to do without him.

  Though he and Gavin rarely shared confidences, he thought he understood what was ailing his little brother. Were their roles reversed, he didn’t think he could stand to be around so much lip smacking and cooing either—especially when he had been alone most of his life.

  Nay, Colin begrudged Gavin nothing.

  “I wish he would at least return the cart,” Leith groused. And then he stood, scratching his head. “Ha’e ye seen the lumber for the roof?”

  Colin shook his head. He reached up to swipe a rivulet of sweat from his brow. “I’ve not seen it since two weeks past when we set it aside to work on the walls.”

  Leith tossed down his hammer. “Gaddamn thievin’ folk around here!” He cast Colin a questioning glance. “Do ye think Montgomerie would be up to his auld tricks?”

  Colin laughed. “Nay, Meggie would have his arse!” he assured Leith. But then he wondered. It wasn’t like Gavin to take anything that wasn’t specifically assigned to him, but could his brother be so damned desperate to be away from them that he would have borrowed their lumber to finish his roof?

  But nay… he would never. Gavin was the most honest fellow Colin had ever known—despite being his brother.

  Leith apparently had the same thought. “The pinions are gone, too,” he said. “Mayhap it’s time we paid a visit to our little brother?”

  Although Gavin had spent most of his life celibate, he’d made up for every lost moment during the past two days. He and Cat made love again in the meadow once they’d hauled themselves out of the well. And then again in the loch after making the trek across the field.

  They enjoyed the privacy of his home, pleasuring each other’s bodies by the firelight until the break of dawn.

  Truth to tell, until now, in Cat’s arms, he had never realized what it truly meant to have a home, for it didn’t matter where they were, when they were together, it was exactly the right place to be.

  The well was half full now, and a few good rains would fill it completely.

  The house was completed and he considered now whether to bring his bed from the manor or to build a new one. He felt perhaps it was time for all things new, and he wondered what sort of bed Cat would like.

  While he took his axe to the trees, she sat mixing some sort of tincture for the cut he’d sustained on his foot from the lip of the spade. It made him blush to remember that he’d pressed his heel so hard into the metal that it had cut into his flesh—and more, that he’d never even noticed until much later.

  Only one thing troubled him. He was getting used to the lass. And now, though he didn’t believe in any sort of magik, he was beginning to fear even the possibility.

  What if she wasn’t here to stay?

  What if he wasn’t enough to keep her?

  What if he awoke one morning to find her gone?

  He might be a man in truth, but he thought he would weep like a wee bitty bairn for the rest of his given days.

  CHAPTER 8

  South was not his favorite way to ride.

  Aidan sniffed the air about him. The scattered forests still held their verdant green, the ferns remained full, with new growth unfurled. Spear thistle and primrose were still in bloom and the scent of heather was strong in the air. There should be moorland nearby; his nose never lied.

  He surveyed his surroundings, thinking that Cailleach Bheur was not as kind to these folk, leaving them vulnerable to the sting of winter winds despite that they were far enough north that cold remained their bedfellow. The mother of winter had sheltered his own people for ages now, coddling them like tiny babes in her warm bosom, throwing up mounts to discourage more timid men from venturing into their crib.

  Though his people needed no king, Aidan was as close as any north man came to such a title. He led with his heart, and protected his kinsmen with every fiber of his soul. His father had done the same before him, and had died with the sword of one of these Sassenach loving Scoti in his belly. His mother too had died defending their home, leaving him to raise a brood of five—the youngest being his sister Cat. That bastard would-be king of Scotia had stolen her directly from her bower.

  If they took her far enough south she would be lost to them forever. And if she returned north with a Sassenach in her belly she need not return at all.

  For two centuries his people had remained inconspicuous and stayed out of men’s politics, and as much as it would pain him he would not allow a Sassenach into their midst—not even one whose blood ran through his veins. In truth, he shared the blood of many, including David of Scotia… but that did not make them the same.

