Three
 

Having just made her third mistake in the last ten minutes, Mary put down her embroidery. She had to do something. She was so restless. Stretch her legs, perhaps? Despite the lateness of the hour, she decided to go for a walk.

The journey, the return home after so many years, simply being in Scotland again had affected her more than she’d expected. Though her immediate family was gone, seeing Lady Christina, Lady Margaret (Atholl’s sister who was now wed to the MacKenzie chief), and even Robert had been nearly as overwhelming.

All the memories that she’d kept so carefully bottled up inside were threatening to explode. She didn’t want to remember. Didn’t want to miss them. Didn’t want to think of Scotland as home when her life must be in England.

She’d been here only a week, yet she felt the pull so strongly it threatened to destroy the contentment she’d fought so hard to achieve. It was as if she’d taken a piece of slate and wiped it clean, only to discover later that the lines had been etched into the stone, not made from chalk.

Worse, her mission had been a failure. The negotiations for peace had stalled, as they always did over the issue of Bruce’s kingship. Robert refused to sign a peace treaty that did not recognize his sovereignty and Edward refused to sign one that did. No woman’s voice could change that.

As she expected, Robert was sympathetic and understanding toward her son’s plight—and had no intention of forfeiting his lands—but he also would not recognize David as Earl of Atholl until he did fealty for those lands. Something that was impossible as long as her son was in Edward’s power.

The stalemate continued.

Moreover, also as she expected, Robert was hardly inclined to share his secrets with her. Her mouth twitched with a wry grin. Especially after she’d told him outright that Edward wished her to spy on him, so if he had any dark secrets, to make sure he made them easy for her to discover.

After a moment of shock, Robert had burst out laughing and told her she sounded just like her sister. Isabel, he’d meant. The bold, speak-her-mind sister he’d fallen in love with and married when he’d been a lad of eighteen, and who’d died a few years later in childbirth. Mary hadn’t realized how much she’d changed, but he was right.

Of Janet’s presumed death, his sorrow had been nearly as great as Lady Christina’s. And like her brother’s widow, he claimed to know nothing of what had become of her.

The peace envoys had managed one small success, however, in extending the truce until November.

Mary could hear the sounds of merriment coming from the Hall as she hurried down the stairwell from the tower chamber she shared with some of the other ladies and the two attendants Edward had provided for her—probably to keep an eye on her.

Highlanders could dance until dawn, and from the sounds of it, the feast was still going strong. Perhaps I should have …

She stopped herself. She was right to have begged off the feast tonight. She couldn’t allow herself to be drawn in.

She’d been doing her best to keep to herself, but it was getting harder and harder to stay away from the festivities. Harder and harder not to get caught up in the excitement. In the fun.

God, how long had it been since she’d had fun? She’d almost forgotten what it was.

But being here made her remember. Being here made her remember a lot of things.

One more week. That was all she needed to make it through. They were leaving at the end of the Games, and then she could return to her life in England.

But the sounds around her seemed to challenge that characterization. Music. Voices. Laughter. Those were the sounds of life.

No. She pushed it aside. Quiet. Peace. Solitude. Independence. That was what she wanted.

Finding those things at a castle in the midst of the Highland Games, however, was all but impossible. She hurried down the corridor and out into the barmkin, heading for the postern gate, which exited toward the beach.

It would be peaceful there, gazing up at the moonlit sky. The stars were different in the Highlands. Bigger, brighter, closer. Her mother had told her it was because the “high” lands were so near to heaven. Mary could almost believe her.

The stars in England were—

She stopped herself again. She couldn’t let herself keep comparing; it would only make leaving that much more difficult.

Don’t dwell on what you can’t have.

She was about to pass by the stables when she heard a strange sound that stopped her. It sounded like a pained moan. Glancing around, not seeing anyone, and thinking that it was odd not to have a stable lad at the entry, she was about to walk away when she heard it again. Louder this time, and followed by a hard grunt.

Was one of the horses in distress?

She rushed inside, following the beam of light from the torches, barely noticing the pungent smells of animal and hay that hit her the moment she entered. It was pleasantly warm and sultry, the animals providing a natural, radiating heat.

Two torches had been fixed on the posts at the entrance, spilling off a wide enough pool of light to see that nothing appeared out of the ordinary. Well, except for the apparent absence of anyone to watch over the animals. The horses were in their stalls, and—

She stopped, hearing it again. Then, as if following their own direction, her feet started moving toward the sound, which seemed to be coming from one of the stalls at the far corner of the building. More moans and cries. Not animal, she realized, but …

She felt a prickle of something tingle down her spine, a premonition, right before they came into view.

Human.

She came to an abrupt stop, as if she’d slammed into a wall. She sucked in her breath, her body frozen in shock. The sight that met her eyes was unlike anything she’d ever seen. She felt as if she’d been plunged into a den of sin, an orgy of sensation, a sensual banquet for the eyes.

