by Kris Kennedy
He leaned forward, bent his elbows, and dragged the tunic over his head.
Her gaze traveled greedily over his arms, his chest, her eyes growing heavy-lidded with desire.
Then she reached out and ran her fingertips down the inked lines. He held his breath, holding himself in check as she trailed down his arm, to the bend of his elbow, then made the small but important leap to his stomach. And then down, to the band of his breeches.
Swiftly, she unlaced him, and he let her, did nothing but say, “Let down your hair.”
She did, watching him as the hair spilled over her shoulders, then together they tugged off his hose. But when he put out a hand to draw her back into his lap, instead of taking it, she dropped to her knees between his legs.
He closed his eyes and said a silent prayer of thanks.
He would have to ensure this woman drank whisky every day.
She settled in, her palms resting atop his thighs, and stared at his body, her brow now furrowed, her fingertips trailing lightly over his chest. “Why did they do this to you?” she asked softly.
“To mark me.”
“As what?”
“A savior.”
She looked up. “Of what?”
“Rardove.”
“Oh, Aodh.” The words caught in her throat.
“I do not want to talk of Rardove,” he said harshly.
“No. No, we must not.”
His body almost vibrated with lust. His hair felt as if it stood on end; his blood churned. He debated, briefly, leading her to the bed, but even that much movement might blow a breath of reality on the moment and she might spark away again. In any event, he was perfectly happy to have whisky in his blood and Katy on her knees, so he sat back and let her be.
Head tipped back slightly, chin in the air, she skimmed her fingers down the length of his erection. It quivered. He hissed in a breath, and she released a little pant of desire, then tipped forward, bringing her hot mouth closer to him.
“You best be certain, Katy,” he rasped.
“I am,” she assured him, her words breathy, and curled her hand softly around the length of him and gave a little stroke. His hips jerked up.
She did it again, a light stroke. Her eyes, bright with excitement, lifted to his. “Like that?”
“Not quite,” he said tautly. “Harder.”
Her body trembled. “Show me.”
Swiftly, he curled his hand overtop hers and made her squeeze tighter, much tighter, then moved their hands in a stroke up the length of him, a long, hard pull.
“Oh.” She was all hot breath and pink cheeks. She was excited.
Katy would try anything. And love it, he thought with fierce, grateful affection. Her adventurous spirit was entirely unappreciated by any man but him, thank God.
He drew their entwined hands up the length of him again, faster this time, and his bollocks tightened.
“So hard,” she whispered.
“Aye. Hard. That’s how I like it.”
A little pant broke from her as she tried it herself, moved her fist up him, a fine, hard stroke, then looked up at him.
“Is that proper?” she whispered, trembling.
He smiled. “Not a’tall, lass. ’Tis quite wicked.” He moved their hands again.
“Wicked,” she echoed, her lips parted in a pretty, wet pant.
“You like wicked, Katy girl?”
Passion-heavy eyes lifted to his. “I like your wicked.”
“Then take me in your mouth. You look good. I want to feel you.”
Her head tipped back helplessly. Words alone could take her to a climax, he realized now. One day, he’d set himself to the task.
She leaned over him, and took his cock into the hot, wet cave of her mouth.
Every day, the whisky.
Leaning her forearms on his thighs, she took him in, her head bobbing, her hand gripped beneath Aodh’s, circling the root of his shaft. Together they pumped him in long, rhythmic strokes, up to her mouth, then down again. Then he loosed his hand and sat back, lifting his hips ever so slightly, not wanting to frighten her, but wanting very much to have deeper carnal relations with her mouth.
She let him in.
He made an inarticulate sound, something between a growl and a curse and a plea. He would marry this woman, if only she would let him.
“Can you take more, leannán sidhe?” he murmured, coaxing. He rested his hand lightly on the side of her head and tipped his hips up. Her body trembled and she shifted on her knees and moved down on him, taking him in deeper, to her throat.
He descended into a vortex of lust. There was nothing but Katy’s hot, wet mouth. He closed his eyes and let her manage everything, just fisted his hand gently in her hair and held on.
The end came swiftly. It crested over him in a hot, thick wave. He tightened his hand in her hair and gently pulled her up just before it burst from him. He pulled her onto his lap and took her mouth as he came, and they stroked him together through the climax.
He used a linen towel to wipe himself clean, then drew her back down onto his lap. Dazedly, she sat, and he kissed her throat, intent on the next step.
“I know what we toast to next,” he said.
“I’ll get the whisky,” she gasped, fumbling for the cups.
Chapter Thirty
IT TOOK TWO HOURS, but finally, Aodh Mac Con, son of a hard-drinking Irishman, bred on peat, passed out cold from drink.
The moment his breathing was steady and low, Katarina wrapped herself in his heavy cape and hurried out the door, her body still pulsing from all their ‘toasts.’
She hurried down the stairs to Walter’s chambers and scratched at the door. Cold drafts drifted along the floor like fog. The door slowly creaked open.
Walter’s single strand of hair floated eerily in the drafts atop his otherwise bald head as he stared at her in amazement. “My lady!”
