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Love you like a sister.

Avelina could not be more pleased with her decision. With her husband. Yet that word.

Love.

She’d told Niall she never expected to marry for love, which was true. She did not love him, so surely there was no reason to pine for Niall to feel that way toward her.

What precisely, then, was the fluttering in her stomach when he held her hand as Avelina climbed onto the dais?

Desire. ‘Twas desire.

A sensation that did not abate throughout the meal. Sharing a trencher. Niall’s fingers grazing hers. By the time their host congratulated them and called for the sweet trays to be brought into the hall, it was well into the day.

“I do believe I may have drunk too much wine,” she whispered to her husband.

He peered at her but did not look away. Avelina held her husband’s gaze. When he made a sound deep in his throat, her insides twisted and turned. Not in a bad way but turned nonetheless. Her breath caught looking at him. Imagining him between her legs.

“You are a beautiful woman, Avelina.”

She was so accustomed to him using Lina that the full use of her name surprised her.

“I do love hearing my name on your lips,” she said, oblivious to the revelry around them.

“If you would like, when we share the marriage bed this eve, I will use that name.” He leaned into her. “Do you like that, Avelina? Spread your legs wider for me, Avelina, that I might plunge my tongue deeper into you.”

He sat back.

“Did you really just say those things at the supper table?”

Niall looked down, as if verifying they were, indeed, sitting at a supper table.

“I believe I did, my love.”

She swallowed. “You are a naughty man.”

“I am your naughty husband,” he responded. “Do not forget it.”

“How could I possibly forget such a thing?”

“Mmm.”

That seemed to please him.

“A toast,” their host called suddenly.

All in the hall raised their mugs and goblets, including the newly married couple.

“Two rivals, seated together, as husband and wife. Let it show all who seek to consider their enemies more than their allies, ‘tis better to forge friendships than foster hate. Tannochbrae is proud to host such an event as the union of these two clans.”

While everyone toasted to his words, Avelina’s stomach did another little dance. This one not as pleasant as the last when her husband gazed at her. ‘Twas like a premonition, one that did not settle well with her.

‘Tis better to forge friendships than foster hate.

If she’d not met Niall, Avelina would have continued to foster hate toward his clan. Despite their union, she did so for the men who engaged in the Battle of The Black Friars, who killed her father. ‘Twas not so easy of a thing to let go of hate.

“Something is amiss,” Niall said, watching her.

Avelina shrugged off such thoughts. There would be time later to reconcile her feelings for the clan she’d married into. This was her wedding night, a time not for memories of the past to intrude on the possibilities that lie ahead of them.