The Highlander Series 7-Book Bundle

by Karen Marie Moning

  Since she’d emerged from her chambers after her bout of grieving, Circenn had repeatedly given her every indication that he desired to enter a sexual relationship with her, but something was holding her back and she didn’t have the faintest idea what it was. She’d studied it from every angle but still was no closer to understanding why she pulled away each time he tried to do more than kiss her. She hovered on the verge of asking him if he knew why she did, but couldn’t bring herself to be quite so brutally honest.

  A part of her wished he would try to storm her walls, so she could figure out what the damned walls were. She thought she’d decided to be happy here, but then why resist his seduction?

  A knock at the door set her heart to pounding.

  “Come in,” she called softly, desperately hoping it would not be Gillendria who entered, carrying yet another restitched gown or surcoat.

  “Lass,” Circenn murmured, as he closed the door behind him.

  Lisa sat up straight and placed her wine goblet on the table. Don’t say anything—just kiss me, she thought. Kiss me hard and fast and don’t give me time to think.

  “There was something I wanted to discuss with you, lass,” he said. He crossed the room and pulled her up from the chair.

  “Yes?”

  He stopped and gazed down at her for a long moment. “Och, sometimes I make a fankle of things with words,” he finally said. “I’ve been a warrior all my life, not a blethering bard.” Cradling her head in his hands, he seized her mouth with his.

  He buried his fingers in her hair, slipped his tongue between her lips with a smooth velvety stroke, kissing her slowly and thoroughly. He gave her a long, deliciously romantic kiss that left her clinging to him breathlessly. He nibbled her lower lip, sucking and tugging, then swept inside again, possessing her mouth. His hands slid down her back and over her bottom, and he groaned. He needed her desperately, but he also needed her to seek his affection. His tongue retreated and he paused, waiting for her to seek its return.

  She didn’t.

  He sighed and moved back an inch to look at her. “At least fight me, lass, like you did when the Bruce declared us handfasted. Think you I’ve forgotten that? When I took my tongue from you then, you would have none of it.”

  Lisa averted her gaze.

  Ruthless, Circenn reminded himself, or she will slip away from you. You cannot leave her trapped in grief and guilt.

  When she moved to sit on the bed, he exhaled a small sigh of relief. The fact that she felt comfortable perching on the target of his seduction told him she wasn’t entirely adverse to it.

  “What are you waiting for, Lisa?” He sank next to her onto the bed. He was heartened that she didn’t pull away but merely sat together, shoulder brushing shoulder. “Do you remember what you said to me the night that you arrived here, when you feared I might take your life?”

  She glanced warily at him, indicating that she was listening.

  “I have not even lived yet. Those are the words you said to me, and I heard many things in that statement. I heard frustration and regret. I heard curiosity and hunger for experiences, and a terrible fear that you would never get to have them. I cannot die. I have not even lived yet! you said to me. I thought you meant it. That given the chance you would live boldly.”

  Lisa flinched. She could feel the echo welling up inside her. It was true, she thought defiantly, she hadn’t even lived yet. She felt a sudden flash of fury. She’d spent years denying herself the luxury of feelings, and with a few simple sentences, Circenn stripped them bare in front of her. She resented his psychoanalyzing her. It made her angry that he dared be so intimate with her feelings. Her eyes narrowed.

  His lips curving in a faint, understanding smile, he said, “Go on, be angry with me, lass, for giving voice to the things you try not to feel. Be angry with me for saying aloud what you scarcely permit yourself to think—that a part of you resents your mother being ill because you cannot give yourself permission to live while she is dying. Be angry with me for saying that it tears you into little pieces, and that you feel you should suffer, because how could you not when your own mother lies dying? Be angry with me for demanding that you live now. Live with me. Fully.”

  Her hands clenched around wads of blanket. She couldn’t deny anything he’d said. She did feel that she should suffer, since her mother was suffering. She did feel that every small smile she permitted herself was somehow a betrayal of Catherine. How dare Lisa smile when her mother was dying? What kind of monster could be happy for even an instant? Yet, she’d smiled occasionally, and even laughed, and then had hated herself for it. He was right on—this was what had been holding her back. An insidious little belief that she still had no right to be happy.

