Chapter Twelve

As much as she'd been bestirred into expectant knots by the way he'd moved with such intense purpose toward her, she was equally, powerfully bereft when he gave in.

Her own doing—her hand, her instruction.

Her breath caught, she stared at him, at his magnetic and potent gaze, surely having the ability to set a lass on fire. His nostrils flared and his jaw twitched and for a moment, she wondered if he would pounce anyway, wondered if she really, truly wanted him to.

Her hand trembling, she lifted it away from his naked chest, her palm now as damp as his flesh, and curled her fingers into a fist as she lowered her hand.

She took a step backward, and then another, her gaze locked on his, both seething with some unnamed but tumultuous emotion.

Hadn't she wondered? What a true kiss would feel like? What it might be like to be held and caressed? Hadn't she wondered more about those things in his company than at any other time in her life?

But to give in to an impulse? When rarely before now had she known such an inclination?

The alternative, of course, was to spend the rest of her life wondering what his kiss would feel like.

The thought was instantly expected to be unbearable, causing her stomach to twist and knot.

Boldness she knew well, and this overrode hesitation. Before she could stop herself, before any idea of the consequences of her actions could pull her back, Fiona closed the space between them and lifted her face to him.

He did not come agreeably to her kiss, damn him.

She stood on her toes and pressed her lips to his. He stiffened, his mouth unmoving, and Fiona's knowledge of kissing had reached its full potential, having pressed her lips to his. Awash in humbling embarrassment, she dropped onto her heels, a mortifying heat scorching her cheeks. Tears burned immediately as she lowered her red face, and she turned to escape before she made a bigger fool of herself.

Blood pounding in her ears prevented her from hearing and discerning movement, but she was seized roughly by the arm and swung back around, coming up against his chest. Her natural instinct to fight when caught off guard made her frown and reach for her sword.

Austin clutched at her shoulders and with a feral growl, brought his mouth down onto hers.

Tears did not subside but came sharply, a silent product of the magnificent thrill inside her as fantasy became real.

He kissed her savagely, without a hint of tenderness, as a man fights for his life, to escape death. He was not brutal but hungry, she sensed. His hands were iron braces around her arms.

His lips were firm, demanding, wet, slanting and twisting over hers. He pulled at her lower lip with his teeth, and she gasped when he slid his tongue along the tight seam of her lips. Her heart banged against her chest when his tongue touched hers; nonsensically she thought, Tongues kissed?

His taste—the idea of a kiss having taste—was foreign to her, but decidedly and decadently male. He kissed as he did almost anything else: skillfully, with an economy of movement that somehow seemed graceful, and with complete and absolute confidence. The stubble of many days on his cheeks and chin scratched her mouth and face and she didn't care.

With a little moan, she slid her hands up his sleek, hard chest and around his neck. She pulled herself up on her toes, leaning into him, a fierce insistence welling up inside her, demanding that she know everything, all at once.

Meeting his tongue with her own was not a tentative gesture but pursued with as much gusto as she imagined he had, her newfound longing aching to be satisfied.

The strong hands at her arms pushed her backward. He lifted his mouth from hers.

"This is nae a skirmish, lass," he instructed, a smile evident in his tone, "where ye need to develop swiftly the upper hand. This is a dance."

Shame, hot and red, flooded her, for being called out on her raw but zealous technique.

"I dinna..." she murmured, dropping her face from his. "Enough." She pushed at his chest. "I dinna want to dance with you."

"Aye, ye do. But who've ye been kissing, lass, that ye ken it's a melee?"

"I've nae kissed—" she caught herself, choking back the rest of her mortifying admission.

The last thing she wanted to do was lift her face to his, to see his reaction, his expression. For the life of her, however, she couldn't resist a peek.

He froze, his mouth gaping a bit, while he slowly comprehended her half-given statement.

"Jesu...Fiona," he began but seemed, uncharacteristically, at a loss for words. His fingers gentled on her arms. "Ye've...been kissed before," he insisted. "Tell me ye've been kissed before."

She tried to wrench her arms free, tried to push him away. He didn't budge.

"Fiona?"

She struggled in vain to keep her secret but heard herself spitting out her response. "I have nae. There! Satisfied? I've ne'er kissed or been kissed. And now ye've ruined my first." She attempted once more to whirl away, having some success in that she nearly broke free of his arms.

He caught her hand, pulling her back. "Nae. Nae, lass. Ye're nae escaping so easily, nae after throwing down that gauntlet. Ruined yer first kiss? Nae. Nothing is ruined unless ye walk away."

