She met his gaze with only hints of shyness, barely that, that Iain found himself smiling at her for reasons that had nothing to do with her want to be outside, or how easily her wishes might be granted by so many eager to please.
Artair explained, “Was only talk, really, until Duncan got hold of it, and insisted Will Carpenter put all else aside this morning.” For all the disorder this surely caused, Artair showed not one ounce of regret for what was happening.
“Ask and you shall receive, aye, lass?”
She shrugged, maybe a bit guiltily now, but qualified, “Won’t be but a few weeks out of the whole year that we might make use of it, but we will be happy while we do, I think.”
Duncan appeared then from the carpenter’s shed, walking backwards, carrying one side of a quickly constructed but sturdy looking table. Will Carpenter, a spare man of usually good humor carried the other side, squinting as he stepped into the sunshine.
“Aye, I see,” said Duncan as Donal directed him toward the spot where he’d placed the chairs.
Iain was pleased with this circumstance and then more so when Maggie bounced a bit on her toes, her excitement palpable. She threaded her arm through Artair’s and bade him follow with her. Iain walked behind, encouraged by her contagious enthusiasm, such as he hadn’t seen in some time.
Duncan and Will Carpenter set the table down and Donal held out the chair for Maggie. She slid easily into it, smiling up at Donal. Artair did likewise and set his ledgers and papers on the table, which immediately were mussed by the wind, until Iain stepped forward and thumped his hand on the thick stack.
“Oh, we didn’t consider the wind,” Maggie said with some disappointment.
“Nothing a good stout stone or chunk of wood won’t solve, lass,” Duncan said, finding one of the former with some debris near the wall. He tossed this to Iain, who plunked it down where his hand had been.
Her smile reappeared. And the ones on all the faces surrounding the pair at the table stayed as well and Iain thought this was very good indeed.
It became a regular sight then, since that day, to find Artair and Maggie at their table, in the yard, whenever the weather permitted. They spent so much time out of doors, that Maggie’s cheeks were given a great bit of color by the sun—as was Artair’s balding noggin, which he was teased mercilessly about, though he seemed not to care. They were rarely alone though, often joined by any number of people, most regularly Glenna, Archie, and Duncan, when they weren’t about their own work, or had chores that might be undertaken in good company and could be attended there at the table. Sometimes, Archie just sat and whittled beside them. Once, Iain had come upon Duncan having a midday nap right there, his face tipped up to the sun, his hands folded comfortably in his lap, and Maggie and the steward talking in low voices while he slept.
He’d happily joined them himself on occasion, the first time with some self-consciousness, that he’d posed some questions to Artair about the coming jaunt to the village, for answers he already knew, pretending that had been his purpose.
It should not have been an awkward circumstance, considering that he spent his nights in her bed, many nights by then. He shouldn’t, of course, but she hadn’t given him any reason to think she did not want him there with her.
It was magnificent, and then torture, to hold her in his arms night after night, and make no move to further what burned and bloomed between them. One night, she’d turned around in his arms to face him. They’d stared at each other for several seconds. Iain had let his gaze fall hungrily to her lips before he demanded that she turn back around, and settle as she normally did, with her back to him. “Dinna face me, Maggie Bryce, until you’re ready for what will come.”
She’d opened her mouth to argue and he had all he could do to instruct further, “Ready without reservation, without fear.”
Her face had fallen, but she had turned her back to him again. “I want to be ready,” she’d said softly into the night.
“You will be,” he’d whispered against her hair. “I’ll be right here when you are.”
Today, he sat at their table with them, with genuine purpose, as Artair had brought up the subject of raising rents on the leases of the crofters.
“As you haven’t in three years,” the steward said pointedly.
“So long as we dinna need to, we won’t,” Iain maintained.
“If market prices keep as they are, you will need to.”
Duncan joined them, likely waiting on Iain to get to the training field. Will Carpenter had since made several more chairs to accommodate the usually crowded table and Duncan sat in one of these, next to Maggie, who was fussing with a spool of thread that had become tangled.
