The Warrior Bride Read online

  She nodded once. He sloshed a draught into a drinking horn and handed it to her.

  “You had no trouble securing the spirits?” she asked and, releasing her tunic with one hand, took the offering. The shirt slipped a fraction of an inch. Lachlan ’s erection grew in direct proportions. Interesting.

  “Nay,” he said.

  “And what of a meal? Can we yet sup?”

  “I convinced them to bring us a trencher.”

  “Kind of them.”

  “Oh aye,” he said, and after filling a basin with water from the bucket, dipped a rag into it. “The old man’s all but a saint.”

  She almost smiled before trying a sip of the wine.

  “Truly.”

  ”Turn a bit,” he said, and she did so, twisting slightly on the mattress so that she presented her back. Smooth and fair, it scooped dramatically down toward hidden treasures. His heart rate bumped up a beat, but he scoffed at himself. This was no great ordeal. It was just a back, after all. Just a back. The water felt warm as he wrung out the cloth and touched it to her flesh. She flinched slightly. He grimaced and drew away.

  “Me apologies.”

  “Nay.” She was sitting very straight now. “I was only startled.”

  But he knew he had hurt her and when he touched the cloth to her back again he did so with cautious gentleness. “They had no chamomile for the water. Lady Fiona would box their ears if she knew of their negligence. Still, I was fortunate they had camphor. ‘Twill keep the swelling at bay.”

  She remained very still as he washed the edges of the wound. There was some inflammation, but only a bit and soon the area was clean.

  “Lady Fiona,” she said. “Your uncle’s wife.”

  “You know of her?” He could not help but be surprised.

  “Only a bit. She is a healer, I believe.”

  “Aye,” he said, and leaned away, feeling somewhat breathless.

  “You are finished?”

  If he was, did that mean she would don her tunic?

  “Nay,” he said, and finding a fresh cloth, dipped it into the bucket. “There is a bit of blood…” He drew a breath and touched the rag to her neck. “There.” He washed it gently. She turned her head to watch him. Her eyes were huge, her lips slightly parted, her tongue a coral shell all but hidden behind pearlescent teeth.

  Sweet mother of God.

  “And…” He steadied his hand as he leaned forward again. “There,” he said and smoothed the cloth across her cheek.

  She said nothing.

  “And there.” Lachlan eased the warm rag across her brow. It was high and regal. He placed a hand to her jaw and she shifted slightly, turning sideways on the bed. That alone was nearly his undoing, for while the sight her back was alluring as hell, the thought of her breasts all but stole his breath away.

  Oh aye, she still held her tunic to her chest, but she seemed to have forgotten its purpose, for the fabric was pressed up against her bosom, and somehow that only managed to push it well into view. Above the linen garment, the uppermost portions of her breasts looked as soft as a dream. Between them, a silver chain formed a fortunate V and disappeared mysteriously into the folds of heaven.

  Breathe. Breathe, he told himself and pulled his gaze from the tantalizing chain.

  “There,” he said and, remembering his mission, dabbed gently at her nose. It was, he thought, a perfect nose, straight and small, but not weak or silly. Just below it, in the delicate teardrop dell Above her lips, he washed away a smear of blood, and then it seemed wrong to ignore her chin. He bathed it gently, drawing the cloth along the sharp edge of her jaw and then down the endless length of her throat. Slowly, ever so slowly. Her head was tilted back slightly, her breasts were pressed high, and in between there was an endless tract of ivory flesh, as soft and perfect as a fresh bank of snow. He trailed the rag down the length of it, removing a trace of dirt. His knuckles brushed her flesh. It was the simplest contact, and yet he felt the impact like a fire in his gut.

  They were close, so very close. “MacGowan.”

  He snapped back to reality. Had he been leaning in? “Aye?”

  “Perhaps I should finish washing… Oh, me hands…” she murmured and gazed at her fingers where they curled about the drinking horn. “They are soiled.”

  Lachlan took the horn from her like one in a daze.