A man—an extremely muscular and powerfully built man—stripped to the waist, with his braies loosened and hanging onto his buttocks by the barest of margins, was on his knees in the hay, gripping the hips of a woman who was on her hands and knees before him. He was plunging in and out of her from behind. Mary’s eyes widened. From behind!

Her first reaction was one of concern. Was he hurting her? But although the scene was in profile, from the half-lidded eyes and fierce sounds of pleasure the woman was making no effort to contain, she was enjoying it. Enjoying it rather a lot.

Mary knew she should go, but her feet seemed incapable of movement. She was transfixed by the look of rapture on the woman’s face. She didn’t recognize her, but she was young, probably about nineteen or twenty, and very pretty. Her long blond hair was loose and tumbling around her shoulders in soft waves. She was well curved, with wide hips, full breasts, and softly rounded limbs. Although technically the woman was clothed, her gown was loose to the point of falling off at her bodice and the hem was tossed up around her waist, leaving little of her body that was not exposed.

“Oh, yes!” the woman cried. “God, it feels so good. You’re so big.” She was arching her back, rocking her hips against him eagerly.

The man’s movements, by contrast, were almost lazy. He reached forward to fondle one of her sizable breasts, and the woman’s moans and cries took on a frantic edge.

Mary couldn’t look away from his hands. Darkly tanned against the pale softness of the woman’s skin, they were big, well formed, and as strong-looking as the rest of him. He was a lean, perfectly honed weapon of war. Atholl had been a muscular man, but this man defied comparison.

A blacksmith could have forged the broad shield of his chest, and not an ounce of fat marred the steely slabs and ridges of muscle that narrowed to a V at his slim waist and hips. Tight ropes of muscle lined his stomach like a ladder carved into the sheer granite face of a cliffside. Even the curved flanks of his backside looked hard and tautly muscled. And his arms … his arms were like battering rams, thick and powerful, rippling and flexing with every movement.

Muscles like that could only be earned on the battlefield.

The sheer masculine perfection of his body might have given her the illusion of a Greek god but for the numerous scars that gave proof of his humanity. Still, it was a thing of beauty, something to be admired—hard and chiseled as any statue, but bronzed and radiating warmth.

Or maybe that was her. Looking at him made her feel all hot and tingly.

“Do you like that, my sweet?” he purred.

Mary jolted at the sound of his voice. Sweet heaven! It was dark, deep, and mesmerizing, brimming with sensual allure. It was the voice of sin, and it blanketed her body with heat.

“Tell me what you want,” he murmured, weaving his sensual web around them both. It was as if he were talking to her.

Mary wanted to look at his face but couldn’t seem to take her eyes off his hands. He was rolling the woman’s nipple between his fingers as if massaging it to a point, and then squeezing gently. Seeing those big, blunt-edged fingers work so deftly …

Her own breasts felt heavy, her nipples peaking under the thick wool of her gown.

The woman seemed incapable of speech. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted, her expression one of total rapture.

A rush of memories hit her hard, memories that had been buried a long time ago. Feelings and sensations that had confused her at fifteen and been blunted at eighteen now returned, clearer, sharper, and stronger. Much stronger.

Passion, Mary realized. In that one look she saw the realization of something she’d never known but had instinctively longed for. How she envied the woman!

“Please,” the woman begged.

She wanted something and seemed increasingly urgent to find it. The man’s strong hands started to roam her body, touching her in ways that seemed to increase the woman’s agony. Or pleasure; the two had seemed to have become one. He was teasing her, each caress of his hands calculated to stoke the flames of her desire.

His hips moved at a steady beat, slow and easy, in long, deep strokes. Not the frantic, hurry-up-and-get-it-over way Mary remembered.

He was drawing out the woman’s pleasure.

My God, he cared about her pleasure. All his efforts seemed to be focused on the woman. He was moving as if he had all the time in the world.

But the woman had had enough. “Please …”

Mary took such pity on her, she almost told him to put the poor creature out of her misery.

But she wasn’t miserable at all. The woman was in heaven.

He slid his hand down between the woman’s legs and his fingers dipped between them in the place …

Mary gasped, feeling a rush of heat between her legs, almost as if he were touching her there. She shifted, feeling hot and uncomfortable. The warm air of the stables felt sultry, the small area too intimate.

She couldn’t breathe, poised on the precipice of what would happen next.

The man leaned forward, pulling the woman up against him, and put his mouth on the nape of her neck, nuzzling, nipping, almost as if he were a stallion.

He was a stallion, Mary realized. A prized stallion. Sleek, lean, and hard, exuding a raw, unharnessed strength. A creature of magnificence to look upon.

