The Lady and the Highlander

by Lecia Cornwall

  When the clock chimed ten, Laire slipped the dirk into her sleeve and donned Iain’s black cloak. She climbed out the window of the salon and shut it carefully behind her, hoping the gust of cold air did no harm to the exotic plants in the room. Her fear of the dark had eased since the night she’d crossed the city through the clan’s tunnels. There’d been no more missions—The clan had sworn off thievery after Wee Kipper’s brush with death. Iain let them stay at Lindsay House and watched over them. He was kind, not cruel, gentle and not brutal. Her heart caught in her throat as she made her way along the streets, skirting the shadows, keeping her eyes open for trouble. The city was so much more dangerous than the Highlands. There, the dark might hold a wild creature on the prowl, but here the predators were two-footed, armed and ruthless. She hurried on, hoping she could trust Iain . . .

  When she reached King James’s square, she slipped quickly into the cellar and entered the dark house like a thief. In the kitchen, Morag dozed by the fire just like Mrs. Groves, but with a cup of whisky instead of sherry. Laire tiptoed past her and hurried up the steps. Iain wasn’t in the library or the dining room. The others were all safe abed.

  She paused outside the door of Iain’s bedchamber. Should she knock? She heard footsteps on the floor above—Hoolet or Bear or Dux, perhaps—and lifted the latch and dove into the room.

  She closed the door and stood with her back against it. There was a candle burning beside the bed. Iain sat up, the bedclothes falling away to reveal the naked planes of his chest. A number of small silver scars crisscrossed his skin, and she found herself staring. What would it be like to touch the marks, trace them?

  “Laire.”

  She forced her eyes up to his. His expression was unreadable, his eyes in shadow. She remembered the kiss, and her mouth watered to kiss him again. She felt a rush of heat go through her body.

  “I came to ask—to beg if I must—for your help.”

  His brow furrowed and his mouth tightened. He’d refuse, send her away . . . She rushed on before he could speak. “My uncle thinks I’m jealous of my father’s new wife, that my running away was just a tantrum, that I’m a silly child, and that there is no poison.”

  His gaze slid over her body. It made her feel anything but childish. She licked her lips and went on. “I need you to help me convince him that I’m telling the truth, Iain. And if you can’t do that, then tell me what the poison is, how she’s keeping them in thrall, and I will find another way. I won’t give up. I cannot.”

  “Turn around,” he said gruffly.

  She raised her chin. “I’m not leaving.”

  “I sleep naked.”

  Laire felt her face fill with hot blood. She spun and faced the door. She heard the rustle of sheets as he got out of bed. The silence of the room made the sound of his dressing loud, erotic. She could picture it even if she could not see him. She could smell the rich, masculine scent of him in the room—soap, and leather, and the unique, familiar smell of his skin. It made her quiver. She remembered how it felt to kiss him, the sweep of his tongue in her mouth, the taste of him . . . She clutched the wool of her cloak in her fists.

  “How did ye get here? Is there someone waiting downstairs for ye?” he demanded, and she turned to face him. He wore his breeches, but no shirt or stockings. He had long, well-shaped feet.

  She swallowed. “I came alone. This is not a conversation I wanted to have in front of Mrs. Groves.” She took a breath. “You are the only one who can help me. I understand that you are Bibiana’s servant, her sealgair, but I don’t understand why you serve her. Most men strive to be good, yet you strive to be bad. And you’re not.”

  He folded his arms over his chest and regarded her flatly. “Am I not?”

  She shook her head. “You’re kind, Iain, and good. You saved me. You have a house full of strangers, thieves, and cutpurses.”

  “They’re children.”

  “Aye, they are,” she agreed. “My youngest sister is only five, younger than Wee Kipper and Magpie. Help me save her and the rest of my family.”

  He swallowed and crossed to the table under the window. A bottle of whisky stood there, and he splashed some into a cup and swallowed it. He stared out the window at the street below.

  “Bibiana has had five husbands in the seven years I’ve been with her. Every one of them had pretty daughters or sisters. There were more, many more before those men. In all those years, she’s never changed. Her face remains unlined, untouched by time. Old Terza gets more wrinkled and crooked each year, but they continue on together.”

