The MacKinnon's Bride (11 page)

He merely chuckled at her impudence, and her
ire intensified. Lord, but how dare he be so impervious!

“
No’ so auld as that,
wench,” he yielded, his grin turning frankly lascivious. “But auld
enough to discern a virgin’s blush—and, I warrant, auld enough to
know desire when I spy it.”

He had the audacity to wink at her.

Page’s gasp was audible, and when she could
find her tongue to speak again, her words were strangled with fury.
“How dare you!”

His grin turned more crooked still. “Well,
now, because I’m a barbarous Scotsman, that’s how I dare. Have ye
no’ heard, lass? We’re a randy lot, we Scots.”

“
You’re a mighty crude
lot!” she returned. “And feckless, too!”

“
Aye, and dinna forget
lusty,” he added, and winked again.

Sweet Jesu, if it was his
intent to distract her, then he was surely succeeding in the
endeavor, for she was flustered to her very toes. Page scowled at
him. “Bedamned! Is
that
all you can think of?”

“
Aye, wench.” His smile
turned wicked now, and his voice softened. “When I’m looking at a
bonny lass, ‘tis all I can think of.”

Page was momentarily dumbstruck by his
brashness. She averted her face, her heartbeat quickening at his
shameless cajolery. He was naught more than a smooth-tongued knave
to speak such lies!

And yet...

“
Y-you cannot,” she
stammered, and shook her head. “Y-you cannot possibly think me...”
Sweet Mary, but she could scarce even speak the word!

“
Bonny?” he
supplied.

Page’s gaze lifted to his.

He was scowling now, it seemed, staring as
though he would see into her very soul, but he said nothing.

He didn’t answer.

It was just as she
supposed—they were merely false words from a man who cared nothing
for her feelings.
’
Twas simply his way to
be so glib and he couldn’t possibly mean it... and
yet...

The look in his eyes... the way that he
stared...

Could he?

chapter 9

Iain was staggered by the anguish so
apparent in those liquid dark eyes.

Christ, did she not realize?

Could she truly not know?

In truth, he’d meant the words as a ploy, a
simple flirtation to distract her, and yet it was the truth he
spoke. Faced with her pain and her sorrow, he forgot where they
stood for the moment, forgot that his men were likely to be
watching them, forgot that they were supposed to be enemies—he the
accursed foe, who’d dared steal her from her father, she the
daughter of the man who’d stolen his son.

He squatted upon his haunches, and reached
out to take into his callused hand the disheveled plait of her
hair. “Aye, lass,” he whispered. His fingers skimmed the length of
the braid. “Ye are bonny. Christ, but ye’ve eyes so dark a mon
could lose himself in them. And hair...” He came forward, falling
upon one knee, reaching out with his other hand to tug free the
ribbon that kept her plait bound. He nudged his thumb into the
weave of her hair, working the soft strands loose with his fingers.
“‘Tis lovely,” he murmured as he stroked the unbound locks. “Fine
silk against flesh that’s ne’er felt the like.”

For an instant she seemed unable to respond,
hanging on his every word like a woman starved, and then she
blinked, as though regaining her senses, and wrenched her head
back, tugging the lock free from his hand.

She “glared up at
him.
’
Twill take more than pretty words to
move me, Scot!” she swore. She lifted a brow in challenge. “If you
mean to woo me, you might better begin by unbinding my wrists! They
hurt!”

Iain considered her request, thinking it a
well founded grievance. And yet... he didn’t intend to stay awake
all night guarding the troublesome wench. Her chin lifted and she
held his gaze, her eyes burning with indignation and ire.

“
I’m no animal to be kept
fettered!” she persisted.

“
Nay,” Iain agreed, “you
are not, lass.” He sighed. “Verra well.” He leaned forward and
reached about her, stretching his body across hers as he groped
blindly around the tree for the ropes at her wrists.

It was a mistake, he realized. He should
have gone around her. Certainly it would have been the sensible
thing to do.