Even in profile she could tell he must be handsome. He had dark, wavy hair, just a shade too long to be reputable, a nose that appeared to have been broken more than once but was still nicely proportioned and reasonably straight, high cheekbones, a wide mouth, and a strong, square jaw.

She had no doubt he was a lord. Even if she hadn’t seen the jeweled handle of the sword resting against a stool beside his leather surcote, the aura of arrogance and authority was eerily familiar.

He was undeniably attractive, but it was what he was doing to the woman that made it impossible to turn away, that made Mary’s skin flush, her breath catch, and her breasts heavy.

That made her want him to do that to her.

Mary couldn’t seem to turn away as the woman stilled, and then cried out, her body shuddering with the release of something incredible. For a moment her face was filled with such rapture it seemed divine. Oh … it was amazing!

When she was finished, the woman went completely limp, as if her limbs had lost their bones. All that was holding her up seemed to be his hands.

Mary looked at those big hands, the thick, powerful fingers, and followed them up, over a stomach clenched with tight bands of muscle, past the incredible chest, to the equally incredible face that was now turned toward her.

My God, he was looking at her! She jolted, riveted to the floor by piercing blue, feeling the shock not just at being caught, but also of awareness.

Attractive was an understatement. He was one of the most handsome men she’d ever seen. Deep-set brilliant blue eyes in startling contrast to the darkness of his hair, a bold, aggressively sensual mouth, a nose that had been broken (as she’d anticipated), but the crook only seemed to enhance the pugnacious, masculine appeal. None of his features was perfect, but together …

She almost heaved a dreamy sigh. Together they were incredible. Hard, physical, brutally male. It was a face to stir even a heart that should know better.

But it was the way he was looking at her that sent her heart slamming to her toes.

His warrior’s heightened senses had alerted Kenneth to the woman’s presence well before he heard her startled gasp. He wouldn’t have lasted very long in this war if someone could sneak up on him—even while engaged in the more sensual pursuits.

Although “engaged” was probably putting it strongly. Engaged implied interest, which he was fighting hard to maintain. He’d been silently wishing for the woman to come already before they’d been interrupted.

It was hardly uncommon in a crowded castle to come upon two people giving way to their baser needs. It wasn’t common, however, to stand there and watch.

Rather than run off in shocked embarrassment as he’d expected—as she should have done—the woman had seemed transfixed. At first, when he’d seen all that black and the wimple, he’d thought her a nun. All she was missing was the natural wool scapular over her gown.

Amused, given her prim, officious attire, and not wanting to frighten her off, he hadn’t looked at her directly but watched her out of the corner of his eye.

Not that she’d seemed likely to catch his gaze, as her attention wasn’t focused on him but on the face of the woman beneath him.

Lady Moira had seemed the wisest of the options presented him tonight. Choosing a bedmate was becoming something of running the gauntlet, trying to avoid any connections to the king or his important lords that might land him in trouble. As the widowed attendant of Lady Elizabeth Lindsay, Lady Moira seemed unlikely to give him any problems.

She was also young, uncomplicated, eager to please, and lusty. A perfect combination, to his mind.

Except he hadn’t been able to muster much enthusiasm for the task. Such interludes, which had suited him well in the past, had started to feel rote. Stale. Interchangeable.

He’d attributed it to his focus on the task ahead of him, but maybe it was something else. Maybe he needed a little excitement.

The wee interloper seemed to have provided it.

God knew why, as there was hardly much to her. His first impression was of a ghostlike, colorless creature hidden behind the ugliest, most shapeless clothes he’d ever seen on a woman who wasn’t old enough to be his grandmother or living in a convent.

She wasn’t either. The slight, pinched face, half hidden behind a pair of what he assumed were glasses, was smooth of lines, and the rings she wore on her fingers, along with the brooch pinned to her gown, suggested she was a lady of some position. Perhaps, like Lady Moira, an attendant to one of the noblewomen.

When he’d first glanced at her, he thought there was something familiar about her. But if he’d met her before he could not place her.

Not surprising, as she seemed perfectly forgettable. Almost too perfectly forgettable. There was something fine in her delicate features that seemed obscured. An echo of beauty that could not be completely erased.

He wished he could see her eyes better. And her hair. Though from the light golden brown of her softly arched brows, he suspected it was blond.

There was no reason in Hades why this slight, bland woman who looked about the farthest thing from wicked could be inspiring him.

He’d wanted to shock her. See a flush rise to those pale cheeks. Rattle the prim and serious from her laced-up-tight exterior. Give her a performance to remember.

She seemed entranced by Lady Moira’s pleasure, as if she’d never seen anything like it. Realizing she probably hadn’t, he’d set out to instruct her. He always saw to his bedmates’ pleasure, but he extended it, drew it out, purposefully touched Lady Moira in places that were sure to shock.

And they did. But to his surprise, they also aroused.

