‘Twas quite some time before her sobs dwindled and finally quieted. Ram reached back and dragged over the heaping tray of food before he filled a large silver goblet with rich red wine. Then, as much to give himself something else to think of besides how her arse felt nestled against his erection, Ram took a sip.
“Don’t I get a cup too?” Rose asked, having picked up her face to watch him arrange the food.
Ram shook his head no.
“But what if I’m thirsty?” Rose asked.
“We share,” Ram said.
She held out her hand for the cup but again Ram shook his head no. Instead of speaking, he held the cup to her, tilting it just a bit too much. When he raised the goblet, a thin stream of sweet red trickled from her lips. Ram leaned down to lick it away just as she flicked out her tongue to catch it. They dueled over the errant drop, sharing it and rendering it all the more enticing, too enticing.
Ram drew back, looking at Rose with a mixture of awe and respect. “Damnation, lass, but ye’re dangerous.”
“Me?” Rose protested. “You’re the one tracked by admiring wenches who flirt, tempt and proposition.”
“Mayhaps, I’ve nae been propositioned by the right wench,” Ram said, as he raised a strip of ham to her lips. He slid it in to feed it to her slowly, one succulent pink bit at a time.
Watching with sparkling dark eyes, Ram envied each morsel of meat that slid between her trembling lips. Rose chewed slowly, bathed in a hot fire that didn’t make swallowing a simple task. As the meat slid down her throat, Ram tore off another strip, raising it to her lips as he said, “This puts me in mind of another bit of pink flesh, lass.”
She choked on the ham and Ram raised the goblet, again tilting it a bit too much before he raised it and reached down to catch the dangling red drop with generous swipes of his tongue.
When she swallowed, she reached out her hand for the slice of and tore off a long pink strip. As she raised it to his lips, his comparison of a moment ago filled the air between them. It set his heart and his head to pounding, but with what, he couldn’t say, for all the blood in his body rushed to his loins in such a torrent that it left him lightheaded.
Did she, too, consider that she offered much more than ham? He studied her face. It told him that she knew what she offered–or knew as well as a virgin could, mayhaps. As badly as he wanted to bite the ham, ‘twould be a lie of the worst sort when his future remained so uncertain. So instead, he said, gently, “I can feed myself, lass.”
Rose understood. Through the dull roar in her ears, she understood. “I can as well, my lord.”
‘Twas as though everything rested in the balance of the moment. Rose took a deep breath and moved her now-trembling hand holding the sliver backwards, towards her mouth. Honor compelled him to leave her be–but he saw so much more than ham vanishing. And in the end, he reacted without counting the cost.
His hand swung faster than it ever had with a sword.
Rose started and emitted a wee squeal when he grabbed her forearm. Yes, with a squeal she started–and she’d have sworn she never squealed. But she didn’t even see his hand move, ‘twas a blur and then a grip harder than her heartbeat.
“When I said I could feed myself,” Ram said, “I spoke too quickly. I should have said that once upon a time I could have fed myself. Now, I fear, that time may have passed. As laird, for the good of my clan, I should decide otherwise but somehow, with you, I can be no more than a man. Will you extend your succulent offering again, lass?”
Now she held the ham between them uncertainly, a sliver of pink, trembling and threatening to vanish. Ram watched her eyes and he saw the second that she recalled her foolish guilt over thrusting herself into his life and decided to retreat. It was what the laird wanted, but ‘twasn’t something the man could allow. Reacting with a grunt, Ram leaned forward, opened his mouth and bit the ham — at the same instant that she raised it to her lips and took a bite.
Their wide eyes met and held as they nibbled the sumptuous pink flesh, sharing the moment as surely as they shared the invisible force binding them tighter. The tiniest morsel of pink remained grasped between Rose’s fingers. Unable to look away or even blink, Ram extended his tongue to curl around the meat, swallowing it without chewing, compelled to haste by the compulsion that sent his palms to frame her face. He moved his lips the scant space to take hers, and the world exploded as surely as he had known it must.
