Page 35 of Highlander’s Bride

Raghnall shook his head. How could Angus and Catrìona have kept it a secret? And David himself, who’d become a friend and a sword brother.

“Aye. I do have my suspicions,” he said darkly. “I’ll need to have a serious conversation or two once we arrive.”

Woodsmoke from more campfires filled the air. The sounds of people talking quietly reached Raghnall’s ears. He saw Eanar return, and as he jumped off the horse, he approached them. “Are ye all right, Lady?” he asked Bryanna.

“Thanks. I’m fine.”

Despite their initial misunderstanding, Raghnall came to like the man more and more. “Is everything clear, Eanar?”

“Aye. We should be all right. Though people are worried. Uprooted from their homes like that… Bairns are scared.”

Raghnall nodded. “Aye. I ken.”

That was how he had felt as a fourteen-year-old lad being forced out of his home. As Eanar walked away to the camp, Raghnall studied Bryanna, looking for any signs of her being unwell. “Are ye truly feeling better?”

“I am.” She sat straighter and looked around, then began gathering her things into her black case. “Insulin keeps me alive. It’s the hormone that my body doesn’t produce. Thankfully, they found a way to make it in the future, so my life depends on it.”

He sucked air into his lungs. “And if ye stay here, without that…insu…lin…ye will die?”

She nodded without looking at him. “Yep. Pretty much.” Then she gave a small chuckle. “It sucks.”

It sucks… That probably meant it was shite. Poor lass. His heart ached for her. Living with a constant threat that didn’t come from an enemy but from your own body… And especially this woman, so full of light and life.

“Ye dinna deserve it, lass,” he said as he helped her put back her odd purple cylinders. Their fingers touched, and their eyes met. He could sink into the golden green of her eyes, bright and sparkling. “Ye should have a full life in front of ye…anything ye want. Anyone ye want.”

Her skin was so smooth under his fingers, and she was so close to him…soft and bonnie and feminine. There were her lips, half open, calling for him.

Resist the call, he commanded. She’s not yer real wife and she’s going to leave soon.

What harm would one little kiss do then, if she was going to leave soon?

His body agreed. He reached to her, cupping her jaw, and, as though she had the exact same thought, she moved towards him, too. Like a hammer and an anvil, they came together, their mouths connecting, their arms wrapping around each other’s bodies.

Unlike their previous kisses, there was no hesitation, no shyness, no holding back. Her lips met his with the same level of hunger that had been torturing him for days. They were soft, and her tongue tasted sweet, and it stroked his, caressing, playing, coming together and retreating. The taste of her, the scent of her filling his nostrils, the feel of her feminine body in his arms, brought fire deep within his veins.

He wanted her, aye. He’d wanted her for days. But it wasn’t just lust. It was the need to bathe in her light, to own her by giving pleasure to her, to watch her fall apart deliciously under his careful guidance. Never had he felt this need, this hunger, this ache for a woman. Not even with Mòrag.

He was ready to tear her clothes off and take her right here and now—and she wanted him, too. He could tell from her grinding, and the small whimpers of distressed pleasure that came from her throat and drove him mad.

But he couldn’t. Not after she’d been ill like she had just now. And not under the trees of a forest somewhere in the Highlands, when all his people could see them.

No. This woman deserved silks and a bed of feathers.

And no stolen glances from strangers.

With the effort of will that compared to tearing his own arm from his body, he stopped the kiss and leaned away from her. Her chest was heaving, her eyes were bright, and her lips were red and swollen from his kiss.

He wanted to see her beautiful folds swollen and red like that, too.

“I can tell ye one thing, lass,” he said as he cupped her face. “I like the idea of having ye as my wife more and more. ’Tis going to be very hard to let ye go.”

Chapter 16

Bryanna held a wooden bowl with her dinner—stew made of oats boiled with parsnips, wild garlic, and onions. Not particularly appetizing, but she was grateful to get something warm and comforting into her stomach. It was dark around them, and only campfires were chasing the night away. Families and neighbors sitting around the campfires were talking and eating their food.

Raghnall was by her side, staring into the flames, mindlessly chewing a piece of bannock that Teasag had packed earlier that morning. Eanar and Teasag sat across from Bryanna, talking about something and clearly teasing each other. The air was filled with the scents of woodsmoke, stew, and roasted bread.

Even though the fires and the smells were comforting, the sense of danger, of desperation and fear, hung over the camp like a dark ceiling.