She offered him a shrug. “Aye, but that does nae mean I will like it.”
His expression darkened. “Like?” He came toward her.
Her belly tightened. She was so very aware of him. No matter what she was doing, the moment he came close, her entire body became a trembling mass of receptors. Faolan alone seemed able to unlock a facet of her personality, which was only interested in abandoning everything in favor of being his.
Faolan appeared to know it, too. He backed her across the tapestry-covered floor. For certain, she should have said something, but she was held in the grip of mounting excitement. Her body tingled, and she was breathless.
And then she backed into the wall.
Faolan chuckled and flattened his hands on either side of her, pinning her with his large body.
How was it possible to be so keenly aware of another person?
Faolan leaned closer. “Shall we make a memory of something improper in here to afford ye something to smile about tomorrow?”
She liked that idea. But her gaze touched on the bruise on the side of his jaw. The morning’s events cut through the moment. “Ye should not have argued with the Church.”
She slipped under his arm.
“Ye are me, wife, Cora,” he insisted as he reached out to clasp his hand around her wrist and tug her close. A moment later, she was back against the wall. “I will always shelter ye. Without ye, there is nothing I care to keep.”
“Well…ye should not put what ye have earned at risk.” Cora balled up her hand and hit him in the middle of his wide chest. She wasn’t sure just why she hit him, only that she absolutely needed to get through to him the necessity of not putting himself at risk.
Oh aye, ye love him.
He raised her chin. The glitter in his eyes stilled the rest of her argument.
In fact, it stilled everything. Her very heart felt like it was suspended between beats.
“Ye are the reason I draw breath, Cora. Any man who makes the mistake of forgetting that will discover very quickly how much I know about what is truly important in this world. Being laird only has one purpose, and that is to make sure I can give ye a life full of comfort and purpose. But if I have to choose, I will take ye and leave this place without looking back.”
She shivered. “I…I…”
He pressed his thumb against her lips. “It’s true that I stole yer first kiss, Cora, and I am not sorry. Ye are mine by the hand of Fate. And I am yers because ye have lit a fire in me heart, something I firmly believed impossible.”
He leaned down and inhaled her scent. When he lifted his head, Cora felt her eyes glistening with tears.
“I love ye, lass.”
He replaced his thumb with his lips. It was a fiery kiss.
“Come with me, lass.”
Faolan scooped her up, cradling her against his chest. A little twist of emotion went through her, one that left her tingling with excitement, for being carried in his arms was something she found she liked very much.
He chuckled as he took her down the stairs. “Ye like this, eh, lass?”
Cora hooked her arms around his neck in response. The sun was gone, leaving her in her lover’s arms. Perhaps it was doomed to die out.
Well, all the more reason to make the most of the moment.
Faolan didn’t turn toward the tower where his chamber was. Instead, he made his way just past the kitchens, to a door behind them.
“What is that?”
Faolan set her on her feet and went to close the door. Cora moved into the room to peer at what was sitting next to the huge hearth in the kitchen. The room was very warm because it shared a wall with the hearth.
“That is Malcolm’s bathing tub,” Faolan answered her. He moved closer and looked down into it. “I understand he had it made at some hefty expense.”
“I’ve never seen such a large tub.” Cora blinked. “It must take a long time to heat the water for it.”
“Malcolm seems to have accounted for that as well,” Faolan remarked. He moved over to what Cora had believed was the back of the hearth. Instead, there was a door with hinges. In the semidarkness, she could see it glisten with water. Faolan opened the door, and water began to gush down into the tub.
“There is a section of wall built here to trap water next to the hearth wall,” Faolan said. “It’s ingenious, even if I do nae care to think kindly of me brother.”
The tub was half full of water. Cora stuck her hand into it and smiled at the pleasing warmth.
“Out of yer dress now, lass.” Faolan was suddenly in front of her. He tried to work the buttons on the front of her doublet, but his fingers were too big.
Cora laughed.
“I believe ye shall have to wait for me to disrobe…husband.” She teased him by opening enough buttons to give him a glimpse of her cleavage.
Faolan raised an eyebrow. “Perhaps I might entice ye to work a wee bit faster, lass.”
He opened his belt. Cora felt a jolt as the spot on the top of her sex began to throb. Now that she knew full well the pleasure which might be hers, there was no heating up. Her body began to clamor for freedom from her clothing so she might feed her desire.
But she wouldn’t make it too easy.
“Are ye sure then?” Cora asked in mock innocence. “After all, this was how many buttons I had open when ye carried me from the great hall.”
“Come to supper like that as many times as ye want to be hauled away, madam.” Faolan opened his second belt. “I will enjoy having everyone know how passionate ye are for me.”
Cora opened the rest of the buttons on her doublet and let the garment slip down her arms. Faolan caught her while her arms were behind her back, embracing her and binding her arms behind her.
“Tell me ye are mine because ye want to be, Cora. For I feel I am drowning in what ye make me feel.”
“I have already floated away with the current, Faolan. Ye are me undoing. My only hope is that ye will join me, for love is saddest when it is not returned.”
One corner of his mouth twitched in response to her confession. His eyes lit with happiness before he was blocking everything out with a kiss. His mouth took hers, moving over it with a motion that sent need coursing through her veins. She struggled to free her arms because she needed to touch him in return.
Faolan lifted his head but held her arms. “Sometimes…I like controlling ye, lass.”
She liked it as well.
It was something that conflicted with her logical thinking, but Faolan made her feel things, and her emotions never obeyed her will.
Her waistband didn’t prove too difficult for him to untie. He had the knot open and her hip roll loosened in a moment. There was a whoosh as her skirts puddled around her ankles.
He was only in his shirt. The fabric fell to his mid-thighs, but the front of the garment stuck out. His comment about milking suddenly rose from her mind.
“I wonder how ye might feel about me controlling ye, Faolan.”
Cora slipped her hand beneath the edge of his shirt and found his member. Faolan stiffened, but the tub was right behind him. He could only tumble into it if he wanted to escape her. Instead, he grasped the edge of it, offering his body to her.
“Now…about this…milking,” Cora muttered as she drew her hand along his length. His skin was as soft as silk, but beneath that, his length was hard.