Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

“ W hat are they?” asked Rory, poking at the little parcels of soft white dough on his plate.

“Pork buns,” said Aihan. “Try,” she said, picking one up off her plate and taking a bite. “Good!” she said round her mouthful.

Col hid a smile at Rory’s expression and took a cautious bite of his own bun. The soft, light dough was slightly chewy and sweet, and hidden in the centre was a pocket of crumbly sweet and savoury meat that was quite tasty.

He nodded and smiled at Aihan. “Good,” he agreed.

Fergus manfully took a bite, and his bushy eyebrows went up when he got the flavour of the meat. “Verra guid, lassie,” he growled.

Willy took a big bite and Callum did likewise. Callum glanced at Rory, who was still regarding the bun as if it were an intruder about to rob him, and said thickly, “If ye dinnae want yers, I’ll have it.”

That made Rory stuff the bun in his mouth and chew valiantly.

Col had kept his distance from the lass the last couple of days as she cleaned the house from top to bottom, and today as she took over the kitchen to cook them a Chinese feast, of which the pork buns were the first course. She’d had Willy running errands for her all day into the village for ingredients. When he had penetrated to the kitchen to check on her progress, she had explained that she was having to substitute ingredients.

“Ye nae have many things I want,” she said, her hair tied back off her face and an apron over her gown. He noticed that she had lifted the hem of the gown so that she could walk without having to hold it up, and tightened the too-loose bodice. He should find her some others from Cat’s wardrobe. After all, they were just gathering dust.

However it was, she made do, and the food was strange but delicious. Even Rory enjoyed it in the end. She had made noodles , long strings of a type of dough, he supposed, and cooked a type of spiced stew with vegetables and meat that was more flavoursome than anything Fergus had ever served up. And she finished everything off with a custard and rice pudding dish like nothing he’d ever eaten before.

After dinner he took the dogs for their evening walk, planning to return to his study and read until bedtime. Aihan had retired early the last two nights, worn out from all her hard work. It had made it easy to avoid being alone with her. Tonight, he returned from his walk with the dogs to find her ensconced in a chair staring at a book, taken presumably from his shelves. She was sitting with her feet tucked up under her skirts, a hank of her hair had come loose from its confines and hung down the side of her face, and whatever she was looking at seemed to have her enthralled.

He checked on the threshold, but the dogs marched in, tails wagging, and she looked up to greet them with pats and exclamations in her own language. She glanced up and smiled at him.

His heart turned over and thudded hard, and heat stirred in his breeches again. She was as dangerous as a snake and an as enticing as a siren. He should—he must —keep his distance. He came into the room, pushing the door shut behind him without thinking, and walked towards her. Crouching down by her chair, he said, “What are ye looking at, lass?”

She held up the book: Drake’s Voyage by Edward Cavendish Drake, 1768 . She had the book open to a map of the world. Her finger traced over the map.

“My home,” she whispered. He leaned forward to see better and a warm drop of moisture fell on the back of his hand. “I lived here,” she said, pointing to a spot on the map. She sniffed, and he caught another tear with his fingers as it rolled down her cheek.

“I’m sorry, lass,” he said, husky-voiced. He dropped to his knees and hugged her against his chest, the book still on her lap between them. She rested her head against his shoulder and her thin shoulders shook with silent tears. He found her a handkerchief, and she blew her nose and wiped her face. He couldn’t imagine what it must feel like to be exiled from home. How would he feel if he thought he might never see Scotland again?

Conscious of the burning heat in his breeches, he rose and went to the fireplace to put some distance between them.

“I cannae imagine how ye must feel, lass. I’m that sorry.” Is there a way I can get her home? Then he recalled the Sassenach who had come looking for his brother. What had the man said, something about a British embassy to China, that the Government wanted Merlow to join? Could I get her on that ship? What did Merlow say about it when he was here with Hetty? Merlow had declined to join the embassy, obviously. He didn’t wish to be parted from his new wife. But he hadn’t said aught else about it. It might be too late, but he could make enquiries. Better not to say anything to the lass, raise her hopes only to have them dashed. If I teach her English, she will be useful to the delegation, and they’ll surely not refuse her passage then?

She was looking at the map again, the handkerchief clutched in one hand. He returned to her side and knelt in front of her. “Show me, lass, where you lived?”

“Here.” She pointed to a spot on the map, turning the book around so that he could see. It was a map of the world, and it put into perspective just how far away China was. Whatever possessed them to pursue my brother all the way here? He would question her more closely when her English was better. Her finger rested above the rounded coast of China, adjacent to a large bay and about one finger width inland. “Beijing,” she murmured.

“The capital, Peking?” he asked.

She nodded and closed the book, as if looking at it any longer was too painful. She put it on the side table beside her chair and reached out a hand to touch his face. Her small hand cupped his cheek and sent a tingle of sensation over his skin. His cock, already half-hard from her proximity, stiffened further with a rush of heated desire that made it hard to think. Her eyes, dark and mysterious, had him fascinated.

“Thank ye,” she said. “Ye are kind.”