She hurried him backward into the room.
“Curse you, Walter, why did you tell Aodh to go see Bermingham?” was, inexplicably, the first thing she said.
Walter seemed equally surprised, but perhaps that was from being awakened out of a slumber in the dead of night. “Why, my lady,” he said, all innocence, “I did but offer my opinion. But what are you doing here?” He peered at the door, then back at her. “Are you freed?”
She frowned and held out the letter. “Not at present. I need you to see this delivered. It must go to the queen, or her representative, if one is already en route to Rardove.”
His bony fingers pinched the missive. “And what does it say?”
She scowled at him. “It provides directions for the army.”
She left Walter and swept to the lord’s chamber and peeked into the antechamber. As hoped, little Dickon was curled up on a cot. No Bran in sight.
She crouched beside him and shook him gently. He popped up, bleary-eyed and confused.
“’Tis I, Dickon.”
“Oh, my lady.” He scratched his head and shifted on the pallet. “What is it?”
“Dickon, I need you to get this message to the town.”
He stared at the folded parchment between her fingers.
“Can you do that?”
He nodded miserably. “My lady, are you certain—”
“I swear to you, it is to help Lord Aodh.” She patted his shoulder. “Be careful,” she whispered.
He swallowed. “I will.”
She hurried away, making her way to the barracks through the dark night. Through a barred window at the back of the building, she was able to speak to Wicker. Even touch his hand.
“Are you well?”
“They’re growing tired of watching us.”
“Yes, I suppose they are.”
“Something will have to give soon.”
“Yes, something must.” Or someone.
“I guess an army’s coming?” he said. It was difficult to determine from his tone how he felt about this.
“I don’t know,” s
he whispered.
“He doesn’t seem a bad sort. Spent some time in here with us.”
She tipped her head back, surprised. “He has?”
“Aye.”
“Doing what?”
There was a small pause. “Eating.”
“He has supped with you?”
“He has.”
She hadn’t expected that. “Well then, what do you think of our conqueror?
Another pause, a bit longer. “If he is your enemy, my lady, then he is ours.”
Oh, this was awful. Even her soldiers were turning to him. And she could not.
She reached her fingertips through, touched his, and gave a little squeeze. “Be safe, Wicker,” she whispered.
“And you, too, my lady.”
“Do not worry, I shall not be reckless.”
“Oh, we’ve no problem with reckless,” he said easily, his hand slipping away. “Just be right.”
The heart of the matter, then, in that simple reply.
“I must go. Eat, keep up your strength, and Wicker? I trust Mac Con with my life. I urge you to do the same.”
His wary eyes peered back at her. He was not confused by her words. He knew as well as she that Aodh was what Rardove needed. She just could not give it to him yet.
“Now, I must away.”
Her nighttime travels had taken longer than she’d intended. A gray opalescence was beading up the mists, rising out of the dells as if the coating of a pearl were floating through the air.
She hurried back to the castle and slipped inside. Even under the hood, her hair was damp with mist. Shaking it as she hurried up the stairs, she swung off the cape as she reached the landing and slipped back inside the darkened room.
The fire was almost out; it had not been stirred. The room was still warm.
Ducked over, barely breathing, she shut the door, twisted the lock, and set Aodh’s cloak on the table. Shaking out her hair one last time, she turned to the room.
Aodh was sitting in the chair, watching her.
Cold rivulets of fear rolled down her chest. “Aodh,” she said on an exhale.
He said nothing.
“You are awake. Is your head hurting? We overindulged, did we not?” She started toward him. “I can get you something for it—”
“Where were you?”
“Oh. I was…” She swallowed. “I…” Why could she not lie to this man?
Her voice trailed off as he rested his bent elbow on the table and lifted his forearm. Pinched between two fingers was a folded letter, sealed with cobalt-blue wax.
Her wax. Her letter.
Fear slid down her back. “How…?”
“That does not matter.”
Walter.
“Oh, St. Jude,” she whispered.
“Even he cannot help you now.” Aodh pushed to his feet.
She bolted. Fumbled for what seemed like forever to unlatch the door, then flung it open, Aodh a step behind. She hurtled for the stairs, but he caught her before she made it two steps, wrapped a steely arm around her waist, and hauled her back inside.
The moment he released her, she raced to the far side of the room, around the edge of the bed. She gripped the bedstead as he locked the door and turned to her. His eyes were darker than she’d ever seen, reflecting little glints of firelight. He looked cold and calm and…furious.
“Aodh, please…”
“Please what? What could you possibly plead for right now that I should give you?” He started toward her.
She circled the bed. “Aodh, do you not see? I cannot betray her.”
“I see. Only me.”
She blew out a breath. “I took a vow. An oath. And she has given me so much—”
“Aye, a father imprisoned for loving a woman who must have made starshine seem dull, until he had his head cut off for not renouncing her. Your mam ripped from her home, her heart broken in two on account of the queen’s petty jealousies, so terrified, she chose to die over protecting you. Then she gave you a castle at the end of the world, understaffed and unprotected, which you were somehow to make a go of, and Jesus God, always send the money back to England. Oh, aye, she’s given you much.”
