Page 50 of Duncan

“Why are you doing this to me?” Nicole whispered.

“I’ve waited many, many lifetimes for you.” He drew her into his arms, pressing her shivering body against his. “I kept watch for a dream of a woman, one who would take away my pain. ’Tis all you’ve done since you came, Nicole. The joy you’ve brought, ’tis healed me.”

If she blurted out the truth he would never again see her as he did now, as the woman he desired above all others—as his dream girl. He was all she’d wanted since she’d come here, and she was tired of fighting it. Her truest love might never have to face the truth, either.

“Very well.” It made her eyes fill with tears to say the rest. “Then if you want me while I’m still here, if you can love me until it’s time for me to leave, I’ll be yours.”

The first kiss he gave her landed on her brow, just above her right eye. She could smell the salt of tears, and wondered if they were both crying now. He shifted one arm down, pressing her body against his as he lifted and carried her over to Nyall’s bed. Once she lay on her back he finished undressing, and then unwrapped her clothing as if she were a buried treasure he’d just uncovered. The way he looked at her bare body made her shiver with wanting and pleasure, all mixed up.

“Come here,” she said, opening her arms for him. She took in a sharp breath as he bent over her instead and put his mouth on her breast. “That’s not fair. Oh, Duncan, please, come to me now.”

He ignored her plea, first licking her nipple, and then sucking on it lightly before he let it pop from his mouth. His hands caught her wrists as she tried to pull him down on top of her, and pinned them to the ticking as he kissed her other breast, and then glided his lips down to her belly.

Nicole arched under his mouth, awash with so much need she thought she’d drown in it. She watched him through half-closed eyes as he dragged her to the edge of the bed, and then knelt, shifting her legs over his shoulders as he moved in between her thighs. Watching her from there, he nuzzled her sex, kissing the soft thatch of red-gold curls before delving into them with his tongue and stroking the swollen, damp seam of her pussy.

Seeing his mouth against her added to the shockwaves of sensation as he began laving the nub between her folds, slowly at first, and then faster. He worked his hands under her bottom, lifting her up so he could penetrate her with his tongue as well. It was terribly intimate, something she’d be ashamed to let anyone else do to her. Yet with Duncan it seemed gentle and loving, and inflaming and indecent, all wrapped together.

The climax that came as he stroked her and kissed her drenched her in bliss.

He stood and thrust into her with his thick, hard cock, triggering a second orgasm before the first had ended. The way he fucked her made her writhe on the bed, as he was shafting her so deeply and with so much force it should have hurt. Instead it made her wrap her legs around him, wanting more, needing more.

“I want to taste you when you come for me,” Nicole begged.

Duncan pulled out of her pussy, climbing up on top of her as he held his slick, heavy cock like a gift. She curled her hand around the pulsing shaft, and guided his cockhead to her lips, engulfing him just as he began to jet. He watched her, his eyes narrowed to slits, his body jerking as he found his pleasure and gave it to her. Instead of joining her on the bed, he bent over to give her a kiss on the forehead, and then pulled on his clothes and walked out of the room.

Nicole lay in flushed, sweaty confusion, not sure what had just happened. Hadn’t she given him what he wanted? They’d had sex, spectacular sex, so why would he be angry? After she left she knew he wouldn’t be celibate, either. He’d told her he’d had lovers in the past. He was so handsome he could have his pick of the women on the island.

As soon as she grew steady enough to stand and walk, she got up, washed and dressed before she made her way down to the great hall. There she found the laird and his wife speaking with the ferryman, Nyall and some of the senior men from the garrison. They all fell silent as soon as they saw her, and Valerie came and looked all over her.

“Nicole?” The laird’s wife inspected her. “You should be resting.”

“I’m all right, but I think someone knocked me out in the hall.” She touched the back of her head, which no longer hurt, and then the side of her neck. “I think they might have tried to strangle me, too. Someone really doesn’t want me here.”

“None of the Finfolk or the clan would have attacked you. How did you– Oh, Duncan must have found you,” Valerie said before she could answer. “Are you two all right?”

“We had an argument about me staying on the island, but we settled that.” If she kept talking about him she’d cry. She glanced around the hall. “Where is Fiacail?”

The ferryman made a contemptuous sound, and then eyed Valerie before he bowed to her and the laird and left.

“I am suddenly glad that man can’t speak without destroying the castle.” The laird’s wife gave her a rueful look. “We’ve had Fiacail moved to a room in the garrison hall. She’ll be comfortable, and the men will keep watch over her.”

“She isn’t planning to betray the clan to her sisters or the other hybrids,” Nicole told her. “She wants to live an ordinary life here on the island.”

Valerie frowned. “She told you that?”

She explained about the blending of their minds during the healing process, and then added, “Most of the Cait Sith are like her, you know. They believe they were abandoned by their Fae father, and mortals have treated them very badly. They’ve just wanted to live in peace, somewhere no one could find or torment them. Most of them fear Derdrui and her sadistic behavior. I don’t believe any of the others know the truth about the enchantress, either.”

“What truth?” the laird’s wife asked.

Chapter Thirteen

Meg waited until after dark to sneak away from the stronghold and go to the cave, but once safely hidden in there she grew cold and sick and confused. The impulses that had driven her to attack Duncan on the cliffs had returned, so much stronger than before. Whenever she looked upon one of the MacMar or their vassals, it was all she could do not to lunge at them.

They breathe my air. They show me naught but pity. ’Tis unbearable.

Ever since her childhood, people had looked upon her with contempt or compassion. When she had been a starving wee lass in Éire, the women in her father’s village had chased her away from their rubbish heaps, but a few had instead offered her scraps from their own meals. She had hated the kind ones, for they reminded her that her own màthair had abandoned her when she was just a newborn. Her da had remarried, and kept his second wife pregnant until she died in childbirth with her fourth daughter, leaving Meg to cook, clean and look after the little ones in her place. She should have been loved and cherished like the daughters of the other village women, instead of being turned into an unpaid, unappreciated drab.

Didnae she care for me?