She looked at his naked chest, couldn't face his eyes. "Nothing guid can come of it."

"It will," he vowed. "I promise it will." He paused, didn't kiss her as her body still cried out for him to do. He laid his palms over her ears and waited until she met his gaze. With his thumbs he wiped at fresh tears. "Nae. We have to start anew. I would nae have...ah, Fiona, let me kiss ye."

She was frozen, afraid to move. Lingering embarrassment steeled her against a want to throw her arms around him once more. And yet, she wanted to be here, wanted him to undo her with his kiss.

When next he lowered his mouth to hers, his kiss was a sinfully sweet caress, his lips scraping whisper soft against hers. But he did not take her mouth, did not devour her. His breath came warm against her throat, his lips scorching the flesh of her neck and collar as he moved up and down. She arched her neck and laid her hands tentatively against his chiseled chest once more, felt his racing heart under her palms. Her fingers curled a bit as he left a trail of feathery soft kisses up her neck. When at last he returned to her lips, Fiona opened her mouth, greedy, wanting to be consumed by him. He would not be hurried, though. He was deliberate in his exploration of her lips, making her pulse pound madly. His tongue, when again it touched her, was neither insistent nor wild, but teasing, tasting, as arousing as his commanding kiss of moments ago, eliciting a yearning moan from Fiona.

"Please," she murmured when he continued to torture her with this slow madness.

"Say my name," he instructed gruffly, sweeping his mouth across. At her ear, he whispered throatily, "Say my name and tell me what ye want."

Of course she didn't know precisely what she wanted or how to name it. But she felt a desperate need—an ache— and had every confidence that he knew what she wanted. "Please, Austin," she whimpered. "I want ye. More of ye."

"Aye," he concurred with husky satisfaction. "All of me. All of ye."

He slid his hands down from her cheeks, heat left in the wake of his calloused palms and roughened fingers as they marked a path down her shoulders and fleetingly across her breasts, around her waist to her lower back. Blood surged at each place he touched, shooting out to meet his hands and returning to her core, curiously and wickedly pooling between her legs.

She told herself that she didn't like him at all—this did not mean that she liked him. She told herself that she'd long wanted to know a kiss and more, that for some time she'd hoped to get rid of her bothersome virginity, having believed that it wasn't something she should be carrying around, as it made her feel like a fraud. She believed that to be a great warrior she should know all aspects of life, and not knowing this made her feel green, untried. She told herself this was a safe way to go about it. Austin Merrick was many things, but a true monster he was not, she felt fairly confident.

That's what she told herself, anyway.

And then she told him.

"I want it gone," she whispered against his lips, "everything that makes me less of a woman, less a leader. That's all I want. That's all...this is."

"Absolutely," he agreed heartily, "we can pretend that's the reason ye desire my kiss or my hands on yer body."

The meaning of that statement escaped her for some time, until it was too late too refute it.

"But there's more to it than that, and ye ken that," he said, teasing her lips again, caressing them with his own but not devastating her as she wished.

"What else?" She asked breathlessly. "What else is there?"

"Everything, lass," he promised. "Aside from yer first kiss, we've everything in front of us."

A tremor of excitement, shadowed by fear, made her shiver.

"I dinna...I'm afraid."

"Ye are nae. Ye are Fiona Rose, fierce and fearless warrior. Nothing scares ye. This excites and torments ye, and ye dinna yet understand it, but it dinna frighten ye. The loss of control, as we'll ken with this, is nae a bad thing, lass."

She let that be true, happy to believe she knew no fear.

When next he kissed her, it was deep and possessive, and went on and on, lips joining, tongues dancing, pulses thudding. Her knees grew weak, and she clung helplessly to him as the kiss deepened into something frenzied.

Her lungs burned for air at the same moment he pulled back to stare at her, his dark eyes burning with a piercing sensuality, studying her, as if to measure her condition, whether she was ready for more.

Though he said not a word, Fiona nodded. Aye. I want more.

"Eejits, they were," he stated in a ragged voice, his gaze lowered to her lips.

"Eejits? Who?"

"All of them," he answered, his low and deep voice roughened by passion, "any of them who dinna kiss ye."

Fiona melted in to him, tipping her face up to him. He slanted his mouth over hers again. She was aware that they were moving, that he was leading them somewhere, but in truth she cared only about his kiss. Even as he lowered her to the ground, she went willingly, without question, snaking her arms around his neck again, vaguely aware she lay half atop his plaid and half on the mossy ground.

Her tongue advanced and retreated as did his. She felt utterly alive, with no thoughts beyond this moment and this kiss.

