“I’ll race ye!” Snow leaped forward.
Surprised, he urged the stallion into a canter. Mischievously, she had taken advantage of him. They raced, and she was across the drawbridge and into the courtyard, just barely ahead of him, as he thundered after her. There were no stable lads in view. Laughing, Annabella slid from her mare, leading Snow into the semidarkened stables to her stall. He followed with his own beast.
Without a word between them, they unsaddled their horses, rubbed them down, and filled their food bins with oats and hay. As she exited Snow’s stall, drawing the gate shut as she did, the earl came up behind her, wrapping his arms about her lightly. She protested faintly as he pulled her farther into the darkened stable, pushing her facedown over a bale of hay.
“There is more than one way to couple, madam,” he growled in her ear, as, reaching about her, he fumbled with the buttons on her jerkin, unlaced her shirt, and yanked her breeks down to reveal her tempting bottom.
“Angus!” she squealed. “What are ye about?” She heard him undoing his own breeks, heard them drop to the stable floor.
“My thoughts of ye last night haunt me,” his voice whispered harshly into her ear. “I must have ye, Annabella!I must!” He fisted her thighs apart, grasping her hips.
Her heart was hammering wildly in her chest; she was more excited than afraid. Then she felt his engorged cock sliding into her love sheath.
“Jesu! Ye’re already wet for me,” he groaned, pushing himself deep, her rounded buttocks pressing against him. Reaching around her, he took her two breasts in his hands as he slowly began to piston her. Her sheath tightened about him, setting his lust aboil.
Instinctively she arched her back for him. This was delicious madness—being ravished from behind in a dark stable like some milkmaid or servant lass. But oh, oh, oh, it was wonderful! His thrusts grew quicker and deeper. Her head was already spinning with her own lustful appreciation of his efforts. His hot breath scalded her ear. “Oh, Angus,” she half sobbed. “It is good! So good! Dinna stop!”
What a jest God had played upon him, Angus Ferguson thought as he enthusiastically fucked his wife. He had given Angus a maiden who appeared as meek as a lamb, but was in reality the most passionate woman he had ever known. She was like fire, and she scorched his very soul.
“Oh, aye! Aye!” Annabella cried out as her excitement began to peak.
“Jesu! Jesu!” he groaned as he felt himself ready to burst with his pleasure.
The passion between them exploded. They sprawled upon the bale of hay, their breath coming in painful little gasps as they both attempted to regain their sanity. His fingers squeezed her breasts as the last drops of his juices spurted weakly, and she attempted to prolong the delight.
Finally, Annabella sighed a gusty sigh. “Someone may come,” she said softly.
“Aye,” he agreed, pulling himself slowly to his feet. Pulling his breeks up, he fastened them. Then he drew her up, helping her to regain some order in her garb. He couldn’t help kissing her before he released her. Then they walked from the stables as if nothing had just happened between them.
“So one may fuck anywhere,” Annabella said in a perfectly calm and conversational tone of voice as they entered the castle again.
“Aye,” he replied. “At any time or place.”
“I always thought such activity was confined to the bedchamber in the dark hours only,” Annabella responded.
“Would ye prefer it so, madam?” he asked her.
“Mother of mercy, nay, my lord, I should not!” she told him. “I shall look forward to more of yer delightful surprises. Ye have promised to teach me what will please ye, and I promise ye that I will be a most attentive scholar, husband.”
“Cease, for pity’s sake, madam,” he begged her. “Ye but arouse my lust again, and I have work to do this day.”
“Then do not keep me waiting tonight, my lord,” she cautioned him. “I am so eager to learn.” She curtsied to him and, turning, hurried away.
Angus’s head spun with the lustful thoughts her words aroused in him. Again he wondered what was the magic she was using that made him feel as randy as a young bull in high summer? Then he realized that he didn’t really care. Wasn’t his lust for her, and hers for him, a good thing? Certainly they would produce bairns at a rapid rate if they continued on as they had this day. Women were cautioned by both the old and the Reformed churches that the coupling of a husband and wife had only one purpose: bairns.
Yet he knew for a fact that his dour father and his gay French mother had fallen in love and enjoyed their bed sport. Could he ever come to love Annabella? Or would his emotions for her be confined to simply lust?
December came. Annabella made it an extremely happy month at Duin, for there were many feast days to be celebrated. Pastor Blaine wanted to disapprove of all the gaiety, but the young Countess of Duin would not let him. “There can be no wrong in celebrating the coming of our Lord and his birth,” she said.
“So much feasting and dancing is wicked, my lady,” he said, distressed.
“Is it wrong to thank God for sending us his beloved son, Pastor? Is it wrong to feed the poor, and give gifts to those who have served us well? Nay! I cannot sanction such thoughts, and certainly ye do not believe such a thing,” Annabella told him.
Her words were so reasonable, and how could God be offended under the circumstances? Pastor Blaine acquiesced. He had heard there was to be venison for dinner, and the earl would be broaching a keg of his own whiskey. “But we must always remember to keep God in mind as we feast,” he said.
“Do ye not give the blessing each time ye’re at the high board?” she reminded him.
“Aye, but when I am not there, who does it?” he demanded to know.
