Highland Song

by Young, Christine

  Lainie could only dream. She knew he would leaver her at the MacPherson castle then ride off into the sunset without looking back.

  She turned to him, her own hunger mercuric. "Kiss me, Englishman," she whispered. "Kiss me so I'll never forget you."

  There was a moment of surprised silence then Slade laughed. "You don't have to ask me twice." He gave her a long, deep kiss. It was a kiss that explored and tasted every part of her.

  She met him move for move, longing for the moment to last forever. When the sensation of his mouth on hers vanished, Lainie watched Slade. With a gentle smile, he offered her the food he'd set on the blanket. She accepted it graciously.

  "What will Bertram do?" Lainie asked.

  "About what?"

  "When he finds out you're not taking me to Edinburgh," she said, touching his arm.

  Slade shrugged. "He won't let me resign my commission. I'm sure of that. He can't do anything else. The charges he has against you are false. If he pushes this, it will hurt his career more than mine."

  "Can you prove the charges are false?"

  "I don't have to. He makes a mockery of justice."

  "Isn't there some penalty for trumped up charges?" she asked.

  Slade laughed aloud, hugged Lainie hard and quick. "Not in a corrupt system."

  "There should be," Lainie muttered.

  Slade stretched out on the bedroll his hands behind his head. Then he patted a place by his side. "Come look at the stars with me."

  She watched him for a moment, and did as he bade. The trees made a kind of tunnel to the stars. They were bright and twinkling with light.

  "They're beautiful, Slade." She smiled as she spoke.

  "Not as beautiful as you," he said.

  Slade sat up slightly leaning on one elbow and looking at her. The he kissed the corner of her smile.

  Lainie watched him with sensual memories in her mind and a hungry yearning in the pit of her stomach. Almost as if he didn't trust himself looking at her, he turned Lainie until she faced forward with her back to him. She sat between his legs.

  Her hips pressed intimately against his thighs. She recalled another time he'd sat with her in this same position. She'd almost given herself to him that night.

  Almost.

  She felt him harden in a rush that made her burn.

  "Slade," her voice wavered.

  Long fingers wrapped around her thighs. He pulled her close against him then released her with a whispered word that shook Lainie. She had not thought that simple contact would leave her aching.

  Slade rose in a swift movement. He stood close enough to Lainie that she still felt his heat as plainly as she had felt the heat of his thighs against her own. Her nerves were stripped raw.

  A quick glance told Lainie she had indeed been right. Once, Slade's bold arousal would have embarrassed or unnerved her. Now it simply made heat splinter delicately through her. She remembered what it had felt like to give herself to Slade's raw power and heady sensuality. She hungered for him again with an elemental need that was still new to her.

  Slade's easy expression and banter vanished. "I'm going to take a look around. I don't know when I'll be back."

  "Slade?" she asked, understanding that in some way, she had caused this hasty need to leave.

  "Best you get some sleep. The ride tomorrow will be long and hard. I don't like the dark circles around your eyes."

  Before she could speak, he vanished into the black velvet of the night, leaving Lainie with a vague sense of uneasiness she didn't like or understand. She lay back on the bedroll, alone and stared at the evening stars.

  One of the hobbled horses snorted, interrupting Lainie's dismal feelings. She pulled her jacket, which she was using as a pillow closer to her head, blaming her wakefulness on the hard, lumpy ground rather than on her disturbed thoughts and fears that she had somehow pushed Slade away.

  The ground had always been hard and she'd never had trouble sleeping until now. Plumping her makeshift pillow and turning over didn't make the ground softer, nor did it make her morose thoughts vanish. All she managed to do was get a better view of the trees, and the blackness where Slade had vanished as if something had swallowed him whole.

  Just when she began to think she understood the man and that he was beginning to respect her, he turned full circle, baffling her. This afternoon had been easy and carefree but moments after they stopped, he acted as if he thought her the little tease he had so often called her. Her breath rushed out in a long distraught sigh.

  Without a sound, he walked into the clearing, appearing as mysteriously as he'd vanished. His strong, broad-shoulders were silhouetted against the darkness of the trees. Her breath caught in the back of her throat.

  "Slade," she began in a whisper but then thought again. She didn't want to intrude.

  When she blinked, he'd turned and was watching her. She wanted to ask him where he'd been and what he'd seen. She wondered too, if he'd seen anyone who might be looking for them. And if he knew, she was watching him just as intently as he seemed to be looking at her.

  Then he spoke to her.

  "You should be sleeping," Slade said in a low, husky voice.

  "The ground is too hard," she muttered, wondering if he'd believe her lame excuse.

  I couldn't sleep because I was worried about you and where you'd gone.