  He set the cup down and turned to look at her. “I don’t know what’s in the potion. A good man might. He’d care. I make it my business to look away. I’m her sealgair, only that. I bring her the birds she prefers, and Terza prepares them. I am careful not to shoot them through the heart because it drains away too much blood. She wants them to suffer, says fear makes the meat sweeter. I lie. I shoot them cleanly when I can, kill them instantly.”

  Laire shivered, but he went on. “She uses the feathers. You saw that. She makes collars and coats and fans for the lasses—whole gowns sometimes, and the girls grow more and more like birds, singing at night, sleeping by day, startling and ruffling easily, until they are more bird than woman. Bibiana’s favorite birds are the ones that nest early in the spring—thrushes and robins and tits. They are the sweetest. And young lasses, well fed on the potion—they bloom in the spring as well, become ripe and ready.”

  Laire felt horror creep over her like hoarfrost.

  “One by one, your sisters will disappear. I’ve seen it happen with other girls in other places. Bibiana stays for a winter and a spring, never longer. Then she flies away. “

  “How?” Laire insisted, moving toward him. “How does she do it?”

  He shook his head. He looked her in the eye, his gaze fierce, raw.

  “And my father?” she asked.

  “He’ll live. He’ll be a shell of the man ye knew, broken in spirit and mind. He’ll be dependent on the potion, crave it. Living without it will drive him mad. He’ll forget ye, Laire, remember nothing in the end.”

  She made a sound of grief, swayed on her feet, and he caught her shoulders. His touch was gentle, but she pushed his hands away, moved out of reach.

  “Why?” she asked. “Why do you serve her? You are not that kind of—”

  “I am exactly that kind of man,” he said harshly. “I swore an oath to serve her in payment of a debt that could be satisfied no other way.” He sagged a little, the anger gone as quickly as it had come. He ran his hand through his hair, paced the floor.

  “Tell me,” she said.

  He laughed harshly. “Do ye really want to know? It’s an ugly, shameful tale.” His eyes were pools of pain and horror, but she nodded. His mouth twisted bitterly, and he looked away. She thought he wouldn’t tell her, that the sin and the scars of it were too raw, too deep to expose. He sat down on the edge of the bed, his elbows on his knees, his eyes on the floor. She waited.

  “I was like you once. I wanted to help someone I loved, help myself. I failed. Have you considered what the cost will be to you if you fail?”

  “I will lose everything I love,” she said bluntly. “But it hasn’t come to that yet. There’s still time.”

  She touched his shoulder. “I came to find my uncle. I thought he’d help me save them. But he won’t. Only you can.”

  He rose, shook her off, and backed away like a cornered wolf. “Damn ye. I couldn’t save my own wife. She died, and it was my fault. That’s why I am Bibiana’s servant, bound to her for seven years. Because I asked her for a potion—a love potion.”

  She stared at him, her heart in her throat, her belly tight. He turned away from her.

  “Tell me,” she whispered again. He met her eyes, scanned her face. She held his gaze, fiercely. “What was her name?”

  “Mairi.” The word was rough, bitter.

  “Did you love her?” she asked, bracing herself.


  He looked upward. “I thought I did. I knew her from the time we were children, and it was assumed that we’d wed when we were grown. When we did, I thought I was happy. I’d seen the way my brother David looked at her, you see, how he wanted her, but she was mine.” He clenched his fist. “I didn’t see the way she looked at him. I was so cocky, so sure I’d won.

  “She was unhappy, but I didn’t see it. She cried at night. I didn’t understand, didn’t know why. I didn’t ask. Instead I gave her jewels and gowns. When she told me she was with child, I thought a bairn would make her happy, make everything right. But she told me the babe wasn’t mine. It was David’s. She loved him, begged me to let her go to him.”

  Laire felt her heart climb into her throat, saw the pain in his eyes, felt it in her own breast. “What did you do?”