“Hold up your hands, Duncan,” she said, and then arranged his hands to her liking when he did, turning them to face each other at chest height, about a foot apart. Artair and Iain exchanged a grin when Maggie began to weave the thread around Duncan’s large hands, untangling long sections of it as she did.
But Artair kept up with his argument. “If not this year then most certainly next year. It only needs to be a modest increase, but lad, soldiers and battles don’t come cheaply.”
“Aye,” he said. He wasn’t paying attention any more, though, his gaze, all his thoughts given to her.
A thundering of hooves called his attention then, Duncan’s as well. Neither man jumped to his feet, not taken up with any great alarm, as there had been no call of a threat from the guards on the wall.
‘Twas Archie and Donal and Eideard, returned from checking on the scouting parties. Archie’s grim countenance raised Iain’s and Duncan’s brows. Their silent question was answered quickly enough.
“Longshanks is dead.”
A collective silence greeted this news.
While the devil you knew was always better than the one you didn’t, Iain had to believe that the son could not ever be so bad for and to the Scots as had been his father, Edward I. But then, that was the thing about devils—unless you were one or surrounded by them you never really understood them.
There was more, though. Archie chewed at his cheek and inclined his head that the rest needed privacy.
“Aye, now, lass,” said Duncan, reading Archie’s mien as well, laying the looped thread on the table, “Nice knot around the middle’ll keep this from tangling again.”
Iain spared Maggie only a glance and a soft touch on her shoulder before rising and following Archie and the others into the keep.
Inside at the family table, when all the officers were gathered close, Archie delivered the news in a low voice. “Seems Edward was moving, leading many combined armies north, when he croaked at Burgh by Sands. They sat for a while there, waiting on what, I dinna ken. Some thought waiting on the new king, but some armies kept moving—including the Sutherland force. According to the lads, Sutherland broke off at the Argmore Pass. Spent the night at some little town called Catlowdy near the border and gone the next day. The lads watching ambled into town when they’d gone, chatted up a few of the taproom wenches. They’re headed to Stirling, apparently sent by Edward I before he passed, meant to take Doune Castle.”
Damn. “I’d rather he came to us, get this thing done,” Iain said bitterly. But then, he could not find anything to grouse about with Sutherland being so long gone from Caithness, as all Alpin’s activities had ceased in his absence.
“Aye,” Duncan agreed, but seemed not as put out as Iain. “What kind of numbers does he have?”
Archie nodded. “Those lads scouting—all three, Eagan, Ned, and Simon—agree on the estimate. Three to four hundred.”
“Christ,” blasphemed Duncan.
“Likely more than Doune Castle commands,” Iain said, his mind whirring. “Artillery?”
“None that they noticed,” Archie answered. “They figured a hundred archers, twice that in cavalry, the rest foot soldiers.”
“Where the hell did he get those numbers?” Duncan groused.
It didn’t matter. “W
hat kind of time frame?”
“Take ‘em three days to get there, rate they’re moving,” Archie said.
“Swordmair’s closest,” Iain determined. “Would be quicker to send word to Alec MacBriar, get his army to Stirling before we might, straight from here.”
“MacBriar’s embedded with Robert Bruce,” Archie said with a frown.
“Nae, he’s north again, Artair just heard.”
“Probably wiser not to leave ourselves vulnerable by moving the entire army,” Duncan supposed. “I dinna trust that Sutherland.”
“Nor I.”
To Duncan, “Send forty down to Swordmair, but they gotta ride hard. Tell them to be at Alec’s disposal, whatever he needs.”
MAGGIE ROUSED WHEN he climbed onto the mattress beside her, well after midnight. Gently, he brushed the hair away from her face, knowing that he needed more of her tonight. She woke softly, a slow smile coming for his presence beside her, a smile he could not resist. There should never be too much time between kisses, he decided.
Cautiously, he touched his lips to hers. She should by now be used to his presence, to any and all simple touches from him.
