Chapter Twenty

 

 

 

Mairin swallowed hard.

Niall stood shirtless before her, his tunic bunched in one hand and his breeches slung low over his hips. It was as if her musings from earlier had turned to flesh. Very hard, very masculine flesh.

His skin glowed golden in the soft candlelight. Every muscular contour of his powerful, lean torso stood out, etched in faintly flickering shadows. His stomach was like stacked stone and his chest a smooth wall of strength.

His hands tightened reflexively, making the already-defined cords in his arms and shoulders bunch even more. Belatedly, she realized that the tunic balled in one fist was wet, as was his hair. He must have used it to towel himself off after his dip in the river.

But how had he bathed so quickly, and what was he doing back at the tent already?

“How did ye—”

“What are you—” he began at the same moment. His gaze blazed over her, his eyes hungry.

Here she was standing like a statue, gaping at all the hard male flesh before her, but what must she look like to him?

Her chemise still hung open at the front, the soft linen folds dangerously close to exposing her breasts completely. She had one bare leg propped on the table, the chemise bunched around her hip. Her hair fell in loose waves around her shoulders, and despite the cold, she could feel a flush rising to her cheeks.

The tent filled with another laden silence as she fumbled for words.

“I thought ye said ye were bathing in the river!” she blurted at last, snatching her foot from the crate and awkwardly attempting to shove it into her boot.

“I did,” Niall replied, his voice low and ragged. “It was so cold that I didn’t dally. Besides, the current was running so high and fast that none of the men did more than dunk into an eddy and scramble out again.”

That would explain why he’d only been gone a handful of minutes. Foolish lass, she chided herself silently. She had wasted too much time on daydreams of Niall slowly undressing and slipping into the lapping waters.

“I thought you said you’d be abed,” he continued, raking her once more with his burning blue gaze.

Mairin’s heartbeat stuttered. “I meant to, but then I thought to have a wash as well.” She dropped the rag into the basin and fumbled for the ties at the front of her chemise.

“Don’t.” His voice was so soft that she barely made out the whispered command. Her hands froze, her pulse filling her ears.

He took a step forward. The damp tunic slipped from his grasp and landed on their saddlebags. The intensity in his eyes as he drank in the sight of her was so potent that it almost felt like a caress.

“Are you real?” he murmured, drawing closer still. “Am I dreaming this?”

“Nay, ye arenae dreaming.” Her skin prickled, but this time it wasn’t from the cold. She swallowed against a suddenly tight throat. “But why dinnae ye touch me and see for yerself that I am real?”

She would have gone up in flames of embarrassment over the bold words if he’d hesitated, but he moved so quickly that the breath rushed from her lungs.

Suddenly his hard strength surrounded her. His arms clamped her against his granite chest, his fingers sinking into her chemise. He ducked his head to claim her mouth in an urgent kiss.

She was so much smaller than he was that he had to bend to keep their lips fused. To deepen the kiss, he tilted her back in his arms.

Mairin strained against the feeling of tipping backward at first, her hands catching on his shoulders. But then she realized by the easy yet firm way he held her that she was in no danger of toppling out of his arms. She could trust him. She relaxed into his hold then, reveling in his effortless strength.

He must have sensed her submission, for he growled low in his throat, a sound that was part pleased, part needy for more. With a flick of his tongue, he teased the seam of her lips, wordlessly asking entrance. On a shaky exhale, she opened to him. When the heat of his tongue met hers, she shuddered, a fresh wave of gooseflesh scuttling over her skin.

In one smooth step, he pivoted them both toward the cot. Never breaking their kiss, he eased down onto the edge, bringing her with him.

To her surprise, she found herself settling across his lap. His powerful thighs were rock-hard beneath her bottom—along with something else. He groaned again, gripping her hips and dragging her more snugly into his lap. Where they ground together, she could feel his need, thick and straining against his breeches.

He broke their kiss with a murmured curse. His lips lingered on her neck, then roamed to her ear, where he nipped her lobe.

“You liked it when I touched you here before, aye?” he whispered. One of his hands rose from her hip to where her chemise fell open. His fingers brushed over her skin, following the delicate curve of her breast until he grazed one pearled nipple.