Both of them. When the little voyeur’s breath sharpened and started to quicken, he felt his body respond. Everything felt a little hotter, and a hell of a lot harder.

He couldn’t believe it—the wee drab wren was turning him on.

Hell, if he’d known how much fun it would be to have someone watching him, he would have done this a long time ago.

Anticipation built inside him. He was tempted to drag it out longer, but he couldn’t wait to see how she reacted to what he was going to do next. She was going to like this. Nearly as much as Lady Moira did.

He buried himself full hilt, reached down between Lady Moira’s legs, and stroked her until she started to come. She cried out her pleasure in a soft, keening wail.

But he kept his gaze on the wicked, wee interloper the entire time. He watched her face soften, her lips part, and her eyes fill with such naked longing he would have given anything at that moment to be the one to give her the pleasure she craved.

Jesus. His stomach muscles clenched, fighting against the jolt of lust. He hadn’t expected this. Hadn’t expected it to affect him so much. But watching the sensual awakening on her face, the combination of shock and desire—unwilling desire—was one of the most erotic things he’d ever beheld.

He was no longer in doubt that he would be able to come.

Who would have ever thought that beneath such a dull, listless exterior lay the dormant passion of a wanton?

The lass was completely unaware of what she was doing to him. But he wanted her to know. He wanted her to look at him.

Finally, she did.

At first he’d been annoyed by Lady Moira’s request to take off his shirt, feeling a little bit like a stallion at market. But he was glad for it now. Glad he could see the open admiration and innocent hunger as the woman’s gaze roamed every inch of his bare skin.

Aye, she wanted him. But what surprised him was that he also wanted her. How he wished it was her that he was buried deep inside of right now.

When their eyes met, he let her see exactly what he was thinking. Her eyes looked huge behind the two pieces of glass, and they widened even farther when she felt the force of his lust. It wrapped around them, coiling, tightening, drawing them together as if there were no one else in the world.

His blood was pounding hard now. He could feel the sensations gathering at the base of his spine and knew he wasn’t going to be able to last much longer.

Without thinking about what he was doing, but knowing that he didn’t want anything—or anyone—between them, he pulled out of the woman beneath him and fisted his hand around himself. Holding the other woman’s gaze, he started to stroke himself. He imagined it was her gripping him. Her tight, wet heat pulling him over the edge. The eager expression on her face made it easy.

He groaned, his hand quickening the pace. Every muscle in his body clenched with anticipation. He could feel it. Almost …

Her eyes hadn’t left his, but he knew she’d guessed what he was doing because her mouth opened in shock. A perfect little O.

Her breath hitched in a shocked gasp, and the erotic sound sent him over. His arse clenched. He let out a deep groan, jerking his pleasure in deep pulsing streams.

When he was done, their eyes met in one long, hot moment of primal awareness. He could almost feel the frantic beat of her heart against his and hear the quickening of her breath in his ear. He would have given nearly everything at that moment to touch her. To slide his hand between her thighs and feel the warmth and dampness that he knew he would find there. How many strokes would it take to push her over?

But the spell was broken by Lady Moira. “That was amazing. I’m glad to say this is one time the rumors were not exaggerated. You’re every bit as spectacular as they say with that long sword of yours.”

Kenneth felt a prick of annoyance that was no doubt unwarranted. He didn’t expect more from her than swiving, so why would he expect a more interesting comment than a reference to the size of his cock?

Lady Moira had collapsed in a well-sated heap on the hay-strewn floor when he’d released her, but she’d revived enough to put herself in a slightly more elegant position on her back.

He’d forgotten all about her. Apparently, as had their interloper. He just caught the edge of her horror-stricken expression before she turned and fled out of the barn, the Devil nipping at her heels.

He let her go. But part of him actually wanted to go after her.

Lady Moira sat up. “Did you hear something?”

He shook his head and reached for his shirt, wondering what the hell was the matter with him. “It was one of the horses. You’d better fix your clothes. The lads will be returning soon.”

The lady babbled platitudes for another quarter hour while he helped her with her hair and gown before he could finally escort her out of the stables. His mind was on the other woman. Who was she? And more incredibly, why the hell did he care?

He’d never done anything like that before in his life, and he wasn’t quite sure what had provoked him to such wickedness. He didn’t usually find himself turned on by prim little wrens. But something about her reaction—the innocent arousal and not-so-innocent hunger—had fired his blood in a way that defied explanation, turning something that should have been forgettable into something … different. Memorable.

What had started out as a taunting game had taken an unexpected turn, leaving him vaguely unsettled. He’d gone too far, and he knew it. But he hadn’t forced her to stand there and watch. And he sure as hell hadn’t expected either of them to enjoy it so much.

The lass intrigued him. But all his focus right now was on earning a place in Bruce’s secret army. A lass, no matter how intriguing, wasn’t going to distract him.