The banns were read for Jacob and Lissy in the village kirk for a respectable three weeks before they were wed a month later.
Jacob immediately expanded the shed next to his cottage so that he would have to share his quarters only with Lissy and their growing family. The chickens, geese, pigs, cows, and sheep would have to inhabit the new shed.
And now when Jacob marched his cows to the dairy, Lissy was by his side. Every night he’d take her to bed in his tiny cottage and explore every warm nook and cranny of her body until morning light.
Eventually, they had to slow down so that they had enough strength left over for farm work. The End.
Charlotte stirred in the crook of his arm and looked up, her violet eyes a hazy shade of plum. After a quiet moment she gave him a solid punch in his side. “You made that up,” she accused.
“Of course I made it up. Isn’t that what all great storytellers do?”
“Are you going to fill me up withyourcock tonight?”
Col stared down at the woman in his arms, a serious look of consideration in his eyes. “No, not tonight, my greedy puss.”
She frowned and wrinkled her nose. “Why not? What’s wrong with me?”
He tapped his forefinger against her upturned nose. “Nothing at all. However, I’ve had my way with only one of your senses tonight, and there are so many to go.”
“Which one is next?”
He tapped her nose again. “This one.”
She gave him another playful jab in his ribs. “How can you make love to my nose?”
“Show me the way to your kitchen and give your cook the night off.”
10
Charlotte chafed at the sensual anticipation Col had set off in her nether regions. However, she’d lost the niggling fear she’d felt earlier in the evening. Maybe she was starting to trust him.
Then again, maybe she shouldn’t, she thought as she followed his swaggering form through the narrow hallway to her kitchen set into the rear quarter of the house. The tiny villa did not have a lower level, which was just fine as far as she was concerned.
When they both entered the kitchen, Lilith raised her head from the cookbook she’d been poring over and gave Charlotte a quizzical look.
Charlotte was in a strange mood, perhaps because of the last bottle of wine they’d consumed. She hooked a finger toward Col who was busy checking out all the items in the open pantry, opening huge sacks and tiny boxes, sniffing each one as he went, sometimes staring at the ceiling and muttering to himself. “He claims he’s going to make love to my nose, and I need to give you the rest of the night off.”
Lilith said nothing but stared appreciatively at Col’s backside when he reached for some items on higher shelves. She looked back at Charlotte and shook her head. “If I were you, I’d keep this one. And, yes, I would love to take the rest of the night off.” She shouldered the hefty cookbook and headed back toward the far end of garden where her quarters had been carved out of the upper level of an old mews.
The cook threw one last piece of advice over her shoulder. “If you should need my services…for, um, anything, please send Sam for me.” With that, she disappeared into the dark, shadowed garden.
When Charlotte turned back toward Col to see what he was plotting now, he was right there, bare inches from her face, holding up something green and leafy in one hand, and an ominous-looking black silk scarf in the other.
He quickly hid his hand with the greenery behind him while pointing to a high chair at the stone slab counter where most of the daily work of the kitchen took place. “Sit, milady.”
She gave him a mulish look but did as she was told, giving an involuntary jerk when he slipped behind her and wrapped the silky scarf around her head. He tied the ends firmly and tested the tightness with one of his fingers.
“Can you see anything?”
“Of course not,” she snapped peevishly.
“You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?”
“If this is what it takes to keep you here without you leaving in a bad skin, then I must remain yours to torture at will with your nonsensical fancies.”
He whistled at her fervent speech. “Let me ask that question again in a different way.”
She wrinkled her nose beneath the opaque, silky blindfold and tried to see beneath the lower edge of the fabric.
