Her Wicked Highlander: A Highland Knights Novella (4 page)

He grimaced. “The chances of that are high.”

She couldn’t hide her dismay at that. Her beloved home, where she’d been born, where her parents had lived for so many years, then died, invaded by this madman.

“He’ll have torn it apart, looking for the dagger, most like,” she whispered.

Max nodded, and there was sympathy in his eyes. “I’m sorry, lass. Better, though, to tear your house apart than to tear
you
apart, aye?”

“I dinna ken,” she said. “I should be there to protect my home. Standing at the door with my da’s rifle…”

“Nay. Sutherland is an accomplished murderer. You’re safe here, with me.”

“Won’t he find us here?”

“He’s no reason to think we’d have come here.”

“Are you certain of that?”

“Fairly.”

“I want to go back,” she whispered. “I want to see my home… see that everything is all right…”

“Nay,” Max said firmly. “Not until this is over.”

“But I’ve so much to do before the weather gets worse. There’s a leak in my roof—”

“I’ll fix it for you once Sutherland is no longer a threat.”

She blinked at him. “You’d do that for me?”

“Aye, of course.”

He offered his help so freely, she felt flustered, off-kilter. Her attraction for this man seemed to rise with every word out of his mouth.

“How long d’you think we’ll be stranded here?”

“No telling.”

“Well.” She sighed. Her chickens could be self-sufficient for a while, and she wouldn’t be planting the potatoes for at least another two months. “There’s plenty of work here to occupy us, I suppose. I should send a message to Gin to let her know not to come home until this is over.”

“I can arrange that. We’ll send your message to the Knights. They’ll ensure she receives it.”

“I’ll write her tomorrow.” She leaned against him again and held out her glass for more whisky. After a short hesitation, he poured more into her glass, then into his own.

She drank it straightaway.

Aila relaxed against Max, her soft curves pressing against his side, and he knew he should keep his distance. This was an assignment, and he was a professional. At least he was now that he was a Highland Knight. He intended to prove himself to the Knights, to be part of the brotherhood for the rest of his days. God knew that bedding the first woman he encountered in the job could cause an endless set of problems. They might turn him away.

They might do worse.

But none of that stopped his body from hardening. His cock tightened to the point of pain beneath the pleats of his kilt.

He closed his eyes briefly, willing his body to stand down. It didn’t listen.

She gave a breathy, happy sigh and pulled away from him before turning to him, her lips curling in an impish smile. “I believe you now.”

His own lips quirked. “Good.”

“I thought you were a bad man at first, but I’m starting to think you’re a good one.”

Ha. Little did she know. He didn’t think he was an evil man, but he definitely wasn’t a good one. With that thought, images of the men he’d killed marched through his conscience. He kept his face blank, fighting off the flinch.

Too damn many dead bodies. The battles of the Peninsular Wars had offered up most of them, but in the two years since Waterloo, he’d sold his commission and worked as a mercenary for hire on the Continent. That had been bloody, soul-sucking work. The offer from the Highland Knights had felt like a chance to start over. To do something good. Something with a true purpose.

“And,” Aila announced, “I think you’re quite handsome.”

Max had never suffered from a lack of attention from the opposite sex, but hearing that from Aila—a woman who called to him like no one ever had—made something inside him twist.

He wanted her to think of him as a handsome man. More important, he wanted her to think of him as a good one.

And then she launched herself at him, pushing him back until his upper body was sprawled on the sofa with Aila on top of him. Her lips fused to his, sweet and soft, open and pliable.

The woman knew how to kiss—clearly she had a great deal of experience with it. Her kisses were hungry, punctuated with wee gasps of pleasure, as if he were the most delectable meal she’d ever tasted.

Her torso lay upon his, her breasts pushing against his chest. He wrapped one arm around her back and pushed it down over the swell of her bottom. He squeezed, pulling her closer, tighter against him.

He was breathless, panting now, desire pulsing through him until all he could see was Aila, all he could feel was her—her lips, her tongue, her body pressed against his. He wanted more. Nay, he
needed
more.

He flipped her over on the sofa. Now she lay on her back, and he loomed over her, looking at her. Both of them were out of breath. A sweet pink flush bloomed across her cheeks.

