She laughed. “We wasted a lot o’ time, did we no’, sweetheart?”
“It did not help at all that you ran away from me!” he protested, laughing. “But we are together now, Lady Crawford, and nothing will ever part us again.”
“D’ye want a girl or a boy first?” Crissy asked, stroking his cheek.
“A girl I think,” he answered. “As long as she looks like you.”
“I dinnae care aboot that,” Crissy laughed. “They will still be oors nae matter who they look like.”
“We should practice,” he murmured, with an evil smile.
Crissy arched her breasts up to him provocatively.
“Not a word,” he whispered. It was an order. “Not a sound.” She nodded, her beautiful eyes wide. He pulled her close to him and rubbed his body up and down her wetness till she was moaning and tingling with desire, then he took both of her hands in one of his and clamped the other one over her mouth, smiling at her wickedly. They began slowly this time, relaxed and easy with each other, but soon Lewis speeded up, almost ramming into her till she was crying out with both pleasure and pain. Her climax was titanic and it took her a long time to fall down to Earth again. Crissy looked into the chocolate brown eyes and almost wept at the love she saw there.
This is a dream, she thought. It has tae be. If it is, I never want tae wake up. But she had to.
“Again,” he demanded, with a determined light in his eyes.
Crissy had hardly noticed that her beautiful wedding dress was ruined. His fingers were all over her breasts, teasing her nipples into hard nubs. She ran her hands over the hard muscles of his chest then moved them down to cup his firm buttocks. He interlaced his fingers with hers on either side of her head, and she could not have moved from under him had she wanted to. She watched his shaft as it thrust into her and felt her body leak moisture to ease his passage. They looked into each other’s eyes as the wave hit them, then Lewis strained her body to his as they lay shuddering with the force of their orgasms.
For a moment neither could speak, and then Lewis laughed quietly.
“I will need to get you something to wear,” Lewis said ruefully. “You cannot go back to the castle naked!”
Crissy laughed. “That is true, sweetheart,” she replied, “but I dinnae think I will need a dress the night!”
* * *
EPILOGUE – LEWIS AND CRISSY
* * *
Lewis took the well-filled tumbler of whisky from Magnus and swallowed it in one draught. He was pacing up and down the hallway outside the birthing room, occasionally hammering frantically on the door, which was shuddering on its hinges on the door. He was almost matching the screams of agony from inside the birthing room with screams of frustration of his own. If only it would be over! he thought. My poor Crissy does not deserve this!
Magnus put his hands on Lewis’s shoulders. “My friend,” he said gently, “give yourself peace. There is nothing we can do now but pray for her; believe me, for I have been where you are.”
“But you were in the room with her!” Lewis objected, as another piercing scream came from inside the room. Lewis covered his ears with his hands. “Why did they let you in and not me?”
“You were too slow before the midwife locked the door,” Magnus answered. “If you had been here a minute sooner…” he shrugged. “However, I refuse to let you knock the door down, since you are already wearing a hole in the carpet with all your pacing.”
Lewis attempted a laugh but did not quite manage it. Magnus poured him another glass of whisky, hoping that it would calm him down. If it did not have that effect, perhaps it would stop him pacing for a while. Lewis sat down, but started tapping his heel nervously on the floor so fast that the whole chair shook.
Magnus put a hand on his knee to stop him. “It will be over soon,” he said gently. He put his arm around Lewis’s shoulders and gave him a comforting squeeze. They waited ten more minutes, then they heard a long bloodcurdling scream worse than anything they had heard thus far. Lewis jumped up and pounded on the door just as they heard another scream; the indignant protest of a baby being thrust out of a warm mother’s womb into the cold world.
“Crissy!” Lewis wailed. “Crissy—let me in!” He was hammering so hard on the door that he fell inward as the midwife opened it. He stumbled, almost landed on the floor, but regained his balance with some difficulty. Crissy would have giggled had she been able to, but all she could manage was a breath and a smile. Since her beating at the hands of the thugs, her ribs had been weak. The midwife cut the cord and laid the baby on Crissy’s stomach.
“It’s a wee lad,” she said, smiling. “Congratulations, M’laird, Milady.” She hurried to clean up the mess from the birth and left the new parents alone.
Lewis gazed at his son in amazement, then at Crissy. “I love you with all my heart,” he said huskily, “and my wee lad.”
The little boy had stopped screaming and was now nursing contentedly at his mother’s breast. Crissy was gazing down at him, and although Lewis knew that he was being fanciful, she looked as though she was being lit from within by some inner light, which lent her an ethereal beauty.
“You look like a Madonna,” he whispered, smiling.
“I look like a wummin that has jist spent hauf the night pushin’ a baby oot her body!” she said in laughing indignation. “He has your red hair, Lewis.”
“And your blue eyes,” he replied.
“A’ bairns are born wi’ blue eyes!” she said, smiling as she moved the baby to the other breast.
“What are we going to call him?” Lewis mused.
“I am too tired tae think aboot it,” Crissy sighed. “Come on, Paw. Come an’ coorie in wi’ yer wife an’ bairn.”
Lewis climbed into the bed fully clothed, not wanting to waste a minute of the time he had in getting to know his son.
