Highland Champion (11 page)

He stood up, grasped her by her small waist, and sat her down on the bed. Careful not to strain the leg she had just declared healed but weak, he knelt before her. He removed her prettily embroidered shoes, her small, slender foot sharply reminding him that his wife was of a more delicate build than the women he had known before. Taking the opportunity to stroke her legs as he removed her stockings, Liam felt his blood grow recklessly hot. Her legs were surprisingly long considering her small stature, as well as slender and beautifully shaped. Beneath her soft skin, he could feel taut muscle. Delicate Keira might be, but she was obviously not weak.

Liam kissed each of her knees, then stood up and began to remove his clothes. He tried to undress without any obvious haste, but knew he was not completely successful in hiding his near desperate eagerness to be skin to skin with her. After tossing aside the last of his clothes, he looked at Keira and nearly grinned.

His beautiful little wife was blushing so fiercely, she looked feverish. After she looked him over, her wide gaze stayed fixed upon his erection. Liam did not know whether to be flattered or concerned. There was definitely a hint of uncertainty, even fear, in her eyes. Since he knew he was no bigger than most men, he began to feel certain that Duncan MacKail had indulged in only the most genteel bedding of his wife or had been one of those fools who believed one’s lady wife should not be confronted with such things as a man’s naked body and passion.

Keira nearly flinched away from his touch when Liam joined her on the bed and began to unlace her shift. Liam Cameron was a very fine-looking man from his thick coppery hair right down to his feet. She had not seen him naked for weeks, not since he had woken up in the cottage, and she had never seen him in
that
condition. Keira knew it was going to hurt her a little the first time a man possessed her, but she feared she would be far more than a little hurt when he stuck that into her. The healer part of her scolded her for being an idiot, but Keira could not stop herself from fearing she was soon going to be torn asunder in the name of passion.

Then he pulled her shift off and tossed it aside. Keira forgot all about his size and waited tensely for what would happen next. Her nudity was one of the things that had caused her husband such distress. Although she could not see his expression clearly, Keira did not think Liam looked even slightly distressed as he slowly looked her over from head to toe. She felt hope stir when he gently lowered his body on top of hers and
only shivered a little. At least she thought it was him, but since she was shaking as if she had the ague, it was difficult to be certain.

“Ah, wife, ye are beautiful.” Liam brushed a kiss over her mouth. “Dinnae frown at your husband when he pays ye a compliment. Ye are beautiful.”

Liam could tell that she did not believe he truly meant those words, but he would do his best to make her believe he spoke only the truth. She was dainty in height and shape, but she had all the womanly allure any man could want. Her breasts might not be large enough to call her a fulsome lass, but they were plump, nicely shaped, and tipped with dark rose nipples that sorely tempted him. Her waist was small, her hips gently curved, and her backside was sized just perfectly for his hands. At the top of her slender thighs was a neat arrowhead of dark curls that pointed the way to paradise. And all that pale, creamy skin felt as soft as eiderdown against his, he thought as he kissed her. He would make love to her in a way that would prove he did not just mutter empty flatteries, and if it took many, many times of making love to get her to believe him, he was more than ready to oblige her.

When Liam covered her breasts with his hands, Keira nearly leapt from the bed. The feelings he stirred within her with his kisses and his touch were too intense. They made her want to run away at the same time they made her ache for more. When he took one aching nipple deep into his mouth, suckling her gently, she knew what at least some of that
more
was.

Soon she stopped waiting for him to flee her arms, unable to return and finish what he had started. The humiliation of the past was forgotten for a time, burned away by the heat of the passion Liam stirred within her. She tentatively stroked his back, and he murmured his approval. She rubbed her body against his ever so gently, and he groaned, then held her closer. Keira did not understand what was so different about her that this husband wanted her, but she saw no sense in arguing with the kindness of fate. At some point, Liam might begin to suffer as Duncan had, so she held him tightly and tried to hold fast to all the pleasure she could.

“Och, lass, ye make me burn,” Liam muttered as he slipped his hand between her legs.

He ignored the brief tension in her and her fleeting look of shock, both which faded as he stroked her. Her marriage had been very short, and he was beginning to think her husband had been a very poor lover. It pleased Liam to think that he would be the first man to give her pleasure.

Deeming Keira ready and knowing he could wait no longer to possess her, Liam settled himself between her legs. It troubled him a little when she did not immediately wrap those slim, strong legs of hers around him, but again, he decided her husband was at fault. It took only a slight tugging on her legs as he tried to put them around his hips himself before Keira realized what he wanted, much to his relief. Then he kissed her even as he plunged inside of her, now desperate for the feel of her heat surrounding him. Liam felt her tense beneath him and realized in a small part of his passion-clouded mind that his entry had been less than smooth, so he forced himself to lie still. He looked at her as he fought to gain a little control of himself. She looked startled, he thought, but that made no sense at all.

