Taken by the Laird (8 page)

There was no question of leaving her to fend for herself in a tiny skiff during a winter storm in the North Sea. She must be mad. Or desperate.

What in hell had she thought he would do to her?

A fine drizzle fell, enough to drip down the neck of his coat as he jumped into the boat and started rowing. The wind increased as did the surf, and Hugh had to battle against the waves as they lapped against his skiff. Bridget was not going to be able to control her own craft if the storm got any worse or the wind picked up.

He rowed furiously and cleared the southern point of the cove, then caught sight of her, far ahead. She was struggling, and drifting too far from the shore. The cold drizzle turned to rain, and Hugh knew that if she did not turn in toward land, there was a good chance she would be swept into the current and carried away.

Hugh doubled his efforts to reach her, working frantically, straining against the heavy waves and his biting anger. ’Twould not serve him now. “Bridget!” he
shouted, turning to face her. “Row toward shore! Go on! Toward shore!”

It looked as though she was trying to do exactly that, but the waves were too high, splashing into the hull, soaking her. Hugh knew she would soon be too cold to hold the oars. Her hands would freeze and she would be paralyzed with shivering. He had to get to her soon, or she would be drawn out to sea and there would be naught that he could do.

Hugh’s own situation was not much different. The sky darkened further, and his worst fears were realized as the wind sharpened and the rain started coming down in sheets. The waves splashed high, crashing into his small craft and jarring the oars from his hands. He risked turning once again to see how Bridget fared, and realized that she was losing the battle against the wind and waves.

He roared his frustration and pulled harder and faster, cutting through the water with a superhuman effort. He heard a cry behind him, and glanced briefly, afraid to see what was amiss. He was only marginally reassured to see her still in the boat, but struggling to hold on to one oar. “Hang on! I’m coming!” he shouted.

They had drifted far south of Glenloch, but nowhere near Inverbervie. The beach between the two was mostly deserted, though there were a few places where kelpers put in to shore. Some of them had small crofts near the beach, and if they survived this reckless adventure, he and Bridget might find one where they could wait out the rain before heading back to Glenloch.

If he didn’t kill her first.

Hugh could not believe she’d been foolish enough to try to get away by sea on a vile day like this. He sped toward the irresponsible wench, using all his strength to pull the boat in her direction, sweating under his coat despite the frigid conditions. He could no longer feel his hands.

“I’m sinking!” she cried.

“I’m almost there!” he shouted, wishing it were true, for he still had some distance to cover. Rushing madly to get to her, he let the rain batter his head and eyes without stopping to wipe it away. He ignored the frigid water sliding down the back of his neck and onto his back, and the ominously growing puddle at his feet.

With one last burst of strength, he finally came alongside her and grabbed the edge of her boat. “Is there any rope in there?”

“N-no!” she cried. She looked terrified, but her fear did not stanch his anger.

“Then we’ll leave the boat. Come to me.” He spoke as calmly as he could, in spite of their dire circumstances. One wrong move and his boat would tip and they would both go under. Hugh knew they would not survive it.

“What should I do?” she cried.

“Take my hands and lever yourself over the side. Try to land in the middle of the skiff.”

“I can’t!”

“Aye, you can!” He grabbed hold of her hands and she raised her bottom, eyeing his boat.

“We’ll tip over!”

“No, I’ll lean away and counterbalance you.
Now,
Bridget! Move!”

He pulled her and she fell into the puddle at the bottom of his boat. Hugh managed to move at the same time, throwing his weight against the opposite side. The boat wobbled crazily in the water, but they managed to stay upright.

Bridget pulled herself up onto her knees in front of him and held on to the edges of the boat. Hugh did not stop to ask her why she’d been so intent upon getting away from Glenloch that she’d had to steal one of his boats to do it. She was rightly fearful, but not cowed by his icy stare, and he went right to work before the storm could get any worse, before his own strength failed.

