Chapter 28

28

I gnoring the warning in his head, Doughall rolled his tongue against hers, capturing her mouth in an overwhelming kiss. His hand skimmed up her waist, smoothing over the swell of her breast, kneading that supple flesh while his mouth sought her nipple, eager to suck until she bucked and writhed against him, desperate for more.

Spurred on by her sighs and moans, he scooped her up into his arms, groaning as her legs locked around his waist. His manhood strained for the Siren call of her silken depths, burning with the need to plunge inside her, to thrust until she screamed his name, to satisfy himself to the last drop.

Kissing her as if he had made no vow to show restraint, he carried her to the spot among the heather that her spinning had flattened. Holding her to him, he unfastened his cloak and tossed it down, before laying her down on it.

He halted there for a moment, breathless, holding himself above her. He could not ignore the yearning in his loins, the temptation overwhelming as his burning flesh rested between her thighs, her skirts falling back, her legs still loosely wrapped around his hips. All it would take was one tear of the seam of her drawers and an adjustment to his plaid and he would be able to feel that sweet release, burying himself inside her.

For what? A fleetin’ pleasure that might result in a bairn?

His yearning manhood would have to go on yearning.

Mustering every shred of his discipline, every scrap of his frayed willpower, he sat back on his haunches and pulled her with him. Holding her intense gaze, he lifted her dress… but as it covered her face, he could not resist. Dipping his head, he took the neckline of her stays between his teeth and tugged down like a beast, freeing her breasts.

Holding her arms above her head, her face still covered by the fabric of her dress, he kissed his way across her bosom. Her every breath was a shaky gasp, enticing him to play a little before he let her look upon him again.

He flicked his tongue against one erect nipple, and her entire body shuddered in response. He flicked his tongue again, her breath hitching.

Smiling, he took her nipple in his mouth and sucked, her back arching as a cry of pleasure filled the air. All around, the fireflies glowed brighter, as if they were the ethereal embodiment of her bliss, pulsing and burning with the sheer power of feeling within her.

Not wanting to spoil one and neglect the other, he trailed his tongue across the valley between her breasts and drew her other nipple into his mouth. Freya bucked as he had hoped she would, her back arched, her moans filled with delicious frustration.

As he kissed his way up the slender column of her throat, he lifted the dress the rest of the way and threw it to the ground as a second blanket.

Freya blinked at him, her face flushed in the moonlight, an almost drunken smile on her lips.

“Ye keep surprisin’ me,” he said before he could stop himself.

“How so?” she replied, running her hands over his chest, pulling his shirt free from his belt.

He shook his head slowly. “Whatever I throw at ye, ye dinnae back down.” A smirk danced on his lips as he tutted under his breath. “And ye called yerself a mouse.”

“Or maybe I learned somethin’ from ye,” she replied in a sultry tone that tingled like a touch in the center of him. “A few things, potentially.”

She tugged his shirt up, but as he raised his arms, she held the fabric there for a moment. Behind the rough material, she could not see his grin, but it spread so wide that his cheeks began to ache.

Of course, she did not have his strength. If he wanted to get out of that hold, he could have done it in an instant, but he was curious to see what she would do.

Her fingertips touched his chest almost hesitantly, following the defined lines of his muscles as if she were committing them to memory. The more she touched, the more assured her caresses became, and as they ventured downward, her hand pulling at the buckle of his belt, he feared he was about to disappoint her once more.

Managing to grab some of his shirt, he pulled it the rest of the way over his head. A moment later, his belt loosened, the folds of his plaid threatening to fall aside to reveal him.

“I cannae, lass,” he said, taking both of her hands in his. “Whatever ye think might happen tonight, it willnae.”

Freya tilted her head to the side. “I just… wanted to touch ye.”

“And if ye touch me like that, I’ll take ye right here in this meadow,” he replied, his tone laced with a warning.

Her eyes widened, a flicker of doubt shining in those warm pools. “We should… wait until the weddin’ night, I suppose. I’ve… read about what happens on a weddin’ night.”

“Aye, well, readin’ and experiencin’ are two very different things,” he purred. “Lie back.”

“What? But I thought ye said?—”

“Lie back,” he said in his most commanding voice.

She did as he asked, lying back on the makeshift blankets, her skirts falling to the tops of her thighs. Moving slowly over her, his hands braced on either side of her head, safe in the knowledge that there was still a thin barrier of material between them, he rocked his hips forward. He dipped his head to kiss her as his thick length pushed against her, eager to feel the part of her it would never get to discover.

Freya gasped against his mouth, clawing at his bare back.

