“I am, darling. I am.”
“It must be ye.”
“What?”
“It canna be him. Do ye understand?”
“Nay.”
“It maun be ye. I give mysel’ to ye, hear? I give myself whole. Body, heart, spirit.”
Aye, so she felt the same flash of possessive wonder as he.
He caught her face between his hands, there where she lay atop him.
“Aye,” he said. “I am yours and ye are mine.”
“And I will lie wi’ ye first before I lie wi’ him.”
Comprehension struck him a staggering blow. True enough, he lay here in a state of arousal as complete as any he’d ever known. And true, she belonged to him in that way as much as any other. But…
“Bradana, lass, I want ye. I want ye more than I can say. Yet there will be consequences to such an act, consequences for ye.” He did not care so much if Kendrick or Earrach retaliated against him. Without Bradana, his life mattered naught anyway. But such punishment, such disfavor, might land upon her instead.
“Earrach may have expectations. If ye be—”
“I am untried.” She tossed her head with disdain. “I would let no man touch me that way. Adair, ’twas as if I knew. As if I waited for ye.”
“Aye so, yet—”
“And now it can be no one but ye. Understand?”
He did. It would be a sacred thing between them. Not something to be wrested, forced, or torn.
He sat up with her in his arms, barely noticing the complaint of his healing ribs. “Let me talk wi’ Kendrick first. I will go to him at first light and do my best to convince him. If I can, and ye come awa’ wi’ me, we can be together at peace in Erin. Forever.”
Her eyes, wide and fastened unwavering to his, revealed her emotions all too well. Fear, dread, reluctance and disappointment, desire, and stubborn resistance. Love.
She said, “I want ye now.”
“I want ye now also, Bradana. Here. Tonight.”
“This moment.”
“This moment, aye.”
“I never knew what desire was until I met ye. Now it haunts my days, my nights, my every breath. Promise me we will be together.”
An impossible promise to give. Yet he could feel what raged inside her, the other half of what raged inside him. So he spoke the words.
“We will.” So they must.
“Speak to Kendrick in the morning, aye, do. Use all your powers o’ persuasion. Until then…”
“Until then ye must go to your chamber, as I must stay here in mine. Anything else, if discovered, will anger Kendrick, and then how will I persuade him?”
“He will be angered by any road.”
“He will.”