She sucked in a hard breath. “Aye,” she panted.

While he circled the pad of his thumb over the peak, his other hand slid down to cup one calf. His fingers drifted to the delicate flesh behind her knee, then to where her thighs were pressed together.

“And here?” he murmured. “You liked it when I touched you here?” He trailed up the length of her thighs until he reached their juncture, his fingertips gently teasing the curls there.

“Aye,” she moaned. Too aroused to feel even a hint of shame, she spread her legs, giving him better access to that spot pulsing with need.

He traced the seam of her sex before parting her gently.

“God, you are already so wet for me.”

She didn’t fully understand why her desire pooled like warmed honey there, but from the rough, hungry edge to Niall’s voice, she took it as a good thing.

Abruptly, he rotated and rolled so that they both came down on the cot, she on her back and he over her, one hand still caressing her between her legs.

He lowered his head, nudging her chemise out of the way as his mouth roamed over her chest. When his tongue flicked over one nipple, all coherent thought fled her mind. In the place of rationality, there was only pleasure, only sensation.

He began to move his hand, finding that point of pure ecstasy and building a rhythm as he had with his tongue back at the cave.

She gasped, already feeling herself climbing toward that moment of shattering release. She fumbled for him, clung to him, looking for something to anchor her in the storm she knew was coming.

It was as if her hands had a mind of their own. They couldn’t get enough of his skin, his powerfully honed muscles. She slid her palms over his chest, sank her nails into the corded strength of his shoulders, arched into the solid warmth of him.

But it wasn’t enough. She wanted so much more than to latch onto him as she rode out her impending pleasure. She wanted to give him the same release, make him soar with his own pleasure. Make him lose control, just as he made her.

Blindly, she dropped a hand to his manhood, which pressed taut and hard against the front of his breeches. He sucked in a breath at even her first brushing contact. When she cupped him, he hissed a string of curses and groans.

She had no idea what to do next, but fortunately his hand closed over hers and guided her up and down his length. When she picked up his motion, he returned his attention to her, yet his touch was rougher now, less measured than it had been before.

Their gazes met and clashed in the flickering candlelight. She realized he fought with all his might not to come undone. Even under her unpracticed touch, even still wearing his breeches, he was seconds away from falling apart.

That knowledge—of the depth and ferocity of his desire for her, of his losing battle for control—was what sent her careening over the edge and into oblivion.

She bowed off the cot, grinding into his hand. A cry of ecstasy ripped from her throat, but his mouth came down over hers just in time to muffle it, keeping it from filtering through the thin canvas walls. His fingers and tongue coaxed wave after wave of pleasure from her as she soared.

Through the haze of her release, she felt him pull taut, his manhood thrusting into her palm. Just as he had done when he’d sensed her on the edge of release, she quickened her motion and pressed back more firmly.

He rocked hard against her hand once, twice, thrice before he shuddered and groaned into her mouth.

A stillness came over them as their panting breaths mingled and they drifted down from the heavens. Mairin’s pounding pulse slowed, yet it still beat hard against her ribs even after the energy drained from her limbs and a warm drowsiness stole over her. Her heart couldn’t seem to rest with Niall still propped over her, his chest pressed to hers and their legs tangled.

Slowly, reluctantly, he drew away, drawing her chemise down over her legs and perching on the edge of the cot, his broad back to her.

“Bloody hell,” he murmured. “You’ve turned me into a green lad, Mairin, spending into my breeches at just a touch.”

He dug through his saddlebags for a moment, then straightened with another pair of breeches in his grasp. Rising from the cot, he moved to the crate where the basin and cloth still sat. He shucked off his old breeches and discreetly cleaned himself.

Mairin watched, mesmerized by the play of soft light and shadow over his strong back, muscular buttocks, and corded legs. All too soon, he’d finished with his ablutions and was tugging on the fresh pair of breeches. He tossed the wash water out the tent door before turning to her once more.

