Highland Obsession

by Dawn Halliday

  Highland Obsession

  Dawn Halliday

  CHAPTER ONE

  Scottish Highlands October 1715

  Cam dismounted and tethered his horse to the spindly trunk of a juniper. Though a full moon had brightened the night sky earlier, clouds had gathered and now a soft mist fell. The horses' heavy breathing steamed the air and their intermittent snorts contrasted with the whisper of water on the bushes and grass.

  Ignoring the needles scraping his arms, Cam glanced back at Mac-Lean, who remained mounted, waiting for Cam's instruction. The man and his horse formed an inky shadow in the increasing gloom.

  The ground sank under Cam's feet and leaves rustled as he moved to take measure of the small valley below. He scanned the stables and few dark outbuildings hardly visible through the rain, but his gaze came to an abrupt stop when it collided with the largest dwelling in the enclave—Alan MacDonald's two-room cottage near the banks of the loch. Sorcha and Alan were inside. Alone at last on the first night of their marriage. Hours ago, from behind an old cairn, Cam had watched the villagers dance around a bonfire as the lively tune of their fiddles and pipes echoed through Glenfmnan. Coldto the marrow of his bones, he'd stared past the stones down at them, at her. Sorcha smiling shyly as

  Alan led her in a reel, her skirts swishing around her calves. She looked as a young bride should: beautiful, happy. Innocent.

  But she wasn't innocent.

  Her father had tried—and failed—to keep a tight rein on her. Now it was Alan MacDonald's job. Cam knew Alan would do it better.

  Smoke puffed in small clouds from the chimney and light spilled out from the cottage windows onto the water, making it glitter as it splashed gently against the pebbled shore. Again Cam glanced at MacLean, who sat patiently upon his horse, reins held loosely in his meaty hands. "Wait here. Come only if I call for you." MacLean nodded. Cam didn't allow his gaze to linger on the big man—he didn't want to see any sign of disapproval, though logic told him MacLean followed him blindly with no interest in separating right from wrong. If Cam saw disapproval in MacLean's expression, he'd be conjuring it from a blank slate.

  Swiping the back of his hand over his stinging eyes, Cam stared at the cottage. He had no choice but to go down there. He had to see it through to the end. Maybe then his obsession with her would end.

  "Stay out of sight," he murmured to MacLean.

  "Aye, milord." MacLean's rough voice came from behind him, but Cam hardly heard. He was already striding down the wet slope toward the cottage.

  Sorcha. Her name rose in his mind, peaked and receded like a delicate wave. How had it happened this way? And why, for God's sake, did it even matter? He'd thought Sorcha was a toy, an entertaining plaything. A dalliance. Nothing more. How wrong he was. Over a month ago, her father had left Cam's service and moved his family to Glenfinnan. The day before she'd gone, she met him in his bedchamber. After they made love, she'd clung to him, and her eyes had glistened with tears as they'd murmured their farewells. Cam assumed he'd forget about her. He predicted he'd easily find another skirt to amuse him. Instead, he'd thought about her daily. He ached to see her, to hold her again. To touch her silken skin. To see her generous smile, then kiss her into submission. When he learned of her upcoming marriage to Alan MacDonald, something had snapped in his consciousness. Thoughts of her began to occupy his every waking moment. He'd tried to stop. He'd schooled himself to restraint and resolutely kept out of her affairs. Today was her wedding day. And, God help him, today he hadn't been able to stay away. He reached the edge of Alan's cottage and placed his palm flat on one of the cold, wet stones. Slowly, he walked around the back to the closest window, dragging his fingers across the jagged surfaces of the stones as he went. Now completely hidden from MacLean's sight, Cam peered inside.

  There was Sorcha, closer to the window than he'd expected, facing away from him. She stood still, her dark hair a satin waterfall cascading down her back. Beyond her, the large, cluttered space contained a rough-hewn dressing table, several chairs and chests, a long bench, and a bed built into the wall. A peat fire flickered in the fireplace at the room's far end. Rustic, but comfortable. Nevertheless, far below Alan's means. Cam sensed movement deeper within and ducked away, his pulse surging to a frantic cadence.