  He walked over and sat on his haunches next to her bedroll. "I can't do anything about the hard ground." His hands were clasped in front of him. He reached and swept a strand of hair away from her face.

  "I know," she told him. Her body thrummed with the need to have him touch her, to kiss her. But she didn't think he would. Something had happened today to change everything.

  "Why aren't you sleeping?" she asked, unable to think of anything else. "And where did you go?

  Slade's smile flashed faintly in the starlight. "Been thinking."

  "So have I," she said, regretting her words. She didn't want to give him an excuse to probe into her thoughts or her fears. She didn't want him to know that she'd fallen in love with him.

  "Are you worried about Jericho?"

  "No, I'm more worried about your brothers. But not enough to keep from sleeping." He inhaled deeply, watching her.

  "Then what's keeping you awake?" she asked, reaching out to touch his arm.

  "You." He moved away from her fingers.

  Lainie sat up. Watching Slade through the dim light she wondered what expression he would have if she could see his face more clearly. Would it be the grim man she first met, or the easy carefree man who she'd just spent the day with?

  "I tried not to make any noise," she told him sardonically.

  He laughed. "No, I could hardly tell you were awake you were so still. Perhaps it would have been better if you'd been asleep."

  Lainie waited, watching him, hoping the Slade of today would plop down beside her and start teasing her again.

  "Then--" she began but he placed a finger on her lips stopping her.

  "Little darling, every time you move," Slade said, "I start remembering and thinking--I told you I'd been thinking--how warm it must be under your blankets. Then I think it would be nice if I were there with you, exploring places I haven't touched yet."

  She coughed. "I can't think of anywhere you haven't touched."

  "I'd like to find out."

  "I didn't think you wanted…" Lainie's voice faded.

  "You?" Slade asked.

  "Aye. You didn't so much as look at me or give me any indication that you wanted me. And I wanted you so much--I was afraid."

  "I didn't dare look at you, Lainie. I was terrified."

  "Afraid of what? That I would say no? I'm not a tease. Why does that thought make you so grim and unapproachable?"

  Slade let out his breath in a stifled curse.

  "There isn't a woman alive who has ever made me feel the way you do. Not even the little witch I thought I'd fallen in love with years ago," he said raggedly.

 
"You don't like the way I make you feel?" she asked, truly confused yet there was a memory in the back of her head, something he'd told her the first time he'd tried to make love to her.

  "Not one damn bit."

  "I would never hurt you. I lov--" Lainie corrected herself instantly, not wanting to give her innermost thoughts to a cynical man who would never love her, "I want you to much to hold out my favors, then refuse to let you make love to me. I would never do that. You’ve taught me well, Aaron Slade."

  She held the blankets aside in silent invitation.

  Slade shook his head seeming to deny her. "We're both too tired for a romp in your blankets," Slade said in a curt voice. "Tomorrow will be just as hard on you as today. I should have enough self-control to let you have a good nights sleep."

  "I don't want you to have control," Lainie said. "I want you to make love to me then hold me through the night. I want to feel alive again."

  "Lainie," Slade whispered, trying and failing to control the crazy burst of fire that had overcome him when she spoke.

  He knelt down beside her with a soundless groan of passion and desire then he stretched out beside her, pulling her into his arms in one lithe motion. When she bracketed his face with her hands, she felt the trembling in her fingers and was amazed at the intensity and honesty of her reaction to him.

  "I don't want to hurt you," he said hoarsely. "I want you so much, and you were so tight and so small…"

  "I'll be fine." Lainie interrupted.

  Lainie moved her head, fluttering kisses on his lips and his chin while he inhaled her scent and wondered again how this delicate woman could have so much power over him.

  "You burn me, darling."

  He took control of the kiss, demanding her sweet surrender and found that he surrendered instead. The heat of the kiss raced though him, and went straight to his head just like fine French brandy. He inhaled the satin warmth of her mouth with intense, deep movements of his tongue, exploring and caressing, needing Lainie with a fierceness that was like nothing he had ever known before. She was a fire in his soul.

  "Then we will go up in flames together," Lainie said.

  Slade tried to slow down the molten hot inferno rushing between them and had been gnawing at him for hours on end, but self-control kept vanishing like landmarks in the dense highland mist.

  When Slade finally forced himself to pull away from the kiss, he was totally, agonizingly aroused. He braced himself on his elbows and closed his eyes, battling for control that for the first time since his first encounter with a woman eluded him.

  Lainie touched his chin with her fingertip and the innocent moistening of her lips made him desperate to have her. The air surrounding him was filled with the scent of roses and Lainie's secret warmth.

  "I hope you need me half as much as that kiss suggested," he said in a tight ragged voice. "There's a storm brewing inside me and I'm not sure if I can stop it."