The wind became brutal and he had to fight it to get them back to shore. The current pulled them farther south, but he managed to stay on course for the most part, dragging them relentlessly toward the land. Her lips matched the blue of her eyes, and her teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Hugh’s hands were beyond numb, and he feared his eyelashes had turned to icicles.

When they were only a few yards from land, Hugh saw a large upright rock, an obsidian obelisk that was used as a landmark by kelpers and fishermen and free traders all along the southeastern coast. He made for the obelisk, hoping his memory of a nearby kelper’s croft was accurate. He would hate like hell to get out of the water, only to freeze in the elements on land.

The oars went aground and Hugh jumped out, land
ing in a few inches of water. He pulled the boat in as far as he could, and Bridget climbed out after him, half falling out of the boat. He helped her gain her feet, and they somehow managed to pull the boat from the water. He put his arm about her waist and dragged her along with him as he followed a path away from the water, trudging through wind, rain, and mucky sand, to find the shelter he only half remembered. They had to get warm, soon.

“This way,” he said. “Hang on to me.”

Brianna felt like a fool. She was vastly grateful that Laird Glenloch had come after her, but she’d endangered his life as well as her own. She should apologize, but what would she say? How could she possibly justify what she’d done?

No doubt he thought her a lackwit, though it had seemed such a good idea at the time.

“Move your arse, Miss MacLaren,” he said rudely, provoking her indignation. “We’ve a distance to go.”

“You’ve no need to be vulgar, Laird Glenloch.”

“You think not?” he retorted angrily. “I didn’t risk my neck for you only to freeze to death out here.”

“You needn’t have come!”

“No? And where would you be if I had not?”

The answer loomed between them as Brianna doubled her speed. She tripped and would have fallen, but for Glenloch’s quick move to hold her up.

She was not happy when he kept his tight grasp on her arm and helped her up the path, but her sodden, ill-fitting boots were awkward on the rocky ground. She
knew his anger was fully warranted, even if she did not care to admit it aloud.

She was freezing, shivering so badly she did not believe she could form the words of an apology, even if she knew what excuse to give him.

They got to the top of the ledge beyond the shore when she saw it, a small stone croft, set among the rocks on the beach. It was a primitive building with a low, thatched roof that did not look promising, but they made their way toward it, since any small shelter would be better than full exposure to the elements.

A small boat lay behind it in the wet sand, tipped bottom up, just as Glenloch’s boats had been. Bree hardly noticed it, not when her arms and legs were stiff with cold, and her eyes burning with the frozen salt water of the sea. Glenloch released her when they reached the door, and he tried to open it, but failed since it was either jammed or locked. Cursing under his breath, he backed away, then crashed his shoulder into it.

The door flew open and he pushed her inside, shoving the door closed behind them. The place smelled. It was dark and there were no windows, but at least it was dry inside, and protected from the wind. Laird Glenloch stepped over to the hearth and knelt before it. When he spoke, his tone was curt and gruff. “Look for a tinderbox.”

Brianna’s eyes adjusted to the dark, and she saw that there was a table, one chair, and a low pallet of straw near a fireplace. She located flint and steel, but her hands were shaking too badly to strike them to
gether to make sparks. She handed them to the laird, who found something to use as a char cloth and quickly lit the small chunk of peat that rested on the grate. Once the fire was burning, he stood, turning to survey their surroundings.

“Get those clothes off,” he said.

“I-I—”

“Do not even think to argue with me,” Hugh said, the anger in his voice broaching no discussion, no disagreement. He picked up the chair and bashed it against the floor, breaking it into pieces, then fed it to the fire. “Get them off so we can both get warm.” His expression was dark and dangerous, and Brianna did not dare deny him.

With shaking hands, she worked at her ties and fastenings. The heat of the fire penetrated the room, and she could no longer see her breath. What she
could
see was Laird Glenloch, pulling off his greatcoat, then the rest of his clothes. She eyed one disreputable, thin blanket of plaid lying in a heap on the pallet, the wool looking far too insubstantial to ward off the cold.