She did not resist, did not stiffen with any upset, but tipped her bonny face up to him, sleep-shrouded but amenable to this kiss. So much of him wanted to devour her, thought that he’d held himself in check long enough, too long. He wouldn’t, of course, reminding himself as he did every day that small strides and an inordinate amount of patience were required.
But then she touched him. Of her own accord, she reached for him, her slim fingers sliding around his neck as she opened to his kiss, met his tongue midway, delighting him beyond hope even. Iain shifted on the mattress, diminishing the space between them. He didn’t rise up and over her but drew her nearer that she was above him and could control the kiss.
She did, wonderfully, not embracing the role without hesitation, but with a willingness to experiment. Her hair fell all around them, curtained their faces and their lips and joined tongues. He placed his hand on hers and moved it away from his cheek and down across his neck and to his chest, wishing tonight he’d thought to remove his tunic. He left it there, asked nothing else of her, and was thrilled when she embarked on her own discovery then, splaying out her fingers, sliding her hand slowly across him. He continued to ravish her lips, or she his, and then thought to raise his tunic, get the thing out of the way, wanting to feel her hands on his bare skin. He kept all movements to a leisurely pace, as if he had not this burning need inside. He moved her hand again, lower, just beneath the bottom of the tunic, now just below his pectorals.
Maggie gasped against his lips when her hand touched his ribs. She stilled, but just for a moment, then continued her exploration, even dared to push her hand under the fabric, over the muscles of his chest, over his nipples.
He groaned his delight, enflamed by both her touch and her keenness to explore, all the while raging inside with desire for the knowledge that she wore only a thin nightrail, that so little separated them from bliss. He moved his hand up her arm and over her shoulder, his fingers pulling the loose fabric of the neckline away, down her arm. She stiffened, he felt that. Her lips stilled against his.
Iain paused. “Open your eyes, Maggie Bryce.”
She did, so close to his. He laid his head back against the mattress, put distance between them even as his hand held on her nightrail, lowered down her arm, one freckled shoulder shown to his hungry gaze.
Her pupils were large. She blinked twice, her wariness readily apparent.
“It’s me, lass, and you ken I would never harm you. You keep your eyes on me, lass.”
She rolled her lips inward and nodded, but he sensed she was unconvinced.
Iain removed his hand from the linen and shifted again, sitting up, forcing her away for a moment. He lifted the tunic up and over his head and tossed it aside. When he laid down again, he took her face in his hands and brought her lips to his, touched only her cheeks, did not close his eyes. Her hand settled on his chest once more as she was brought so close.
He kissed her slowly, reverently. Soon, her hand moved again. Her eyes drifted close.
“Ah, lass, I’ve dreamed of your hands on me,” he whispered to her.
And when he moved his hand down, traced a path along the slim column of her neck, over the nightrail and onto her breast, she seemed only to wait. He lifted the weight of her breast in his hand, pushing it upward but not harshly, certainly not in conjunction with the need coursing through him now. Lowering her breast, he let the tips of his fingers slide over her nipple, felt her shudder as the peak hardened.
Her hand upon him stopped moving. Her kiss slowed and her breath quickened.
“Just feel,” he said against her hovering lips. He nipped softly at the peak with his fingers through the fabric.
“I feel it further than—not only right there,” she said with some amazement.
“Between your legs?” He asked, sliding his mouth across hers, while his fingers continued their play.
She nodded, breathless now. “Aye.”
She arched her back ever so slightly, tilted her head. His cock responded. Iain lifted his head and rained kisses along the exposed skin of her neck. “I want you to crave it, Maggie Bryce. I want you to beg me for my touch.”
“I think I do,” she said shakily. “Crave it.”
“Now picture my lips where my fingers are. That’s what I want.”
She whimpered.
