“I’ll gie my men their orders then, Mouse, and ye and I will ride down to Broc Ailien. I’m anxious to meet this Alanna.”
It was already nightfall when they slipped into Alanna Wythe’s cottage. Alanna was in her nightshift, and the fire was low when they arrived. Sybilla lay asleep in her cot.
“And who is this giant?” demanded Alanna crossly. “I didn’t give you permission to bring your friends here.”
“This is Ranald Torc, Alanna. He’s agreed to help us. We move tomorrow. I’m going home tonight toGrantholmto get Annabella to send a message to sweet Velvet to come and visit wi’ her tomorrow afternoon. Ranald’s men will take her on the road between the village and my home. Then they’ll take BrocCairn’s cattle, and we’ll be gone.”
“What happens when your wife gives the alarm because Velvet hasn’t arrived, Ian? You’ll have to send the message in Annabella’s name so that she doesn’t know there’s been a message. That way we’ll have more time. You can even send another message toDun Broclater, saying her ladyship has decided to spend the night atGrantholm.That way there’ll be no alarm until the following day, and by the time they reach Alex, we’ll all be very long gone.”
“By God!” Ranald Torc said, “I like a woman who thinks like a man. Now, mouse, tell the wench my condition for helping ye.”
“Mouse?”Alanna looked at Ian and laughed. “Aye, I can see it! What condition?”
“He wants to fuck ye,” Ian said bluntly. “He’ll help us if ye’ll let him.”
Alanna let her eyes roam over Ranald Torc. Her gaze was bold and noncommittal. “He’s got to wash first,” she said.
“What?”Both men spoke in unison.
“He smells like a pig byre. I’ll fuck him, but he’s got to be clean.” She didn’t give either man the chance to think, instead saying, “Ian, get the tub I use in the pantry, and I’ll start heating the water.”
Ranald Torc was fascinated. He had expected a shriek of outrage, which he would follow with the rape of the Englishwoman’s person. Instead she was ordering him to bathe, and, by God, he was going to do it! He had never met such a woman in his entire life. He gave a barely perceptible nod to his cousin, and within a short time the tub was filled with warm water and set before the fire, which Alanna had built up so that its warmth filled the room.
He handed her his shirt and his stockings which she immediately threw into a smaller tub to wash. Ian, having yanked his cousin’s boots off moments before, had already fled the cottage. He didn’t want to be around when Alanna got a good look at Ranald Torc’s private parts.
“Get into the tub,” Alanna ordered the giant, pulling his kilt from him and turning to shake it out the back door. “Now,” she said, “just sit there a few minutes until I get your shirt and stockings clean. ’Tis no good putting a clean body into dirty clothes.”
It was obvious she hadn’t taken a good look at him yet, he thought, or she’d be screaming the cottage down. He did as he had been told and sat himself in the tub, considering even as he did so how foolish he must look, his knees sticking up into the air. Within a few minutes, as she had promised, his shirt and hose were washed and spread before the fire to dry. Alanna now turned to the task of bathing Ranald Torc, and she showed no mercy as she wielded a boar’s-bristle brush on him.
“Jesu!” he complained as she soaped him with a small cake of soap. “I smell like a damned flower.”
“You smell clean, you great oaf! A rare departure, I don’t doubt! Stand up! I can’t bathe what I can’t see!”
Ranald Torc stood and waited for her scream to come. For a long moment she was very quiet, and then Alanna said, “I thought that Ian Grant had the biggest cock in Christendom, but I was certainly wrong, wasn’t I?” She soaped him, her hands lingering lovingly over his male parts. “God almighty, you’re built like a bull, Ranald Torc!” She cupped the pouch of his sex in her hands, and it overflowed her palms. She ran her tiny fingers sensually down the long, long length of him, sighing voluptuously as she did so, and his manhood stirred violently in her grasp. “Sit down and rinse yourself,” she said in a tight voice. “The sooner you’re clean, the sooner you can fill me up with that great pole of yours!”
No woman had ever spoken to him like that. Usually they howled and wept with fear at the sight of him. He looked up at her. She really was a little bit of a thing next to him. He was suddenly afraid he’d kill her with his bigness, and for some reason he couldn’t quite explain he didn’t want to.
As if reading his thoughts, she said, “You’ll have to go slowly until we see how much of you will fit.”
He nodded and, standing up, stepped from the tub. She rubbed him dry with a small square of toweling, and when she had finished he found that despite his nudity he felt himself in full command of the situation, no longer so nonplussed by the small, blond woman who spoke so boldly to him. “Well,” he said slowly, “ye’ve had a good look at what I hae to offer, now let’s see yer goods, woman!”
With a slow seductive smile, Alanna dropped her shift, and her smile broadened at his intake of breath. She was very proud of her body. She might be tiny in stature, but her limbs were pleasingly rounded, and her breasts were big and full. Reaching out, he gently hefted one of those large breasts, and a smile spread on his face as the nipple puckered at his touch. Taking him by the hand, she led him up into the loft above the cottage’s main room where her mattress was spread. They knelt facing one another, and he let his hands run eagerly over her lushness. Overwhelmed by the bounty offered him, he couldn’t decide where to begin. His big hands reached around to squeeze her buttocks, which were plump and firm. Alanna lifted her breasts and rubbed them against his hairy chest. His whole body was, she saw, covered with darkish hair. For a few moments, they explored each other, but the truth was that she excited him tremendously, and, seeing it, Alanna lay on her back and spread her legs wide.
“Go on,” she encouraged him, “stuff me with that monster cock of yours, Ranald Torc!”
With a groan, he fell on her and began to push himself steadily into her. At first Alanna felt she was being torn asunder, but she forced herself to relax, and he restrained himself from hurrying. Suddenly, to her surprise, he was buried completely within her. With a pleased grin he kissed her heartily on the mouth.
She pulled her head away, though, and said, “Now fuck me, you brute! We know now you can’t kill me.”
Ranald Torc complied with Alanna’s request most willingly. She was the first woman he’d ever taken who accepted him easilyandat the height of her passion begged him for more. He spent a long and happy night loving this tiny English-woman. If the truth had been known, she actually wore him out, and he loved her the more for it. When the dawn came, she arose to cook him a large breakfast of porridge, ham, eggs, and scones.
Ian Grant, creeping back and expecting to find his mistress dead, instead found her eating quite contentedly with his cousin.
“She’s my woman now,” Ranald Torc said bluntly.
“Ye fucked her?” Ian was astounded.
“Aye,” came the reply.