  Breathing heavily, he leaned back against the wall. Out of all the men in the world, why did it have to be his closest friend who'd taken her to wife?

  Cam turned his face up to the rain and savored the feel of the stones digging deep into the flesh of his shoulders. What in the devil was he doing, slinking about like a common low-bred thief? Longing for something he could never have? He hated himself for it. Yet he couldn't stop.

  He turned and looked in the window once again. Alan sat on the edge of the bed now. He'd removed his plaid, and his white linen shirt covered him to midthigh. He spoke softly, much in the same way Cam had seen him calm a jittery horse. Sorcha took a step away from the window. Cam couldn't see her expression, only the dark fall of her hair shimmering in the light of the tallow candles as she moved. She wore a thin linen nightdress that shifted provocatively with the sway of her hips. Alan was ignorant of Cam and Sorcha's previous carnal acquaintance. If he knew, he never would have married her. Cam was familiar enough with his friend's personality to know this as absolute fact. It was clear Sorcha hadn't revealed anything of her experience during the short period of their engagement.

  Ultimately, Cam couldn't blame her for hiding the truth. Her father had placed her in this position, and she would die before dishonoring him. Furthermore, her blasted Highland morals wouldn't allow her to embarrass or anger Alan, her laird and future husband. And now they were married. Joined together ... as one ... until death. Cam winced. Bloody hell.

  Would she continue to play the part of the timid virgin tonight? Would she cry out as she had when Cam took her maidenhead? After she had made that small, frightened noise, he had frozen in place, hating to have caused her pain. But she'd clutched him tight and whispered to him, saying it was all right and encouraging him to continue. Soon she had arched up to meet him, making a little sound of pleasure with each thrust. Cam would never forget that night. When he had broken through the shield of her virginity, her reaction had been honest. With Alan, it would be a deception. Cam tried to take some comfort in that, and failed.

  Sorcha sat on the edge of the bed beside Alan, turning so Cam could see her profile. Her eyes were downcast. A lock of hair fell across her face, and she reached up to brush it away with trembling fingers.

  So she did choose to play the pious fraud. Cam grimaced, clutched the windowsill, and watched.

  Sorcha couldn't stop shaking. It wasn't that Alan MacDonald didn't appeal to her—in fact, the opposite was true. He was handsome in a rugged, fierce way, yet there was a kindness about him that inspired trust. Only a month had passed since his return to Scotland after a nearly twenty-year absence, yet the MacDonalds of the Glen already respected their laird as if he'd never left at all.

  She was not as quick to trust as her kinsmen. She didn't know this man at all. Alan had spent so many years on English soil, he was little more than a stranger to her. She possessed only one memory of him before he and his mother had gone. They'd visited Camdonn Castle to see her parents. Sorcha had been just a small child and he'd paid her no attention, but she'd clung to her mother as he'd cast narrow, furious glances at everyone, his lips turned down in a scowl. Later, she'd been told the poor lad was angry because he didn't want to leave Scotland. Nobody blamed him.

  He'd finally returned to acknowledge his birthright—his lands on the southern side of Loch Shiel, bordered by the Earl of Camdonn's property on one side and the village of Glenfmnan on the other.

  Within a week of his a
rrival in the Highlands, Alan had met with her father and negotiated their betrothal. Her father was delighted, but Sorcha had never been so afraid. And Sorcha was not the kind of woman who frightened easily.

  "Come, Sorcha. Lie beside me."

  Trying to calm her roiling tension, she turned to him and lowered herself to her side on the bed, her body rigid.

  Alan scooted down beside her. Facing her, he stroked her hair be-hind her ear. She shuddered at the intimate contact. Only one other man had touched her like this before, but that was such a different man. Dark where Alan was light. Whipcord lean while Alan's body rippled with muscle. Everyone was suspicious of the Earl of Camdonn and approached him with anything from guarded wariness to outright hostility, while Alan had earned the clan's trust in a matter of days.

  "Such beautiful hair you have, Sorcha," Alan murmured. "Soft and silky, and black as a raven's."

