Secrets to Seducing a Scot

by Michelle Marcos

  He walked her deeper through the forest until they came to a vast open moor. His eyes continually scanned his surroundings until he found what he’d been looking for.

  “Here we go. See this marshy area? This is peat. Get some of this, and it’ll be fuel for yer fire.” He pointed to a small overhang that faced the sun. “There. That part looks nice and dry. Slice off a portion from the outside. Not too deep, mind. The wet stuff won’t do us any good.”

  “Won’t that black muck get all over my shoes?”

  He turned to her. “And yer point would be?”

  Serena shrugged. “Just clarifying. How much would you like? A wee bit?”

  “No. A fair bit.”

  She shook her head in exasperation.

  “Keep away from that open bog to yer left. Get caught inside it and ye’ll never come out.”

  Wonderful. She was in a wilderness, not another soul in sight, and even the terrain could kill her.

  It was a woeful day for her boots. The muddy, black soil stuck to them, and she kept getting mired in the swampy marsh. It had a putrid, rotten odor to it, and she couldn’t wait to leave this bog. She found the mound he’d indicated and carved off a dried portion. Once she had two brick-size pieces, she rejoined him. He had collected a couple of handfuls of thick green moss.

  “Right. We’re almost ready. Let’s go find some kindling.”

  On the way back, he snapped off some dried twigs and collected them in his arms. When they reached the clearing, he assembled the fire, and they knelt at it.

  “Here’s what ye’ll need to do, Serena. Rub this stick between yer hands like so. The faster ye rub it inside the notch on the wood below, the hotter it will become. When the wood below starts to smoke, place the birch bark on it. The bark will catch fire, and then ye can toss it onto the kindling. When that starts to go, put the peat on top of it. Understand?”

  “I suppose,” she said uncertainly, as she awkwardly rotated the stick between her palms. “And what, may I ask, will you be doing while I am rubbing calluses onto my hands?”

  “I was planning to sit and relax with a cup of tea. But I thought it’d be better if I were to build us a shelter. All right?”

  Serena grumbled, but resumed her rubbing.

  At first, the only heat she felt was in her hands. But once she mastered the tricky skill of keeping the stick in place while it turned between her hands, smoke started to waft up from the notch. The more she rubbed, the thicker the plume became. Excitedly, she grabbed the birch shavings and put them into the notch. To her great surprise and joy, a flame licked up from the tinder.

  “Look! Look!” she exclaimed, and excitedly threw the flaming bark onto the pile of dried twigs. In no time, the twigs caught fire. “Malcolm, I did it! I made fire!”

  He came over and smiled down at her. “Ye’ve set me alight a time or two. Now I see ye can do it to wood as well.”

  She was elated at what she had accomplished. She looked down at the roaring fire and was immensely pleased with herself.

  “Now,” said Malcolm, “put the fish in between the sheaves of wet moss. This will keep it from charring when ye set it on the fire. And in about fifteen minutes, we’ll set down to eat.”

  The salmon was exquisite.

  Maybe it was Serena’s hunger, or maybe it was the pride she had taken in building her own fire and cooking it herself. And the absence of mustard sauce or a glass of wine, or even one of her twenty-five dish sets, didn’t matter in the slightest.

  Malcolm had fashioned a shelter against a dried fallen tree by weaving together green branches and fir boughs, and he lined the inside with soft, dry moss.

  “There ye are, milady. It’s a wee bit rough, but it’ll keep out the fierce wind and give ye a soft place to sleep.”

  Serena looked inside the crude shelter. “I can’t sleep on grass, Malcolm,” she protested apologetically. “If anything even vaguely resembling a spider shows itself …”

  “Dinna fash yerself. If any of the little beasties should bite ye, I’m sure they’ll expire from the venom in ye.”

  She waved away his friendly insult. “I’m sorry. I simply can’t sleep out in nature.”

  He laughed roundly. “I don’t know if ye’ve noticed, but at the moment, there’s a lot of it about. ’Course, there is just one alternative.”

  “What is it?” she asked hopefully.