As it was, he found himself embracing her,
his chin resting upon her shoulder and his lips too near the warmth
of her neck. Her gasp was almost inaudible. He felt it more than
heard it, and then she went wholly still beneath him.

Iain, too, froze, utterly aware of the woman
within his arms.

Christ, but it had been much too long since
he’d been this close to any female... He could feel the peaks of
her breasts rise with her breath, teasing his chest and his
physical reaction was immediate. It was all he could do not to lean
into her, inhale the essence of her—that glorious scent that was
purely female and wholly intoxicating.

He had to remind himself who she was—who he
was—that they were not alone.

And still he couldn’t help himself; he
lowered his body in an effort to reach the bindings and leaned into
her. Trying for a lighthearted tone, he asked, “You’re no’ busy
planning your escape, are ye, lass?”

She said nothing, and he persisted, though
he hadn’t the least notion why he should care. “Promise me you’ll
no’ try to escape.” His hands arrested at her back, awaiting her
response.

For an instant longer, she said nothing, and
then she asked, “If I cannot promise? Will you still release
me?”

So she was a woman of her word, was she?

Iain smiled.

He didn’t know why he felt driven to protect
her, but he knew with a certainty that he’d not let her go. “Nay,
lass,” he whispered against her hair, nudging it away from his face
with his chin. A few strands stuck to his lips, and he tasted them,
closing his eyes as he imagined the silky curtain unbound and
cascading into his face as she rode him. The scent of her taunted
him, aroused him to the point of pain. The image made him shudder.
God, but she was an innocent not to know how she could affect a
man... how she affected him. “I’ll not,” he murmured, clearing his
throat. “I’ll not release you if you cannot promise.”

Though he knew it was impossible, she seemed
to shrink away from him, into the ground beneath him. “In such
case,” she answered, somewhat breathlessly, and more than a little
flippantly, “I promise not to try!”

He smiled at her cunning. “You promise not
to try?” he repeated, disbelieving her audacity.

“
I believe ‘tis what I
said, Scot!”

He couldn’t see her face, but imagined her
saucy expression, and chuckled. He nudged aside her hair with his
lips, and whispered against her ear, “Swear you’ll not escape.”

She made some keening sound as he brushed
her neck with his mouth and wrenched herself away. “Very well,
Scot! I’ll not steal away! Untie me now!”

He chuckled.

“
Get yourself off me!” she
demanded. “I cannot bear for you to touch me!”

Iain smiled, for her quiver gave lie to her
avowal. She was affected by him no less than he was by her. He’d
wager his eyeteeth over it.

Still she sounded quite desperate, and he
didn’t wish to upset her any more than she was already. “You’ll
keep your word?” he persisted.

He imagined that she rolled her eyes, and
his smile deepened, as she said more than a little acerbically, “To
the man who broke faith with my father? Certainly! Now get
off!”

He chuckled at her quick wit. “Ye’ve a
point,” he ceded, and began at once to untie the bindings at her
wrists. “Never mind, I believe I know the perfect solution.”

“
You do?”

He couldn’t help but grin, for she sounded
so ill at ease with the prospect. “Somethin’ that should please the
both o’ us,” he revealed mischievously. God only knew, he was
certainly looking forward to it himself.

Page stiffened at his assurance.

Something that would please them both?

She certainly didn’t think so.

She tried not to panic as she considered
every conceivable solution—tried not to consider them at all. Sweet
Jesu, but it was all she could do not to think of the man poised so
intimately above her!

Nay, he wasn’t lying, precisely, on top of
her, but he might as well have been. Though he shielded her from
his weight, she could feel every inch of his body as though it were
melded to her own. And Jesu, never in her life had she been more
acutely aware of her own body—the places it brushed against his,
the wicked, wonderful sensations that made her feel so very much a
woman.

A lump rose in her throat.

He’d said she was bonny.

Could he truly have meant it?

The possibility made her tremble with...
something she shouldn’t be feeling for her enemy. Her brows drew
together.

How could she possibly
allow herself to be distracted so easily? Aye,
’
twas his intent to distract her, of a certainty, but did she
have to be so blessed accommodating? Nay, he couldn’t possibly have
meant it, she convinced herself.