When he was laying half atop her, his hand crept down from her neck and over her shoulder, settling on her breast. Fiona went still in the heat of his kiss, waiting, her body eager. Through her linen tunic and short shift, he caressed her breast with his fingertip, causing her nipple to tighten. Fiona's mouth gaped at the startling uproar caused within, and she shifted in his arms, instinctively arching against him.

Austin groaned—she thought it sounded like pleasure, or the want of more, as did the noises she made. Impatiently, he dug his hand under her tunic and shift, sliding his palm and fingers upward with no small amount of fervor. Fiona choked on her breath when his hand cupped her breast, lifting it. She whimpered when his thumb grazed over her nipple, rough against soft, awakening a thousand sensations inside her.

He grunted now with greater impatience and shoved the tunic and shift upward until her breasts were bare to his gaze. He stared but briefly, lips parted before cupping her breast again, lifting it to his waiting lips. His mouth closed around her nipple, sucking and pulling, first gently and then more firmly. Fiona's breath caught in the back of her throat. She stared overhead, discovering they were under a canopy of leaves, but aware of only the feeling of his mouth on her.

Sweet Jesus.

He pushed her garments higher, and Fiona yanked them over her head, discarding them thoughtlessly. She fed her hands into his long, damp hair, anchoring him to her. This, she thought, this is what she wanted. She was drowning in feeling, in him, in her body's reaction, so much heat. She felt suddenly womanly, seductive even, this notion advanced by Austin's low groaning as he fondled and tasted her breasts and their sensitive buds.

Lost in the wonder of his touch, it took her a moment to understand that he used only his fingers now, and that he was watching her. Fiona tipped her head forward, meeting his gaze. She looked into dark eyes that were often—habitually—unfathomable. But not now. Right now, he wanted this with her, wanted it as much as she did. The intensity of his smoldering gaze suggested that he very much enjoyed watching her discover her own body and what his potent caress did to her.

His gaze drifted lower over her breasts, and she swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. The hunger in his eyes caused an internal, giggling shudder. He was a predator, but a worshipful one. Strange, that so much was available for her to see in his striking eyes, when so often he truly was unreadable.

At the same time, she was aware of his bare chest, carved like stone, his blatant masculinity, his arms thick with muscles. She lifted her eyes, exploring the rugged features of his face, as if now after having averted her gaze more than she did not, she wanted to explore and know every plane, every line, every shadow of his countenance.

He bent and kissed her again, savoring her, lingering over her.

Her earlier mortification had faded, overwhelmed by vibrant desire. She didn't know herself at the moment, this woman in his arms, holding him to her kiss, no more hesitant with her lips and tongue than she was with a sword and dagger.

Austin shifted, holding his weight off her, his hands working on something at her middle. He made quick work of her belt, letting it drop on either side of her. He stripped her of her breeches at the same time he swooped in for a kiss, broadly licking her inside her mouth with his tongue. Cool air brushed lazily against her limbs, warmed only where he touched.

His hand skimmed down over her breast, and she cried out into his mouth when he did not pause there, moving over her belly and lower. Without hesitation, he slipped his fingers into the silken folds between her thighs, scorching her with his touch. She opened her mouth, her throat clogged with words, but no sound came forth, and when his finger slid inside her wet heat, Fiona came apart. She clutched at his shoulders and met his fevered gaze, which poured more heat onto her, more than his finger slowly sliding in and out of her.

"Austin...?"

"Aye, lass. Feel it."

Oh, she did. The flesh beneath his fingers pulsed with the need to be stroked. Groaning, she gave into the desire to move her hips against his hand, matching his rhythm. She arched upward, damp and aching.

He rose over her, and she welcomed his kiss with wild abandon, her tongue stroking his as his fingers stroked her. Mindlessly, her legs opened wider while the evidence of his desire pressed against her thigh.

Astounded, yearning, confused, hopeful, afire—she felt all those things. Her unschooled body throbbed with need. "Austin, please," she begged.

Austin withdrew his fingers and hastily shucked his breeches. He reared up over her and settled between her thighs. She gasped at everything he brought with him, the coarse hair of his chest tickling the tight buds of her nipples, the thick heat of his manhood to the center of her, a heart-melting kiss as he pushed his staff inside her.

The hot length of him filled her core, stroking artfully over tender flesh. She'd known very little about the act before this evening. She knew now, as he began to fill her, that this was where she wanted him most. The height of pleasure was there, or would be found there, she was beginning to realize. Austin had the means to give it to her.

He wore an expression of excruciating pain and somehow she understood, from the tension in his jaw and arms, that he was restraining himself for her benefit.