  “Will you continue to punish yourself for sins not of your making? How much must you suffer before you feel you have paid in full? Would your lifetime be enough?”

  Her lashes swept down, shielding her eyes.

  “Would it be so wrong to plunge headlong into the love I offer you? Take—draw of life, suck it into your body, taste it with a vengeance.”

  “Damn you,” she whispered.

  “For saying what you think? Lass, I am the one you may say anything to. I assure you, I will understand. I doona care how ignoble you think your thoughts or feelings are. Feelings, emotions—they are neither right nor wrong. They cannot be assigned a value. Feelings are. By labeling a feeling wrong, you force yourself to ignore that feeling. And what you most need is to feel it, let it burn through you, then get on with life. You are not responsible for any of what happened to your parents. But to punish yourself for a having a feeling—och, lass, that is wrong. You felt some resentment—there is no shame in that. You are young and full of life—there is no shame in that.”

  Lisa looked as if she desperately wished to believe him.

  “It wasn’t your fault—not the wreck, not your mother getting ill, not your being brought here to me. Let go of it. Stand up, Lisa. Take what you want from me. Live now.”

  “Damn you,” she repeated, shaking her head. Feelings long denied now flooded her.

  She sat still, his words echoing in her mind. Then another voice startled her, because it sounded so like Catherine’s, resounding in her head: No more punishment. He’s right, you know. Do you think I didn’t see what you were doing to yourself? Live, Lisa.

  Her hands were trembling. Could she? Did she know how? After years of refusing to believe that anything good might happen to her, could she reclaim the dreams she’d had of being a woman unafraid to love?

  Her gaze swept over him. Magnificent Highlander, half savage, yet more civilized than most modern men. Tender, caring enough to penetrate her shell in a valiant effort to wrench her from it. She would never find a better man.

  Live, she agreed.

  Without a word, she rose to her feet, suffering the sensation that she was splitting into two different people. As if in the act of rising she slipped from her twenty-first-century body, leaving the old Lisa huddling on the bed, her arms wrapped around a pillow, vehemently denying her own needs. This new Lisa stood tall and composed, waiting for—inviting—his next demand. Ready to make demands of her own.

  “Remove your gown, Lisa.”

  Her breath clawed its way from her lungs.

  “I said remove your gown.”

  “What about you?”

  “This is not about me. This is about you. Let me love you, lass. I promise you will not regret it.”

  Lisa drew a shallow breath. He saw her heart as it really was, full of complicated and less-than-noble emotions, yet he wanted her. And in removing her gown she was dropping her barriers and extending her arms to welcome him. Welcoming what they could be together.

  Her fingers felt stiff and clumsy as they moved over her clothing, but grew more nimble the more honest she was with herself.

  “I want you. I am here for you. I adore you.”

  I adore you … His words lingered. And she acknowledged that she wan
ted it to be just like this. To disrobe for this man, to offer him her body, to find the approval and desire she knew he felt for her. To reach out and taste what he offered, to turn her willing body over to him to be taught, initiated, savored.

  To live.

  Her gown rustled to the floor.

  “Stop!” He sat motionless, gazing at her as she stood, pale in the candlelight, in her lavender bra and panties. He made a sound low in his throat. Lisa had never heard a man make such a sound before, but she realized that she wanted to hear him make that sound many times, looking at her in just the same way.

  “Proceed,” he said finally, “verra slowly, lass. Kill me with it. You know I want you; use it. It is one of your many powers.”

  Lisa blinked, thrilled to realize that she had such power as a woman. His plaid was lifting, his chest was falling and rising rapidly, and his eyes were dark with desire. He was inviting her to wield her feminine strength, and she wanted to. In her fantasies she’d dreamed of just this: being with a man whose attraction to her was something she was so certain of that she could tease him, revel in her femininity, provoke and invite the consequences.

