Highland Lover: Book 3 Scottish Knights Trilogy (36 page)

First, he stroked her bare skin gently, as if he feared he might bruise her if he pressed too hard. The sensations astonished her, making her moan and her body writhe as if every nerve and muscle urged him to do more. Then he began to kiss her again, not just her lips but all over, even her legs, her thighs, and…

Feeling his breath where no one’s breath had caressed her, she exclaimed, “What are you doing?”

“Shhh,” he murmured, stroking her there and bringing
an echo of Lizzie’s words to her mind when he said, “Let me pleasure you as you should be pleasured.”

Moving upward to kiss her belly and lave her breasts, he left his hand where it lay and slid a finger inside her as he captured her lips again.

When she gasped, he took it as an invitation to explore her mouth with his tongue. An extraordinary feeling below, where he rubbed, made her jump.

Jake murmured, “Easy, lass, just feel. Relax as much as you can, and it will be easier. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“They are waiting for us, are they not?”

“Forget about them. We’ll leave as soon as we’ve finished here. Next time, we’ll enjoy ourselves more. ’Tis good reason to take care now.”

He eased over her as he spoke. She felt him at her opening. Then, although he eased himself in, the ache was nearly more than she could bear. Remembering his advice, she did her best to relax. He slipped in and then seemed to reach a barrier. When he penetrated it, she cried out.

“Shhh,” he murmured. “That was your maidenhead, sweetheart. You are a wife now, for better or worse. And you’re mine.”

She was so beautiful. Her skin was so warm and softly silken that afterward he wanted just to hold her. She fit into his embrace as if God had created her for that purpose. Never before had he felt as if he knew what a woman was thinking, let alone understood her thoughts. But Alyson’s face was so expressive that her mind seemed as open to him as her body was.

The thought was a potent one. It made him
feel
powerful. At the same time, he knew that he’d never felt so protective of anyone. Sakes, he had never thought he would
want
to feel so. Offering protection created burdens, did it not, responsibilities that chained a man as much as land and a wife chained him?

Had he not believed that for years? Had he not also thought he understood himself and knew exactly how he wanted to live his life?

“What are you thinking?”

His racing thoughts banged together in a disordered clump. “About you,” he said. “And about me.”

“And about freedom,” she said.

“Nay, or not entirely. I was thinking about how I thought I knew myself and coming to the conclusion that I was a bit owf, as one might say.”

“Do you regret marrying me, Jake?”

“Nay, sweetheart. In troth, I’ve rarely regretted anything. Everything we do teaches us something helpful.”

“Even bad decisions?”

“Especially bad ones,” he said, grinning at certain memories although he knew she had not meant to amuse him. “This is not a bad one.”

“I don’t think so, either. We do have to go soon, though, do we not?”

He agreed, so they tidied themselves and dressed. Downstairs, as they said their farewells, he knew despite her air of calm dignity that she felt vulnerable. She was thinking that the priests, although celibate, probably knew all about life and lovers and exactly what the two of them had done. She was probably right.

As Alyson ascended the
Sea Wolf
’s gangplank, she felt as if the sleek little ship offered more sanctuary than St. Andrews had. The thought seemed odd when one was leaving a place that had safely harbored young Jamie Stewart, but it flitted through her mind nevertheless.

Her body still tingled and ached from the consummation, but the
Sea Wolf
seemed to welcome her. Coll and the oarsmen were all smiling. The ship, its wood strakes and planks newly polished and gleaming in the sun, seemed to smile, too.

While Will and Mace helped their oarsmen stow the towboat, Jake escorted Alyson to her cabin.

“How long will it take to get to Perth?” she asked as he pushed the door open and set the bundle she had taken with her to the castle on the alcove table.

“We should arrive around dusk,” he said. “We’ll have the tide against us this afternoon, so I want to make speed whilst we have the wind and tide at our back.”

“Must I stay inside?”

“I see no need to lock up so bonnie a wife,” he said, putting a finger under her chin and tilting it up to kiss her. “We’ll pass some fine scenery, but keep your cloak handy unless you’re sheltered from the wind.”

She smiled. “I’m hardy, sir. I like to feel the wind.”

Her answer clearly delighted him, because he kissed her again and grinned as he said, “Please yourself. Nae one will pay us heed.”

For much of their journey from England, until they neared the Scottish border, they’d kept well off the coast, and the unending seas had grown tedious. But this day’s journey delighted her.

The sun shone, albeit disappearing behind one scudding cloud or another to reappear shortly afterward. The air was crisp but not cold, making it pleasant to watch the shoreline pass on either side. The northern shore was distant at first, drawing closer as the firth narrowed to meet the outflowing river Tay.

She watched monks from Lindores Abbey, on the south shore, piling fresh-cut squares of peat in neat, monk-high stacks to dry near their woods. The sight reminded her of the awful dream she’d had of Niall’s coffin in the forest of pikes and lances, when men had charged her on flying horses, bellowing that she had no right to be there, while their mounts kicked up peat squares as they flew.

