Highlander of Mine (23 page)

She pushed against his chest. Not hard enough to drive him away, but to stop him. His wild green and orange eyes were glassy, but he tried to focus on her.

She shook her head. Then slowly tiptoed around to face the wall. Twisting her neck she smiled at him. “Is this what you wanted?”

He looked down at her body, nodding.

“This is what I want too.”

He lunged for her then, his mouth on hers, his hands on her hips. Again, his length plummeted between her thighs, but after a few crazy thrusts, she held onto his cock and guided him to her entrance.

He growled, pulling away from the kiss, but didn’t move the rest of his body. Only the head of his penis was inside her, and she so badly needed more. Gripping onto the wooden wall in front of her, she pushed her hips back, feeling inch by lovely inch of him fill her. It had been just a few hours since he’d made love to her against the wall outside the house, but even so she was ravenous for this, for him.

He pulled on her chin, turning her face to his to kiss her again, devouring her lips. Then he finally began to pump into her. In and out, he gripped onto her hips. His kisses became clumsy and his hot breath met hers.

“So good,” he whispered.

“Yes,” she moaned.

Reaching around, he found her clit again, instantly tightening the building tension in her body. He circled her nub with his fingers, timing it perfectly with every thrust of his. She had to break away from the kiss and lean farther into the wall, her knees becoming weak. In so doing she arched more into his pistoning hips. His other hand found her breast, caressing her sensitive skin, finding the nipple and pinching.

His thrusts were becoming more powerful, faster.

“Oh, Duncan.” Over her shoulder, she saw him—so strong, touching her everywhere, losing himself in the act.

He moaned.

She wanted him to say her name, and the fact that he hadn’t stung, but she did her best to push that thought away.

“Fleur?” Duncan stilled and with one hand pulled her face closer. “Where did ye go? Ye have such a far away stare. Do ye want me to stop?”

She shook her head.

He took a huge breath. “Ye don’ want this. Jesus, I’m—”

Somehow, she twisted herself enough to kiss him. After forcing her tongue in his mouth, he began to move, not only his lips, but his hips too. But very slowly.

She knew she had to say something, he was hesitating. Pulling away from the kiss, she told him as much of the truth as she could bear. “I...I’m...I’m just so happy.”

Giving her a wide smile he kissed her tenderly, sweetly. Then pulled away and out of her. She pouted right away, but he lifted her in his arms.

“I’m so happy too, Fleur, my bonny flower.”

He laid her on the plaids he’d prepared for his bed, spreading them out, then fanning her hair around. Hovering over her, he kept his grin, but it had waned into something a bit more serious.

“Aye, so happy.”

Slowly he kissed her as he fitted himself between her thighs. Then he was inside her again. This time his thrusts were slow, careful, deliberate, and so tender. All the while he kissed her, letting her invade his mouth, then vice versa. She lifted her legs, wanting him deeper inside, placing her knees along his sides. His pace quickened. After she moaned, he reached a hand between their bodies, where he found her nub, making her arch into him. She lowered one leg to try to meet him thrust for thrust. His breath accelerated as did his rocking. He growled against her mouth.

The combination of his talented finger, his hardness inside her, pleasuring her, his chest against hers was too much. She clutched onto his shoulders, accidentally digging in her nails when her orgasm shattered through her body, making her scream out his name.

Then his thrusts hastened all the more. He released her clit and gripped her hips, plunging into her until finally he went very rigid, groaning. Twitching, he ground against her a few more times. Opening his mouth, he looked like he was going to say something but captured her mouth to hers, kissing her in a whirl of passion.

Chapter 28

D
uncan kept kissing her, making it impossible for his foolish lips to whisper the words he ached to say. He loved her. Lord, how he loved her.

After many moments of boneless joy, they settled into the house, sleeping on Fleur’s bed. He briefly wondered if his mother would mind. But he figured he’d fib to Helen. Tell her that they were hand-fasting. That Fleur wanted that. To marry him.

It wasn’t that he wanted to lie to his mother.

Nay. It was because he wanted the lie to be the truth.

If the fae or muses had brought her here, then there must be a reason for it. Why not to wed him? Hadn’t he had enough hardship in one life? Couldn’t he have this one thing? Love.

Before he’d gone to bed with Fleur, he’d checked on his ma who slept like a babe. An incredibly pale bairn, but it did him good to see she no longer fevered. Her face no longer pinched in agony. The cancer had stopped. His mother was recovering.

Mayhap he could now start living. He could take his mother and Fleur to the Americas, find his brothers, then...then his life would be happily set, wouldn’t it? He’d have Fleur at his side. Whether she knew it or not, she was practically engaged to him after what they’d done. Perhaps it was a bit manipulative to not tell her that by sleeping together, she was binding herself to him. But Duncan hoped she would forgive him eventually.