  Slowly she began to strip away her lingerie, sliding the straps of her bra off her shoulders, tugging playfully, provocatively at the bow between her breasts. When his eyes flared, she slipped off her soft slippers and tossed one at him. The motion made her breasts sway gently. When the slipper hit him lightly in the chest, he swallowed hard and tensed to rise from the bed.

  “No. I find I like this. You encouraged me. Let me discover who I am.”

  Circenn sank back to the bed, but looked ready to launch himself at her at any moment. A scrap of lace fluttered to the floor, then another, and Lisa stood before him holding her breath. She saw herself reflected in the polished mirror behind him and moved a bit to the right. Perfect, she thought: She could now see him fully clothed, his wide shoulders and muscled back, the bed, and herself standing nude before him. It was fiercely arousing, erotic, her desire strangely heightened by the fact that he was still completely dressed.

  “Turn around.”

  “What?” she gasped, nearly losing her composure.

  His laugh was a low purr. “You are perfection, lass. But turn around and show me all of your lovely body. I’ve been dreaming about you for weeks.”

  Lisa swallowed, uncertain that she could do it. She wouldn’t be able to see him. What if he thought her behind was fat? Men never think a behind is fat, Ruby had told her once. They’re so happy just to be seeing it.

  “Come, lass. Show me if your back arches as I think it does—a cool sweep of ivory, with your hair tumbling down it. Show me that beautiful bottom. Show me those long lovely legs. Show me every inch of what I am going to kiss and taste.”

  His words were more than adequately persuasive; what woman could refuse such a promise? Lisa drew a deep breath and turned. After a few moments of excruciating silence, she glanced nervously over her shoulder, seeking their reflection in the mirror. He had dropped to his knees by the bed and was crouched behind her, looking up and down, and up and down again.

  Black eyes lifted to meet her gaze. The expression on his face was wild, possessive, and made her feel she was the most beautiful woman ever to stroll through his fourteenth-century world. He lunged to his feet and hauled her back against him, hard. The rough fabric of his plaid was arousing against her sensitive skin and she melted against his body. With a firm tug, he pulled her bare bottom against his hips, and she lost herself in the sensation of the fabric and the hard length of maleness that lay just beneath it. She pushed back, feeling the ridge of him pressing in the cleft of her behind. It jerked against her and she gasped with anticipation.

  His hands slid up her waist, over her ribs, and he held her breasts reverently at first, then with rough excitement. Her nipples were already hard and aching from the cool air in the room, and when his fingers brushed them she nearly screamed. Her hips bucked back, and a flash of pleasure darted from her nipples to where she would take him into her body. He pinched them, and she felt her world spinning, narrowing down to nothing but her and him, and a desire to do everything with him that was possible between a man and a woman.

  “That’s it. Push back against me. Show me how you want me.” He rocked against her, imitating the thrust and draw of lovemaking, and she felt the wetness between her thighs. Her movements became strained as wordlessly she begged for his body.

  He wrapped an arm around her waist, bit the nape of her neck, catching the tendon between his teeth. It felt so … dominating. His other hand sought her lips, and he slipped his finger between them. She stroked it with her tongue, closing her lips over it and sucking it into her mouth.

  Gently, he inched her toward the chest at the foot of the bed.

  “Sit.”

  She sat breathlessly, so aroused that even the chest felt good to her aching bottom. Hard, that was what she wanted, something hard, and solid, and … him.

  He stood before her, legs splayed, eyes dark. He brushed her nipples with his palms, his calluses deliciously abrasive against her sensitive peaks. She watched them tighten, fascinated by her body’s responses to him. With his knee he nudged her legs apart slightly, seemingly transfixed by the small dark mole on the inside of her left thigh. He wet his lips, and she knew he would kiss her there many times.

  Holding her gaze, he undressed for her, with excruciating leisure, never taking his eyes off her. No modern-day stripper could have competed with the performance he gave her. It had a funny effect on her emotions, that even though she was naked, even though he could have taken her quickly, he was making it as he’d promised: all about her. He was progressing slowly, feeding her every fantasy. He was still trying to woo her, despite the fact that he’d clearly already won her.