  “Dinna sleep. I’m sure we can think of a way to while away the hours.”

  “Malcolm, I’m serious. If I even see a spider, I’ll scream down these hills. Perhaps there’s an inn not too far from here.”

  He sighed. “There are no inns for miles. But if ye like, I’ll make ye a hammock with my fly plaid. Will that do?”

  “My unending thanks.” She watched him create a makeshift hammock with the black wool fabric, adjacent to the bed intended for her but about two feet off the ground. “In payment, how would you like a warm drink? I can boil some leaves of wild heather in the tin, and make us a nice cup of tea.”

  They sat around the fire, sipping the hot tea, which tasted quite delicious. As night fell, the winds blew back the blanket of clouds, revealing thousands of white stars. The only sounds were those of the leaves on the trees rattling in the wind and the crackle of the fire.

  Silently, Serena watched him swallow the steaming liquid and lean his head back against a pine tree.

  “They say you’re a thief and a traitor. A man not to be trusted.”

  He opened his eyes and fixed them upon her. The flames reflected in what had become black eyes. “Who said that to ye?”

  “Is it true?”

  Malcolm shook his head and looked away. “Tell me something, Serena. Who do ye say I am?”

  Serena leaned forward. “I say that you are someone much maligned, and unfairly so. I say that there is so much shame in you that you live in a suit of armor not to keep others out, but to keep yourself in. I say that you once had a compassionate heart, but it’s been kicked about so much that it’s callused over so it bleeds no longer. I think that that scar on your hand has compelled you to bury a lot of dreams. But equally I hope that whatever that scar may signify, it doesn’t keep you from seeing the man you truly are.”

  A smile inched across his face. “My God. Now I understand the hold ye have over me.” He reached out his scarred hand and placed it over hers.

  She squeezed it and lifted it up, cradling it between her own. “Does it pain you?”

  He shook his head. “I canna feel anything there. The scars have blotted out all feeling. I carry the pain … a little deeper.”

  “Who did this to you, Malcolm?”

  He closed his eyes, and the furrow between his black eyebrows deepened. She sensed him going back in time to a place that he had visited many times by himself, but never with someone else.

  “My own clansmen.”

  Serena’s mouth fell open. “The Slayters?”

  He exhaled. “Slayter isn’t my real name. It’s my label. My … title.”

  A cloud of confusion came over her. “Your title?”

  “Aye.” A note of sarcastic asperity pierced his voice. “I’m to be known forever as a slaighteur. It’s Gaelic for ‘knave.’”

  “Slaighteur. So that’s what the S stands for.”

  “Aye.”

  “What did you do to deserve that?”

  Malcolm exhaled deeply. “I was born into a family of men that failed to present themselves in battle.” He paused. “My father and my brothers didna stand with the clan, and the clan lost. For this, they should have been branded. But the clan was no’ after justice. It was after revenge. They slaughtered my brothers, my father, and my mother, while the wee ones watched.”

  Serena had never heard anything so horrifying. “That’s barbaric. Were the murderers caught?”

  “Of course not. There is no justice in a place like this, Serena.”

  “We have British laws.”

  “But Highland ways. What law can exist here? The
law of blood is all that is understood. Ye say it is barbaric, and so it is. At least I was thirteen. Almost a man. I could take it. But what sort of unrighteous justice would allow my young sisters and brother, three wee ones only this big, to be branded like so much cattle and taken as bondservants?”

  Serena closed her eyes to the horror. “But why punish the little ones? Any of you? You were all innocent.”

  “To show the world that we came from a family of cowards. Because children grow up, and they might take it into their heads to avenge themselves. So no self-respecting Scotsman would support a man with a brand like this one. Would ye help a criminal?”

  Serena’s voice dropped to a whisper. “And all this time I thought it was for something that you did.”

  He closed his eyes. “I don’t deserve this for something I did. I deserve it for something I didn’t do.”

