“What about Knox?” I asked. “Did he not get jealous?”
“Nay, he never had the need to. He was laird-in-waiting and my father always treated him as such. The two of them were very similar in temperament and in looks.”
I pictured Wilkie as a small, proud boy. And Kade, vying for the attentions of his elegant mother. And I imagined young Knox, perhaps a miniature of his noble, striking father.
“I’m sure she would have been very proud of the men you have all become.”
“I hope she would. The very last thing she said to us before she died was this—‘Promise me this: always follow your heart.’”
This silence was laced with sadness but also somehow charged, almost sparkling with it. I almost didn’t dare ask it, but then I said softly, “And are you?”
“Aye, lass. I am,” he said, his eyes deeply, darkly blue. “I am following my heart, to you.” He kissed my lips for a tender, lingering moment.
Then he settled me against him and looked out again at the low-hanging moon.
His next comment was murmured, like a private thought spoken aloud. “I am following my heart, but I am not following my brother the laird’s direct orders. Therein lies the problem.”
And so I understood his conflict a little bit more clearly, and how difficult a problem I had introduced for him. He could justify and allow his desire for me in part because he imagined he was living the last words his mother had spoken to him, by keeping me close; yet this desire warred with his duty to his brother and his clan, their outreaching prosperity and the strengthening of crucial military alliances.
I was disturbed by his dilemma. And I was also comforted by his confession.I am following my heart, to you.Hope ballooned in my chest. Maybe, just maybe, there could be an alternate solution to Wilkie’s betrothal to one of the Morrison women, another way of securing the alliance between clans and armies. Maybe, if Knox was reminded of his mother’s dying words and if he knew of Wilkie’s claim on me, maybe he would somehow allow us to be together.
My eyes felt heavy, but my mind continued to churn.
“Come on, lass,” Wilkie said. “Time for bed.”
He carried me back to his bed and lay facing me, securing the furs tightly around us. His hand on my hip relaxed, and his breathing slowed as he fell asleep. I noticed this about him: he was a good sleeper, drifting easily into his dreams.
My drowsing thoughts were fluid and disturbed. I wondered if Knox was unrelenting in his orders and Wilkie wed another, would I be able to share him or to leave him when the time came? I thought not. I was too deeply invested in this man to ever be separated from him now and survive it. His presence in my life was too strong, too all-encompassingly fundamental to go without, now that I had experienced his magnificence. His blood had mingled with mine, and I had taken his seed into my body. He was in me, and I could feel him. I was overwhelmed by all that he was. As Wilkie described me, I considered:you are the sun. I, too, felt his light and his essence inside myself and all around me, like a newfound life force. Before those moments when I’d seen and touched him for the first time, by the loch and in the cave, every memory seemed faded anddull. When Wilkie had stormed his way into my life, darkness had become light.
I realized with some distress that I was no longer willing to live without him.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
IWASDREAMINGABEAUTIFULdream. I lay in my cave, warmed by a stoked fire that heated me to such an extent that a dewy sweat covered my skin. I kicked off my furs. My dark warrior came to me and lay with me in our quiet haven. He lifted my shift, cooling my skin deliciously. He eased my legs apart so he could kneel between them. His mouth was kissing the skin of my stomach. He lifted my shift farther, over the swell of my breasts, which he kissed and nuzzled until they were aching and heavy. He placed his hot mouth over the tip of one breast, and the vibrant pulls sent quickening channels to the core of my body, which grew slick and honeyed and wanting. I arched to him, and he took my other nipple, using the wetness of his mouth on the first to swirl sensation, teasing in pinching tugs. I was writhing and moaning, wanting more. I was pleading with him. I needed him to ease the scorching emptiness, to stroke my rising tide. I felt him touch my entrance with his heavy shaft, gliding its very tip against me. This lightest touch was the fulfillment of every desire I had ever known. With its subtle persuasion, this touch fed a spiraling burn throughout my being, igniting my body into a thousand suns, blinding me with sensation as it raged lusciously through my clenching core.
But then the touch was withdrawn, and I was leftfloundering and irate from the removal of such intense ecstasy. My anger awoke me, and I opened my eyes.
We weren’t in our cave but in Wilkie’s chambers. He was not a dream lover, but a real one. I reached for him, and my hands found the thick silk of his hair. His hands were forcing my legs wider. And his mouth was on me, caressing my lingering rapture, releasing it anew with his greedy attentions. The rippling waves were not as intense this time, but long and lush and brimming with molten, starry pleasure.
I lay on my back as he continued his tender kisses, and his fingers were everywhere, lightly learning my every curve and contour.
I pulled, ever so slightly, on his hair. He looked up at me. His eyes glimmered with mischief, a sight which relieved me greatly. Gone was his angst and his turmoil, for now.
“My Roses wakes,” he said.
He crawled up my body and lay on top of me, holding his weight, but still lying heavily against me. I was very aware of his bold, immense hardness, pressing along my near-naked body.
“You pleasure me, warrior.”
His dark eyes were smug and simmering with his own heat. “You are the sweetest fruit.”
“And what of your own pleasure?”
“You are my pleasure.”
But I wasn’t convinced. The dream touch of his body barelyinsideme ignited me with a new awareness. I wanted more. “You’re holding back,” I said, and I was surprised to feel that I was mildly incensed by this.
He smiled at my light anger. “For now.”
