“Ava, Ava, Ava,” he rasped in her ear. His hand rubbed down her body, past her hip to slip between them to her throbbing nub. As he landed on it, she moaned, her voice high-pitched. He circled it, rubbing across it as he continued his deep thrusts.
With one last clenching surge against him, Ava felt herself fall over the top of the mountain. She yelled his name and was answered with her own as he growled and strained, releasing a flood within her tumbling body. Thrust after thrust kept the exquisite sensations rolling like the waves of a storm through her until, finally, they began to ebb into a languid pool of sweet heaviness.
Chapter Ten
Tor pulled Ava’s back against his chest as the cool river water swirled around them. He thrust slowly, enjoying the exquisite feel of her tight passage along his length. Her breasts sat upon the arm he anchored around her chest, his other hand below the surface, toying with the sensitive spot between her spread legs. He held her up in the current, thankful for the unseasonably warm day.
“Hamish lied,” Ava said as she arched her back, angling her body to meet his thrusts.
“Hmm?” he murmured against her flower-infused hair.
“The cold water doesn’t make you crine.” Her laughter bubbled with the water over rocks farther upstream.
He cupped a heavy breast, gently pinching the nipple. He tasted her neck, kissing it to her ear. “If ye are thinking about Hamish, I’m doing something wrong.”
He thrust faster, making her catch her breath. A soft moan rose from her lips. He grinned with contentment as she let her head roll back into his shoulder. They’d been wed for two weeks and had spent most of that time learning how to please each other. Ava was an adventurous learner and not afraid to tell him exactly what she liked. As long as he stayed away from pinning her arms overhead, she was a wild and wanton lover.
The thought of her reaction on their wedding night dimmed Tor’s smile. What horror had his actions resurrected? He’d seen from the blood on the sheets that she had been a virgin, not that he’d have faulted her if she’d not been. He’d have made damn sure to find out the bastard’s name, though if someone had stolen her maidenhead.
“Are you sure no one will find us?” Ava asked, and Tor realized he’d slowed his rhythm. “This is a well-known bathing spot.”
“I gave strict orders for no one to bother us. Cullen is guarding upriver.”
He felt her relax against him. Slowly he withdrew and turned her in his arms. With hardly a lift under her thighs, Ava floated her legs up, hooking them around his back to guide him back into her willing, hot body. Tor loved watching her face as he entered her, a look of pleasurable relief mixed with anticipation. This position allowed him to hug her close and kiss her hungry mouth.
One hand held her moving against him while his other cupped her face. As his strokes built momentum and their mouths melded, Ava moaned low in her throat. “Make me cum, Tor,” she whispered against his lips. He lifted her hips up higher with his hands, touching her in every intimate crevice until she panted his name. When he felt her squeeze him from inside, his own orgasm crashed over him. He roared out over the loud churning of the river.
He sank deeper into the water’s embrace, holding Ava wrapped around him. He kissed her gently and marveled in the beauty of her satisfied smile. Slowly she opened her eyes to meet his. “You are good at this,” she said, making him chuckle.
“Is that why ye like me to love ye so much?”
She blushed and swatted at his shoulder, but he wouldn’t let her move away from him. “You like it just as much.”
“Aye.” He grinned. “I do.”
She dropped her legs down his, and he held her close in the deep water. “You said you wanted an heir,” she pointed out. “Just doing my duty.”
His smile faded, and he raised a hand out of the water to push her wet hair back from her cheek. “About that,” he started. He opened his mouth and closed it, looking away for a moment. “That wasn’t a fair thing for me to say before. A wife isn’t just a broodmare.”
Her face softened into a smile. She showed her teeth. “Neigh,” she said and grinned widely. “I’m glad you see it that way.”
Luckily, she didn’t ask anything about his dead heart, because he had no answers for her. Right now, all he knew was that they fit together perfectly. She didn’t ask about his past farce of a marriage, and he didn’t ask her more about her terror when he held her wrists over her head on their wedding night. Just the thought of the panic pinching her face made him open his mouth.
