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Hilla near falls off the log in a fit of coughing. Not a reaction I’d expected. When she finishes, all three of the men look at us.

“Are you well?” I ask.

But that is not the question, and Hilla knows it. I seek her permission for something else.

“Aye, well enough now. Thank you, husband.”

Now is my chance.

16

Hilla

Tis not a sin to want to save our lives.

Even before their jest, I wondered if the men had noticed Aiken and I do not touch. Shamelessly, the thought came to me as an excuse to move closer to him. Surely man and wife would be more at ease with each other?

I’m fooling no one—not God nor myself. As Aiken leans into me, I want this even though I should not. But if he deems it necessary for the ruse, why should I argue? He’d not break such a sacred vow if our lives were not in danger.

At the first touch of his lips, I nearly come off the log, so charged is the touch. His lips are soft, and warm. They cover mine so perfectly. Aiken’s hand cups my cheek as the men clap and howl. How could the same person who came so close to slitting a man’s throat be so gentle now?

And then, his lips are gone.

Except that I could feel them for long after Aiken and the reivers resumed their conversation. I do not contribute, or even listen, as I’d done before. Instead, I resist the urge to touch my lips where his had been.

If I’d known it would feel that way. If I’d known flutters would begin in my chest and travel down to my very core. If I’d known a simple touch as that could warm my cheeks, my chest, my whole body, in a way the fire in front of us could never have done.

I might very well have had the damn affair I’d been accused of.

Nay, Hilla. You would not.

’Twould have disappointed my mother. And my sister. And God. But most of all, myself. I know that because even now I feel poorly for wanting Aiken’s kiss so badly.

“My lady?”

One of the men must have asked me a question.

As Aiken slips his fingers through mine, his hand clasping around me like an anchor, my “husband” repeats the question.

“He asked, “Would you like more meat?’”

Clearly, Aiken was not affected as I’d been by that kiss.

“Nay,” I say, marveling at the ease with which our hands intertwine. I have never held the hand of a man before now. Not once. And it is wholly unlike any other feeling. Tis as if . . .

“We leave you to your fire then.”

One by one, each of the men stand. Unfortunately, Aiken does as well. Our contact, broken. I do not move. Or speak. It is not until their saddlebags are repacked and Aiken calls to me that I stand.

“Fare thee well, my lady,” says the very man Aiken assaulted. The one who could have killed him had he not accepted the sword at his feet. ’Twas a dangerous thing to do, and though I’ve not seen it before, I have heard of the Highlander custom.

“Fare thee well.”

Oddly, bidding adieu to a reiver in the middle of the woods halfway between the borders and the capital of Meria is not even the most remarkable of circumstances I’ve found myself in this past sennight.

Being dragged by my husband and his men to Craighcebor, not knowing precisely what they planned but being thrust into a horrific plot . . . lying naked in the same chamber as an Elderman, a handsome one at that, who’d taken me against my will . . .

“Are you well?”