Highland Surrender (23 page)
Read Highland Surrender Online
Authors: Dawn Halliday
But his answer disturbed him. Nothing about Elizabeth affected him—not their kiss, and not learning that she was more sexually experienced than she’d let on.
If he’d just discovered Ceana wasn’t what she seemed, that she’d pretended to be someone other than who she’d shown to him, he’d be throwing furniture through the window. But when it came to Elizabeth, he felt nothing. Gràinne could have told him something as ordinary as the fact that she’d eaten porridge for breakfast and he’d have the same response.
“Why aren’t you angry?” Gràinne studied him, her brown eyes narrowed in assessment.
He shrugged. “She’s not a fool. She knows she cannot reveal such secrets to the world.”
“Aye, well, that’s true.”
“If she told me right away . . . Well, I don’t know what experience she’s had, but, for example, if she told me she’d sucked a man’s cock, I would have called off our engagement immediately, and she knew that. She’s not simpleminded.”
“Aye, well, I gathered that much.”
He drank the remainder of his whisky in silence, thinking about the way Ceana’s curls bobbed at her shoulders. The way her eyes sparked at him when she made one of her ridiculous commands. When he set the cup back on the table, Gràinne asked, “And what of Ceana MacNab?”
His head snapped up. “What?”
“What do you think of our new healer?”
Desperately, he tried to form a coherent sentence. “She’s a MacNab,” he finally muttered.
“Aye.” Gràinne grinned. “Through and through. And yet . . .” Her voice dwindled, and the smile slipped from her face. “She was not very MacNab-like when the English lady and I were speaking of the finer points of bedding you.”
“Oh?” He tried to sound unaffected. Instead he sounded like a noose were being drawn tight about his neck.
“No, she was quite . . . withdrawn,” Gràinne said thoughtfully. “She didn’t look at either of us. She wasn’t focused on my wounds, either, though she tried to pretend she was.”
“Hm.”
Gràinne’s dark eyes sharpened on him. “Cam?”
“Mm?” Abruptly, Cam rose, his chair scraping over the dirt as he pushed it back. He turned to fetch more whisky. God knew he needed it.
“Ceana MacNab went red as a beetroot as I discussed your cock with your lovely wife-to-be.”
“You shouldn’t have been discussing my cock at all,” he choked out. The thought of the three women in here, talking about how to please him . . . It made him want to squirm out of his skin. At the same damn time, he was harder than a rock.
Gràinne chuckled. “It is what women do.”
“They shouldn’t,” he grumbled, pouring the whisky.
“You spent a night in Ceana’s cottage. Something happened between you, didn’t it?”
“I was shot.” He waved his hand at his shoulder, as if his injury could explain everything.
“Aye. So?”
“I’d lost half the blood in my body. I could hardly move.”
“And yet . . . something happened. I smell it. On both of you.”
“You don’t smell anything, Gràinne.”
“Oh, but I do. I have a nose for such things.”
Wicked woman
. “Nothing. Happened.”
. “Nothing. Happened.”
She snorted.
“I’m betrothed to the niece of an English duke.” Warily, he lowered himself back onto the chair across from her. At least now he had a fresh cup of whisky with which to fortify himself.
“Ah! That’s it.” She smacked her good hand down on the table. “What would have happened, then? If you weren’t betrothed to the niece of a duke?”
“Don’t ask that.”
“It’s important, love.”
“How’s that? How can this be important to anyone? It’s irrelevant. I have brought my betrothed and her family hundreds of miles. I’m to be married in two weeks’ time. Anything between myself and Ceana MacNab is over, and it must be forgotten.”
“But what if it cannot be? What if you and Ceana are unable to forget?”
“We must,” he said stubbornly.
“You want her.”
He groaned softly.
“You want her badly. Your body craves her beneath it. Your cock aches to sink into her.”
“Stop it.”
“You want to fuck her, Cam,” Gràinne crooned. “You are mad for her. Obsessed. You can’t stop thinking about her.”
“That’s not true,” he pushed out.
“It is. Is this how you felt about Sorcha MacDonald?”
“That was different.”
“How?” she demanded.
“I was a stupid fool about Sorcha.”
“You tried to force yourself to stop thinking about her. You couldn’t, though, could you? Your longing for her increased day by day until you couldn’t control it any longer. And then you did a foolish thing.”
He pushed back from the table and rose to his feet.
“You are putting yourself at risk, love. It could happen again, and this time, you could destroy yourself—and Elizabeth and Ceana. Don’t be blind.”
“Stop!” he said harshly. “This has naught to do with Sorcha MacDonald.”
“Doesn’t it?”
He leaned forward, placing his hands flat on the table’s surface. Rage trembled inside him, softened only by the obvious abuse to Gràinne’s face. He would not shout at her. “I intend to make good on everything I promised Elizabeth and her uncle.” His voice was lethally quiet. “I intend to make a life for us here. My plans will not change. Not for anything. Not this time.”
“How, Cam? How is it different?”
“I learned from my mistake.”
“And what are you doing to prevent a similar disaster from occurring again?”
“I’m simply not going to allow it.”
“And wasn’t that the same approach you took last time?”
“No. Not at all,” he said, lying through his teeth. He let out a harsh breath. “I must go. Return home to Elizabeth before she wonders what I’m doing up on the mountain with you.”
Gràinne leaned back. “Aye, love. You should hurry home. You don’t want poor Elizabeth thinking you’ve been unfaithful. In deed”—she cast him a wistful smile—“or in thought.”
He ground his teeth. Both of them knew he’d been unfaithful to Elizabeth in thought, damn it.
Hell.