“Autumn is already here,” she said. “Next comes Christmastide. How does Aros celebrate?”
He noticed chill bumps on her arms and waded them toward the shore. He left her to grab the bathing sheet from the peg his father had nailed into the oak on the bank. “We cut a yule log to burn through the twelve days.” Tor reached down for her hand, lifting her up.
She shivered, and he wrapped the drying sheet around them both, his body quickly warming the space. “We have a feast that lasts several days.” He smiled, remembering his father’s boisterous knighting of the last Abbot of Unreason. “Much merrymaking.”
Ava looked up, her eyes seeming bigger with her hair flat against her head. “I think I will like that here.”
“Didn’t ye celebrate in York?”
She nodded, but he watched a shadow fall over her features. Even though she still smiled, the light had changed in her eyes, the corners of her mouth forced into a position he was beginning to understand was her mask. “Yes, there were delicious dishes and wassail to share with the servants. Family members made their way home for the twelve days.”
Tor helped her tug her smock back into place over her damp body, the sheer fabric sticking in all the right places. “I know nothing about your family,” he said. “Besides Grace being a distant cousin. Were ye close to your mother? Any nearby kinsmen?”
Tor cinched his kilt and watched Ava pull on her petticoats and bodice. Her figure was perfect for a man’s hands, his hands and every other part of him. Slim waist with a full bosom, wider hips, just right for tupping and, hopefully, birthing.
“A half brother,” she said and presented her back for him to lace. “My mother died several years ago, and my father was seriously ill when Grace and I departed Somerset.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, watching her wrestle with her stockings. Women’s dress was entirely too complicated. “Ye could have delayed your journey.”
Her slender shoulders rose and fell. “We were not close. His last wish was to see his daughter wed to you.”
She stood, and he gathered her back in for another kiss. Her frame was stiff, and he touched her face. “And so ye did, just like he wished, just like my father wished, too.”
She offered him a smile that would fool most into believing her happy. But he’d studied her now for two weeks. His brows lowered. “Do ye not wish to be wed? Were ye forced?”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Yes, I wish to be wed. To you.” She looked slightly off of his gaze, focusing on his ear. “Often circumstances, at first pushed upon us, can become advantageous, a path we would choose again if given the benefit of seeing the future.”
His smile spread. “So ye like our arrangement, then?” He glanced at the river where their playful bath had turned hot and carnal within seconds.
“Do you?” she asked. Her wry smile looked authentic. Was she really asking if he liked loving her in all the adventurous places they’d happened upon? Trying all the erotic things he’d heard men brag about while traveling between clans as a lad? Could she really wonder?
“Aye,” he said low, his voice taking on a predatory grumble.
Her laughing gaze cut toward the forest on the other side of the river. An arched wooden bridge spanned the water, leading to secluded glens beyond. “Have you heard of a children’s game called All Hid?”
Children’s game? He shook his head, watching her gather her petticoats in one hand. The corners of her lips rose in a mi
schievous slant. “Give me until the count of twenty and come find me.” With that, Ava tore off over the bridge, glancing back with the visage of a sprite.
“One, two, three.” Tor counted loudly, his heart thumping and his member growing full once again.
“Slower,” she called back with a playful glance.
“Four…five—”
“Ho,” Cullen called, striding toward him. “Lost your wife, have ye?”
Six, seven, eight. Tor continued to count in his head. “For the moment,” he answered as his friend stopped before him. “But I’ll find her.”
Cullen rubbed his short beard and laughed. “Ye look like a randy rooster, and here I thought ye were taking care of Ava in the river.”
Twelve, thirteen, fourteen. “The lass appreciates lots of attention from me.”
Cullen laughed, slapping Tor on the back. “Lucky bastard.”
“Fifteen, sixteen—”
“What’s that?” Cullen asked.
“Was there something ye needed to tell me? Or were ye coming back here hoping to spy?”
“Just wanted to make certain ye hadn’t drowned.”
Nineteen, twenty. “I’m perfectly healthy,” Tor called as he jogged away, his boots thumping across the wooden bridge. Cullen’s laughter faded behind him as Tor caught the slight movement of white lace up ahead through the golden leaves. The chase was on.