  Setting it aside, he slipped his hand around hers. Without the leather gauntlets, it did not seem quite so daunting, but neither was it a delicate hand. Taking up the cloth again, he washed it down her wrist and across her knuckles. Her fingers curled slightly against his palm. There was a scratch on her thumb. He slipped the rag over it, washing it gently, and then it simply seemed like favoritism to ignore the other digits. Wrapping her index finger in the warm cloth, he dragged it over her knuckle and onward, across the smooth bed of her nail.

  “Dirty.” He could think of nothing else to say. In fact, it was difficult enough forcing out that simple word.

  She nodded once, then licked her lips. He watched breathlessly as her tongue swept against the edge of her teeth and over the sunrise brightness of her lips. Strange. There seemed to be an odd lack of air in the room.

  “Perhaps- ” she began, and tugged at her hand, but he interrupted and tightened his grip ever so slightly on her wrist.

  “Still dirty,” he said and moved on to her middle finger. “Can’t allow that.” Her hand lay soft and limp against his palm. His own looked large and. square beneath her wrist. A row of calluses graced the ridge of her palm, but the omnipresent gauntlets had kept her hands supple and fair. The pads of her fingers pressed upon his wrist and he tightened against the pressure on that sensitive area. “Mother always insisted that we wash thoroughly.”

  “What?” She glanced up, and in her eyes was a rapt uncertainty that made his heart pound against the containment of his ribs.

  “Mother…” he said and, finding the hard bar of lye soap, slipped his hand over it before lathering her ring finger. “She taught us to wash well.” He massaged the delicate digit. Her lids dipped momentarily and for the same small span of time she drew a breath between her lips. As he watched, his mouth went dry, but in a second, she recovered and tugged at her hand.

  Once again he tightened his grip. “Surely yours did the same,” he said and, turning her hand over, rubbed a slow circle into her palm.

  She watched the movement, watched the suds appear in a cyclonic score and seemed to sigh under his ministrations, but perhaps it was his own sigh that escaped.

  “Did she not?”

  “What?” she repeated, as if from a daze. “Did she not insist that you wash?”

  She blinked at him and stiffened slightly. Even in the center of her palm, he felt her muscles tighten. Fascinated, he enlarged his circle, encompassing her callused pads. Then he eased down her fingers again, pressing away the tension. She seemed to relax against her will.

  “Nay,” she said, her voice low. “She did not.”

  ”Ahh, well.” He shrugged and moved back to her middle finger. “Mothers be strange. Me own did not mind if we brothers beat each other as senseless as plow shears, but she liked to see us clean. What of yours? She must have allowed you your battles also, else-”

  “That’s enough,” she said, and pulled her hand from his grip. In her hurry, her tunic slipped a bit, but she pulled it back to her chest, pressing her bosom higher still.

  “Me apologies,” he said.

  Perhaps she had meant to rise, to draw away, but she froze now, staring at him with mercurial eyes. “Why do you apologize?”

  Near the delicate swirl of her ear, her hair was slightly damp from his cloth. One gossamer wave curled beside her cheek. He raised his gaze from it to her eyes.

  “You’ve no wish to speak of your mother,” he said. Her expression showed her tension.

  “Thus we shall not.”

  The shadow of a frown formed between her brows and suddenly he had a burning urge to kiss it away.

>   “Still,” he said, resisting the temptation. “You owe me.”

  “I?” There was a glimpse of the warrior in her face again, a trace of the brooding gladiator she was thought to be. “Owe you?”

  “Aye,” he said, but he kept his voice soft as he reached for her hand again. Surprisingly, she did not pull away.

  “You owe me the opportunity to keep you alive for a wee bit longer.”

  She canted her head at him. “Is me wound so grievous then?”

  “Nay,” he said. “But you need rest if you are to mend.”

  She still watched him, and he searched somewhat desperately for an explanation.

  “You must not overtax yourself,” he said. “And you need to wash.”

  “Bathing is not usually horrendously tiring.”

  “Bathing!” The thought burned through his mind like a scorched elm. “Did you wish for a full bath?”