Keira stared at Liam as he raised himself up on his forearms and looked at her. She had thought she had hidden her reaction to that brief slash of pain rather well, but the
frown upon his face told her he had noticed something. Since he just looked a little confused, she decided he was not certain what he had felt, and she hurried to take advantage of that.

Wrapping her arms more securely around his neck, she kissed him using all she had learned from the way he kissed her. She tightened the grip of her legs, pushing him deeper inside and heard him groan low in his throat. When he began to move, she almost cried out in relief. As his thrusts grew fiercer, she felt something deep inside her begin to tighten and tried to urge him on with her own body. He slid his fingers between their bodies, down to where they were joined, and touched her in a way that made her feel frantic. When he did it again, she felt that tight knot inside her snap, sending pleasurable chills throughout her body. She clung to Liam as his movements grew briefly frenzied before he tensed and cried out her name. Keira felt the warmth of his seed and nearly wept with joy.

He collapsed in her arms, his breath hot against her neck. Her body still hummed with the pleasure he had given her, and she savored it. All too soon he would recover, and his mind would grow sharp and clear again. The knowledge she had briefly glimpsed in his eyes would return. Then all this pleasure and joy would be torn away by his anger and her painful memories of the past.

Liam sat on the edge of the bed staring at the damp cloth he had used to clean Keira and himself of what he often jested was the sticky side of a good rutting. There was no explaining away the faint stain upon the linen. He may have been far less controlled than usual, but he had not been so fierce that he would have caused her to bleed. Despite the cloud of passion encircling his mind as he had kissed and caressed her, he had sensed a virginal unease at times. Now that his fever had cooled, he could also recall what he had felt as he had thrust inside of her. Her kiss, the feel of her lithe body wrapped around his, and his own blind need had briefly pushed that knowledge from his mind. His wife, a woman who had been married for three months, his little widow who should have had some experience in the bedchamber no matter how inept her husband, was a virgin.

Or had been, he quickly corrected himself. For a moment he felt extraordinarily pleased by that, savoring the knowledge that he was her first lover. Then, dark suspicion crept into his mind.

His wife, a word he realized he still liked the sound of despite the suspicions he now felt, sat up against the pillows. She held the sheet close to her chest and watched him, her eyes wide with distress. There was fear there, too, and he quickly smothered the urge to comfort her. Until he knew the truth, she had good reason to be afraid.

“My first question might be were ye ever e’en married, but I heard your brothers confirm it,” he murmured. “So next I wonder, did ye refuse your husband his rights?”

He sounded so calm, so polite, and so absolutely furious that Keira had to take a deep breath to steady herself before replying, “Nay. Never. Duncan was verra forthright about his need for an heir, and I entered the marriage kenning that it would be my duty to try to grant him one.”

“Did he think ye needed time to adjust to being his wife, for ye didnae love him, did ye?”

“Nay, I didnae love him,” she whispered, wishing it did not sound so much like a guilty confession. “I liked him. He was a good, kind mon. Gentle really. There was no talk of waiting.”

“Curse it, Keira, ye were a virgin. If ye didnae deny him your bed and he didnae think ye needed time to become accustomed to your new life, then how could ye still be a virgin?”

“Because Duncan didnae want me!”

“He married ye. He must have wanted ye. He picked ye, didnae he? The mon wouldnae pick someone he didnae want.”

“He tried. Poor Duncan really tried, but he couldnae. I wasnae to his liking.”

Liam sighed and rubbed a hand over his forehead. He needed to be calm. Either they were talking in circles, or she had not yet explained it all clearly enough. It was incomprehensible to him that her late husband had not wanted her. Until he had fully realized that he had rammed his way through a maidenhead that should not have been there, he had been enjoying a passion hotter and sweeter than any he had ever known and its delicious aftermath. And Keira had returned his passion in full measure despite it having been her first time with a man. Liam could not believe another man had been blind to the promise of her lithe body.

“Was he impotent?” he asked.

Keira frowned. “I dinnae think so. His, er, mon part did as it should from all I
could tell. Duncan didnae light as many candles as there are in here so ’twas difficult to see much.” Which, she thought, was a good thing considering what had happened.

Turning to face her, Liam could see how distressed she was. His dark suspicions eased a little. Something had happened in her brief marriage that had made her think she was undesirable, at least to Duncan MacKail. Duncan had not been a bad lover. He had been no lover at all. Liam desperately wanted Keira to say something that would make him believe it had all been Duncan’s fault. He did not want to think Keira capable of such a large deceit as marrying a man and, even though she never allowed the marriage to be consummated, was now claiming to be the man’s true heir. Nor that she would be willing to risk men’s lives to claim that false inheritance.