He was doomed. He didn’t have an answer, but Gràinne was right: The more he tried not to think of Ceana, the more he thought about her. In the end, his obsessions could ruin them all.
He was doomed. He didn’t have an answer, but Gràinne was right: The more he tried not to think of Ceana, the more he thought about her. In the end, his obsessions could ruin them all.
“Take care of yourself, Gràinne,” he pushed out, eyeing the bruises on her face. “My men will report all your actions to me. I know you are too stubborn to remain in bed, but if you leave this cottage . . . or if you take a client into your bed . . .” He allowed the threat to remain unspoken.
She nodded and batted her long russet lashes at him. “Oh, aye. I’ll not allow another man to step foot inside my house until you give me your permission, love.”
“Good.”
Rising, she held the door open for him as he strode out. He felt her smile burning into his back until he turned his horse onto the path and disappeared from her view.
It was after midnight when, lying in his bed in the dark, he realized to his disgust that he’d forgotten to question Gràinne about her attacker.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
C
eana had neglected her herb garden during her stay at Camdonn Castle, but the weather had been fine, with just the right amount of rain to help it flourish. Weeds had begun to sprout in the fertile soil, however, and today she knelt in the dirt, determined to pluck them all away.
eana had neglected her herb garden during her stay at Camdonn Castle, but the weather had been fine, with just the right amount of rain to help it flourish. Weeds had begun to sprout in the fertile soil, however, and today she knelt in the dirt, determined to pluck them all away.
She missed Cam. She missed everything from the planes of his face and his aristocratic nose, to his belligerence about his wound, to his determination to do right by his tenants, to the mixture of anger and compassion in his expression when he’d set eyes upon Gràinne.
Everything reminded her of him. The blankets on her bed smelled like him. The medicines she’d mixed for him still stood on her shelf. The bowl and spoon she’d used to feed him lay beside her dishpan. Even her garden reminded her of him, for he’d collapsed on its fringes when she had tried to drag him to her cottage.
Ceana sighed. It was utterly ridiculous, but she envied Gràinne. The whore had been the one to introduce the young earl-to-be to the pleasures of the flesh. She’d always been there for him, as a friend and a lover.
Ceana wished she’d known him that long. Wished she could have known him when he was a green, faltering youth. Wished she could have seen how he had become the man he was today.
“Good afternoon!”
Shading her eyes, she glanced up in surprise. “Sorcha!” She rose to her feet, brushing the dirt from her hands, and saw the servant standing beside the laird’s wife. “Good afternoon, Margaret. What are you two doing here?”
Sorcha shrugged. “Alan is being . . . oh, I don’t know. Too
motherly
. I needed to escape from him awhile.” She glanced gratefully at the servant woman. “Margaret agreed to come with me. I fear my foolish husband will be furious when he hears I’ve been traipsing about the countryside, but I simply cannot stay trapped at home one second longer.”
motherly
. I needed to escape from him awhile.” She glanced gratefully at the servant woman. “Margaret agreed to come with me. I fear my foolish husband will be furious when he hears I’ve been traipsing about the countryside, but I simply cannot stay trapped at home one second longer.”
Ceana grinned at her. “Men tend to be a wee bit protective of the women who carry their offspring.”
She invited the women into her cottage and they sat in the chairs Ceana had placed near the hearth. She poured them each a glass of cold fennel tea, and after drinking hers down Margaret asked if she might take a closer look at Ceana’s garden. Ceana gave her approval, then watched in suspicion as the older woman closed the door behind her. Margaret had never expressed an interest in herbs before.
Sorcha tilted her head, turning her cup around in her hands, and a far-off, wistful look clouding her green eyes. “I’ve been meaning to ask you . . .”
Ceana stiffened. Sentences begun in that manner generally led to things she’d prefer not to discuss.
“. . . about Cam,” Sorcha finished.
Though the tactic likely wouldn’t work—Sorcha had seen them kissing, after all—Ceana opted for playing innocent. “What about him?”
Sorcha chuckled. “You were near to crawling right inside him when Alan and I walked in here after he was wounded.”
Ceana took Sorcha’s cup and then rose to place it in her dishpan. “ ’ Twas a lapse of judgment,” she said. “It didn’t happen again.”
Sorcha’s dark brows rose. “Why ever not?”
Wearily, Ceana lowered herself in the wicker chair Margaret had abandoned. “He is to marry soon. It would be folly, and unkind to the girl.”
“Elizabeth,” Sorcha said, as if testing the name on her tongue.
“Aye. Elizabeth. I like her. And so does Cam.”
“But he doesn’t love her.”
“Is that my business?”
“From the way you were kissing him—”
Ceana raised her hand. “I shouldn’t have anything to do with him. You know that.”
“But you did. That was no experimental peck of a kiss, Ceana. That was . . . that was passion.”
“Well, it was short-lived passion, because it is no longer,” Ceana said snappishly.
Sorcha stared at her. “You’re in love with him.”
“You forget, my friend. I am a MacNab woman. We don’t fall in love.”
“Don’t you?”
“No.”
“Why is that?”
Ceana shook her head. Some secrets were too painful to be told to anyone, even as sweet a friend as Sorcha. “Family secret.”
“Ceana . . . Lord. I know you want Cam. You’re miserable. You seem too pale . . . and look at how you’re twisting your hands in your lap. Is that how you’re feeling on the inside too?”
Ceana leaned forward. “I know you’re trying to help. But where could this lead? He will marry soon.”
“But if he’d prefer to marry you . . .”
Ceana nearly choked. “Marry me? Choose me, a poor Scottish commoner, over a rich English duke’s niece with a dowry that’s more than a thousand times as large as the sum of all my possessions? He isn’t a madman!”
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