“We dinnae… have to wait,” she moaned as he pushed against her again, her neck arching. “Dinnae… make me wait.”

He grazed his teeth across her lower lip, a mix of guilt and satisfaction pulsing through him. If he asked her to beg, he knew she would… but he was only tormenting himself. Tormenting both of them with what could never be.

But that doesnae mean she cannae have her satisfaction.

Kissing her hard on the mouth, he moved down her exquisite body, taking care to lavish his attention on every part of her that his lips and tongue and hands could reach, kissing every new constellation of freckles he found.

As he reached the soft rise of her stomach, he could not resist a bite, smiling as her hips bucked in response. Indeed, just because they could not lie together did not mean that she would be starved of pleasure. Doughall was already imagining the myriad things they could do together that would have her in blissful rapture.

He deftly untied the ribbon of her drawers and eased them down her legs, challenging his self-control as he moved back to where he was before, holding himself above her, letting his plaid fall to the ground. She gazed up at him with blazing, beautiful eyes as he tilted his hips, a shiver of bliss running through his veins as he felt himself glide through her tortuously slick folds.

“Oh… Oh God… Oh Doughall…” she cried out as his flesh brushed against her sensitive bundle of nerves, making him wish he could somehow feel what she was feeling.

He drew back and eased forward again, barely able to restrain himself. It was the greatest test of discipline he had ever been given, every teasing glide bringing him closer and closer to throwing caution, and all his promises to himself, to the wind.

And it seemed he was not alone. With every spark of slick friction against that swollen bud, Freya became more and more untethered. He could see it in the flush on her face and the delirious look in her eyes, feel it in the grasping, gripping, clawing of her eager hands, hear it in her rousing moans and frenzied cries. And as her hands ran down the length of his back and over his buttocks, grasping that hard muscle, it moved his hips just enough to give them a taste of the forbidden.

He growled at the sensation of her around him as she cried out his name, her breaths short and sharp, her expression a heady mix of pleasure and pain. Every instinct urged him to press in deeper, to bury himself to the hilt, to join himself with her entirely, but his years of strict discipline had not been for nothing.

Rolling his hips back, giving up that exquisite feeling, he slowly eased his fingers inside her instead, his thumb applying the friction that he could no longer create with his length.

“Oh… aye! Oh… oh…” she half-screamed, her back arching off the makeshift blankets as she moved her hips to the rhythm of his pulsing fingers and strumming thumb.

That was too close.

Doughall panted, fighting to quell those overwhelming desires, forcing himself to focus solely on her. Even so, he doubted he would ever be able to forget how that brief moment of utter bliss had felt.

Deciding that he ought to be as far from temptation as possible, he scooped an arm underneath her thigh and let his tongue take over from his thumb. The first taste of her was like cold, crisp water to a parched man, and he lapped her up, listening to the subtle shifts in the language of her bliss.

It did not take long for him to rediscover what she liked most, flicking his tongue in quicker strokes, teasing her swollen bud toward her explosive conclusion with the pulse of his fingers.

Within a matter of minutes, her body seized as if it had been possessed by the very entity of pleasure. One hand gripped a fistful of his cloak while the other grabbed his arm, her neck arching and her eyes closing as the wave overtook her, cresting through her entire being with such force that he could almost see the ripples.

His tongue rolled in slower strokes, his fingertips slowing with them as she chased her conclusion to its end. Only then did he pull away, kissing his way back up her relaxed and trembling body until he found her lips, and then kissed her leisurely.

Her arms looped around his neck, pulling him to her. With a smile that he could not seem to get rid of, he wrapped his arms around her in return and rolled onto his back, pulling her to his side and allowing himself the privilege of holding her. Even if it was just for a moment.

“If it’s of any comfort,” she said quietly, once she had caught her breath, “I dinnae think I’m goin’ to catch me death of cold anymore. Ye’re surprisingly warm for someone so cold.”

He let out a soft, sleepy laugh. “Dinnae tell anyone. Ye’ll ruin me reputation.”

“I promise,” she whispered, resting her head on his chest.

He closed his eyes. “I’m glad ye’re feelin’ warmer after yer reckless swim.”

She chuckled and draped her arm over his stomach, clinging to him in a way he rather liked—though he would never admit it.

“Doughall?” she said a few moments later.

He grunted in reply.

“I’ve been thinkin’ about that letter that was lost,” she continued hesitantly. “With the threat Lewis left and everythin’ after, I had… sort of put it out of me mind. But… I keep wonderin’ where it went, where it ended up… and, I suppose, who wrote it.”

