“We are no’ far,” she said.“Another ten miles or so.”
Another ten miles and he’d see the son he hadn’t known he had.He’d meet people he didn’t remember.He did not even know how he was meant to feel.What he thought he’d known was a lie, and now he had a son and a woman who he’d once loved scrubbing her creamy skin in front of him.
She lifted her hair away from her neck and splashed water over her skin.Trickles spilled down to the loose, slightly torn laces.Such expensive gowns were not intended for trekking across the Highlands, yet he had to admit, even in a torn, grimy gown, she looked stunning.The sight arrested him and made his heart want to beat out of his chest.
Then his heart froze and he scowled.Kneeling down next to her, he touched the top of her spine.“What is this?”
She dropped her hair and stiffened.“Naught.”
She didn’t fight him when he pushed aside her golden curls and found the top of a scar.He eased open the laces and forced down her chemise to find the scar travelled down her back and was met by others, all in the same criss-crossing fashion.
“What are these?”He touched the lines and felt her muscles tighten.
“Naught.Pray cease,” she begged huskily.
“These are from a whip,” he said.
“Aye.”
“Who did this to ye?”For one awful moment, he wondered if it could have been him.He still had little idea who he was.What if the man he was now was really him?Or what if he was worse?But Lorna had said she saw pieces of the old Logan in him.And she had said that in his softer moments.
“My husband.”
Relief coursed through him and he eased open her gown further.The lack of fight in her disturbed him but he could not stop himself.How could a man do this to a woman?To mar someone so beautiful?The pain he must have caused...Logan gritted his jaw.It was a good thing the man was dead or Logan might have to exact some revenge.Maybe see how he liked being flogged.
In spite of her obvious tension, he studied the marks and touched them.“He beat ye often?”
“Aye.”
“What could ye have possibly done to deserve such a beating?”
Lorna shrugged.“Ye know I dinnae hold my tongue well.And lack of sons always angered him.”
“Did I know about this?”
“Nay.”
“But what about—”
“We have but one night together and...well, we didnae undress.”
“If I had known...”
“If ye had known, ye would have killed him and ye would have ended up hanged, for that was the kind of man ye were.None except my maid knew of Walter’s actions.I wouldnae have anyone fighting my battles.”
“I still would kill him if he were alive.By God, I’d have taken great pleasure in it,” he said through gritted teeth.
She shrugged away from him.“See?Ye are no’ so different to the man ye used to be.But pray, dinnae look, they are unsightly.”
“They are no’ unsightly.”He splayed a hand across her back.“Ye are beautiful.Every part of ye is beautiful.Ye are too lovely for me, to be sure.”
He saw her eyes flutter closed while he rubbed his hand up and down her back.This lass was the strongest person he had ever met.She had endured so much yet she had still been willing to fight for him.
The draw was too powerful.He could fight it no longer.Whoever this woman had been to him in the past, he needed her now.As the mother of his child, mayhap she was his future.He eased around behind her, his hands splayed over her shoulders and pressed aside the fabric of her gown and chemise.Then he brought his lips to her marred skin and kissed the streaks that told him so much of her buried pain.He did not know who he had been.He did not know who he was now.But he knew he would have—and would still—done anything to save her from more pain.
“Beautiful,” he murmured.
His lips tingled at the feel of her soft skin, and sweet gratification warmed his chest when she gasped and trembled.He pushed her garments all the way down until they pooled at her waist.Lips to her neck, he reached around and found her warm, heavy breasts waiting for him.Her nipples were hard against his palms and if it bothered her being bared to the wilderness of the Highlands, she did not show it.