The breeches clung to him like a second skin, sitting low on his hips even as he quickly fastened the ties at the front. Though she longed to see him standing completely naked before her, she was grateful he didn’t don another tunic to go along with the breeches. Instead, he slipped onto the cot beside her, pulling her against his bare chest.

She drifted in the contented warmth of his embrace for a long moment, but then his words from a moment before tugged at an idea in the back of her mind.

“Shouldnae we have… That is, when ye ‘spend,’ arenae we supposed to be…”

“Joined?” he finished gently, saving her from having to fumble for the right words.

“Aye.”

He combed her hair with his fingers for a moment. “I do not want to take aught from you, Mairin. Only give.”

“Ye mean my maidenhead?”

“Aye.”

She contemplated that in silence for a long while. “Ye’ve already given me much, Niall,” she murmured against his chest. “And ye’d never take aught that I didnae give ye willingly.”

That is why I love ye.

The thought sent a bolt of surprise through her. Did she love him? She wasn’t sure. The word felt foreign, like a new pair of riding boots that needed to be broken in. It was as if her mind were testing out the idea, trying it in the privacy of her thoughts before deciding if it fit.

She let the word sit on the tip of her tongue without speaking it, as if it were a dollop of honey, its sweetness slowly melting until it filled every corner of her mouth.

Niall remained silent as well, though his hand stilled for a heartbeat before resuming its slow, gentle strokes in her hair. What might he be contemplating in the seclusion of his own thoughts at the moment?

“Rest now,” he said, pulling the blanket over both of them. “We both need to be sharp as blades and ready for aught come the morrow.”

But Mairin didn’t want the intimacy they’d just shared to dissolve into sleep. She wanted to draw even closer to Niall, and not just physically, even if it meant lowering her defensive walls.

“Niall?”

“Aye?”

“Can I admit something to ye?”

He rolled toward her so that they both lay on their sides, facing one another. Worry creased his brow when he found her gaze in the low light. “What is it?”

“I am afraid. For tomorrow.”

“To fight?”

“Nay,” she said with a quick shake of her head. Working her lip with her teeth, she sought the words to explain the weight on her mind. “This is England’s civil war. At least ye are English, so ye can claim a stake, however small. But I am Scottish. And this isnae Scotland’s fight. This isnae even about freedom.”

He studied her, his mouth set in its serious line. “But we are here to serve the Bruce’s purposes. We aid his cause by keeping Lancaster alive.”

“I ken, but… Lancaster is a bastard and an arse. I havenae ever met King Edward, but the way he took up his father’s mission to beat all of Scotland into submission is enough to convince me he isnae any better.” She swallowed. “If Lancaster falls tomorrow, then I will have aided Edward in a way. And if Lancaster lives, then I have aided him. Either way, a bad man prevails. What does that say about me? What does that mean for my honor as a warrior, and as a Scot?”

Niall’s features eased as comprehension dawned. “We are both used to fighting for a cause we believe in, yet we have little practice playing the part of simple soldiers.”

She nodded, relieved that he understood.

He brushed a strand of hair from her face gently.

“The loyalty the Bruce inspires is rare, I believe. In most wars, the nobles make all the decisions and the soldiers must carry them out, whether they believe in them or not.”

“Do ye think the others in Lancaster and Edward’s army feel the same as we do, or is it only because we serve the Bruce?”

Niall’s eyes clouded with worry. “There is a…mood amongst the men. An air of discontent. As you say, this is a civil war, with Englishman battling Englishman, neighbors and countrymen killing each other at the whims of nobles. Men will fight and die over this feud between Lancaster and Edward, but I’m not sure their hearts are truly in it. It isn’t their war, either.”

Foreboding constricted Mairin’s gut. “What does that mean for our mission?”

Niall drew in a deep breath and released it before answering. “We still have our orders from the Bruce, but just as you said, this isn’t our cause. Our task is to keep Lancaster alive. We needn’t choose sides, nor must we fight or kill. Only protect Lancaster.”

The knot of worry in her stomach eased slightly. “Aye.”

Niall pulled her close once more, and she let her head nestle against his chest.

Though his words gave her some comfort, the disconcerting thought of aiding a despicable, dishonorable man followed her into unconsciousness and haunted her sleep.