  “Nay. I but meant…” It was her turn to be at a loss for words. “Nay. Of course not.”

  Was that a blush on her cheeks? The idea intrigued him and he stared.

  “Nay,” she repeated, and tugged at her hand.

  He tugged back, but he could not completely resist the temptation to smile. “Very well then,” he said. “We shall have to make do with what water we have here.”

  “I do not think-” she began, but he had already begun to lather her palm.

  Her lips parted as if to go on, but nothing issued forth except for the tiniest sigh.

  “Relax,” he said, and cupping her hand in both of his, smoothed his thumbs outward. “I’ll not harm you.”

  She straightened slightly. “Not even if you try.”

  “You should not be so certain, lass. After all, your trusty dirk is not close to hand.” He caressed again, smoothing outward before finally changing to her left hand. “Then again, neither do you wear your tunic.”

  Their gazes met and locked.

  “And if memory serves I seem to have a bit of trouble battling a half-clothed maid.”

  For a moment she simply breathed, then, “I am not a maid.”

  “Me apologies,” he said and let his gaze skim her breasts for the briefest of moments, before shifting his attention to her hand again. “Forgive me forgetfulness.”

  “Do you- ” she began, but at that moment he massaged the knotted muscle beneath her thumb and somehow that simple movement seemed to leave her breathless. Still, she found her voice in a second. “Do you mock me?”

  “You?” He shook his head in utter earnestness. “Nay. I but wonder why you have chosen the path of a warrior.”

  “Mayhap it was chosen for me.” She shrugged. It was naught more than a simple lift of her shoulders and yet it seemed to change everything, including the rhythm of his heart.

  He continued to breathe and congratulated himself on his efforts. ‘Twas not as if he was unaccustomed to the company of women, but… Well, perhaps he’d somewhat neglected the art of seduction.

  “Chosen for you?” He lathered her wrist. A needlethin scratch marred the satiny flesh, and he washed it carefully. “How so? Did your father wish for a son?”

  She too seemed to be concentrating on the bathing process. Her expression was solemn. “‘Tis difficult to say what me father wished for.”

  Lachlan scowled, trying to read her meaning in her face, but he could not guess. “He was dead before your birth?”

  “Nay.” She shook her head. “I believe he was alive at the time.”

  The scratch on her wrist bothered him, for it lay between the delicate blue veins and seemed to threaten her very life’s blood. Of course it did not. But how many other times had her life been threatened? How many other times had she fought alone and unaided? Washing away the soap with the cloth, he ran a fingertip along the reddened course.

  “You believe?” he said.

  “In truth, I have never met him.”

  “Not met him, and yet he lives?”

  “Not any longer.”

  He glanced up.

  “I did not kill him.”

  Lachlan raised his brows. “I did not think you did, lass.”

  “Oh.” She cleared her throat and dropped her gaze.

  “I am but surprised that you chose not to introduce yourself while he yet lived.”

  She shrugged as if it were of no great interest.

  “Your sire…” Lachlan said, smoothing the cloth gently up her arm. “Who was he?”

  “It matters not.”

  The skin at the bend in her wrist was as soft as a cygnet’s down, and he found that, against all good sense, he longed to kiss it. “Why do you not wish to tell me?”

  “Because it does not matter.”

  He eased his thumb along the crease of her joint, and for an instant he thought he felt her shiver. The idea sent a tremble of excitement through him, galvanizing his desire, quickening his heart.

  “But what if you meet a man you wish to marry and-” “Marry!” she said the word like the knell of death. He raised his eyes to hers, surprised by her tone. “Aye.”

  “I will never marry, MacGowan.” Her entire body had stiffened. Her mouth was pursed and her nostrils flared.

  “Whyever- ”

  “Because I am a warrior!”

  He shrugged. “Warrior or not, you are still a-”

  “Nay!” she said and yanked her arm from his grasp.

  “Do not say I am a maid. 1 am a warrior,” she repeated, but her arm remained across her chest, pinning her tunic to her bosom, which was rising and falling with the drama of her feelings. “Just as you are.”