  Would he still think so in ten years when it started to go gray, like her mother's had? Mama had died giving birth to Sorcha's brother ... would Sorcha die in childbed too? The years stretched before her, brimming with the unknown and now under the control of the man lying beside her. She forced a smile and pushed out a response to his compliment. "Thank you. That is very kind of you to say."

  "I'll go slowly," he said. "I know you are frightened." Sorcha blew out a breath and nodded, but she couldn't meet his eyes. Yes, she was frightened, but not for the reason he imagined. She had experienced sexual congress in many different forms, in many different places and positions, and she had taken great pleasure from it.

  She didn't fear this man's inevitable invasion of her body. No, she feared the future. Living with a stranger day in and day out. Would they grow to love or despise each other? Would he be kind to her or cruel? Years down the line there might be a brood of children for her to care for. What would her life be like then? Would Alan take mistresses? Most of the men she knew did. Even her father, though he was always discreet, kept a woman on the mountain.

  She would never take another lover. She didn't know what her life with Alan would be. Nor did she know whether he'd rule her body as Cam had, though she supposed she'd learn soon enough. In the end, it didn't matter whether Alan satisfied her. She was married now, and she would honor that to the death. She would never bring shame upon herself or her husband.

  She feared for her future. For her life. Surely it was not so odd to do so. Would she die a year hence, in this very cottage, in childbirth? Or would she survive it to birth a dozen babies? Would Alan ever return to England? Would he take her with him? She knew nothing, and it frightened her.

  His fingers, warm against her skin, paused at her temples. "Sorcha, we are hardly acquainted with each other, and I was thinking it would be best to wait awhile before I got you with child."

  Sorcha's breath caught, and she spoke without thinking. "What?" His palm cupped her cheek. "Are you anxious to have children, lass?"

  "No." She drew in a breath and shook her head, stumbling over her words. "What I mean to say is that I should very much like to bear your sons, of course, but..." Her voice dwindled. She felt so awkward, so green and uncertain in her own skin. He shook his head, reading her easily. "Don't tell me what you think 1 want to hear. Be honest with me. Speak the truth."

  "My mother died in childbirth when I was ten years old," she blurted. She clamped her lips shut. How to explain that she'd held on to her younger sister as her mother suffered horrifically? That she'd always feared a similar fate?

  "Aye, I'd heard that, and I'm sorry for it." Alan's hand moved to her shoulder and stroked down her arm. Tiny hairs rose in a line on her skin, following the path of his fingers. "It is natural you'd fear it after losing your mother in such a way."

  "But don't you want a son?"

  "I do, eventually." Alan's fingers laced through hers, coaxing her clenched hand to open. His soothing touch was beginning to calm her. "I would like sons and daughters. But we have the rest of our lives for that, don't we?"

  Sorcha swallowed hard. "Aye, we do."

  He spoke gently. "How much do you know of how children are made, lass?" She blinked at him. She knew he thought her a virgin, but surely he didn't mistake her for a complete innocent. Perhaps he'd languished in sprawling English mansions for too long and forgotten that the people of the Highlands lived in close quarters. She formed her words carefully. "I know everything, I think. Before my mother died, we lived in a one-room cottage. I am the eldest of four children."

  He sighed—it sounded like a sigh of relief. "I don't want to hurt you. Or surprise you." After her experiences with the earl, not much Alan could do to her body would surprise her. "Thank you," she said in true appreciation for his kindness. This was so different from her first time with Cam. That joining had been rushed and surreptitious, on the floor of an unlocked closet, where anyone could walk in at any moment. Cam had slowed only after he had first thrust impatiently into her, and she had whimpered at the sudden, sharp pain. Stricken with guilt, he had apologized over and over for hurting her as he'd rained kisses upon her face and neck. This time the circumstances were different. Premeditated, slow, calm. She and Alan were husband and wife, taking their time, in the private comfort of their own home. Alan moved at a leisurely pace, as if he had the rest of his life to make love to her. She supposed he did, after all.

  "I will spend outside of you, for now. But you must realize that's not as fulfilling for a man. And it's certainly not guaranteed, though it will reduce the chances of my seed taking root within you."