…
“God’s teeth, Ava. I’ve never known you to sleep so late.” Grace’s voice penetrated Ava’s pleasant dream about another erotic antic with Tor. She pulled the blanket over her head. “Oh no, come now,” Grace said, prying the soft wool and sheet from Ava’s curled fingers. “I’m worried you’re ill.”
Ava let her lift the blankets off her face and raised her hands over her head to touch the headboard of the large bed. She stretched the slight aches from her back, wiggling her toes into the rumpled sheets. “I am well,” Ava said, a smile curling up the corners of her mouth.
Grace focused on Ava’s bare arms and blushed. “Are you sleeping naked?”
Ava spread her nude body under the sheets across the bed, the coolness of the sheets helping her wake. “I didn’t start out so.”
Grace’s gasp turned to a giggle. “Heavens, Ava! Did you have any idea that you were so wanton?”
Ava slid her feet over the side of the bed. She sat there, her legs extended to flex her calves and wrapped the sheet around herself. She smiled contentedly. “I had no idea. But I think it has more to do with whom I married.” She restrained the silly inclination to sigh or purr or whatever a woman, well-loved by a man, did.
Grace perched beside her on the edge of the bed. “Is it wonderful, then?” she asked, a note of wistfulness in her voice.
Ava nodded and stood. She dropped the sheet and walked quickly to the dressing screen before Grace could remark on the little nibbles Tor had fashioned across her upper back last night as he loved her from behind. Just the thought made Ava blush. A full washstand allowed her to quickly wash all her well-loved parts. When she emerged in a clean smock, Grace had shaken out Ava’s day dress.
Grace helped her step into the layers of petticoats, all the while studying her. “There’s something else on your mind,” Ava said, easily reading Grace’s worried expression.
Grace’s face pinched. “I…I am so glad you are happy, Ava, and safe, tied to Tor Maclean. I just…What if we need to leave soon?”
Ava searched her best friend’s face. Sweet Grace. Raised to be selfish, as a lady of distinction, and she was waiting on her like a maid and worried about Ava’s happiness. “Have you heard anything from Somerset?”
Grace shook her head. “But every time a visitor shows up in the village or I see a boat in the channel I convince myself for a moment that it must be Vincent coming to take me back to York.” With each word, the volume of her voice lowered until she barely spoke the words out loud.
Ava pulled Grace into a hug, speaking into her hair that fell across one shoulder. “You are my best friend in all the world, Grace Ellington. Sisters, if not by our blood then by our hearts. I will not abandon you.” She pulled back and donned the confident, pleasant mask even as her stomach turned inside. “I will get you to safety somehow. I promise. You will not return to Somerset. Maybe you could wed someone here on Mull, someone you choose.” Hope lit Ava’s middle like a struggling flame. Could it be that easy?
Grace shook her head, her hands clasped. “You could marry without family consent, since your family has all perished. Vincent could try to have my marriage annulled if permission wasn’t granted, or worse, kill the man. His father said I was to marry the Maclean of Aros, no one else. Vincent would fight it. It’s best if I could just escape. Somewhere where I can’t be found.”
Ava made her lips relax into an unworried look. “So, we must find a home in Scotland, maybe on another island. I will ask Joan about the frequency with which Tor travels to the other Scottish islands. Maybe we could go to Cullen’s Isle of Islay. From the map I found amongst Tor’s books, Islay is even farther out than Mull, harder to reach. I’m also looking into the isles of South or North Uist. I spoke with Gavin about them.” She patted Grace’s hand. “No matter what, we will find a remote, safe place.”
Tears welled up in Grace’s blue eyes. She blinked them back. “But you are happy here with Tor. Maybe even…falling in love with him?”
Her question caught at Ava’s throat, causing a knot to form so it was hard to swallow. But she managed to push past it and kept her smile. “Love can’t happen without trust, and trust can’t happen without truth. Those are the rules. So no, I am not falling in love with him. It’s impossible.”