  He laughed without humor. “I refused, told her I’d claim the child as my own and never let her see David again. I took my pregnant wife to Paris, away from my brother.” He rubbed his hand over his mouth. “That’s where I met Bibiana. She was dazzling, lovely, a good listener to a man with all the sorrows in the world on his plate. She said she could give me a potion that would make Mairi love me. She did warn me that it came with a high price.” He shut his eyes. “I didn’t care. I thought I loved her, but it wasn’t love I felt. It was something twisted—hatred for my brother, perhaps. Competition. Mairi was just caught between us.”

  Laire waited for him to continue. He swallowed as he fought his emotions. He stood with his back against the wall, his hands in his pockets.

  “I told Bibiana aye, that I wanted the potion, that I’d pay anything. I let Mairi drink it, watched her drain the cup to the dregs.”

  He stared into the air as if he could see it all, his eyes dark with grief and guilt. Laire felt her belly curl with dread.

  “She woke in the night, screaming. The potion brought on the child too early, and Mairi died in my arms. And David—David came all the way to Paris to fight me for her. He walked into our lodgings just as Mairi breathed her last. He thought I’d killed her, murdered her in cold blood. Then Bibiana arrived, demanded her fee.” His mouth twisted bitterly. “She wanted the child. I told her it had been born dead, so she insisted on another payment. Me—my servitude for seven years. I didn’t care where I went or what I did, so I agreed. I sold my soul and the life of an innocent lass—” He clenched his fists, ground them into his eyes. “My wife, the woman I was supposed to love and protect! I sold her life, sold my own soul to a witch because I had to win over my brother.”

  He opened his eyes and stared at her—wild, crazed. Laire read self-loathing and torment in the gray depths. “That’s why I can’t help you, how I know you cannot save them,” he said through gritted teeth.

  Laire was silent. He hit the wall with his fist. “Now will you run? Go, Laire. Leave. Run.”

  Instead she crossed the room. She put her arms around his waist, and laid her head on his chest. His heart pounded under her cheek. For a long moment he made no move to hold her.

  Then his arms came around her, and he pulled her close, hugged her fiercely. “Christ, lass . . .”

  She placed the palm of her hand over his heart. She stood on her toes and pressed her lips to his, once, twice, three times, soft pecks against his resistance until he groaned and kissed her back. He held her face in his hands, angled her head to deepen the kiss, stroking her tongue with his. He tasted of whisky, and she felt the kiss all the way to her toes, a flush of heat that flowed through her. Could someone get drunk on a kiss?

  She sighed, felt her body turn to warm butter and mold itself to his. Her breasts rested deliciously against the hard, naked muscles of his chest, and she felt the jut of his arousal against her belly. When he tried to pull back, she slid her hands around his neck, tangled them in his hair, and held him. He made a ragged sound of desire, or despair, and she felt his body tremble against hers.

  He gripped her shoulders, pushed her away, but he didn’t let go. He held her at arm’s length. She stared up at him. She wanted him, wanted this, a moment between them, comfort and passion and peace, the rest of the world and all the sins and torments forgotten, just for now.

  “Why, Laire. Why me? Is this a bribe, some kind of payment for my services?”

  She shook her head. “No, Iain. I simply want . . .” The words would take too long to say. She didn’t want to talk.

  She held his eyes as she undid the pin that held her cloak and let the garment fall. She began to unlace the front of her gown. She willed him not to stop her, or send her away. He stood still, watched her.

  She let her gown drop to the floor on top of the cloak. She stood before him wearing only her shift and stockings and shoes. She began to fumble with the ribbons that tied her chemise. His fingers covered hers and took over the task. When the ribbon was loose, he slid the straps off her shoulders, caressing her bare flesh as the garment slid away. She stood naked before him, and his eyes roamed over her, full of heat. “You’re beautiful, lass.”

  She put her hand on his chest, traced the little scars of a manly life. He let her explore. He put his hand on her waist, held her lightly. He lifted her chin with the other hand, pulled her close until her breasts rested on the naked planes of his chest, flesh on flesh, heart upon heart. He brought his mouth back to hers, kissed her until the room spun and desire pooled in her belly, hot and sweet.

