‘What if it is just lust between us?’
She shrugged. ‘Maybe that’s enough, and it’s more than many people have.’
Cullen took her in his arms. She was so lovely – all wide brown eyes and wind-blown hair. He wondered how many men had ever got this soft side of Lowri instead of the snapping, mistrustful lass he’d first met. At that moment, he did not care. He kissed Lowri hard and pressed her back against the wall of the kirk, seized by a need to stamp his ownership on her.
When he swept up her skirts and freed himself, she did not protest, only clutching him tighter. He lifted her onto his manhood, and Lowri gasped. She was not ready, but Cullen took her in a frenzy of lust, jealousy and affection. His heart was too full, his lust too strong to take his time. They came together violently, nails digging in, biting, scratching, clinging to one another in the shadow of the kirk. He felt her tighten around him as she cried his name to the wind.
It was blasphemous, glorious and a blessed release. Afterwards, they clung to each other as if an invisible cord bound them together. Cullen forced out the words. ‘I kept something from you.’
She pushed him back off her and rearranged her skirts. ‘What?’
‘I sent a man to look for your friends, to find out where my father is keeping them,’ he said. ‘I should have told you, but I didn’t want you to get your hopes up.’
‘And?’
‘I came here tonight to meet with him. He came in on the Alainn. He found no trace of the lads, not at Scarcross, or anywhere around there.’
‘What do you mean, no trace?’
‘My friend kept his ears open for rumours, but there were none. No one was talking, and those lads weren’t seen. He has a friend at Scarcross, and he reported no comings and goings to the hole you were kept in, no sign of prisoners kept there.’
‘Are Donnan and Rory dead?’
‘I don’t know.’ Cullen put his hand to her cheek. ‘I sought to free you from your misery, Lowri. I tried, I swear. But I am no further forward than when we left Scarcross.’
‘Do you want me gone? Is that why you sent a man?’
‘No.’
‘You want rid of me. Why else would you do that?’
‘Don’t you know, lass?’ He crushed his mouth to hers in a rush of feeling. ‘I seek your bed not to get a bairn, but because I can think of nothing else but holding you, being inside you, wanting you.’
‘I don’t understand.’
He took her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. ‘I’ll not force you to be with me. I want you here of your own free will, because I could come to love you, lass.’
The words were out of him now. He was a fool, and he may as well have handed Lowri a knife to cut his heart out, for she said nothing, just stared out to sea distractedly. Then she looked down at her boots.
‘I think I could come to love you, too, Cullen.’ The wind blew her hair over her face, and he brushed it back and kissed her. Lowri pushed him off.
‘But I wish I didn’t, for that way holds only misery for both of us.’
‘That is not true.’
‘Oh, Cullen. Don’t you see? With all the bitterness, lies and hatred between our clans, we don’t stand a chance.’
There was nothing he could do with that, so he did not argue, or plead or tell her she was wrong. He let her walk ahead of him,down the hill to the inn, feeling doom descend on him like a black shadow.
Chapter Twenty
It was a fine day for a ride, but Connie insisted her old mare could not keep up in a gallop, so it was taking an age to get to Garron - a little fishing village where there was a market.
A week had passed since their visit to Larne, and Lowri’s heated desecration of holy ground when she let Cullen have her up against a church wall. She was surely going to hell for that, but there were worse sins she had committed to send her there, so she may as well enjoy herself. She smiled inwardly. Cullen had been robust in his husbandly duties since then, and her sexual capitulation had encouraged him to give her freedom of late, though he insisted she always carry the pistol and have company wherever she went.
‘Are you looking forward to the market, lass?’ said Connie. ‘You have such a bloom to your cheeks. You should get a ribbon for that unruly hair, something pretty to tame it.’
Cullen had only that morning declared how he loved her hair tickling his face when she leaned in to kiss him, so Lowri had little interest in ribbons. Her face broke into a smile at the thought, and she was still grinning like a fool when they rode into Garron some time later.
