He’d enjoyed too many successes this night to pay heed to such a little nuisance. So he shoved back his streaming hair, smoothed his robes, and turned away from Dare’s walls, eager to seek his bed.
He had a feeling his dreams would be most pleasing.
The doom of the MacRuaris was assured.
It was only a matter of time.
Chapter Seven
Ronan stood by the hearthside, adjusting the fall of his plaid as surreptitiously as possible. His mind was a careful blank and his expression as stony as he could make it. Both talents he’d been honing for years. Unfortunately, he was less skilled in tempering his more lustful urges.
But a man’s plaid was good for many things.
The voluminous folds perfect for hiding any unwanted problems that might arise.
Determined to avoid such a problem, he squared his shoulders and drew a long breath. In the time he’d needed to steel himself against Lady Gelis’s charms, he’d come to a very important decision.
When the sad day arrived that Valdar was no more and Ronan took his place at the head of the clan, his first chieftainly act would be to forbid the wearing of low-bodiced gowns within Dare’s walls.
A decree against full bosoms — in particular, those with fetching nipples — would be even more pleasing, if impossible to enforce.
He almost smiled at the notion all the same.
Leastways until Lady Gelis took another dangerously deep breath and her decidedly pert and rose-hued nipples threatened to pop into view.
Ronan scowled at the prospect.
His plaid stirred.
Lady Gelis’s breasts swelled even more.
“So-o-o . . .” She picked up her glittering green temptress bauble and fingered the thing as she eyed him. “Are you saying I now have two MacRuari men who wish me gone?”
Ronan blinked. She’d distracted him with all her deep breathing and bauble fingering.
“Two MacRuaris?” He wasn’t following her. “Wishing you gone?”
She nodded. “You, by your own admission” — she flung out an arm to indicate the room — “and if I am to understand your suspicions about who was behind the ravaging of this chamber, your archdruid forebear. Mordred the Dire, may the saints rest his soul.”
“Maldred.” The bedside night candle hissed and guttered on the utterance. “Such was his name and I’d be surprised if you could find a saint — any saint — who’d deign to bless the dastard.”
“Then I say he is to be pitied, not reviled.”
Ronan’s jaw slipped. “Pitied?”
Her head bobbed again. “Och, for sure, and I’d say so.”
Entirely certain, she tilted her head, well aware that the golden light of a well-burning brace of candles was playing advantageously on her fiery tresses.
When the Raven’s mouth tightened, she knew he’d noticed.
Pleased, she let her eyes twinkle.
She also looked at him, wondering when he’d notice that his oh-so- carefully-donned plaid was slipping down his shoulder. And what a fine shoulder it was. Broad, well-muscled, and gleaming in the firelight, its manly allure made it all too difficult to concentrate on some hoary MacRuari ancestor and his centuries-old curse.
Even so, she wanted to try.
“In the great hall this e’en, your druid sang that MacRuari bairns are fed a spoonful of clan earth, sealing their love for kith and kin, the home glen,” she began, watching him carefully. “Is it true?”