Iain raised himself, turning her onto her back, following, suiting action to word and landing his mouth against her nipple, taut against the linen fabric. He drew her nipple into his mouth, finding the neckline once again with his fingers, lowering it. An inch at a time, until her breast was bared to him. A glorious breast, full and round, the center pink and crested, eager for his touch. He repeated the action, suckled her breast, nothing between them now. He kept on, pulling the nipple between his teeth, using his tongue to elicit a moan from her, that soon she was liquid in his arms, sighing her delight, threading her fingers in his hair.
He skimmed his hand along the outline of her, along her hip and down her thigh. He wanted more, wanted it all, and right now. And while she was, just now, as desirous as he, Iain wasn’t entirely sure that her body had healed completely, and this gave him pause. He thought it wise to always move forward, and not ever back. He needed to stop while she was still yearning, still wanting more.
He was hard for her and it nearly broke his heart, but he lifted her nightrail and covered her breast again and brought his lips back to hers, kissing her softly. He raised his head and stared down at her, knowing he would need to address the longing and the question in her gaze.
Before he might have done that, she said, with much hesitation, “I...adore your kiss, Iain. But I...I know I do not like all that follows.” Her voice was very small, filled with apology.
This completely broke his heart. He settled himself at her side, thinking whatever conversation followed just now, his intense regard would not help it. Likely, she would open to him if she felt less pressure from him. He laid on his back and rubbed his chest, only touching her where he held her hand, on the mattress between them.
“Do you trust me, Maggie?”
“Yes.”
“So, if I tell you something, you will believe me? You’d ken I’d no lie to you?”
“Yes.”
“Maggie, I’m no sure of all the particulars of your marriage, but I promise you, lass, whatever happens between you and me, from beginning to end, will be as different from how it was...then, as day is to night.” While he had no idea of how it had been for her, her fear of his touch, even up until a few minutes ago, answered any questions he might have had.
She said nothing, but he thought she might have nodded against her pillow.
He would have said more, but there came a firm knock at the door.
Frowning and rolling quickly from the bed, Iain grabbed his sword and pulled open the door.
Duncan stood there, fully dressed, his combat helmet held in his hand and lodged against his hip. Iain kept the opening narrow, that Maggie might not see this, that Duncan might not see her.
“Boat just arrived from Hawkmore. Artair’s holding the missive that came with it.”
“I’ll be right down,” Iain said without pause. The missive would tell him what he needed to know, but he had a pretty good idea. A note come by water late at night usually gave up bad news. Duncan nodded and Iain closed the door.
“Iain?” Maggie called from the bed.
“I dinna ken what it is,” he said, returning his tunic to his person and affixing his belt and sword now. He grabbed his folded plaid as well but only held this in his hand, did not don it.
He knelt at the side of the bed and ran his hand over her cheek with the greatest of devotion, bringing her gaze to him. Taking her hand, he brought it to his lips and pressed a kiss there. This Maggie Bryce, tousled and pink-lipped from his seduction, possibly his favorite yet, was a nice picture to take away with him. He smiled at her. “We have all the rest of our lives to finish this, Maggie Bryce. My longing for you isn’t going anywhere.”
Propped up on her elbow on her side, Maggie tilted her head onto her shoulder. “Come back to me, Iain McEwen.”
“Always, Maggie Bryce.”
He pressed a kiss to her forehead and was gone.
Iain found Artair awaiting him in the hall. The sleepy steward did not wait for Iain to reach him, but rushed forward with the note from Lachlan Maitland, which Ian received with a heavy scowl.
“Come by boat?” He asked Artair as he tore through the wax seal.
“Aye, three soldiers,” Artair answered. “Those Ramsays have been giving the Maitlands grief for years.”
Iain’s frown hardened quickly as he read the note. “This is more than grief. Christ—a wee critical something.” He was very sorry now that he’d sent off that unit of forty to Alec at Swordmair. He passed the plea for help to Artair and chewed the inside of his cheek, his mind tripping over itself. “Artair, I’ve got to take the whole army.”
The Truth of Her Heart (Highlander Heroes Book 5) Page 25