  Her eyes snapped up to his face. He was staring at the S on the back of his hand. “They gave this to us for being cowards. Well, in my case, it’s become well deserved, for so I am. I couldna prevent the wee ones from being hurt, but I’m the only one who escaped. I should have gone after them. I should have tried to find them. I should have scoured all of Scotland for a clue as to what became of them. But I didn’t. I did nothing. I hid here, in the Highland wilderness. For almost a month, cowering in the fens and forests like a frightened rabbit. If it wasn’t for that game hunter in the next village who found me, I’d probably be here still.”

  Serena raised herself to her knees. “Now you listen to me, Malcolm. You are not a coward. You were a little boy who was scared, and had every right to be. Even if you had been a man, armed with strength and wits, there was not much you could have done. Look at you now. Now you have the privilege of choice. You could have chosen not to protect me. You could have chosen not to go after my father. But instead you faced the danger. At great cost to yourself and with no promise of reward. I don’t know what other people see when they see that brand. But to me, you are a hero.”

  He threaded his fingers in her hair. “Aye. And that’s enough for me.”

  He leaned over and kissed her mouth. It was not just a kiss of affection; it was a profession of appreciation. She returned it with equal fervor, pledging her indebtedness to him for showing her what a man’s love ought to be, and then being that man for her. Until she’d loved him, she’d never loved enough.

  Malcolm … a look from his emerald eyes could stop her heart, and his kiss could make it start again. She had been seasoning in her longing for him for weeks, and now the opportunity had arisen to indulge her desire. Here, with not another human soul for miles, was the chance to forget that she was Serena Marsh, the proper daughter of an English ambassador, and just let herself be a woman who desperately wanted to pleasure—and be pleasured by—the man she had come to love.

  Her hand trailed down his chest. His body felt like a marble statue enrobed in warm velvet. The legs beneath the kilt were long and sculpted, and she yearned to see what was covered by the black wool garment. Her prior experience with a man had resolved the mystery of what such an organ looked like. But she couldn’t help wondering what Malcolm looked like. He was such a large man otherwise. Was a man’s manhood proportionate to his height?

  Slowly, she let her hand descend to his thigh. What a muscle that was. His lap went on forever, firm and inviting. But it was inward her hand wanted to go. Suddenly she felt as men must, driven mad by desire to reach what was underneath a skirt. So easy to get to, and yet …

  And then she felt it. His penis had raised the front of his kilt. Though she touched it only briefly, her question as to length was finally answered.

  She tried not to, but she couldn’t help smiling through their kiss. It gave away her bashful naughtiness.

  Malcolm seized her by the waist and hauled her onto his lap. “Come here, ya wee besom, if ye be wanting it so much. It wants to meet ye, too.”

  Serena shrieked. Now that she was in full contact with the object of her curiosity, she burst into giggles.

  Malcolm laughed, too, a deep-throated rumble that thrummed against her body. “I love how yer big blue eyes disappear when ye smile,” he said.

  She placed a hand on his cheek, delighting in the emerging roughness. The firelight danced upon his masculine features, making him even more handsome. The crease in his cheeks deepened when he smiled thus, and his eyes acquired a warmth she had never seen before.

  “I’m no’ a man of tender words, Serena. I dinna know how to express m’self too well. But I want ye to know how much I love ye. And I’ll always look after ye.”

  His breath was warm on her face, but it was the light behind his eyes that made her warm all over. If only time could stand still in this one moment …

  But well she knew that life was made up of many moments, some just as memorable but wholly unpleasant. The last time a man told her he loved her, it was also a good moment. But the ones that followed were anything but. And though she knew that Malcolm truly loved her, lurking somewhere in her mind was a niggling doubt about his intentions. What if she gave herself to Malcolm, and then lost him because of it? What if all men were just like Ben, her Mistake, charming until they get a woman to give her most precious, intimate gifts, only to then walk away—in search, no less, of a woman who wouldn’t be as promiscuous?

  She couldn’t bear it if Malcolm turned away from her for that. She would be angry with him for a short while, but she would hate herself for years to come. She couldn’t go through that again. And though out here in the wilderness, no one would ever find out if they had made love, she would know it. And her mirror would give her no solace.