“Keira, do ye swear that ye went willingly to his bed?” he asked.

“Aye, at first,” she replied. Then I stayed in the lady’s bedchamber and waited for him to come to me when he felt he could try again.”

“Ye say he wasnae impotent, and ye didnae refuse him, yet, Keira, I fear I simply cannae believe he didnae want ye. There is a part of me that really doesnae wish to hear anything ye did with another mon, but I think ye need to tell me about the bedding.”

“Must I?”

“Aye, for I keep asking questions, but your answers arenae helping me to understand this at all.”

“Duncan wanted to wait until we reached Ardgleann before we had our wedding night. So when we were bedded down together after the ceremony, he left me alone in the bed and slept upon the floor. Before anyone came to help us prepare for our journey to Ardgleann, he, weel, he made sure there was a mark upon the sheets. The first night at Ardgleann, he came to bed with me. He kissed me and removed my shift.” She shrugged. “He was trembling, and I thought it was because he was feeling desire for me, and I felt a wee bit guilty because I felt little for him. Then he put his hand upon my breast. His trembling grew quite fierce, he groaned, and then he leapt from the bed and was violently ill.”

Liam frowned as he studied her. She made no sound, but she wept, her tears dropping steadily upon her hands, which were clenched tightly together in her lap. He had to bend a little to see even that much, for her head was bowed and her long hair shielded much of her face. Such an appalling wedding night could easily have caused a couple to be reluctant to try again, but not, he thought, for three long months.

“Did he have the ague?” he asked.

“I wondered that myself at the time, fool that I was. I leapt from the bed to hurry to his side. He looked at me and just grew worse, screaming at me to get dressed. He couldnae get his own clothes back on fast enough and all the while he muttered about filth, ugliness, sin, and such as that. Then, when we were both dressed, I got beneath the bedcovers, and he took his place on top of them. He patted my hand and said I was not to worry, that it would just take time and that we would keep trying. We did, and it never got any better. ’Twas me. He couldnae abide e’en touching me, couldnae e’en try without emptying his belly.”

Suddenly, Liam understood. Once or twice while at the monastery, he had met a man so tormented by what he saw as the sin of lust he would beat himself bloody in an attempt to banish the feeling. It sounded as if Duncan suffered something similar, had been scarred in some way so that even lusting after his lawful wife sent him into a
paroxysm of guilt. Liam fetched a clean square of linen, returned to the bed, and turned Keira’s face up to his.

“Keira, did I or did I not just bed ye most thoroughly?” he asked calmly as he dampened the linen in the bowl of water on the bedside table and gently bathed the tears from her face.

“Aye, but ye are—weel—ye will bed any woman,” she murmured.

He sighed and rested his forehead against her for a moment. “Nay, I willnae. I would certainly ne’er bed a lass so foul she makes me vomit.”

“But, if it wasnae me, what was it?”

“I cannae say for certain, having ne’er met the mon. There have been monks I have met who felt a mon’s natural urgings were so foul, so sinful, they needed to be purged from the body by any means possible. Brother Paul suffered from that a wee bit, I think. Did Duncan have scars upon his back? Did he e’er have fresh wounds there?”

Keira frowned. “He did have some scars. Once I touched his back and felt a few, but ’twas only a fleeting touch for he fled from it. And once I did think he was in pain, but he wouldnae let me tend to him. He told me it was naught but a wee scratch he got whilst riding. From a tree branch, he said. I thought it odd that he wouldnae let me tend him as he kenned all about my gift, had been quite pleased about it. Told me it was a wondrous thing to bring to his people and that one day, it might e’en help him.”

“Your touch wouldnae have cured what ailed him, love. ’Twas a sickness of the mind. Someone or something turned him that way ere ye even met him.” He could see that she did not completely accept his words, but he would have to deal with that later. “Now, why didnae ye tell me of this ere I bedded ye?”

“Because of my vow. Duncan kenned that Rauf wanted Ardgleann, that he thought it weakly defended and with no heirs to make trouble if he took it. When he heard that the mon was in the area and was probably planning his attack, Duncan made me vow that I would tell no one that our marriage had ne’er been consummated and that if anything happened to him, I would take my place as his heir, get help, and free Ardgleann. One of the reasons he wed me was because he was certain I could gather enough people to fight Rauf and win, especially if they thought the mon had stolen what was rightfully mine.” She shrugged again. “I felt I couldnae tell ye, not until ye were my husband. Then it was difficult to think of a way to tell ye.”