  Lainie nodded and touched his hand. Her fingers were small, delicate. What she was doing stole his breath. As her hand closed around his, she slowly moved it to her breasts. Slade's breath caught in the back of his throat when he felt her nipple hardening into a tight little bud at his touch. "The storm is inside me too. Do you feel it?"

  He nodded. "I wish the trees weren't so thick and the moonlight could shine through. I want to watch you."

  "Why?"

  Slade was too eaten up with raw hunger to answer. He bent and caught the tip of Lainie's breast between his lips, then pulled it deep into his mouth, tugging on her, lingering then nipping gently.

  Her soft cries were music to Slade's ears. The throaty sound in the back of her throat pushed him farther over the precipice he fought to stay on. His hands slid beneath her, holding her while he fed on the tender skin she had offered him. He seduced and shaped her breasts with his lips and teeth and tongue until they were full, flushed and crowned by nipples that stood up hungrily against the sheer fabric of her shirt.

  Slade raised his head and looked at the proof of Lainie's desire. The sight did nothing to cool the savage hunger of his body.

  "That's why I wish for moonlight," he said huskily. "I want to see the pink buds swelling on top of your breasts."

  He laughed softly as he felt the wave of heat climb up Lainie's body at his words.

  "And the rose color that paints your cheeks when I talk about what I'm going to do to you," Slade said. "I like to watch that too. I want to see all of you as clearly as the sun at noon would show me. But the darkness hides you from me. Even the fire has burned so low it cast no light upon you."

  Lainie made a sound that was half laughter half embarrassment.

  "I am so amazed at your innocent passion." Grinning he leaned over and captured between his teeth one of the laces that held her shirt together. With quick motions of his mouth, he tugged until the strings came undone.

  "Take off your clothes, little darling. I want to see and taste and explore all of you."

  Slade felt the shudder that ripped through Lainie as plainly as she did. "I want to see you too," she countered. "You take off your clothes."

  He ignored her proposal. "I could do it. Strip you naked," he said softly, "but then I'd have to stop touching you. I can't do that. So take your clothes off for me."

  "I'd rather take your clothes off you," she said.

  He flexed his fingers and tightened his arms, deepening the arch of Lainie's back until her nipples just brushed against his cheek. His smile came from the inside out as he watched her shiver and arch impatiently, in quest of a more intense caress.

  "Lainie," Slade said urgently. "All delicate and fragile. Undress for me. Undress now or I think I will surely burst."

  Please, want me as much as I want you.

  Slade didn't wait for Lainie to take her clothes off, he kissed her breast, her throat, her lips, taking tiny bites of her in between each nuzzling caress. He moved just enough to let her slip free from her shirt and then continued with his urgent explorations while she wiggled and tried to get her breeches off.

  "Don't stop. This time when I make love to you, I don't want one stitch of cloth to come between us."

  With fingers that shook from the intensity of his words, Lainie undid her pants and pushed them down her legs until she was the way Slade wanted her. Her flesh caught what there was of the moonlight and shone like cream-colored roses.

  "Do you have thorns, little darling?" he asked. Ah, but he knew all women had thorns that could rip away a man's hide. But he didn't care. He wanted Lainie too much to care.

  He pushed back so that he could see her. All day he'd envisioned this moment. Lainie, lying naked, with moonlight dancing around her and on her. All day he'd remembered what it felt like to be buried deep inside her and feel the heat of her passion.

  "You're beautiful," Slade whispered. "So very beautiful you'd put Venus to shame."

  She slipped her hands beneath his shirt and pushed it up and over his head.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Slade lowered himself against her, reveling in the feel of flesh against flesh. She shuddered and cried out as his caress left her arching into him once again. When the tip of his tongue fenced with her taut nipples, she arched again and moaned softly. He wanted her now.

  Slade gave Lainie what she asked for, his lips both caressing and demanding, his fingers exploring the length of her body, searching for the sultry, delicate flesh that lay hidden between her legs. When he discovered her and caressed her very lightly, she cried out.

  Slade stiffened, concern for Lainie clouding the moment. He withdrew. The memory of all the pain he'd caused her haunted him. He gritted his teeth against the ache of needing her but not having her.

  "I'm sorry," Slade said. "I didn't mean to cause you pain again."

  "You didn't," she whispered. "Please Slade."

  "You cried out," he continued, determined to make sure she wanted him as much as he needed her.

  Lainie touched his chest with hands that shook. Her
eyes were wide and the sight nearly made his heart brake.

  "I know," she told him her voice husky.

  "You know?" he queried, confused. "Answer my question."

  "What question was that?' she asked.

  "Did I hurt you?"

  Lainie shook her head, her hands still shaking. "Nay." Lainie stroked Slade, "I like the way you feel," she said. "Please don't stop."