She knew what she looked like—had seen her
reflection oft enough to know that she was no enchanting faerie
creature, able to steal a man’s heart and soul with a single
glance. She was rather unremarkable. Her hair was not the spun gold
of the troubadour’s favor, it was dirt colored; her face not fair
and unblemished, but darkened by the sun and freckled across her
nose. Her eyes were not the lucid blue of a summer sky, or the
green of a new leaf in spring, just common brown.

Page felt her heart squeeze at the cruelty
of his glib words, and then berated herself for her foolishness.
What more could she have expected from a devious, faithless,
oath-breaking Scot?

She bucked beneath him.

He groaned. “I’d not do that if I were you,”
he advised.

“
What is taking you so
bloody long?” she demanded. “Have you not even the God-given sense
to untie a simple knot?”

“
Och, wench, but I’m
trying! I didna tie this accursed thing—and bluidy hell, ‘tis no
simple knot!” He muttered an unintelligible oath beneath his
breath.

Feeling a little desperate, Page lifted her
knee, jabbing him in the thigh. “You’ll need do more than try!” she
hissed.

He made some strangled sound and fell atop
her just as the binds were undone at last. Page twisted beneath
him, eager to be free. With hardly an effort and before she could
stop him, he had her pinned, her arms spread at her sides and
clasped to the ground.

“
That wasna verra nice!”
he told her, his jaw set firm, and his eyes burning with
fury.

“
I did not mean to be
nice!” Page told him angrily, her eyes stinging with tears she
refused to shed. Her nerves were near to shattering—God help her,
but she could not bear another moment of his presence! His eyes
continued to bore into her,

demanding—what?

“
How could you expect me
to be?” she asked him. “You’ve abducted me from my home, kept me
bound to a tree like an animal—and you think I should tender
thanks? Please!” she appealed. “Can you not just set me free?” She
couldn’t help herself; tears welled. They spilled from her eyes,
down the side of her face, onto the ground. She felt the wetness
upon her neck, and blinked. Could he not see how very much it meant
to her to return to her father? “You have your son,” she beseeched
him. Another tear slipped past her guard, and she shook her head,
losing composure entirely. “I could find my way still,” she
pleaded. “Let me go... please?”

He shook his head, lowering his eyes. “I
canna, lass,” he said softly, regretfully. He met her gaze once
more, and she spied the determination in his eyes. “I’m sorry, but
I canna.”

“
You mean you will not!”
Page snarled at him.

He nodded once. “If you will, then, aye, I
willna.”

She swallowed her pride. “But my father,”
she entreated, her voice breaking. “He—”

“
Your father is a
bastard!” he said impassionedly, though the blaze in his eyes had
extinguished somewhat.

“
He bargained with you in
good faith!”

His jaw clenched, and he averted his gaze.
For an instant he said nothing, and then he turned to face her once
more, resolute. “Your father conspired wi’ David to take my
son.”

Page shook her head. “Nay!” she argued. “He
did not! Your King conspired with Henry! My father simply provided
your son safe harbor at David’s urging and King Henry’s command!
Naught more!”

He seemed to be considering, and Page sensed
his hesitation and added hastily, “He told my father you abused the
boy. That he was so ill treated, he would not speak for fear of
chastening!”

Still he seemed to be considering, but he
said nothing; instead he seemed to be waiting for her to
continue.

Page swallowed, afraid to hope, her heart
racing. “So you see,” she urged him desperately, “he thought he was
helping your son. Let me go. You have your son, now let me go!”

“
Nay, lass.”

In the space of an instant, her hopes were
dashed. And so easily. “You are vile!” she spat, and twisted away
from him. “Get off me!”

He complied at once, but didn’t go far. He
sat beside her, leaning an arm upon his lifted knee, his face
screwed with some emotion she couldn’t quite decipher. She hoped he
was suddenly conscience-stricken over his faithlessness, but knew
better than to hope for such a human emotion from a wretch such as
he.