Especially if they had a child together. In the dark of the night he held Fleur closer, lightly touching her belly wondering if she already could be. She nuzzled her nose against him and wrapped a leg around one of his. Resting one of her dainty hands against his chest, her head on his shoulder, he couldn’t believe his luck had changed so completely. His mother was becoming healthy again. And even if it were a wee bit unscrupulous, he had love, love that could potentially be his forever more. Better yet, what if Fleur loved him in return?

He couldn’t help but envision his future with Fleur and possibly...a daughter. Closing his eyes, his heart found such peace thinking of a little girl with a vicious temper who would sass him and fly through the air to land on him and hug him with powerful small arms. She’d have Fleur’s hair with a few strands of red glistening in the black. But she’d have his eyes. His mother’s eyes. What he loved so much about his future daughter was that she had her mother’s spirit—so wild and brave, virtuous and fierce, so beautiful. Drifting into the most restful sleep of his life, Duncan wondered if the fae finally found mercy for him.

*

H
e woke when he heard the squeak of a door. Opening his eyes, he saw his mother’s shadowed frame in the doorway. It was still the dead of the night, and he wondered why she was there, watching him. He tried to get up, but Fleur laid spread over him. Helen reached out her palms, indicating he stay in place. She stood there in the dark, where he couldn’t make out her face to see for himself if the fever had returned. But he felt her smile from where she stood. He couldn’t help but grin back.

“I’m so proud of ye, my bonny son,” she whispered.

His throat tightened, his chest pinched. Lying there with a woman he loved but wasn’t married to yet, he would have never thought to hear those words from his ma. He’d marry Fleur, somehow convince her to wed, then his ma would be all the more proud. And she’d have grandchildren.

“I love ye,” his ma whispered, then waved.

She started to leave, but Duncan finally called back, “I love ye too, Ma.”

She wavered, her back to him, but then she continued walking away. Bah, he couldn’t let her do that. He struggled to move away from Fleur as delicately as possible. It was while he did so that he finally woke up.

It had been a dream. Such a vivid reverie.

Lavender early dawn light poured through the opened windows, and Fleur’s opened eyes stared at him. She caressed his cheeks.

“Hey, baby,” she whispered. “You were talking in your sleep.”

Jesus, was it merely a dream? Panic prickled through his body.

“Ma?” he hollered.

Fleur swept aside and out of bed faster than him, her dark eyes so wide. “Helen?”

“Ma?” he yelled as he raced for a plaid to cover him from the waist down.

No response.

“Ma!” His voice cracked from the strain as he sprinted down the hallway and into Helen’s chambers.

She lay so still. So still.

Duncan couldn’t move from the doorway, watching his mother’s chest for any movement. Fleur crashed into him, forcing him into the room. She flew to his mother.

“Helen? Helen?” Holding fingers over his ma’s nose and mouth, Fleur closed her eyes, waiting, more than likely, for his ma to breathe. “Oh...God.” Fleur then traced the thin lines of his mother’s neck, trying to find a pulse.

Something about the frantic way Fleur moved finally set him in motion again. “Ma?” he yelled.

“Help me get her on the floor.”

“What?” He could hardly understand Fleur’s words, her meaning.

“Help me get her on the floor. I can do CPR. I can revive her.”

He froze.
Revive her
. Lord have mercy, that meant...

“No,” he shouted. “No, Ma, ye can’t leave.”

Fleur shoved an arm under his mother’s back, jostling her too much. She flung aside Helen’s bedding, reaching under her legs. Carefully, he pushed Fleur away, then cradled his ma to his chest, picking her up gently. She was as light as a bird. A bird that had already flown away.

“Oh, Ma.” Tears came from nowhere and blurred his vision.

“Set her on the floor, Duncan. I can try to revive her.”

He genuflected, not able to see where he knelt, still holding his mother in his arms, knowing that this was the cycle of life—when he’d entered this world his mother had held him like this, but now he held her as she left it. That knowledge was of little comfort though. His tears streamed down his face, enabling him to see for a few seconds. Fleur’s own face held silver streaks, but she was trying so hard to be brave and calm. She patted the floor, yet it didn’t seem right to put his mother on the cold wood.

“Duncan?” Fleur’s voice shook. Then her gaze widened.

Looking down, his mother’s eyes had popped open. She stared at Fleur. Against his hands he felt her take a weak breath, and he sobbed.

“Ma,” he whispered.