Katarina stared, dumbfounded, at this rendering of her relationship with the queen. Worded this way, it sounded pitiful. But that was not the way of it. And even if it was… Her father had been executed.
As would she, if she turned traitor.
As would Aodh, too, if that missive she had just sent out was not delivered to the queen. That, and that alone, might save him. But only if Katarina remained loyal.
Traitors did not make good advocates for other traitors.
“I know you are angry, Aodh—”
A short gust of laughter met this. He began circling the bed.
She scooted up on the mattress, over to the far side. “—but did you read my letter?”
“Why would I do that?”
Oh, coldness emanated from him like steam. He had no patience for the reasons why, nor the good that might have been done. He cared only for the deed.
“But, Aodh, you must read it,” she insisted, skirting the table as he stalked her. “I told her everything.”
“Excellent.”
“No, my meaning is…I told her everything about you.”
He mirrored her every move, as she dodged the table and hopped back behind the huge bed.
“Do you know what I said?”
“No, Katy, what?” Slow, calm, tautly controlled, he was beginning to terrify her.
“I praised you,” she breathed, circling onto the other side of the bed.
“Did you?” He sounded absent, as if he were barely listening. His gaze drifted between her eyes and her hips, as if deciding which to pay attention to. She tried to move neither.
“I did indeed. I said you were a good man.” He stepped forward, and she swung around the corner of the bed, her hand gripping the post for support. “A good master for Rardove. I told her I had come to care for you. That I had fallen for your charms.” All the truths were falling out of her now. “Aodh, regard: I told her she was wrong.”
His gaze caught on hers. “You could have done nothing worse.”
A tremor of unease, deeper than her fear of Aodh’s wrath, moved through her. “Why?”
“Elizabeth is jealous. She does not want to be shown up, she does not want to be told she was wrong, and she surely does not want to be told a rebel is right. Such things do not matter. Moreover, telling her you cared would have been the worst thing you could have done. She does not want to be told that.”
Katarina’s heart surged, then tightened at the words. She knew precisely how the queen felt.
“It would have revealed to her that I, too, care for you. That is why you are fortunate this letter was brought to me.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “There is another.”
“Another what?”
“Missive.” Her voice dropped lower. “I gave one to Walter, and one…to Dickon.”
“Oh, Katy.”
Her heart sank. It was a cold progression down her chest and belly, a musical scale of coldness.
“You made a mistake, lass.”
Cold straight down to her toes.
“You went behind my back.”
Cold, into her bones.
“You were seen. People know you snuck out, without my leave.”
“Aodh.” It was a pleading exhale.
His demeanor was level, almost detached. Inscrutable. He held out his hand. “Come here.”
“No. Why?”
His gaze, unflinching and impassive, told her everything she needed to know, so in truth, she did not need any words. “I’m going to punish you.”
“No,” she whispered.
Tall and resolute, he watched her. “You can leave, Katy, I’ll see you to that ship, or I can punish you, but it’ll be one or the other. I cannot have you going behind my back, countermanding me. You are mine, or you leave. This is your last chance to
choose.”
“I do not want to leave.” Leave Ireland. Leave you.
“Then come here.”
“No!” Fear flushed through her. Her hands closed around the post at the corner of the bed. “What if…what if I marry you?”
The words, flung in desperation, finally stopped his advance. His eyebrows lifted. “Now? You’ll marry me now?”
“Yes!” It was all an outbreath. “Yes. Yes. Yes.” She tried to say yes as many times as she’d said no, which was a great many times. They all hung in the air.
“D’accord,” he murmured slowly.
“Oh, good,” she breathed, relief washing through her. She let go of the bedpost, her muscles relaxing.
His hand stayed out.
She went to him, and when she was close enough, he tugged her the rest of the way over and kissed her. It was a slow, lingering kiss. A kiss of consummation, a kiss of devoted union, and she felt the adoration coursing through it. Her hands twined around his shoulders, pulling him down to her mouth, until she was breathless from want.
He began tugging up her chemise. His mouth drifted to her ear. “Let’s get this over with, Katy.”
She froze. “What?”
“I’m going to punish you.”
“No…but I thought…”
His pale blue eyes held hers. “Thought what?”
She backed up. “I said…said I’d marry you.”
“So you did. And I’m very pleased. I’ll make you happy, I swear it. And that is all for later. Right now, you need to lie down over my knee.”
She backed up another step.
His eyes were dark with intent. He meant to do this, whether or not she wished it. Her breath staggered out in unsteady gasps.
“You don’t want me to have to come and get you, lass.”
Head bent, face flaming, she took an extremely small step his direction and peeked out from under lowered lashes. He’d sat down on the edge of the bed.
Bolts of cold fire lanced across her breasts. Her breath came faster and faster as she reached out and laid her hand in his.
He pulled her to stand before him.
Her breasts heaved. They felt full, trapped. He cupped one, his hand hot through the fabric, then he slid his palm down to her waist. His fingertips pinched her chemise.
“Pull it up.”