Page 58 of Highland Guard

Harcourt told her about the tunnel he, Geordie, and Dunnie had found. Her interest and bursts of amusement over the tale he told helped him keep hold of his control as he finished bathing her. It was not as easy to hang on to his control as he dried her off and dressed her in her night shift, but he kept reminding himself that he had a plan.

Sitting down and eating eased his hunger for her a little because it kept him busy and distracted from thinking about making love to her. A hearty meal fulfilled another hunger he had gained after a full day of work as well. Each of them had done so much today that there was a lot to talk about. Harcourt knew this was what he wanted, what he needed. He had not lied to her about that; he was determined to find a way for them to be together like this for a very long time.

Annys finished her cider, set the tankard down, and decided it had been a very long time since she had felt so good. That it was on the night of a day spent preparing for an attack was certainly odd, but she could not deny the fact that she was actually happy, filled with a pleasant languor. She looked at Harcourt who was watching her with a hunger her body rapidly responded to, and smiled. For tonight, she saw no harm in thinking only of herself, her own pleasure, and to pretend that all was right in her world.

Harcourt stood, took her by the hand, and tugged her out of her seat and into his arms. His need for her strengthened immediately, but there was also a saner, calmer sense of rightness within him. This was where she belonged.

He kissed her and savored the way her body pressed against his but his control was slipping away fast. “I wanted this to be a slow, sumptuous loving,” he said as he began to remove her night shift.

“Mayhap that will come later.”

Despite blushing as she lay naked on the bed in front of him, she watched him shed his clothes. He was beautiful to her although she doubted he would like her using such a word to describe him. He was all women said a man should be, she thought, yet they rarely found. He was strong, his muscles easy to see in his every move as was the grace he was probably unaware of. Though he was tall, all his limbs and his torso were of a size to appear perfectly matched. He was neither pale nor dark but a faint golden color, his skin looking as if it had been kissed by the sun and inviting her to touch it. A neat, light vee of black hair decorated his broad chest, a thin line of it began just below his belly hole and went straight down to where it thickened around his groin. His manhood jutted out from his body, hard and pointing right at her, and she smiled. Then she opened her arms to welcome him when he joined her on the bed.

Annys lost herself in the pleasure of his kisses and soft caresses, in the warmth of his skin beneath her hands. By the time he slipped his hand between her legs, she was eager for that intimate touch. A murmur of disappointment escaped her as his back slid out of her reach when he spread kisses over her body and down her belly. She reached to pull him back but then his hot mouth replaced his seductive fingers. Shock ripped through her at such an intimacy, but she had barely acknowledged it when passion burned it away, along with the last tenuous scrap of her modesty.

When she felt that tight ache in her belly grow, she opened her mouth to demand he join with her but did not get to say a word. Harcourt reared up and joined their bodies with a thrust strong enough to make her slide up the bed. She grabbed his arms to anchor herself as he bent his head to kiss her.

She gave herself over to the pleasure of being surrounded by him, his heat warming her inside and out. Despite her efforts to hold on as long as she could, to savor the rush of delight his lovemaking produced, her release mercilessly tore through her and she cried out his name, hanging on tightly as he found his own a heartbeat later.

Although it took a while before he could even move, Harcourt finally rose from her arms and cleaned them both off. He crawled back into bed when he was done and pulled her back into his arms. He sighed with contentment when she curled her body up against his. It had been fast, a little furious, but to his relief, mutually satisfying. He kissed the top of her head and decided that, after he had rested for a while, he would try again to achieve that slow, sumptuous lovemaking he kept promising her.

Chapter Seventeen

At the first clang of the warning bell, Harcourt was immediately awake. He leapt out of the bed and yanked on his clothes. As he prepared for battle, he watched Annys wake to the continuing alarm, watched the fear come alive inside her, and wished he could chase it away. She was going to have to learn to push it aside, however. Sir Adam had caused her to feel that fear, forced her to face it and try to be strong. For that alone, Harcourt wanted the man dead.

“Sir Adam has arrived?” she asked as she slipped out of bed and began to quickly dress, pulling on her shift.

“Aye.” He pulled her into his arms causing her to drop the gown she held and gave her a fierce kiss. “Keep safe.”

“Ye as weel.”

Annys watched him hurry out of the room and sighed. Fear was a tight knot in her belly but she was determined not to allow it to rule her. There were a lot of people inside the keep now, every one of them as afraid as she was. She needed to show them only calm and an absolute certainty of victory. That was one of the things she had been taught that the lady of a keep was expected to do. It was one of the few things that had always made complete sense to her.

Before she left the bedchamber, she looked around. The lovely hot bath she had savored was now no more than a tub of cold, soapy water, but the memory of that pleasure remained. On the table in front of the fire sat the sad scraps of the hearty meal she and Harcourt had shared, the jug of cider empty now, but she could still smile over the teasing and flirting they had indulged in as they ate. The bed was a mass of tangled covers and her body warmed at the memories that sight stirred up.

It had all been almost perfect. The only shadow was the lack of any declaration of love, from Harcourt for her, or from her for him. Harcourt had spoken of how he wanted them to stay together, even brushed over the word marriage, but the one thing that firmly stood between them, was where they each had to remain after the battle was over, had not been banished. The laird of Glencullaich could not leave it and, as his mother, neither could she, and Harcourt needed to return to Gormfeurach, not only out of duty to the people living there, but to his brother. A part of her was grateful that he would give her no false promises when he had no answers to their problem yet, while another part would have liked to hear them anyway.

Shaking her head, she hurried out of the room. The best thing she could do now was to bury herself in all the work that needed to be done. It would keep her from thinking too much on what had not been said between her and Harcourt as well as help her keep her fear tucked away deep inside her. First she needed Joan, or any other grown woman, to correctly braid her hair so that it was out of her way while she worked.

Passing by David’s bedchamber, Annys could not resist stepping inside for just a moment. Her first thought when she entered was that Glencullaich was going to need a lot more cottages than it had now. There were ten cradles with infants in them and three more ready for the three very pregnant women there, ones due to go to the birthing room very soon. Since the children were all busy playing and running around, it was difficult to count the number of very young children but there were twenty pallets on the floor. The three women heavy with child had four older girls and three aged women plus Mary, whose new infant slept in one of the cradles, to help them.

She saw Benet being introduced to the infants by a boy who had to be close to his own age. Benet suddenly looked up, smiled, and waved at her. Annys returned the wave.

“Look at all the bairns, Maman! ” he said.

“I see, Benet. There will have to be more cottages built soon.” She grinned when he laughed and nodded. “Remember to be verra gentle with them, love,” she added and turned to leave only to come face to face with Mary.

“This is a wondrous thing to do for us, m’lady. For the bairns, for us, for the old ones,” Mary said.

“T’was Sir Nathan’s idea, Mary,” she said.

“And we have all thanked him. But, we ken weel he had the idea, aye, but ye and your ladies put it all in place. Now we willnae be underfoot, aye?”

“That was the purpose, aye. The sad thing is that ’tis also so we can move ye all, verra quickly, if the need arises.” She was surprised when Mary smiled for the knowledge should have served to remind her of all the danger they were facing.

“I ken it, m’lady. ’Tis true, I am frightened but kenning that we are here, easy to gather up and move, is a comfort. Sir Nathan showed us where to go when the time comes.”

“Good, but ye will have to be certain to stay together as ye go down to the ledger room.”