“Nae, lass, I feel responsible.” He was conscious of his heart rate accelerating and his breathing rising just from the touch of her hand and her scent. He should get up, move away . . . .

She cocked her head as if not sure of that word. Then, before he could move back, she leaned in and set her lips to his. It was a soft, gentle kiss and over almost before it began, but it fired his senses and loosened his control, which he’d been hanging on to by a thread. Putting a hand behind her head, he brought her mouth back to his and kissed her. She slid her arms round his neck and kissed him back.

He wrapped an arm round her waist, pulling her towards him, and she slid her knees to either side of his hips as he pulled her flush against him to the edge of the chair. His mouth devoured hers in a kiss that sent his blood racing and made his overwrought cock leak in his breeches as he pressed into the apex of her thighs in an unconscious grinding motion, reminiscent of the way she had ground herself on him a few days ago.

She responded now with an unabashed rotation of her hips, seemingly as eager as he to find some relief from the nagging desire that was driving him crazy. Her legs wrapped round him, pressing her closer to the source of raging heat between them. Her breathing as ragged as his, she made a noise in her throat that sent a bolt of hot desire to his aching groin.

His hands dropped to her hips and then lower, cupping and squeezing her bottom, pressing her harder against him. Grinding. Rubbing. Her hips worked as hard as his to bring them mutual pleasure through the layers of their clothing. Fuck! This was obscene, and it felt so good he couldn’t stop, and it didn’t seem as if she wanted him to stop either.

She was as frantic for this as he was, their mouths taking each other with ferocious appetite, their bodies working themselves into a panting, groaning frenzy. “Yes,” he groaned, and so did she, as her body convulsed, suddenly trembling, the movement of her hips going jerky as she moaned again and again, her head falling back, eyes closed.

It was too much, and he came hard in his breeches, panting and grunting like a beast as indescribable pleasure flooded his body. His arms clamped her tight to him as the wave receded slowly, and his head dropped forward onto her shoulder.

He kissed the exposed flesh of her neck and squeezed her tight, dragging in a slow, deep breath. “Bha mi dìreach a’ suathadh ri nighean nèimh,” he whispered. I just touched heaven, lass.

She blinked her eyes and said something he couldn’t understand, a small smile tracing her lips. His own lifted in a half smile too, amused by their inability to understand a word the other was saying while their bodies communicated just fine.

Gradually, awareness of where they were—in his study, right in front of Cat’s portrait—penetrated his sex-soaked brain, and he became conscious simultaneously of the pain in his knees and the wet and rapidly cooling mess in his breeches. Fuck, what have I done?

Her legs unwound from his hips, and he slowly let her go, edging back and rising to his feet, turning away from her, embarrassed and ashamed of his loss of control and the insult he’d just served the memory of his wife. Coming between the legs of another woman in full view of her portrait.

He leaned on the mantle staring blindly down at the fire, his shoulders hunched. He felt sick.

“Mac?” She touched his arm. He resisted the urge to shake her off and roar at her to leave him alone. He had just enough awareness to check that wild reaction. With difficulty he said quietly, “Ye’d best go to bed, lass.”

“Mac?”

“Go, please!” he said, fighting to keep his voice level.

Another moment and then she obeyed him. He felt her move away, a cold puff of air that sent a shiver down his back, but that was probably just the sweat under his shirt congealing. He heard the door open and then close quietly. And he slumped forward, his forehead on his hands, gripping the edge of the mantelpiece.

He stood like that for some time, lost in a kind of anguished haze. Finally, he straightened and looked up at Cat’s portrait through a haze of tears. “I’m sorry, mo ghràdh.” My love.

He turned away and made his way upstairs to his bedchamber, where he stripped, washed, and crawled into bed. Closing his eyes, he forgot to say his usual prayer to Cat, his thoughts a jumbled mess. He fell asleep in the midst of trying to work out what he was going to do.

Aihan, retreating to her room, was conscious of a heaviness of heart in the wake of the joyful pleasure she had experienced in his arms. For a few precious moments, she had felt that the differences in language were overcome by a more primal language that they both understood. But in the aftermath, his withdrawal and rejection destroyed that communion of souls and made her feel cheap and tawdry. It hurt.

She tried to shrug off the stab in her heart, but as she stripped off the foreign clothes and gave herself a quick wash, the tears came anyway, tightening her throat and clouding her eyes. The ache in her chest squeezed, and she suddenly missed her brother fiercely.

Ah Liang, where are you? I should just leave, but I don’t have the information I need yet, for where would I go?

She climbed into the big soft bed with its rustling mattress and snugged herself under the covers, Curling her feet up to keep them warm.

I must find out where you went, Liang. I shall come to you wherever you are, my brother. I need you.

Sleep took her before she could formulate a plan of any kind, but thoughts of Liang were a bittersweet comfort. Yet as she slipped into sleep it was Mac’s face that teased her, his head thrown back, eyes closed, expression twisted, as his body convulsed with their shared ecstasy. She had felt the flood of heat and dampness through her dress. He had come as hard as she did. His arms, tight round her at the end, had felt so good. So big and warm and safe . . .