He invaded with tenderness but without hesitation, tasting the cinnamon and the musk through the scent, the aroma–the bloody taste of roses that pervaded her essence. But he sought that secret flavor that was all of that and none of it. When he found it, his groan echoed round the cavern.
She tasted his hunger and it inspired hers. She answered his groan with a frustrated growl as her need dropped to her nipples, making them pound. She squirmed on his lap, atop the growing girth of his manhood, with enough force to make him lift his mouth and rasp out a question.
“Rose?” Ram thought it a profound inquiry, given the scrambled state of his present thoughts and urges.
She bared her teeth and hissed at him–which could be a very good or a very bad thing. He should know this. Damn it, he did know this–it was good, very good. He was almost positive. With most women he’d say something smart-arsed, teasing about how much she liked it and how badly she needed it–and him. He might even refuse to touch her again until she begged. Aye, he might do that because unlike most men, he was a laird and a warrior, gifted with supreme confidence and able to make a decision and act upon it in an instant. His life depended upon that gift. His clan’s lives depended upon it.
Rose wasn’t most women but she turned him into most men–uncertain and a little fearful. Fearful? Yes. In the wake of her re-living the memory of her attack and near rape at the hands of the Jackal, Ram feared that her response could be born of desperation, in addition to the desire that must be there. Had to be there. He wanted her, needed her, so much and in so many ways that he couldn’t let himself think it possible that she didn’t honestly want him–at least a little. If he believed that for an instant he’d go mad and howl at the sun until the moon appeared to stand duty.
“Rose,” he groaned against her lips and into her mouth when her lips parted. He said it again and again. It seemed to be the only word that mattered. He’d have stayed there forever, saying her name and tasting it on her lips, had she not wiggled. Deliberately. Apurpose.
“You want me,” she said, against his lips, squirming again to nudge the thick length lying against her, throbbing and growing with her wiggles until its woolen-encased length butted her silk-encased belly.
He drew his mouth back, slightly, ever so slightly. “Aye,” he growled. The laird was able to lie well enough to make another’s truth appear to be a sham. He found himself incapable of lying to her. “Aye,” he growled again.
She braced a hand on his bare thigh to help her sit up in his lap. ‘Twas a heartbeat before they realized, at the same instant, how high on his bare thigh her hand rested. Her intent lit golden fire in her eyes before her hand moved. He could’ve stopped her with a word but could say only her name and ‘aye.’ Ram knew that saying either of those things would be idiotic. He didn’t recall that none of his blood was headed towards his brain until he proved himself a supreme idiot by saying both. “Rose, aye, Rose, aye.”
Before he could form the hope that her maiden’s shyness would halt her boldly meandering hand from wandering that far–it did. She wrapped her hand around the base of the ravening beast between his legs and removed his two word vocabulary with one gentle squeeze.
The intonations of his thick, multi-syllabic grunt didn’t convey his urgent messages–more, harder, higher, now, right now. Or, if they did, she ignored him and did the opposite, releasing her tenuous hold. She addressed his beast instead, expressing her fascination–in the kind of cute babble the lasses used to a bairn.
He made a demand for proper respect, if not the awe, admira
tion and anticipation generally gushed by lasses upon their introduction to the beast. And he let her know in absolute terms that talking to beast like a bairn was completely unacceptable. Of course, his stern lecture emerged as a short, staccato grunt that turned into a groan of protest, encouragement or both at the antics of her finger.
First, her bairn babble turned to his “giant beanstalk.” Why, Ram must’ve eaten some of those “magic beans.” But that mean, nasty Jack won’t be climbing this beanstalk, now, will he? “No he won’t. No, no, he won’t.” That was so wrong on so many levels. Normally, Ram would recall what all those levels were, but just now, all he could do was groan and thrust as Rose’s index finger began tracing the ‘beanstalk’ all the way up to its “giant root.”
Ram was panting, thrusting his fearchas towards her hand, concentrating so hard on grunting out sounds that were no longer language but still demanded the return of her hand. He was concentrating so hard that he missed exactly what Rose muttered. ‘Twas something about wanting some “magic beans” herself and wondering if she might be able to–wait–did she say, “swallow them right from the root?”