“Only a fool would go into the water on a day like this,” he growled.

“I could not st-stay.” She bristled at his tone, even though she fully recognized how foolish she’d been.
They’d barely managed to get out of the water, and it remained to be seen whether they would survive her wild escapade.

“Only a scatterwit—”

“I am no scatterwit, sir!”

“Hmmph,” he muttered. He unbuttoned the placket of his shirt and pulled it over his head, tossing it to the floor near the hearth. “ ’Tis December. In Scotland, in case you hadn’t noticed. The North Sea.”

“Your mockery is unwelcome, Laird.” There was no need to go on about it.

He started to unfasten his trews and Bree averted her eyes. “So is good sense, apparently.”

“I have
plenty
of good sense,” Brianna retorted, fuming at his despicable attitude. She somehow managed to get her own sodden breeches down her legs, then stepped out of them and threw them angrily in the direction of the fire. “But I needed to get away from Glenloch.”

“Why? Were you anxious to get away with the plate? Or the brandy?”

“I am no thief! Nor am I a drinker,” she retorted, so angry she did not even notice she was nearly naked.

“Well, whatever it was you took, ’tis lying at the bottom of the sea by now.”

Brianna clutched her chest. “Oh no! My dresses, my money!”

“Ha,” he said without mirth.

“ ’Twas all I had!” she shouted, turning all her anger, her frustration, and the vestiges of her terror on him. “All that was to keep me until—”

She stopped short, unwilling to tell him her true purpose.

“Until…?”

“Until I got to Dundee.”

“Ah, right.” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “You want me to believe you intended to walk all the way to Dundee.”

“I have a very good reason,” she snapped.

“Which is irrelevant now. Get the rest of your clothes off and come over here.”

She bristled at his words. “There is only one blanket.”

“Aye. So we’ll share.” He came to her, and before she realized what he was doing he’d ripped her shirt from her shoulders, then grabbed her, pulling her against him.

“No, we will not share!” she cried indignantly.

He ignored her and yanked the blanket off the pallet, wrapping them together in the dry wool even as he hauled her down to the straw mattress with him. Brianna sputtered her protests against the frigid skin of his neck, but he paid her no heed, dragging her naked body as close to his as was physically possible. They shivered together, and Brianna struggled to shove away from him.

“Be still!” Glenloch rasped, grabbing her bottom and pressing her hard against him.

She froze when her hips met his.

He made a low sound deep in the back of his throat, and Brianna felt his body change. Time seemed to stop as every nerve ending in her body shifted from her out
rage and funneled directly to the stirring she felt below. She pressed her eyes closed and tried to resist it. Yet when he began to stroke her buttocks, his pelvis rubbed hers in a way that heated her from her inside out. Brianna could neither withdraw nor protest.

His breathing became harsh, and his shuddering diminished. Brianna felt enveloped by him, by his size and his growing heat. She pressed her cold nose into the crook of his neck while his hand slid up her back to cup her nape, and then trailed back down.

Brianna’s breath caught in her throat and she felt him swallow, hard.

“I should throttle you,” he whispered against her hair, “but Christ, if you are not the most exciting woman I’ve ever encountered.”

He shifted and pressed Brianna into the straw mattress, turning so that he rose slightly above her, drawing her into a close embrace. He slid one of his densely muscled legs between hers, and Brianna made a whimper at the sensation of his direct touch on her feminine flesh.

“Aye, lass, ’twill be good between us.”

“No,” she whispered. “I left Glenloch because of this. Because you…B-because I don’t want…” But dear heaven, she did. She wanted more of his touch, more of his kisses. She could no longer deny that she wanted to feel the heat and exhilaration of his embrace.