  And God forbid she should emerge from their tryst with a belly. She was lucky enough to have escaped that humiliating fate with Ben. But that particular sort of luck runs out every month. And if there was one thing that Malcolm had taught her, it was that danger always struck when everything appeared safe.

  His hand caressed that particular spot at the bend of her elbow, the spot that always disintegrated her resolve.

  “Malcolm,” she breathed before her strength gave out. “I love you, too. And I know you love me not just in words, but in actions. Tonight, I need you to show me how much you love me. By waiting.”

  He closed his eyes and let his forehead touch hers. She watched him as he talked his body down. Regret twisted her features for putting him through that again.

  “Do you ken how difficult it is for me to keep m’hands off ye? It’s getting harder and harder. No pun intended.”

  She chuckled nervously. “I’m sorry. I wish I could make love to you as well.”

  His hand tightened on her waist. “Tell me one thing. Are ye still comparing me to him?”

  Her chest caved. She’d had no idea he could read her so. Her chin tucked into her chest. “In some ways, yes. We … made love … only the one time. Afterward, it was disastrous. But you should know, Malcolm, that there is no more ‘him.’ There is only you.”

  He nodded. He lifted her off his lap, stood up, and then lifted her onto the hammock made from his plaid. Once she was comfortably ensconced in the floating bed, he placed a kiss upon her lips.

  “I wish to God I had been yer first. Because then ye would have bonded with me, and not with some arse who broke yer heart.”

  Her heart twisted inside her. As Malcolm lay down on the moss-covered floor, she realized he was right. She had bonded with Ben first. In her hurry to know the pleasure that other women knew, she gave away the beautiful opportunity to bond forever with Malcolm. The regret returned, as strong and insistent as the day Ben told her it was over.

  As she curled up in the black woolen hammock, enveloping herself in Malcolm’s woodsy smell, she valiantly kept from crying herself to sleep.

  The chirring of the nightjars roused Serena from sleep. She opened her eyes to the diminishing fire, a weak flame beneath a prison of charred twigs. Beside her, Malcolm slept peacefully on the moss-covered ground.

  She’d
been to balls that boasted dancing, drinking, and parlor games. She’d been to operas, galleries, and the exalted houses of England. She’d had conversations with the most informed and erudite people in the world. But none of those experiences even compared to just watching Malcolm sleep.

  She rolled herself off the hammock, falling soundlessly to the floor. Malcolm’s deep slumber was undisturbed. His chest rose and fell evenly, his body motionless.

  She gazed into his face. Now that she had come down off her high place and down to his level, she could see him more clearly. Moonlight caressed one side of his face and cast a blue glow on his raven’s-wing hair. His hooded brows cast his eyes into shadow, but twin sets of eyelashes feathered down from the recess.

  The fire sparked and crackled to life. Serena sat upon her haunches as she eyed Malcolm’s body. His white shirt draped over his massive chest, outlining the divide down the middle and each of the hard lines that furrowed across his muscled abdomen. The shirt fell open at his throat, exposing a V of skin. His wide shoulders hung from a cobra hood of muscle at his neck.

  Serena backed away on all fours, her loose mane spilling down the sides of her face, until she was kneeling at his feet. His long legs were relaxed, falling open slightly. Serena’s gaze wended up the sturdy calves, the powerful thighs, and came to rest on the mound in between his slender hips.

  Flames licked up from the gathering fire in response to the mounting hunger between Serena’s legs. She let out a tense breath, reveling in the rising heat. She wedged herself between his legs and placed a hand on each of his knees.

  Malcolm’s eyes fluttered open, and he looked down at her. “Serena? What are ye—”

  “Shh,” she whispered, one finger at her lips. Slowly, she pushed back the fabric of his kilt, higher and higher up his tensing thighs, until she exposed the object of her desire.

  In the intensifying orange light, Serena could see his sleeping cock lying over one thigh amid a black nest of hair. It was long and dark, sheathed in plaited skin all the way to the tip. Malcolm rose to his elbows, regarding her in curious excitement. She reached out a hand and covered it with her palm.