“What are you playing at, lass?” he rasped.

“I want you,” she said breathlessly.

He shook his head, even as more blood surged between his legs.

“Dinna presume to tell me I don’t,” she growled. “Because I do. I want you. I want you more than anything I’ve ever wanted in my life.”

“You dinna ken what you’re saying.”

“We’ve discussed this before. I ken exactly what I’m saying. I want you, Maxwell White. Here.
Now
.”

Damn. How could he deny her? His body had pushed his previous logic deep into the far reaches of his mind. A new logic came to take its place. A beautiful, willing woman lay beneath him. She wanted him, and he wanted her. There was no reason to deny themselves what they both wanted.

He flexed his jaw, trying to see clearly, think clearly. It was damn difficult. He just wanted her. To plunge his cock deep inside her willing body and ride her to ecstasy. But she wasn’t ready for that. Not yet. He wanted her to feel ecstasy too.

He drew back and flipped her over, quickly undoing the buttons of her dress. Then he turned her over again and drew the bodice down over her arms and chest. She gasped as her breasts popped free of the confining material, and stared at him, her eyes big and green.

Her breasts were full and round, tipped with small, rosy nipples. His mouth watered at the sight. He kissed her again, then moved down, over her jaw, down her neck, tasting her warm, soft skin before traveling down her collarbones to her chest. His lips traveled up the slope of her breast until he reached the tip, then gave it an openmouthed kiss, suckling gently.

“Ohhh,” she breathed, and she pressed her hands to his head, threading her fingers into his hair and pulling him tighter against her.

He lavished attention on that breast first, then the other one, until she writhed beneath him.

“So sensitive,” he murmured. “So responsive.”

She began to chant, “Please, please, please…”

“Please what, lass?”

Her fingers tightened in his hair. “I dinna ken!”

He chuckled and reached down her leg, bunching her dress in his fist and pulling it up while stroking her leg. He reached her garter just above her knee, then touched the bare skin of her thigh.

She shuddered beneath him, and he moved up to kiss her lips again. He couldn’t get enough of her lips. They were nothing short of perfect. The way she kissed him made ripples of sensation snake through his body and center in his groin.

His cock pulsed with every beat of his heart, so tight and solid, he knew he’d only last a few strokes inside her.

He drew his fingers up the inside of her thigh until he reached her center. He cupped her there, closing his eyes, thinking of how good she’d feel wrapped around him, tight and hot. It was going to be like nothing he’d ever experienced, he knew that instinctively.

She pushed herself brazenly against him. There was nothing shy or timid or inexperienced about this woman. She knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to show him.

Wiggling his fingers, he found the slit of her womanhood and explored the outside, feeling her arousal in the slickness of her folds. If he’d doubted she wanted him, there was no need to doubt now.

He found her opening and slid two fingers inside, blinking at the resistance. With a squeal, she nearly leaped off the couch.

He gently pulled free and gazed at her. She was panting, flushed, wide-eyed, the bonniest thing he’d ever seen.

“Did that hurt you?” he asked, confused. He’d never encountered a woman who’d had that reaction when he’d pushed fingers inside her. He’d also never encountered a woman that tight before.

“I… dinna ken… It was… it was… Well, almost,” she admitted weakly.

And then, it suddenly hit him, like a pan of ice-cold water thrown directly onto his face.

“Are you a virgin?” he asked.

Chapter Four

Aila scowled at him. “Of course I’m a virgin!”

His jaw dropped.

“What’d you think, that I was some sort of… some sort of… of…
leman
?” she demanded.

“The thought crossed my mind,” he said, still looking at her as if she’d suddenly grown antlers.

Her reaction was instantaneous. She slapped him, hard, across the face. He reeled back, pressing a hand to his cheek.

“Jesus Christ, Aila!”

“Get off me!”

“I didna ken you were a virgin.”

“Get off!” she roared.

He slipped off her and stood, pushing his hands through his hair until he grabbed the back of his neck.

She stood, yanking up the sleeves of her dress and reaching behind her to button it haphazardly. Her cheeks burned, but she faced him head-on. “You are an offensive, horrible man. I take back my earlier comments about you being good.”

