Page 14 of Kilty as Sin
And he began to sing.
It wasn’t loud, and it wasn’t vulgar. In fact, he sang almost under his breath, the sound echoing strangely in his confines of his helmet, a ballad she recognized as one her old nurse used to sing.
Was he doing it to calm the unimaginatively named horse? Or calm her?
It worked.
Horse paused, then seemed to pick a new route up the mountain, each step deliberate and solid. And Grace…Grace exhaled and lifted her head from Barclay’s strong back.
But she didn’t go far.
When the song ended, she hummed softly. “Ye have a beautiful voice, Sir Hunter.”
“Dinnae think to flatter me, lass,” he warned, although there was no malice in his tone. “I’ll no’ be swayed by your sweet words.”
She snorted. “If I was flattering ye, I’d speak of the strength in yer arms and the breadth of yer shoulders and the handsomeness of yer face.”
“Ye think me handsome?”
Oh hell, had she admitted that?
“I havenae seen yer face,” she was quick to point out. “How could I ken that?”
His shoulders twitched as if in laughter. Or mayhap he was attempting to keep from falling off the horse. “Ye said I was a charmer. Is it so hard to believe I’ve wooed dozens of women with my handsome face?”
“Dozens?”
Good heavens, was he the sort of man who had women throwing themselves at him?
His hand tightened momentarily around her knee, a brief squeeze before he relaxed again. “Aye, and I’ve left each one satisfied, lass.”
Now he wasbragging.
Irritated at allowing herself his comfort, Grace dropped her hold on his belt long enough to flick his hand from her knee. “I dinnae pretend to ken what ye’re speaking of.”
As the horse picked his way toward the lip above them, where the stream tumbled over the edge, Barclay made a noise suspiciously like a chuckle.
“Ye dinnae ken of pleasure, lass? Ye’re that innocent?” His voice dropped. “Ye dinnae ken of the pleasure to be had between a man and a woman, the way a man can use his fingers and his tongue to bring his lover to—”
“Stop.” Her voice was much squeakier than intended. “I dinnae need to hear—”
“About my talented tongue? And the way I could make ye scream—”
Oh, God in heaven! “Cease!” She swallowed, then whispered, “Please.”
Becauseaye, she knew about the pleasure to be shared between a man and a woman. She might be a virgin, but she wasn’t innocent. Laird MacGill had taken great pleasure in explaining how he would plow her belly night after night, until she’d birthed him a half dozen sons, and how he’d ignore her tears and pleas and pain.
She’d thought the marriage bed held naught but horror, until Sister Mary Titania had explainedpleasure. Aye, of course Grace had experimented in the darkness of her own chamber, but she hadn’t realized amancould make her feel that way, not until the nun had told some rather vivid stories.
It wasn’t the memory of those stories which had Grace squirming against the horse’s back now.
Nay, it was the thought ofBarclaybeing the one to bring that sort of pleasure.
His fingers.
Histongue.
With a groan, she dropped her forehead to his back once more, squeezing her eyes shut in an attempt to block out the thoughts.