“And, I suspect ye feared I would have the same difficulty as Duncan did.”

“Weel, aye, but I was hoping ye wouldnae because ye—”

“Are a rutting, lecherous swine?”

“I wouldnae say that,” she mumbled.

“Ye did say that once when ye were screaming at me that night we camped in the wood.” He was pleased to see her glare at him, for it meant her despair had eased, the sad memories retreating for a while. “We shall have to discuss that soon, but for now, I must needs speak to Sigimor and Ewan.”

Keira gasped and sat up straighter as he got out of bed and began to dress. “Ye cannae tell them!”

“I must. They are ready to ride into battle for ye and Ardgleann. I willnae allow them to put themselves in front of a sword unless they ken the full truth.”

When he put it that way, she had to agree. “I willnae be able to look them in the eye ever again,” she said, flopping down onto her back and tugging the sheet over her
head.

Once dressed, Liam tugged the sheet off her face and gave her a quick kiss. “I ken I will have to repeat myself many times ere your wee, stubborn mind grasps the truth, but the problem was with Duncan, not you.”

“My wee, stubborn mind?” she muttered, but Liam was already out of the room and shutting the door behind him.

Shaking her head, Keira got out of bed. She added a little wood to the fire, then had a quick wash before donning her shift. Wrapping a blanket around her, she poured herself some wine and sat on the sheepskin before the fire to await Liam’s return. When Thunder and Lightning appeared to curl up on either side of her, she smiled and took turns lightly scratching each kitten’s ears.

She searched her heart for any guilt over telling Duncan’s secret and breaking her vow, but found only a little. Poor Duncan’s secret would remain safe, of that she had no doubt, but Liam was right. She could not ask men to face a sword unless they knew the full truth, no matter how humiliating that truth was.

Liam’s explanation for Duncan’s difficulties also made sense, and she was strongly tempted to accept it. Her new husband had certainly revealed no reluctance to bed her. Yet Duncan had to have known how hurt and humiliated his rejection had made her. Why had he not even tried to explain or reassure her that it was not her fault? It annoyed her to admit it, but Liam could be right about that, too. It was going to be difficult to make her wee, stubborn mind accept that truth. Then again, she thought with a soft smile, if Liam was intending to use his lovemaking to prove his point, she would be a fool to complain.

Liam found Sigimor and Ewan in Ewan’s ledger room. He patiently endured a few jests about new husbands fleeing their wives’ beds before telling them all he had learned. Sigimor listened carefully, frowned, and then left the room, saying only that he would be back in a few minutes. Liam shrugged, poured himself some wine, and took a seat facing Ewan’s worktable. He was just about to start discussing the problem with Ewan when Sigimor returned with Keira’s two brothers, who looked as if they had been dragged from their beds.

“Tell them,” Sigimor ordered.

Only briefly did Liam hesitate before doing as his cousin ordered. He found the wide array of expressions that crossed Artan’s and Lucas’s faces as he told them the story a little amusing. If Duncan MacKail were still alive, he would soon pay dearly for what he had put Keira through.

“Why didnae she tell us?” muttered Artan. “We could have gotten the marriage annulled.”

“She was humiliated,” said Liam. “Still is. It will be a long while ere she believes it wasnae at least partly her fault Mayhap, if the marriage had lasted longer, she
would
have turned to her family.”

“Mayhap,” agreed Lucas, “but why did we need to hear of this now? The mon is dead.”

“He named his wife his heir,” said Sigimor, “but because the marriage wasnae consummated, the law would say she wasnae his true wife.”

“Oh, aye, I suppose that is true.” Lucas scratched his chin. “Dinnae think it matters. If I recall, the agreements signed give Keira Ardgleann if Duncan dies without
leaving a legitimate heir. Verra simply put. No qualifications.”

“And there is
no
other heir?”

“Nay. Duncan was the last of his line. Weel, except for the bastard.”

Liam sat up straight. “Duncan’s bastard?” For a moment, Liam feared he had been lied to, but did not want to believe it.

“Och, nay, his father’s. A mon named Malcolm. My father wanted to make certain Duncan told the truth when he said there was no heir to question Keira’s right to be named his, so he sent men out to verify the tale. He thought he
had
been lied to when he heard about Malcolm. Went to see the mon himself. Malcolm doesnae want to be laird. Ne’er has, ne’er will. He doesnae want it widely kenned that he is the old laird’s bastard. My father had him sign papers and all, just to be sure. So, no heir.”

“Duncan was the true heir, and he had the right to name whome’er he pleased to take his place,” said Ewan. “Unlike the English, we arenae so concerned about direct lines or legitimacy. Duncan obviously felt Keira was the best choice because of the strength of her family and its allies.”