She felt alive and wild, reckless with longing. "More. Oh, God." ?Twas unlike anything she'd imagined, anything she'd known.

He withdrew slightly and forged gently ahead. He watched her again, his gaze softening as he thrust inward and pulled out. Heat gathered where he touched her inside. He quickened the pace and lengthened his thrusts.

Fiona grimaced, pain beginning to intrude.

Austin plunged hard, entering her fully, and settled deeply, going still.

She gasped and tears stung her eyes, her body stretching—tearing, it seemed—to accommodate his size.

Shite.

"Christ, I'm sorry, lass." He dropped his forehead against hers. "Just once, the pain. And nae more."

"But..." she moaned, more disheartened by the loss of the promise of pleasure than by the pain itself. "Everything stopped."

"Och, and we canna have that," he muttered, a small chuckle briefly shaking his shoulders. Dipping his head into her hair, he whispered at her ear, "I ken how to fix it."

"Oh, thank God."

He pushed himself upward from his elbows to his hands, until he was nearly seated, and her hips were lifted well off the mossy ground. There, he rocked gently forward, and used his thumb on her nub, a part of herself she had only ever wondered about. Her entire body tightened, her core, her toes, her fingertips.

Austin watched her while he pumped gently in and out and stroked her to near oblivion. Fiona had never felt this connected to anyone, not ever, not in all her life.

Pleasure began to spiral beneath his thumb, aided and abetted by the quickening strokes of his manhood. His hips pitched forward with greater vigor until her body not only willingly accepted him but ached and arched for more. Instinctively, she squeezed herself around him, eliciting a low growl. He lunged forward, towering over her, pumping steadily, driving deeper. Fiona hooked her feet onto his back, opening herself to him. There was a strange eroticism to the sounds their bodies made coming together. A sweeping hunger engulfed her.

A torrent of raw emotion washed over her. Hot pleasure engulfed her body and mind. An odd shower of bliss that was torture suffused her.

She covered her mouth with her hand, attempting to stifle whimpers so telling.

Austin pulled her hand away. "Nae. I want to hear ye. Those are mine, every whimper and moan I pull from ye."

She gave herself up to it, to him, to wonder, and let it take away all thought save for him, all sensation save for this.

Nothing else mattered.

She soared and crested and floated down gently, her toes curled and her lips trembling, her body limp.

"Saints howling," she mused, her thoughts scattering.

Austin's low and abrupt chuckle brought her mind round. Her body was wasted, spent.

He kissed her swollen lips and drove deep and hard inside her, stiffening and then pumping again until a long and low groan emerged, and he dropped his head on her chest while he filled her core with warmth.

"Saints howling indeed," he murmured after a moment, his voice muffled against the swell of her breasts.

She blinked slowly, as if waking from a long sleep.

She felt depleted. And invincible. As if she were stronger and weaker than ever before.

For a long time, neither moved.

Her thoughts drifted languorously. Life was often divided into distinct chapters, with a clear demarcation between before and after. These turning points were usually marked by some great or tumultuous event that changed everything. Fiona found herself reflecting on this truth now. She might lump her entire childhood into either before or after—after her mother died or before her father had. For many years, a definitive boundary between youth and womanhood had been the arrival of her menses. The greatest line drawn between before and after had once been the siege at Dunraig, when her world had been turned upside-down.

And yet here was a new one.

Before Austin, her world had been one of duty and survival, of battles fought and victories hard-won. Her heart had been a fortress, impervious to any siege. She had lived with a singular focus, every action driven by necessity and strategy. The days were a blur of training, commands, and the ceaseless march toward an uncertain future.

And then—now—there was after. After this, Austin's touch, his kiss—a moment so powerful, it would once more cleave her life in two. She was not—could not be—the same person who'd climbed the wall with him and others at Wick. ?Twas simply impossible.

Her world had shifted once again.

Suddenly, the boundaries between her past and future blurred, duty and survival seeming a lesser concern. She felt she stood at a crossroads, her still-thundering heart pulling her in a direction she had never anticipated. She realized that she could no longer see her life in the same light. The simplicity of before was gone, replaced by the tangled, intoxicating possibilities of after.

She looked at Austin, seeing in him not just a warrior or her lover, but a man who had the power to change her destiny. The realization was both thrilling and terrifying.

Not at any point had she thought, I should stop this. This is madness. He's a Merrick. I don't like him.

Not once.

She sighed, acknowledging an inner, hidden truth, a rare contentment settling her in peace.

There was no going back to the way things were.

Fiona smiled and drifted off to sleep in Austin's arms.