She must’ve because his bold, curious, inquisitive, imaginative lass bent down and down. Her tongue–her lovely, luscious, pinkish brown tongue flicked out and she wagged it, teasing him. She’d nae have done it, surely, had she known how he teetered on the verge of turning into Jack, beanstalk or no. His desire passed pain back when she wiggled on his lap. It turned into torture when her hand meandered up his thigh. Her touch taught him how Satan’s demons endured the torments of Hell for eternity. The luxurious pleasure of it would have held him poised on the sword tip of destruction until time no longer existed.
But her tongue? That was something else. ‘Twas something altogether different. If that tongue touched his fearchas Ram would break. He could take that because he was, after all, only a man. That was part of the reason he could take breaking, but ‘twas also the reason he feared she couldn’t take his breaking. He was only a man and when a man broke in this way, for this reason– he became what his aroused fearchas always was: a beast.
Rose suffered a savage attack at the hands of one betrothed. The last thing she needed was to suffer a beastly attack by another betrothed. Another betrothed? No, that was wrong. He was – It took a while. Bold she was but the rapid pace of her descent slowed enough that if he hadn’t been lost he could’ve stopped her. He should’ve stopped her but in truth–he didn’t want to. He wanted this excuse to allow him to face the truth that must rule his future. He wanted – Her tongue reached the stiff, strained, throbbing head of his manhood. Her swooping dive at the end did him in. It wafted her scent straight to him–that mixture of roses, cinnamon and musk peculiar to her alone. When her tongue touched his anguished organ as her smell surrounded him, he was struck by liquid lightning. ‘Twas too much for his frenzied senses.
Her name emerged in a warrior’s shout that echoed around the cavern as Ram clenched too late to halt a single dollop of ecstasy that emerged against her tongue.
“What did I do?” Rose asked, dropping his fearchas. “Did I hurt you?”
By the time she managed the second question Rose lay flat on her back with Ram atop her, his lower half melded to hers and his upper half supported on his forearms. She had no memory of him picking her up or moving her, but he must have. She was stuck on his reaction to her boldness. She’d hurt him somehow because he perched and panted above her with his features drawn tight. “I do apologize, and–“
“No,” Ram said, managing a word, albeit, a short one, that was not her name. He grimaced, concentrated and tried for a more impressive one. “Wait.”
After another minute or two, he realized how tense she looked, albeit, for an entirely different reason. It loosed the chains on his voice and he said, “Oh, sweets, no. This won’t do. It willna do a’tall.”
Ram lowered his face, warning her as he did. “I shouldna’ do this, lass. I’m so close to the edge that I’m dangling. The slightest thing may push me over.” Against her lips, he finished his words. “And this is much more than slight.”
He pressed his lips to hers, softly, very softly. Fighting the urge to pound his lips into hers, to invade her mouth’s inner sanctum, Ram used his formidable willpower to keep the kiss tender when every fiber of his being willed it otherwise. When he lifted his lips and looked down at her moments later, she was rosy and flushed.
But, apparently, she remained a wee bit troubled. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“You didn’t,” he said, smiling internally for he didn’t dare risk moving anything external. “I’m trying to restrain myself so that I don’t turn into your former fiancée, the Jackal.”
“If you’re betrothed to Flora, Jack may be my present betrothed,” Rose said, pausing before she added, “but you’re nothing like him,” Rose insisted. “Nothing. Do you hear me?”
She was so strong, so courageous to imagine herself returning to her former life, and so very foolish to think he’d ever allow that. “I would like to make it impossible for the Jackal to be your present betrothed. Do you hear me?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Rose replied.
Ram flexed his hips. “You should be able to feel what I mean.” He flexed his hips again. “Feel how badly I want you, how much I want you. My need for you is stronger than my will. I want to make love to you–right here, right now. But I dinna want to take you like a Jackal. I dinna want to take you a’tall. And I dinna want you as a gift for you’re not a package to be opened, played with and discarded. I want us to share each other in a way that only begins with our bodies.”