  Riding with the wind, he’d brought twenty warriors to search for Catrìona, and hoped they would find her before it was too late. The thought of passing a winter without her bonny smile filled his heart with a bitter black melancholia. Nor did he relish the thought of losing a single man or woman, as few of their kindred that remained.

  “The Scoti king is near,” his scout said, returning from his reconnaissance. “They search these woodlands for her, though it appears she evades them still.”

  Aidan smiled thinly.

  Catrìona would know what to do. His sister was a warrior, after all. He had trained her well. He had raised the lass since her very first smile and she could wield that as adeptly as she could a blade.

  All of his people were warriors for in the Mounth it was a matter of life and death.

  “Continue searching here,” Aidan directed his men. He’d brought his most fearsome warriors—all of them willing to die for every woman and child in their care. That was the way they had survived all this time, leaving no man to himself.

  Painted in the woad of their ancestors—a reminder to them all of where they had come from—they rode white steeds—ghost horses, trained to step lightly and travel, not with haste, but with precision. To race through the Mounth was a death sentence. They took their cues from mother earth, listening to the secrets she had to whisper, and they missed nothing—not so much as a child’s weightless footstep on solid rock, nor a single broken twig.

  They were the last of the painted ones, and they carried the heartbeats of their ancestors in their blood, and the song of their people in their hearts.

  “Ride,” he commanded his men. “Turn every stone until she is found.”

  As cool as the weather remained high in these hills, the heather bloomed a brilliant violet against a vivid carpet of green. While Gavin lay upon his back in a bed of yellow buttercups, Cat knelt at his feet with a bowl of her healing potion in her hands, slathering the blue concoction upon the bottom of his foot.

  “I canna see as how your war paint will heal my foot—anyway, it doesna hurt,” he reassured her.

  “This—” She held up the bowl. “—is not war paint,” she reprimanded him. “And though ’tis blue, it is not the same as the paint you found me wearing. However,” she enlightened him. “That is not war paint either.”

  He winked at her. “Whatever it is, I’d like to see ye wear that often—and only that.”

  She laughed softly. “It is a tribute to my ancestors—to yours, too, Gavin Mac Brodie, for we share the same forefathers.”

  “Forsooth, I ha’
e never met a blue person in all my days,” he swore. “As far as I can tell, none of my kin ever painted themselves either. Alas, I do not share your pixie blood.”

  “Pixie!” she protested, pretending to be affronted. By his grin, she knew he was teasing.

  “Aye, judging by your height,” he said. “Pixie or faerie, one—I swear your minge is magic!”

  Cat slapped his leg, but laughed nevertheless. “Stay still, Gavin, or I will surely put a hex on you!” she threatened.

  “You already have!” he told her, and dipped his toe into her bowl, then slathered the tincture across her face with his foot.

  It took her completely by surprise. He had been such a grouse at first but now his mood had lightened considerably. No longer did he brood, and she concluded that he must have needed to appease his willy. It made sense to her. A man could simply not go his entire life without a little love—and he had, she was certain because he’d had that pinched look about him of a man whose bollocks were petrified from lack of use.

  A grin broke across her face. “Why you!” And she took her paint and crawled between his knees, lying atop his chest to swipe it across his face.

  “Och, but ye’re a pawky wench,” he swore, and leapt up to take the bowl from her hands.

  “Nay!” she shrieked, and then the two of them began to tussle over the bowl, dipping in their fingers and slathering it on each other wherever they could reach.

  Cat giggled profusely as they rolled along the meadow together, leaving blue stains upon the buttercups as they passed.

  Soon they would have to have a very long talk, and she would need to tell him everything, but not right now—right now, she was enjoying the moment, wanting it never to end. Feeling particularly wicked, she threw off her tunic and began to paint her breasts with the tincture, drawing in the style of her people.

  The look in his eyes turned sober then. His blond brows arched and his green eyes gleamed, and then he pinned her down and lay her upon the grass to make love to her yet again.