His head descended and his mouth captured hers in a searing kiss. He pressed his tongue against the barrier of her lips, and Bree opened on a sigh, allowing him in. He speared her with his tongue, and Brianna
felt as though she were being consumed. There was a fire in him, and it burned away her logic, her sensibility. His touch robbed her of self-control, and she responded with abandon. She encircled his waist with her arms, then skimmed her hands down to his bare buttocks.

“Yes. Ach, touch me.”

His body was hard, yet the skin below his waist was smooth. Bree was fascinated by the contrasting textures of his body, hard and firm, but at the same time, smooth as the finest silk. The rasp of the hair on his legs brought a groan to her lips.

When he nuzzled her neck at the sensitive corner of her jaw, she sighed with pleasure, then arched her back at the touch of his hand at her breast. She moaned when he circled her nipple with the tips of his cool fingers. She willed him to touch it, to put his mouth on it and suckle as he’d done the night before.

He finally lowered his head and licked the hard peak, and Bree shuddered with arousal. Their bodies separated slightly with his movement, and she touched his chest, slipping her fingers through his coarse hair until she found his nipples. He groaned when she caressed them, and moved his hand down her belly, his destination her most private parts.

Brianna let out a harsh breath when he touched her, fondling some hidden place that responded exactly the way flint sparked when struck by steel. She grabbed the straw on either side of her and opened for him, afraid he might stop, stunned and mystified by her body’s reaction to his touch.

“Ah, lass, you’re wet for me.”

He kissed her mouth again, and used one finger to enter her while his thumb kept up the same caresses that made her wild for something more. A deeper touch, a stronger stroke. “Please,” she cried.

“I need to be inside you,” he rasped, shifting to move between her legs. He took hold of her hand and placed it on his hard member, then guided it to the spot his own fingers had just abandoned.

She pressed the velvet tip of his erection to the private place that hungered for him. “Now,” she whispered, her need replacing what little bit of good sense she still possessed. “Now, please.”

He pushed into her, moving slowly, gently breaching her maiden’s sheath until he could hold back no longer. He plunged deeply, then held still for a moment, trembling above her, lowering his forehead to hers. He swallowed thickly. “Are you all right?”

Bree did not know. “Yes,” she said, moving against him with a whimper, anxious to feel more of the building sensations. “I-I…need…”

He slid back, and a powerful tightening pooled in Bree’s lower extremities. Her muscles felt as though they would explode, and when he pushed back in, her body moved with the rhythm he set. The friction of their bodies stoked a deep, primal pleasure in her, and when a sudden exquisite spasm overtook her, she shuddered with primitive gratification, the repeated contraction of her muscles pulling her into some perfect netherworld.

The laird continued to move, sliding in and out of her with increasing speed until he stopped suddenly, groan
ing deeply and trembling violently with the climax of his own pleasure.

“ ’Tis a far better method of getting warm than arguing, is it not?” Hugh said, using a glib tone, rather than expressing his wonder.

He’d shared the bed of many a skilled lover, but no one had ever roused his passions as Bridget MacLaren had done. Every untutored touch and caress had raised his arousal to a higher level, until he’d felt as though his entire being had been caught in a maelstrom of sensation.

If he’d had any question about making her his paramour, it had been answered. Beyond belief.

He kept them tightly covered with the old blanket as he shifted positions, keeping her in his arms. She cuddled against him, her head resting on his chest, her hand trailing precariously close to his spent erection. She touched him, sliding his cock into her hand even as she pressed her mouth against one of his nipples. Hugh did not think it possible, but his entire body responded at once. He nearly came off the pallet as she swirled her tongue around his exquisitely sensitive nipple, then drew it into her mouth, sucking.

She was too inexperienced to understand the profound effect she had on him, and as he became erect and ready again, he forced himself to remember that she had only just lost her maidenhead. She could not possibly take him again. But yet…

He let out a ragged puff of breath. “Lass, you don’t know what you do to me.”

He looked at her in the flickering firelight and she met his gaze, without interrupting her intimate explorations. Her eyes reflected the same amazement that coursed through him at her touch.