“Thank ye, Lewis,” Crissy whispered. “For my bairn.”
He sighed, and smiled. “It was my absolute pleasure, Milady, but I am sorry for the agony.”
“It was worth it,” she whispered, then her eyelids drooped and she was asleep.
Lewis kissed her soft lips, then kissed the baby’s hair, and joined them in slumber.
Magnus was waiting outside with an expectant expression on his face.
“A son and heir, M’laird.” The midwife was beaming. “The Crawford line is safe noo.”
Magnus laughed and closed her hand around a florin. “Thank you, Francie,” he said gratefully. She curtsied her thanks and went bustling away to tell the castle servants. The news would be in distant Aberdeen before tomorrow.
There was little sound from inside the birthing room, apart from the faint murmur of voices. Magnus smiled and walked away, then went into the parlor to tell the others.
It had been pure chance that Isla, Magnus, and baby Bonnie had been visiting at just the right time, since Crissy’s baby had not been expected for a few more weeks. Crissy had wanted no one outside the room but Magnus to be with Lewis, reasoning that he was the only one who could keep him relatively calm.
Laura Crawford, Lewis’s mother, jumped up.
“How are they?” she asked fearfully.
“Mother and son are both doing very well indeed!” Magnus announced. “The midwife is pleased, but I cannot tell you about Lewis because he disappeared too fast!”
“Oh, that is wonderful!” Isla was beaming. “I am so happy for them!””
“Me an’ a’!” Annie said joyfully.
David Crawford smiled then got up and solemnly poured a glass of whisky for each of them. “No occasion is complete without usquabae!” he intoned gravely, but with a twinkle in his eye. “To Lewis, Crissy, and the newest Crawford!” he said, holding up his glass. “Sláinte Mhath!”
They drank a toast to the baby’s health, and then they waited.
David Crawford was delighted. He was the person who had done the most to stand in the way of Lewis’s marriage to Crissy, thinking that she was nothing m
ore than a common gold-digger only after the family fortune. He had forced her to run away; he knew that and had not been ashamed of it at the time, but now he was.
When they had married at first and Lewis had intended to move them to a cottage on another part of the estate, he had been incandescent with rage. It was his wife who had persuaded him to relent, but he had never been happy having a housemaid for a daughter-in-law.
However, Laura soon came to love her, and David had to admit that Lewis looked happier than he ever had in his life, and just before the wedding, he had decided to accept her, and it was the best decision he had ever made.
“Are you happy?” Laura asked him. “Because you look like a person who has lost a farthing and found a florin!”
David laughed and kissed her hand. “I am so glad we accepted Crissy, Laura. Look at Lewis.”
“What do you mean ‘we?’” she asked. “I accepted her a long time ago—you were the stubborn one! She makes my son happy. Why should I not like her? She has a good heart, David, and she loves him; and he loves her. Besides that, I like her for who she is. She is kind, generous, and she has the ability to listen, which is a quality not many people have. So yes, David, I like her—in fact, I love her. Now she has given us a grandchild—” she shrugged and spread out her hands, unable to express herself for a moment, then went on. “I have no words to express my gratitude to her. As far as I am concerned, I am proud to have her as a daughter. The rest of our so-called friends can go to hell.”
Lewis came in at that moment, smiling from ear to ear. He looked flushed and tousled from sleep, but he was transparently happy. Immediately he was swamped with congratulatory hugs from Isla and Annie, handshakes and pats on the back from Magnus and David, and last of all a long embrace from Laura, who cupped his face in her hands and smiled at him. “Well done son,” she said softly, with tears in her eyes.
David embraced him too, then kissed his forehead, an unbelievably warm gesture of affection from him.
“Thank you, Mother,” he replied, smiling. “Now, speaking of sons, would you like to see mine? And Father? As grandparents you are allowed to be first.”
“Try and stop me!” she said, laughing. “Come David, I am not wasting another minute!”
Crissy had just woken up and was cradling the baby in her arms. She had never felt such overwhelming love in her life. She loved Lewis, of course, but in a different way. No one had told her about this, not even Isla.
She would kill anyone who harmed her baby; she would die protecting him, and she had known this as soon as the midwife had put him in her arms. He was not yet a pretty little creature, but she had been warned to expect this. He was red, wrinkled, and his nose and head were still squashed from the birth, but to her he was the loveliest sight she had ever seen.
Laura came in and went straight to her bedside, then kissed her. “How are you, Crissy?” she asked anxiously.
“I am a bit sore, Mammy,” she said, smiling, “but very, very happy!” She handed the baby over to her mother-in-law, who took him around to David.
David looked down at the little morsel of humanity and gently took him in his arms and kissed the tiny forehead. His eyes filled with tears and he had to swallow a lump in his throat as he said, “Crissy—he is beautiful.” He looked up at her. “I have been unjust to you in the past, but I am so glad I saw sense.” Their eyes met for a moment and both of them smiled.
“I am an’ a, Gran’paw! Noo ye can teach the wee yin how tae get intae mischief!”
David laughed. “Do you hear that, wee man? She wants to make a criminal of you already!”