  God help me, he thought as he gave in to temptation, to the scent of her, the desire in her eyes, the soft sound of her sighs, the silken heat of her skin against his. She was so soft. She fit against him perfectly. He kissed her gently, sure she’d change her mind and pull away, but this was Laire—bold, brave, exquisite Laire. She sighed and kissed him back. She let her head fall back, giving him access to the sensitive place under her ear, and gasped when his tongue found the pulse point at her throat.

  He cupped the fullness of her breast, ran his thumb gently over her nipple.

  “Tell me to stop,” he growled.

  She shook her head, made an incoherent sound and tightened her hands on his shoulders. He trailed his mouth along the upper slopes of her breasts and flicked his tongue over her swollen nipple. She arched her back, cupped his head in her hands, held him to her.

  The soft sounds of need she made shot straight to his cock, drove him mad. He forced himself to go slow, sure she’d change her mind, realize what he was . . .

  “Touch me,” she pleaded when he took his mouth away.

  “Where?” he asked, his voice thick as honey.

  “Everywhere.” She moved her hips restlessly against his.

  “Tell me what you want,” he whispered against her mouth.

  “Everything,” she said. “All of you. Every part. Don’t stop.”

  He scooped her up, carried her to the bed and laid her down. He unfastened his breeches, peeled them off, tossed them away.

  She lay on the pillow and watched him, her incredible eyes roaming over him. “Oh,” she sighed. “Oh.” She held out her arms to him, and he tumbled into her embrace, pulled her under him, kissed her. Slowly, he warned himself. She was innocent and untried. But she was beautiful, and it had been a very long time . . . or never, perhaps. This was new—this was love, not sex. He recognized that, felt the danger of it, but he wanted her and this moment between them.

  She reveled in the feel of him—his erection hard against her belly, the pebbles of his nipples as they brushed her own, the silk of his skin over muscles like solid oak. He was hairy where she was smooth, hard where she was soft . . . He murmured Gaelic endearments in her ear, and his hands roamed over every inch of her, leaving trails of fire and ice. She gasped as his fingers dipped between her thighs and slipped into the wet heat of her body. His fingers teased, stroked, urged. He wanted . . . or was it she that wanted it? The wave of sensation surprised her when it came. Her body pulsed. She cried out, and he kissed her, caught the sounds she made with his mouth.

  He positioned himself between her thighs, He hesitate
d, and she could see the question in his eyes, the strain on his face.

  She looked back at him, sure. “I want this,” she said.

  With a groan he filled her in one powerful thrust, and she gasped in surprise at the small, sharp pain that shot through her. He held still, his eyes on hers, and let her grow accustomed to him, to his body inside her own. He stroked her hair, whispered sweet, soft things. He was so hot, so hard. She shifted her hips, and he let out the breath he’d been holding. His eyes drifted shut, and the muscles of his jaw corded. He withdrew, and drove into her again. He moved against her, filled her, over and over again. She dug her nails into his back, felt the rush of desire rise, and threw her head back as sensation overwhelmed her again. She felt him thrust into her, once, twice, and then his body arched over hers as he found his release.

  Iain marveled at the feel of her in his arms. She lay with her head on his chest, curled against him, safe, soft and warm against his heart. This is what he’d wanted, what he’d longed for with Mairi—comfort and pleasure and pillow talk on a winter’s night.

  “Is the portrait of the lady in the other room your wife—your Mairi?”

  He tensed. Not his Mairi. She’d never really been his Mairi . . . “Aye,” he said. This was not the kind of pillow talk he wanted. He eased her away gently and got up, reached for his breeches, pulled them on.

  She propped herself up on one elbow and smiled at him, contented as a cat. He felt a moment of pure masculine pride at her satisfaction. “This is what my uncle meant . . . the desire, the wanting, love. He said love made a person act drunk and daft. He said it was what I’d feel when I found the person I was meant to be with.”

  “It’s not love, lass. Not with me. Ye deserve better than me. This was only a bedding. A very, very good bedding, but no more than that.” He refrained from looking at her, afraid she’s read the lie in his eyes.