She kept gazing at Fleur. Her mouth moved, and finally her lips opened. “Protect my son.”

Fleur nodded as tears rushed down her face.

“Ma.”

Helen slowly shifted her gaze. She stared right through him, her eyes so dead of color.

“Ma, please . . .”

As if it were a Herculean feat, she finally focused on him.

Neither said a word. Duncan dared not, afraid if he did, she would stop looking at him. Except he needed to tell her what was in his heart. He needed her to know. “I love ye, Ma.
Always
have.”

She didn’t say anything. Duncan didn’t expect her to. But she looked as if she were struggling, trying to find the words, trying to stay alive. She hadn’t taken a breath since she’d spoken to Fleur.

Her eyes lost their focus. At first Duncan didn’t notice, but then his ma, his bonny mother, was no longer looking at him. He felt her fighting, even if she was so still, so still.

He knew what he had to do. “I ken ye’re proud of me,” he whispered. “I ken it. And I ken ye love me. Ma, I forgive ye. For everything. I forgive ye. And I hope ye’ll forgive me.”

He realized he really had. He hadn’t thought he’d held a grudge against her, but the reality was he held a grudge against everything. Even the town of Durness he’d hated because...for no other reason than it was where he’d grown up, where he’d once had dreams and wished upon stars, but then had all of that dashed away. Durness and the people in it had been the silent witnesses, whether they knew it or not, of his murdered dreams, and for that he’d hated it and the folks therein.

He hadn’t thought that he’d held anything against his ma. After all, he understood why she had done what she had, marrying Albert. But his heart never had. However, at that moment he no longer felt the residual bitterness when he thought of his past. He thought only of the times he and his brothers had laughed, of when Helen would sneak into the barn with them and they’d play hide-and-go-seek for hours. He’d been a grown man almost, thinking he’d been playing for the benefit of his younger brothers, but he’d played because it was fun, because it had been filled with love.

With the realization came a buoyant sensation, lifting all his muscles, feeling weightless and filled with happy sunshine. Helen’s eyes dimmed, and he felt her motionless struggle stop.

Tears leaked down his face, feeling too cold and wet.

Although his arms hardly heeded the difference, Helen was even lighter.

“No!” Fleur hollered.

Glancing at up at her, Duncan watched as she kept shaking her head.

“But she’s recovering.”

Duncan tried to tell her his mother had taught him how sometimes before a death there is a rush of energy, enabling the dying to finalize what was needed. He remembered she’d told him how she’d compared it to the times when a woman was pregnant. At the end of a pregnancy, the soon-to-be mother was energized to prepare for her bairn. It was the cycle of life, Helen had told him, his mother who should have been a physician if it weren’t for her sex.

He was surprised he’d remembered, remembered everything she’d ever told him.

Fleur suddenly gasped and reached over his mother to hold his cheek. “Oh God, Duncan, I’m so sorry. She’s your ma. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

He let out a choked sob. Then she wrapped her arms around him and Helen. She held them both.

Duncan refused to release his mother for hours, and Fleur stubbornly refused to let him go. At one point she moved to sit behind him, her back against a wall, propping him up, so he could remain holding his mother. He held his ma, first hoping she might take one more breath, but when her body cooled, he lost that hope. Too soon her body began to harden. Duncan couldn’t hold his ma while her body transformed into a rigid statue.

After Fleur had dressed herself and he, she sat him on the lumpy couch, the first thing he’d bought his mother, then told Mrs. McVicar of the news. The village people came and went, giving him their condolences, food, and flowers, seeing his dead mother for themselves. He wasn’t too sure what to do with the flowers, but Fleur placed them in vases here and there around the house.

When they were alone, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down to her chest where he cried. In his mind he heard Albert berate him for his tears,
men don’t cry
, but then Fleur would whisper how he needed to cry, to let go. And he did. Sometimes, though, he let Fleur hold him, wondering if she would disappear at any second. But by the time the undertaker took Helen away after dusk, after Duncan had said goodbye to his mother’s body, as the rusty sky turned midnight blue and black, he held Fleur because it felt damned good.

He’d thought he couldn’t depend on anyone ever again. And there Fleur was, proving him wrong. He needed her now, and she gave to him. She let him cry on her without any judgment. She held him and cared for him. Although he wasn’t too sure if the fae would take her away or not, and although he wasn’t sure how she felt about him, she gave to him when he needed her.

He found himself in her bed, the bed that used to be his brothers’. He was somewhat undressed. His plaid was still on but not much else. And he lay on Fleur’s chest while she caressed his hair and sang a sad song, the words foreign to him. But he knew the sentiment. It was a song of missing the people who left. It was a song for him, for his heart.