Page 38 of Wild Highland Rose
"I gave it to Grania." Marjory whispered. She was sitting up in bed, her expression still guarded.
"You what?"
"I gave it to her. She had need for a plank o' wood. She's always building something. I never use the thing, so I gave it to her." She shrugged. "I meant to get a new one. I just never did."
He looked around the room for something to prop against the door. There was nothing. "Great." He crossed back to the bed. "Move over."
"What?"
"I said move over. It's cold. I've absolutely no intention of freezing my ass off standing out here waiting for Torcall and Allen Cameron to decide we've given them enough of a show. Move over or I'm getting in on top of you."
She slid to the far side of the bed, looking at him with a mixture of anger and amazement.
He turned back the covers and crawled underneath. It was blessedly warm. He could feel where her body had been. The warmth encircled him.
"Ewen, what's going on in there? We canna hear a thing."
The door inched open, but only a little. Evidently, Torcall was being true to his word and allowing him some privacy, but it wouldn't last long if they didn't convince their audience there was a reason for giving them privacy.
"Look, we've got to at least pretend like something's going on in here. Can you moan or something?"
Moan?Marjory thought. What in the world did he mean by that? Her experience with mating, to date, had involved a little grunting on Ewen's part, but nothing that could even remotely be considered a moan.
"I'm no' going to moan." She hissed, determined to maintain the upper hand. Just because he was in bed with her didn't mean she had to follow his orders. "'Tis no' dignified."
"This isn't about dignity, your highness, it's about saving our butts. I don't have to remember him to know that Torcall Cameron isn't a patient man. He gets what he wants no matter the cost, and right now what he wants is you and me doing the horizontal mambo. And that," his voice was so low she could barely hear it, but it was still impossible to miss the sarcasm there, "my dear, means moaning."
She tried to contain a shiver, but couldn't. The cold combined with the emotions roiling through her had reduced her to shuddering uncontrollably. Gently, as if she were a precious thing, Ewen reached out to pull her close. "It's going to be all right ," he whispered. "I swear."
His kindness was her undoing, and despite her initial reluctance she allowed herself to settle into his warmth. It surrounded her, against all odds, soothing her.
She felt the ripple of his chest muscles against her arm as he shifted. She shivered, but not from cold. Damn the man. He'd never affected her like this before. Who'd have known a shave and a bath could incite such a riot of emotion?
"What, pray tell, is a mambo?" She stumbled over the word, wondering if she'd fallen into his madness. Lying here with him, speaking nonsensical words, dreaming of his hands on her body. "You canna expect me to do something I've never done before."
With a groan he pulled her so close his breathing stirred the hair around her face. "Don't you ever quit arguing, Marjory mine?"
She started to retort, but before a word could leave her lips, he covered her mouth with his, the touch threatening to suck the breath right out of her. His lips were hard and soft all at once, stroking, caressing.
She froze for a minute, not certain how to respond, then something deep inside her clenched and released, a wave of ecstasy shimmering through her body. Pressing closer, she reached up until her hands tangled in his hair, her breasts pressed tightly against his chest. The kiss deepened, his tongue tracing the line of her lips, and she shivered with desire. She'd never been this close to a man before, at least not by choice. Before with Ewen it had always been over almost before it started. Quick, and painful. As if she were a vessel not a human. Something to be filled and then discarded.
This was completely different. A coming together, a mating.
His mouth dipped lower, his tongue finding the shell of her ear, rasping against the soft skin there, making her tremble with need. She wanted him to touch her—possess her.
And she wanted to touch him. Feel his skin beneath her fingers, memorize the hard planes of his body. Acting on the thought, she reached out, fingers spread, her hand meeting velvety ridges of muscle. She ran her fingers through the soft mat of hair curling across the broad part of his chest, her heart beating staccato against her ribs. He nibbled at her earlobe, his hand covering her breast, his thumb brushing across her nipple sending lightning streaking through her.
Allowing her hand to trail lower, she circled his abdomen and hips, feeling his rigid hardness through the thin linen of her nightshift. With a groan, he rolled on top of her, his mouth finding hers, his kiss demanding, intoxicating. Sighing, she opened to him, his tongue thrusting forward, capturing hers, the heat inside her building to a fever pitch. She arched against him, her need laid bare, her hands urging him to take more, to take her.
"I think yer having us on, brother. There's naught going on in here but blethering." Allen Cameron burst into the room, his presence like icy water from the loch.
Marjory rolled backwards in surprise, harsh reality hitting her with the force of a highland wind. This was not for real. It was playacting. A way to placate Torcall Cameron.
She tried to push him away, to escape both Ewen and his brother, but her husband followed her, covering her body with his. "You have to trust me, Marjory." His whispered words held an urgency she wasn't certain she understood, but the emotion was hard to ignore. And truth be told, she did want to trust him.
He untied the ribbons of her shift, baring her shoulders, brushing a kiss across her already heated skin. "We have to make it look real."
Saints preserve her, she wasn't certain how much more real it could be.