Doughall cracked open one eye, staring down at her. “ That’s what ye’re thinkin’ about?”

“I cannae help it.” She shrugged, her expression shy. “It was… such a strange letter, and I dinnae care for unsolved mysteries. It’ll bother me ‘til the day I die, I imagine.”

“Strange in what way?”

She peered up at him. “Well… it said, ‘ If I cannae have ye, neither can he. ’ That’s all it said, and I still cannae tell if it was some kind of jest or the words of a jealous suitor or… some kind of threat.”

An uneasy feeling wriggled in Doughall’s stomach, his sleepiness swept out of the way. He doubted he could have felt more alert if he had dunked himself in the loch. To him, the note sounded unmistakably like a threat, but he found it difficult to believe that someone could have written something like that to his mother without repercussions.

The men on the shore… The men who killed them both. What if the note came from one of them?

He dismissed the thought as quickly as it came, for even if the note had come from one of those men, it was gone. If all it had contained were those seven words, it was as good as having no clues at all, leaving him where he had started. And he would not get his hopes up for vengeance again, running off on a wild goose chase that led nowhere. Not when he had someone else to protect now, someone who was becoming dearer to him by the moment, someone who would not like being left behind.

“What do ye think it means?” Freya asked.

He sat up slowly, brushing a stray dusting of grass seeds from her hair. “I dinnae think it means anythin’ to us,” he said calmly. “The books in that library came from all over. It probably belonged to someone far from here. Dinnae trouble yerself over it.”

“But—”

“Come,” he interrupted, reaching for his plaid. “Ye need to sleep. Ye’ve got a weddin’ to worry about instead.”

He belted the dyed wool quickly and pulled his shirt back over his head, before helping Freya to her feet. He helped her back into her clothes, noticing as he did so that the moon had gone behind a cloud and the fireflies had vanished.

As he fastened her cloak at her throat, she looked up at him with a pensive expression and asked in a quiet voice, “About the weddin’.” She paused. “Do ye think ye’ll ever change yer mind about bairns?”

He tied the cord in a knot. “Why do ye ask? Will ye run if I say I willnae?”

“Nay, but… what happened before,” she replied, dropping her chin, her eyes downcast, “I liked the way it… felt, though it was just… um… for a moment. I like the way… ye make me feel when ye… touch me. And since ye already broke yer promise to me braither, I wondered if… maybe ye’d be willin’ to break yer promise to yerself, too. Break it fully, I mean, nae just… a bit.”

She blushed furiously, looking anywhere but at him. Despite the words of the note that had been circling in his head, he smiled and admired her courageous embarrassment. It had clearly taken a lot for her to say that, and as he replayed her words in his mind, the strangest thing happened.

A laugh, a real laugh, bubbled up from the depths of him, escaping his lips.

Freya gasped softly, her attention snapping back to him. “I did it,” she whispered, seemingly to herself.

Through his laughter, he managed to ask, “Did what?”

“Got ye to feel another emotion!” she replied excitedly, throwing her arms around him again. “I got ye to feel joy! Och, I cannae believe it!”

His laughter faltered, softening into a suspicious smile. “Is that what the Laird MacMillen business was about—ye tryin’ to get me to feel somethin’?”

“Well… aye, and it worked! And when ye left me that book, I kenned ye were capable of empathy, even though I did have to put ‘considerate’ back on the list,” she said in a giddy rush. “Although, maybe I can cross it off the list again. I once read that a lass should find herself a considerate lover, so…”

He burst out laughing again, not knowing whether to be annoyed or applaud her efforts.

“Ersie and I had a bet, ye see,” she continued regardless, apparently too excited to know when to stop talking. “That I could make ye feel emotions. But I cannae remember if this means that she wins or I win.”

He shook his head slowly, his laughter fading to a faintly disapproving sigh. “I think I liked ye better when ye were afraid of me. I didnae realize I was in the middle of an ambush.”

“Ye dinnae mean that!” she urged, pulling him closer to her.

He smiled despite himself, catching her by the chin. “Nay. I dinnae.” He kissed her softly. “But when I get back to the castle, Ersie is gettin’ a night in the dungeons for conspirin’ with ye.”

“Ye dinnae mean that either,” Freya replied with a grin.

Doughall groaned. “Nay. I dinnae.”

Taking his bride by the hand, he led her away from the secret meadow, waiting for the spell of that place to break as they headed back through the shadows of the forest.

But the spell did not break, his heart still full, her hand still warm in his, a smile still tugging at his lips. And as he glanced down at her, he had to wonder, Might I change me mind?