Grace looked down her nose at Ava, her eyes and brows raised in a skeptical look. “I don’t think love follows rules, Ava.”
Ava turned away to pick up her wrap. “Well, I do.” She walked to the door of the bedroom, glancing back over her shoulder at Grace. “And I keep my promises.”
…
Tor stood at the wooden counter in the kitchens across from Alyce MacDonald, who had served as cook at Aros for decades. “Tarts with apples and spices.”
Her round face pinched as her lips turned upward, and she tugged on her long silver-streaked braid. When Alyce smiled, her whole face smiled, eyes dancing, full cheekbones raising, making the wrinkles at her eyes as deep as grooved bark. “So ye’ve taken a liking for tarts now, lad.”
Even as the Maclean, laird and Beast of Aros, the woman still thought of him as a lad who liked to sneak the miniature sponge cakes she left to cool. “My wife does,” he answered. He knew Ava liked tarts, had seen her looking longingly at them, and yet he’d never actually seen her eat one. She used to hunt them down in the dark kitchens of her home in York, and even though he’d asked Alyce to make them for the last two weeks for the dinner meal, Ava hadn’t sampled any. Had he not yet chosen the flavor she liked?
“Cinnamon and mace sound compatible,” Tor said, making Alyce frown.
“I’ve been baking tarts since before ye were born. I’ll spice the apples just fine without yer interference.” She shooed him with her dimpled hands.
Tor strode out of the kitchens to the great hall and glanced at the stairs leading to where Ava still slept. The memory of the erotic and bold night they’d shared stirred his blood. Aye, the lass would sleep till noon. He adjusted himself and sat across the table from Cullen, just realizing his friend frowned at an unfolded missive. “Foul news?”
Cullen snorted at the paper. “My second-in-command, Errol MacDonald…” He held up the paper to indicate the author. “Says his father, my troublesome uncle, is grumbling about my absence. Might start more fuss about the old chief naming me as the new one. I don’t know why my grandfather skipped over his own sons to lead when he died, but he did.” He cut Tor a dark glance. “And the bloody English sent word they could pop over for a friendly visit to make sure Islay isn’t harboring French rebels.”
“Bastards,” Tor murmured and dr
ank some of the cool ale in his cup.
Cullen threw the creased letter on the table. “Have ye received a notice to expect a visit to Mull in general?”
“Nay,” Tor said.
Cullen cursed. “Your da was right. An English bride makes ye seem more loyal to King Henry.” He glanced around the room. “Now where can I find me an English bride?”
The question still hanging in the air, Ava and her English cousin stepped to the bottom of the stairs. Ava looked fresh and bonny in her blue dress. She held Grace’s hand on her sleeve as they crossed.
“Do ye think Grace has any ties to the gentry in England?” Cullen murmured to Tor.
“Not that I know of, but she is English.”
Tor and Cullen stood as they neared the table. “Ladies,” Cullen said with a slight bow. He smiled widely at Grace. “Ye both look lovely this morning.”
“Is it still morning?” Tor asked, half a grin on his face as he met Ava’s gaze. “It must be past the noon hour.” She blushed softly but didn’t look away.
Grace held a sweet look in place. “I kept her upstairs chatting.” Grace lifted and dropped her shoulders. “Amusing woman talk.”
Had Ava told Grace about their antics? Tor’s teasing grin faded, although he doubted Ava would have been able to talk about their play to anyone without burning from her blush.
Cullen coughed his laughter behind a fist, and Ava rolled her eyes. Grace was teasing. He must be losing his touch for scaring the maid witless if she’d bait the Beast of Aros.
“Where is Joan this…afternoon?” Ava asked, sitting at the empty table.
“Have ye eaten?” Tor asked. Was it his imagination or did Ava look thinner?
“I brought her some porridge,” Grace said.
“Did ye eat it?” he asked Ava.
Cullen glanced between them. “Joan is in the village. Something about purchasing more tallow candles.”
“Yes, I ate it,” Ava said with a petulant look. “I’m very able to care for myself.”
The Beast of Aros Castle (Highland Isles) Page 11