  To keep from saying "thank you" like a fool again, she merely nodded. Cam had spent on her belly and in her mouth most of the time, though in his fervent haste he did come against her womb more than once. She was lucky he hadn't gotten her with child. More than lucky. She knew her dalliance with the earl could have cost her everything. Yet at the time, even that knowledge hadn't stopped her. She had lived her days desperate to see him again, to feel his hands on her body, to succumb to the sensation of him inside her.

  She'd known her actions were impulsive and foolish. Perhaps that had been part of the pleasure in it—the innate excitement in furtive trysts and secret rendezvous. When her father had taken her from Camdonn Castle to live in Glenfinnan, she'd secretly mourned losing Cam, but their separation was for the best. She'd never been enough of a fool to think there was a future for them—she was a factor's daughter and he an earl, for heaven's sake.

  Alan grinned suddenly, jolting her attention back to the here and now. This man was her future, not the Earl of Camdonn. She'd best remember that.

  "It seems odd that one of our first conversations should be of such a personal nature. But I want to be candid with you, Sorcha. I believe honesty to be the basis of a strong marriage."

  She smiled back at him, and this time it was real. "As do I." And then her own hypocrisy struck her. She truly believed honesty was important to a marriage. Yet she lay here, deceiving her husband on their first night together, playing the part of the virgin wife. What a liar she was.

  She hated lying. It was no way to start a marriage based on trust. Yet if she revealed her past with the Earl of Camdonn, it would only bring pain to them both. Alan would be furious that she wasn't an innocent as her father had promised. Her father had told her that her virginity was important to Alan, and though she'd opened her mouth to blurt the truth a hundred times in the past weeks, she hadn't been able to force the words out. The truth was too painful, too raw, and in the end, she couldn't bring herself to disappoint her family. The laird honored them by his wish to marry her, and she couldn't bear the pain she'd cause if the truth were revealed.

  In any case, the men had been too distracted to pay her much attention. The country was rising in rebellion, and her upcoming nuptials were overshadowed by talk of whether the MacDonalds would join the effort to remove King George from the throne of England and replace him with King James, who currently languished in exile in France. She'd never thought herself a weakling but now realized she wa
s. She'd either dishonor herself by lying or dishonor herself by speaking the truth. Both ways, she would lose. A shudder shook her shoulders, but she stilled them,, resolute. Only tonight would she pretend to be something she wasn't, and henceforth she would be true to her husband. It was for the greater good. When honesty would serve only tp cause needless suffering for all of them, what was the point of it?

  Alan's fingers touched hers, then traced the curve of her hip. His touch was so warm, so gentle. "You are lovely, Sorcha."

  He was stroking her again, trying to calm her. His efforts made her like him all the more.

  "You—" Her voice broke, but she tried again, unused to offering compliments to the opposite sex. "You are quite bonnie yourself, Alan MacDonald." Tentatively, she reached up to trace his square-shaped jaw with her fingertips. She brushed her thumb over his nose, running over a small bump on its ridge. Continuing upward, she stroked his broad forehead and skimmed his hairline, touching the soft, burnished gold hair that curled around his temples.

  She stared into his eyes. By far, they were his best feature. A crystalline blue, they were framed by pale but impossibly long lashes and thick eyebrows, and their edges crinkled when he smiled. When she gazed into them, she felt as if she dove into his soul only to find a perfect sapphire, pure and real. It was no wonder that every person he met instinctively liked him.

  She ran her fingertip across his full bottom lip. Quick as a flash, he grasped her wrist, holding her hand in place, and his mouth closed around her finger. His eyes fluttered closed as he suckled her finger gently, reverently. The warm, moist sensation traveled under her skin and down her body to her center. Her blood rushed there, heating her, making her flush and open for him.

  When her breaths became shallow, he released her. "You taste like sunshine, Sorcha." She laughed shakily. "How does sunshine taste?"

  "Like a hot summer's day, blooming heather, sweet wheat." He didn't return her laugh. His eyes narrowed into thin blue slits as he stared at her. When he spoke again, his voice emerged low and rough. "I'm going to kiss you now."