“Aye, I thought ye might,” Ewan said, grinning at him.
Catriona could have sworn that she heard Fin growl, but her thoughts swiftly flew ahead to what would happen in the bedchamber. She had no time to think long though, because when he’d shut the door, he wasted no time disrobing her.
Fire spread through her everywhere he touched her, but when she reached to put her arms around him, he stopped her as he had earlier. Then he scooped her up and carried her to the neatly turned-down bed, laying her naked upon it.
When she reached to pull up the covers, he said, “Nay, sweetheart, leave them. ’Tis warm enough in here, and I want to think of you lying as you are whilst I stir up the fire and light more cressets. Then I want to look at you.”
Chapter 18
Fin attended quickly to the fire and the cressets, but the image of Catriona as he had left her stirred him to even more haste in doffing his clothing. It occurred to him as he did that a tunic and mantle were much more convenient in such situations than a man’s doublet, shirt, braies, nether hose, and shoes or boots.
“The two of you said naught to me or to each other about your talk,” she murmured as she watched him fling off his tunic. “What did Ewan say to you?”
“Not enough, since he clearly thought that I still needed some of my own sauce served to me at supper,” he said as he moved to join her in the bed. “But we are not going to talk about Ewan. Where were we before we stopped?”
“We did not stop,” she muttered, only to gasp when he recalled what he had been doing and reached to see if she was still as ready as she had been then.
She was nearly so, and he noted how eagerly she welcomed his touch.
Knowing that his control was limited due to his earlier tactics, he forced himself to disregard a nearly overwhelming urge to take her hard and swiftly.
She was already moaning at his slightest touch and arcing against him. So he gently kneed her legs apart and positioned himself. Easing himself into her silken sheath, he waited to see if she might reveal any sign of lingering discomfort.
Instead, she rose to meet him as if to aid and encourage him.
Instinct took over, and the result for him came swiftly. Aware that she had neared her own climax, he stroked her until she, too, gained release.
Afterward, lying beside him with the coverlet over them, his arm around her, and her head resting in the hollow of his shoulder, she sighed and said, “Grandame said that it could be pleasurable. And you promised earlier that I would not forget it. But I had no idea what either of you meant.”
He chuckled. “Do you think that you might like this aspect of our marriage?”
“I do, aye, although it did last but a short time. And you said—”
“Sakes, lass, we’ve only just begun,” he said, still smiling.
They lay quietly for a time before he pushed the coverlet away with his free hand and began to caress her again. The cressets still cast a golden glow over the room; so rising onto an elbow, he delighted in watching her reactions for a time while his hands sought to memorize the wondrous planes and curves of her body.
Moving purposefully, he made slow, sensuous love to her until she squirmed with pleasure beneath him, gasping his name, and begging him for release.
Midway through the night, he took her again. And then, in the gray dawn light, she reached for him. Afterward, as they lay beside each other, sated, he knew that God had spoken at last and all was well.
As he had promised, he spent the morning with Ewan, while Catriona slept. But she was up before midday to rejoin them and beg to hear their reminiscences of their years together at Tor Castle. She listened raptly, too, as Fin recounted more of his adventures with Rothesay and others.
They retired early again that night and spent Thursday in much the same way. Shortly after midday on Friday, Tadhg arrived, big with news.
“Himself said ye’re tae return at once, Sir Fin,” he said as he ran across the hall to the dais, where they were sitting down to their midday meal.
“Why such hurry?” Fin asked him. “We’d return tomorrow in any event.”
“Them bloody Comyns, sir. They killed three o’ our men ashore, and