Page 27 of Twelfth Knight’s Bride

A wad of snow hit him square in the jaw.

“Ach, nàmhaid, ye’ll pay for besting yer laird,” he baited, and soon the two ducked and dodged each other, flinging up snow. Her hair was falling loose from her netting, and she didn’t seem to notice or care, as her face remained light with laughter, and his heart opened an inch farther to her. Snow landed upon her cheek. She smarted, backing up a step, then swooned playfully.

“’Tis a good thing I have yer flag of truce with which to wipe my brow.” She sighed, and withdrew his white kerchief from her sleeve to dab her face.

“Oh, ye insult the enemy by sullying his flag?”

She nodded, grinning, and scooped up another fistful to lob at him. He dodged it, withstanding a barrage of snowballs and guarding his face with his arm as he encroached upon her.

“Nay…” she breathed at his approach, and took flight, tossing poorly aimed fistfuls at him. “Do nay capture me!”

He snagged her about the waist, spinning her around as a squeal escaped her throat, and they stumbled off balance. He caught her as she fell against a tree, barely catching himself before he crushed her to it.

“Do ye surrender, nàmhaid?” he breathed.

“Never, nàmhaid!” she declared, as if a valiant warrior going down a hero while he held her to the tree.

Their laughter subsided. He could feel her chest heaving for air against his abdomen, could smell the rosewater used to freshen her skin, could feel her body heat, steamy from their exertion and damp clothes. He took in her hazel eyes, glowing in the stark midmorning light, took in each fairy kiss upon her nose and the bonny wisps of escaped tendrils that hung loose around her face. Her lips parted, and his eyes dipped to them. Her smile fell, and her hands…sakes, he could feel her palms braced against his belly, palming him through his doublet. His mind ran wild with sudden thoughts of those hands, what they might feel like snaked beneath his coats and tunic, skin to skin, fingers inducing quivers of delight, burning patterns across his flesh…

Her breathing grew erratic, and uncertainty sprang to her face. Desire throbbed unchecked through his blood. His hands dropped his grip upon her shoulders and migrated to her fingers, peeling them away and enfolding them, lifting them over her head and pinning them to the tree. Their bodies flush, her wedged beneath him, he stared at her lips as desire to taste them nearly overpowered him.

Could he steal a kiss? Could she not give him a sign as to whether or not she wanted one? For he wouldn’t kiss her otherwise.

Singing in the distance was faint but brought with it reality, and reminders that the Yule party would eventually join them. Yet he remained against her. She had yet to indicate she’d prefer him to relinquish her—a prize in itself, to have her acquiescence. But the singing grew louder, and as he glanced toward it, he could see Angus and the others approaching with a clear view. Had they watched the entire snowball spectacle? Jesu, they probably thought their laird had gone daft.

Aileana, too, seemed to come to, and she dropped her head. “Mary mother…” she prayed beneath her breath, wriggling her hands from his grip. He released them. “Ye’re nay like what I expected.”

She didn’t sound as if she’d intended to speak the sentiment aloud. His brow lifted, and he glanced askance to examine the dips and rises of the landscape.

“What did ye expect?”

“I wanted—nay, needed—ye to be the same beast ye were when ye attacked Urquhart, with yer face covered in woad and mud, who cut down our sentries and breeched our curtain wall, so that I could remain shielded to ye. I didnae expect someone who feeds foxes and finds pleasure frolicking in the snow.”

He frowned and eased back an increment so that she wasn’t so flattened beneath him. Cleared his throat. Was she saying that she liked him? But the remark poured cool water upon his lust, quelling the throbbing. They’d shared amusements and playful ribbing, but there was much that still lay between them. Wrongs he’d committed against her and her people, wrongs they’d committed against him and his.

Would such an obstacle ever be overcome?

“My thanks for the jaunt,” he said, clearing his throat again. “I sensed ye’d like to be free of my folks’ scrutiny, and in sooth, I wearied from my cousin’s questions about ye.”

She nodded with understanding. “I do nay think yer kin and kind will be overly sad when I depart come Epiphany,” she jested, though like most jests, he could sense an undercurrent of truth.

And didn’t the constant reminders of their union’s fragility nip him with unease. He pushed it aside. He still had more than a sennight left with her to build upon this truce and, perhaps, claim his money.

“Mayhap ye should be yerself to them,” he suggested. “Ye’ll grow on them, as ye’re growing upon me.”

As she opened her mouth to refute his suggestion, the plodding of horses approached and the singing tapered off. A whistle at his expense ensued, and Aileana’s face reddened with embarrassment.

“Aye, he does indeed subdue the Grants abed,” sniggered a soldier softly.

Aileana, scalded, yanked away from him, turning from them to hide the distress that had sprung to her face.

“Aileana,” he began, reaching for her hand, but she ripped it away from him.

Instead, James scowled at his people for the thoughtless remark, though they were preoccupied with their merry singing and once more passed their flasks about. Instead, he swiveled away to fetch the horses as they rummaged alongside an overturned tree buried in a snow drift, the magic of the morning ruined. Shame washed over him as he collected the reins and brought Aileana’s palfrey back to her—at the taste of the acerbic disapproval from his people, at her recoiling from his touch as he tried to help her mount, when moments ago he’d had her willing body against his. He’d wronged this woman, who he was starting to—he swallowed—feel something for. He’d forced one of Grant’s sisters to endure this hostility all because of his inheritance, no thanks to his stepmother. He should have known this would happen.

Mounting up, his thoughts strayed as he guided Devil into the woods, once more leading the procession. After he’d had time to wrangle down his anger and frustration, he’d make his displeasure known to his people.

Chapter Seven