Ram leaned down, lowering his face bit by bit until he knew that he filled her full range of vision because she filled his. And he asked when his nature urged him to demand. “Shall we share ourselves, sweets?”
In answer, she reached for his neck, trying to draw his lips down the scant space to meet hers. His lips would like nothing more but he was holding onto his gentleman’s mask by the barest of grips. The slightest touch would rip it away, revealing the real man, the beastly primitive ready to invade, seize and conquer. He resisted her tug and paid her the tribute of the truth.
“No,” he said. “Not kisses. Not a gesture. A word. One word. Yes or no.”
He’d respect her decision, he promised himself. All the while, waiting for seconds that passed like centuries, he hoped to hell and back that he would, that he could respect her decision.
When the word emerged from her lips he remained still for a moment, fearing that he wanted it–needed it so much that he’d imagined it. But she repeated it, saying the sweetest thing that had ever been said.
“Yes,” she said, thrusting up against him, answering the call of his manhood in a method as old as time and as primitive as desire. ‘Yes, Ram.”
“Thank you, God,” Ram mumbled, the brief and heartfelt prayer his first since childhood. He didn’t finish it aloud. Only his nigh uncontrollable desire and his fomenting waves of tenderness heard his request that the creator make him strong enough to introduce her to physical love with consideration and caring. She wasn’t experienced enough to appreciate the effort it took for him to undress them slowly, taking time for tender torment between each garment, making sure she wanted each step.
But afterwards, when they lay bare and pink and panting, the dancing candlelight caught the barest shimmer of moisture in his eyes. That told her enough to kindle her courage to ask a question. “I suspect that it doesn’t always feel like this but I’ve no way to know. Was this special?”
“My curious little love,” Ram said, too exhausted to do more than pant, “this is quite special. I’ve joined bodies afore, but I’ve nae joined lives.”
In answer, Rose leaned over and kissed the left side of Ram’s chest, a caress he felt all the way to the organ that–despite his best efforts and his clan’s best interests–now beat for her alone. He opened his mouth to tell her that but her sweet gesture turned naught
y as her mouth slid over to surround his nipple. And he forgot everything except the magic they made together.
When they shed the blinding light and binding warmth of the second afterglow, Ram realized he still hadn’t made his intentions plain. He shouldn’t delay a moment longer. Yes he should. He had to consider whether he should get on his knees. No. His knee. One knee. Never two. Two meant begging and he’d nae beg for anything, nor would any Highlander worthy to walk the sacred soil. Yes, he’d go to one knee. If he must do this here, while they were both naked as bairns, she at least deserved the courtesy of a proper proposal.
Ram rose to the proper position and took her hand. He said her name and – A voice. He heard a voice. ‘Twas his squire, shouting from just outside the entrance, inquiring whether he was ceart gu leòr.
Why would he not alright?
Surely, enough time hadn’t passed for anyone to be concerned. He’d not even fed the lass yet. He’d thought to get through his proposal and then discuss the timing of the wedding over lunch. Well, he’d thought it in the last wee bit. Afore that, when he’d been thinking with his head, he’d planned to do no more today than look a lot and play a little. He’d be in a far less treacherous spot if he could claim he’d been thinking with his little head. That could be excused.
Truthfully, he’d been thinking with his heart since her ‘confession’ and there was no excuse for that a’tall. Nor was there anything to be done about it at this stage but what he was about to do. Was there yet time?
Nae. His squire called again, his voice closer, louder, and carrying a faint note of alarm that would be mildly insulting were he in the midst of a battle with a rival laird. Given that he was here with a lass whom his squire likely outweighed, any alarm was damned insulting.
“Halt,” Ram ordered, the command in his tone sharp and the ire sharper. “And what mean you by sounding concerned that I might not be well? Think you that I could be done in by a wee lass?”
Rose paused her rather entertaining efforts to get back into her garments at a speed impossible for anyone save a few actors who excelled at such quick changing. She propped her hands on her hips and walked at him, advancing in a way that made him powerfully glad that she wasn’t armed–except with her question.
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