  When he stood nude before her she closed her eyes, overwhelmed by him. She took a deep breath and opened them again, only to discover him bobbing before her. It’s beautiful, she thought. She’d never realized that a man could be so beautiful. The hard bulges in his abdomen tapered into lean muscles that rippled down to his thighs, creating a vee of taut ridges that commanded attention to the raw masculinity that hung heavily between his legs. The mere sight of him made her stomach feel tight and empty. It was thick and long and raising itself eagerly. Olive-pink, smooth, velvety-looking, hooded, with a strong vein running the length of it. It would be warm—no, it would feel hot and silky beneath her hand.

  Leaning closer for a better look, she was startled when it bobbed again and brushed her cheek. Laughing, she looked up at him, and lost her breath.

  He stared down at her transfixed, his expression so possessive that she gasped. She would never be the same after this night. Be bold, she told herself. Be brave and wanton and everything you always fantasized about being. Take from life, Lisa.

  She wrapped her hand around him, and, as she’d suspected, her fingers couldn’t close. A shiver shot through her, imagining her body yielding to take so much of him. He bucked within her grip. A smile curved her lips. She could do that to him, make him jerk hungrily in response to her touch. She squeezed, sliding her hand up and down.

  This part of him was such a contradiction: so hard, yet the skin so very soft and sensitive, so strong, yet so weak before a woman, so easily wielded by a man as a weapon, yet so easily used as a weapon against him. Lisa licked her lips, wondering how he tasted. Salty? Sweet? Where was her whipped cream? She dropped her head and brushed her lips over the tip of him. Just once, a tight suction with her lips, the quick flick of a tongue, just enough to taste him and assuage her curiosity.

  A bit salty, and a scent of spicy man, she thought, pondering the flavor on her tongue, her hand momentarily still. His spicy scent that numbed her brain was more prevalent here, near the center of his manhood. It did alarming things to her—both relaxed and stimulated her. She glanced up, wondering why he’d gone motionless, and was stunned by the startled, savage look on his face.

  He drew her up
into his arms, swept her back onto the bed, and stretched himself on top of her. “Lass, I am going to love you until you cannot walk from my bed,” he whispered, before kissing her.

  She responded eagerly, fiercely, molding her mouth to his.

  “Slowly first.” He drew back slightly. With excruciating gentleness he brushed his lips against her, once, twice, a dozen times. She parted her lips against his gentle friction, signifying her desire for more. He laughed softly and ran the tip of his tongue in a playful circle over her lips. He teased until she was moving frantically, trying to catch his tongue with hers.

  “Place your hands above your head, lass, and if you have a problem keeping them there I will be happy to use fabric to secure them,” he murmured.

  “What? Do you want to tie me up?” she exclaimed, mildly shocked. She felt his lips curve in a smile against hers; he was amused by her reaction.

  “I would not be adverse to the idea.” His laughter was husky, darkly erotic. “But for now, I merely wish you to restrain your hands from my body. You need give nothing, do nothing; I assure you, I’ll be taking my pleasure in the giving.”

  Lie back and let me pleasure you, he was saying. Have I died and gone to heaven? she wondered. And he prefers to do this? Her fantasy lovers had always been dominant and demanding illusions who exhausted themselves in bed, giving their woman pleasure. Obediently, she raised her hands above her head. The movement lifted her breasts, and he caught one roughly with his mouth.

  Then she was burning, her nipples were on fire. He nipped and tongued, licked and tugged until her breasts felt swollen and hot. He raised them together and dragged his tongue down the soft crevice, then he separated them and kissed each nipple. He nipped her stomach and kissed her hips—the very sensitive part where her leg met her upper body, only inches from the soft hair between her thighs. The skin was thinner there, more delicate. He pressed hot kisses to the tiny mole inside her thigh, dragged his velvety tongue over it, and she arched against him, instinctively guiding him closer to her center.