He just stood in the center of the room, giving her a baleful look.

“I’m going to my room,” she announced. “Let me know when Sutherland has been arrested so I can go home.”

She turned on her heel and stomped out of the room, fuming. He’d thought she was a whore. She couldn’t even express how offended she was.

She marched upstairs to the room she’d escaped from earlier. This would be her home for the rest of her stay, and she had plenty of work to do to make it livable.

Max followed Aila up the stairs at a distance, letting her work off the rest of her anger. He hadn’t meant offense—he really hadn’t. And admittedly, he had taken several wrong turns with this woman before—his communication skills had never been the best.

But even he could understand why essentially calling a lady a whore might not elicit copious amounts of goodwill from her.

When he reached the bedchamber he’d assigned her earlier, he saw the door was shut, and alarm shot through him. What if she’d climbed out the window again? He flung the door open only to see her leaning out the window, giving him a good view of the curves of her backside through the fabric of her dress.

He remembered holding her bottom, pressing his fingers into it as he urged her closer to him, and just like that, he was half-hard again.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

She spun around. “Get out of my room!”

He sighed. “I canna let you escape again.”

“Do you think I’m an idiot? I’m not planning on escaping. What, do you think my injured pride would make me so thoughtless that I’d leave here and run chest-first into Sutherland’s dirk?”

“I wasna entirely sure,” he said truthfully.

She made a sound of utter disgust and then turned back to the window. “I’m pulling up my bedclothes. They’ll need to be shaken out, at the very least, before I sleep in them.”

“Wash them,” he suggested. “I’ll fetch some water for the washing.”

She made an exasperated noise as she turned back to him, her arms full of bedclothes. “They wilna dry in time. I’d have naught to sleep in tonight, and it’s midwinter, if you havena noticed.”

“I have clean plaids.”

She pressed her lips together, then nodded. “Fine, then. Bring me the wash water. And bring plenty of it. I’ll probably be washing the rest of the night. Everything in this place is filthy.”

“I will. But first—” He broke off suddenly, not sure how to say what needed to be said.

She waited, her lips pressed together in distaste as she watched him.

“Well, I didna mean offense.”

She snorted.

“It’s just… the way you kiss. It’s as if you’ve done it a million times before.”

She said nothing.

“And so I made an assumption. ’Twas wrong of me. I’m sorry, lass. I shouldn’t’ve done that.”

She broke eye contact, looking away. “How would you ken anything about how experienced I am? How many women have you kissed?”

Too many.
“Some,” he hedged.

She sighed. “I’m sorry. I
was
acting somewhat brazenly, I suppose. I dinna ken why.” She looked down at the bedding in her arms, her eyes sad. “Or maybe I do… a bit. I just… havena had real human contact in so long. I suppose I was craving it. And,” she added ruefully, “I’m a wee bit drunk.”

Sympathy washed through him. Loneliness he understood. All too well. “We’re both lonely, I imagine.”

She looked up at him. “You too?”

“Aye well, I was in the army for a long time, but after the Battle of Waterloo, I sold my commission. I’ve spent the last two years on the Continent doing… a variety of things. I rarely encountered a soul who spoke English, and I never saw anyone Scottish.”

“I dinna think I could bear that,” Aila said.

“Aye, well, now I’m here with you, I realize…” His voice dwindled.

“Do I remind you of home?” she asked softly.

“Home, and more,” he said.

“Och, right. Home and whores,” she said, lips twisting.

“I’m sorry for that.”

She sighed. “Dinna be. I suppose I should be glad I dinna kiss like a green lass.”

They smiled at each other for a moment, but it was a tentative smile.

“But I
am
a green lass,” she clarified, raising a finger to make her point.

He nodded.

“I’d rather no’ be green anymore, you ken?”

The realization that Aila was a virgin had brought logic flooding back into Max’s mind. He’d nearly put his position in the Knights at risk.

“It’s no’ a good idea,” he murmured. God, he hoped she knew the cost of him saying that. He didn’t think he’d ever wanted anything as much as he wanted Aila.