With the tide ebbing, the river rushing out with it, and the wind easing as the sun dropped behind western hills, the oarsmen worked harder. She sat on the bench by the cabin, where their rhythmic movement, emphasized by the low
boom-boom
of the helmsman’s drum, lulled her thoughts so that occasionally she dozed.

Whenever she awoke, she saw Jake smiling. The sight warmed her, whether he was looking at her or elsewhere.

Approaching the harbor, she saw Perth’s stone bridge ahead. For seventy-five years, people had used it to cross the river Tay. Although it stood where the original one had, at the first place narrow enough to bridge the firth, townsmen had lost track of how many bridges they’d lost since. But the stone one ought to last.

The sun had set when they entered the harbor, as Jake had said was likely. The emotion that swept over her at the familiar sight was nearer trepidation than delight at her homecoming.

She watched as Jake dropped the sail and oarsmen
maneuvered the ship to anchorage and prepared the towboat to take them ashore. Remembering that Jake had said he would handle her family, she tried to imagine how he would do that.

He had said they’d take only Will and a pair of armed oarsmen with them to the house. Mace and Coll would take charge of the
Sea Wolf
and the other men.

Soon, too soon, she and Jake were walking briskly through town with their escort. Because of the increasing darkness, he had opted for four men rather than two. One man ahead and one behind carried torches to light their way.

Alyson guided them from the harbor past St. John’s Kirk, from which the walled town had taken its name. They proceeded along the Skinnergate and Castle Gable almost to North Port, the northernmost gate in the wall.

Jake said, “Did not the ancient castle stand nearby?”

“Aye, across the common. The Blackfriars Monastery lies just beyond. ’Tis where Albany and his grace stay when they come to Perth if they don’t stay at Scone Abbey. The way we’ve come used to be a direct route from the castle to St. John’s Kirk. The next turning is ours, sir. The gate to the close will still be open.”

When they entered the close, MacGillivray House stood directly ahead. Alyson’s stomach clenched at the sight but relaxed when Jake touched her elbow.

“Courage, sweetheart,” he murmured.

Squaring her shoulders, she went up the steps. Since darkness had fallen, she plied the knocker, because they bolted the door at dusk. Hearing muffled sounds on the other side, she looked at the squint and smiled.

The door opened swiftly.

“M’lady!” exclaimed her father’s ancient porter as his
gaze swept her escort and came to rest on Jake. “What be this, then?”

Alyson said, “You need not announce us, Malcolm. Sir Jacob, this is our porter, Malcolm Milroy. Is the family in the great chamber or the solar, Malcolm?”

“Ye ken fine that the laird likes tae sit doon tae his supper afore dark, m’lady. They be still on the da—”

“Allie! What the devil? Where’s Niall? And who are these men?”

“Good evening, Ranald. Malcolm, please see that our men and this laddie, Will, get a good supper straightaway. Sir Jacob and I require supper, too, so we’ll join the others. Nay, Ranald,” she said when her brother strode purposefully forward. “I must speak with Mother and Father, and there is no need for me to tell my tale twice. We’ll go into the great chamber, if you please.”

“Well, I do not please,” Ranald said testily. “Everyone is in there, because Great-Aunt Beatha and Sinead have not gone home yet, and others have arrived to await the sitting of Parliament and Bishop Wardlaw’s consecration. I don’t think it is wise to inflict all these visitors on our father and mother, in any event.”

“Is that not for your lord father to decide, lad?” Jake said with an easy smile. “Surely, your parents will want to see for themselves that Lady Alyson has got home safely after ruthless pirates attacked her ship.”

“Pirates!”

Keeping her patience with difficulty, Alyson said, “Aye, pirates. So prithee, move, Ranald. I grow cold standing here.”

“We’ll go, then. But you must first tell me who this officious fellow is.”

“Certainly,” she said. Without looking away from Ranald, she said, “As you doubtless have guessed, Sir Jacob, this is my brother Ranald.” Then, savoring the moment, she added, “Ranald, this is Sir Jacob Maxwell, my husband.”

Jake thought Alyson’s timing was rather abrupt, but her brother’s slack-jawed reaction almost made him laugh. The younger man’s mouth gaped, and his eyes grew big, revealing utter shock.

“But you cannot be married to him,” Ranald said. “You married Niall.”

Stepping forward with his hand out, Jake said as Ranald automatically responded to the gesture, “We’ll explain it all, lad, but to everyone at once. As we are brothers now, prithee, call me Jake.”

“This is madness,” Ranald said. “You may lead the way, Alyson. I trow, I do not know what everyone will say to you.”

“But how could you know that before they speak?” she said, resting her left hand on Jake’s proffered right forearm.

He put his left hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. Hers trembled briefly. Then, her serenity apparently restored, she guided him through an arched opening into the great chamber. Though not lavishly appointed, it seemed comfortable. The fire in the hooded fireplace emitted a pleasant odor of peat and burned cheerfully. It was, as far as Jake could see, the only cheerful thing in the room.

Eight people sat at the dais table, facing them, and all
eight looked up at their entrance. Their combined reactions were much as Ranald’s had been.