  “I do not mean to…”

  “I am like you,” she insisted.

  He could not help but shake his head.

  ”Aye, just like you,” she insisted and leaned toward him. But if she meant to emphasize her point with that movement she would be sadly disappointed, for now he could see her breasts from Above, hugged together like pearly lambkins with the silver chain trapped between.

  “Lass- ”

  “Warrior!” she corrected, “with the same training and skills. Nay, better skills than you.”

  “I do not doubt your-”

  “The same strengths, and aye, the same weaknesses.” His gaze fell to her breasts again. Even mostly hidden, they were truly beautiful, full and fair and tempting beyond belief. “I doubt you have the same-”

  “The same needs!” she hissed and, slipping her feet to the floor, snatched up her dirk. Her breasts dipped nearly into full view. Lachlan held his breath, then remembered to inhale when she straightened.

  She stood now with her dirk in one capable hand, but still it was hard to concentrate on the threat, for she looked all the more glorious with her eyes ablaze and her hair strewn about her pearlescent shoulders. Indeed, he ached with the intensity of his need. If she would give him but the slimmest indication that she felt the same heated desire, he would not delay a moment. In fact, if she would simply put aside the knife, he would be encouraged. But she held it just below her chest. Convenient really, for this way he could watch the dirk and her breasts at the same time.

  “Lass- ” he began, but she interrupted.

  “You think we are different.” Her tone was very low, her eyes utterly steady. “You think me form sets me apart from you, but this I swear…” She paused, her eyes narrowed. “We are the same, you and I.”

  “I…” he began, then paused as her meaning came home to him, like an arrow to the heart. “The same needs?”

  “Aye,” she said. “Regardless of the shape of me body, I am no less. We are no different.”

  Holy mother!

  He rose slowly to his feet. All this time he thought he’d been seducing her, when in truth, he’d only been making her angry. She had no interest whatsoever in him. No interest in any man.

  Nay, she was attracted to women!

  Chapter 6

  Hunter watched him back away.

  “Me apologies.” His voice was low and a muscle jumped once in hi
s lean jaw.

  She scowled. Although she had belittled his abilities at first, she had since learned he was not the kind to retreat. Indeed, in the past he had all but begged for battle. Why not now? He outweighed her by a good four stone. True, many men did and found their size gave them little advantage, but with MacGowan it would be different. His additional weight was not wasted on fat. Instead, it was formed of naught but muscle, and much of that was packed into his chest and arms. Aye, he had the grip of a bear, and yet he was as silent as a cat when he wished to be. It was a strange meld of capabilities, and she could not deny that it intrigued her somewhat. Had she time for a man in her life she would not be adverse to making him that man.

  “I did not mean to… That is…” He motioned toward the bed where they had been seated. “Me apologies,” he said again and nodded brusquely as he backed away. “I will go inquire about the-”

  But at that moment a knock sounded at the door.

  Hunter tightened her grip on her dirk and shifted her gaze to the portal. Lachlan did not so much as turn. Instead, he set his hand to his own knife, as if welcoming a challenge, so long as it did not come from her.

  “Who comes?” he asked. His voice was as deep as the night outside their lead-paned window.

  “‘Tis your dinner, me lord.” A young woman answered. She was probably not the type he’d care to challenge either, Hunter mused, but his tone was no lighter when he spoke again.

  ”A moment,” he said and, keeping his gaze pinned to Hunter’s, motioned for her to get into bed.

  She raised her chin and her dirk at his imperious manner, but he only lowered his brows as if mildly irritated. ‘They might not be as enlightened as you,” he murmured. “Indeed, if they see you thus, they might mistake you for a woman.”

  She considered a half dozen appropriate rejoinders, but the maid spoke again, and Hunter finally stepped toward the bed. Lachlan swept the blankets aside, allowing her to slip beneath the woolens. In an instant he had covered her nearly to the top of her head.

  “Enter,” he called.

  The door creaked open.