“So this is why they don’t tell us…” she whispered, moving to straddle his leg, pressing her feminine mound against him. She sighed and shuddered with pleasure.

“Tell you what?” he asked, stifling a groan.

“How it feels,” she replied, her fingers skimming over the swollen head of his cock. His member grew apace with her intimate touch, and her eyes slid closed.

He took her mouth in a wild kiss as he eased her onto her back, twining his legs with hers. Christ, he wanted her again. Now.

“ ’Tis too soon for you, lass,” he said, torn between trying to cool his ardor and delving into her again, as she clearly wished.

He’d had only one experience with a virgin—his wife. And Hugh had subsequently wondered if he had botched that first time, for she’d shied away from their marriage bed ever after. And yet with Bridget the experience could not have been any more stunning. What she’d lacked in skill, she’d more than made up for in a hot, sensual keenness to feel it all. To take every thrust of his hips and give back every inch with a fervor that still took his breath away.

Hugh should have felt at least a pang of guilt for bedding this innocent, but he’d been powerless to arrest the momentum of their attraction. And now he could not regret his actions. He slid down to press his mouth
against the fullness of her breasts, laving each one with his tongue. He could not remember ever feeling such a fierce arousal so quickly after climaxing, yet her touch made him mad for more. He craved the sensation of sliding into her tight sheath, of feeling her tighten around him.

He licked and sucked her nipples, and she writhed beneath him until he felt nearly mad with his own need. Yet he held back, pressing his hand against her mound, stroking the sensitive nub that lay hidden in her folds. She held his head in place and made small panting sounds as he pleasured her.

“I want…Oh!” She was breathless but demanding. “Oh, Hugh, I…Please. Can we…”

“Come for me, Bridget. Let go, sweet.” He was entirely focused on her pleasure, caring only that she come apart at his touch, in his arms. He wanted to see the amazement on her face and in her eyes.

He altered the rhythm of his touch and she suddenly cried out, clamping her thighs around his hand. “That’s it, sweet. You were made for this. For pleasure.”

She pulled him down for her kiss as shudders wracked her body.

And Hugh was very glad indeed that he’d seen her from the nursery window, taking the skiff out to sea.

Brianna felt a well of emotion fill her chest as Hugh tightened his arms around her. It was the oddest feeling…as though she could breathe freely for the first time in years. She’d felt some degree of peace during
her years at Killiedown with Claire, but nothing like this. Nothing like the calm and secure sensation that filled her now.

His embrace turned into a brief hug and he withdrew from her, suddenly leaving her alone on the pallet. In truth, they were much warmer now, and so was the croft. He moved quickly to the hearth and added a few more pieces of wood to the fire, then spread out their clothes to dry.

Bree turned to watch the flex of his long legs as he moved quickly and efficiently, to appreciate the dense muscles of his chest and shoulders as he tended the fire, and to study the curious male part of him that had just been inside her. It was still hard and large, and Brianna knew it did not normally jut out from his body as it did now. She wondered if it was painful.

Inexperienced as she might be, Brianna knew he had felt the same sensations created by their joining as she had. But he’d pleasured her a second time without reaching his own climax, no longer angry, but concerned for her well-being.

She gathered the blanket around her shoulders, feeling warm and sated, perhaps a little bit sore. And more vulnerable than she’d felt since coming to Scotland with her aunt Claire nine years before.

She’d turned onto a dangerous path, and it involved more than just giving up her virginity. She’d let down the defenses she’d built so desperately during her early years and again when Bernard had deserted her. She needed them now—she needed to keep some control.

If she did not, she would have nothing.

And yet it was difficult to hold back that part of herself she’d always protected. She was anxious for him to return so she could do something akin to what he’d done to give her pleasure. Perhaps he need not enter her to reach fulfillment. She was eager to learn, in spite of social convention and all the arguments against it.