Page 43 of The Cruel Highlander's Healer
He held out a hand to her, allowing her to take it. Conall ignored the way her small hand fit in his as he led her through the end.
The staircase was in the far corner of the building, and as they reached it, he realized how narrow it truly was.
“Walk in front of me,” he ordered, and for once, Eliza did not argue with him.
She toddled towards the stairs, her hand gripping the balustrade a bit unsteadily as she began to climb. The room that they’d been given was all the way at the top, and Conall wanted to make sure that if she began to stumble, he would be behind her to stop her from tumbling down the stairs.
The sound of her humming filled the small space, and they passed door after door. Sounds emanated from a few of them, the cries of pleasure from varying women and men rising up to greet them.
I wonder what Eliza sounds like as she finds her pleasure.
Conall bit the inside of his mouth, the taste of blood filling it as he tried to distract himself from those thoughts. He glanced ahead of him and almost immediately realized his mistake.
With Eliza climbing the stairs ahead of him, her backside was nearly level with his eyes.
She was holding her skirts high, clutching them so they didn’t sway around her ankles and trip her. And the way she was holding them had the fabric of her dress pulling tight over the curve of her rear.
Conall gulped, feeling heat flicker through his body. He looked down again, trying everything that he could to stamp down his urge to reach out, and caress her.
“Is this it?”
Eliza’s voice flickered down to him, and he nearly ran into her as he realized that she’d stopped on the landing right in front of him. It was the last door, painting white with winding vines spiraling out from the knob.
“Aye,” he grunted, moving past her to insert the key.
The hall was cramped, meaning Eliza was pressed nearly flush to his body as he unlocked the door. He cleared his throat, the sound of the lock turning getting lost in the night.
A touch grazed his side, light as a feather. It was so fast and so hesitant, Conall could almost believe that he’d imagined it. That was, until it happened again.
Fingertips brushed against his thigh, moving the fabric of his kilt gently. As quickly as they appeared, they were gone.
The door is unlocked, ye need to open it.
Conall did not move.
The fingertips brushed against his side again, rising up to his bicep, and then to the exposed flesh of his arm from where he’d rolled the sleeves of his tunic.
“Eliza.” He gritted his teeth, using her name as a warning as he turned toward her.
She was staring up at him, large doe eyes fixed on his face.
“Yes, me laird?”
Her eyebrow cocked up, a clear challenge. She wanted him to correct her, wanted him to remind her to use his name. And by God he wanted to. He wanted to watch as her lips moved, forming the syllables of it.
Instead, he turned the knob of the door and thrust it open. The room beyond was dark, but he dipped his head toward it anyways.
“In,” he commanded, and he didn’t wait for her to respond.
Reaching out, he grabbed her hand, doing his best to ignore the feeling of her hand in his. He gave it a quick tug, more gently than he normally would have. But with her a bit unsteady with drink, it was not hard to get her to move.
Eliza stepped past him, her smell drifting up to tickle his nostrils. He wanted to lean into it, wanted to inhale the way her musk mixed so intoxicatingly with the smell of the whisky and the beer that she’d been drinking.
In the hall, he grabbed one of the lanterns off of their sconces, using it to light their chambers as he stepped through the threshold.
The room was modest, with only a small writing desk next to the window, an armoire, and a washbasin side by side. The bed was large, though, occupying most of the space from where it was pressed into the corner.
Three large windows dotted the wall, and Conall knew they would be waking with the sun.