David gave the baby to Laura, then walked across the room to Crissy. He embraced her tightly and kissed her forehead. “Thank you, my daughter. Crissy, I have wasted so much time—please let us make up for it.”
Crissy laughed and put her arms around him gently. “Paw,” she said, groaning slightly, “Ye are hurtin’ my sore rib!”
At once he sprang away from her, horrified. “I am so sorry!” he said, shocked.
“Ye can stop apologizin’ noo,” she smiled, rubbing her side. “Now, Maw, Paw, Lewis, any suggestions for this wee lad’s name?”
Everyone thought for a moment, and a number of names were suggested and discarded; Robert, James, Duncan, Douglas, Hamish, and Angus.
“You can’t call him Angus!” Lewis cried, horrified. “I cannot call my son after my horse!”
“I like Adam,” Laura suggested tentatively. She looked at Crissy and Crissy looked at Lewis, who nodded.
“Does nobody want my opinion?” David asked, laughing.
“Have ye got ane?” Crissy asked in disbelief. David laughed and hugged her, more gently this time.
“Adam Lewis it is, then,” Crissy announced, smiling. “Very fittin’ for a first-born, eh, wee man?”
More whisky was drunk and a lively conversation about babies began between Isla and Annie, but Lewis noticed that Crissy’s eyelids were drooping. He clapped his hands for silence.
“My wife is very tired,” he informed them. “Time to go!”
Crissy was kissed half a dozen more times and sighed with relief as everyone trooped out.When they had gone, Crissy sighed with joy and amazement. “This has been the happiest day o’ my life, Lewis.”
He kissed her softly. “And mine, Mammy,” he murmured, his eyes full of love.
That was the beginning of a golden time in the lives of Lewis, Crissy, Laura, young Adam, and David—who was hardly to be seen anywhere without Adam. It would be fair comment to say that they adored each other.
“Who wid have thought it?” Crissy said, shaking her head as she saw her father-in-law running around the courtyard with Adam on his shoulders. The child had taken years off him. Adam was now a year old and Crissy was hugely pregnant with her next baby.
“The midwife says it might be twins,” Crissy informed Lewis. “Wid that no’ be nice?”
“Indeed it would,” Lewis said, kissing her. “Have you ordered girls this time?”
* * *
“Indeed I have, M’laird!” She laughed, and three months later along came Tara and Edina.
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Before you go, turn the page to read the story of Magnus and Isla!
Chapter 1
Castle Auchterlinn, The Scottish Highlands in the late 1400s...
Glenn Balfour was awoken very early that morning by the mighty, discordant clamor of the castle’s church bells all being rung together. He threw on his clothes and as he was going downstairs, he met one of his men running up them to warn him.
“What is happening?” he asked anxiously.
“M’laird, the McTavishes are preparin’ for a siege,” the man explained breathlessly. “There are hundreds o’ them oot there already an’ they are raisin’ siege engines an’ towers!”
Glenn thought rapidly. Isla and Andrew were his primary concern—they must stay safe at all costs. He went up to the turrets and looked over the battlements; the McTavish clan had prepared well. Siege engines were being assembled already and a camp was springing up just out of bowshot range. There were hundreds of heavily armed soldiers there and all were busy working on a way to bring Auchterlinn castle to its knees.
Isla had slept with Andrew in her bedroom since her mother, Elspeth, had died during childbirth and now, Glenn hastened there to inform them of what was happening outside. Andrew was bawling loudly because of the noise and Isla was trying to quieten him. She looked immensely relieved to see her father.
�
��Father, what is going on?” she demanded.
“We are all in great danger,” Glenn answered grimly. “I have no time to explain, Isla. Pack a bag with as much food as you can carry, a change of clothes, and a blanket.”
“But, Father—” Isla began, but Glenn held his hand up to silence her.
“Go down to the closest siege tunnel and follow it outside then get as far away from here as you can.”
“But, Father! I do not understand! I—”
Glenn stopped her again, raising his voice over hers. “Isla, be quiet! There is no time for questions! You are going to be running for your life. You are going to have to sleep in barns and shepherds huts for a while, but it is better than staying here. Go to your Uncle Broch’s house in Arbroath, you will be safe there and so will Andrew. Here.” He handed her a pouch and she heard the jingle of coins. “Buy a horse if you can and some more blankets and food. Keep the money close to you at all times and look after yourselves. Most importantly, my darling girl, remember that I love you.”
Then Laird Balfour hugged them both as if he would never stop then suddenly turned and dashed out of the door. He knew that if he stayed a moment longer, he would not be able to let them go.
Isla stood looking after him for a few moments, feeling shocked and terrified. There were dozens more questions she wanted to ask, but her father was gone and now she had to do his bidding. She hastily put on her plainest, thickest dress and wrapped Andrew in two warm woolen shawls. She packed two blankets into an improvised pack that she had fashioned from a bed sheet and then made another into a sling for carrying him. She put on two cloaks and stuffed a blanket into the pack together with a warm scarf, leaving just enough room in the backpack for as much food and milk as she could carry.
Seduced By The Noble Highlander: A Steamy Scottish Medieval Historical Romance Page 13