Julia London - Wild Wicked Scot

Arran growled, thrusting hard into her as his own release came.

For several moments afterward, neither of them moved. Both of them sucked air into their lungs until Arran slowly rolled off her and onto the bed beside her.

Margot was stunned. She swallowed hard, then pushed herself up and gathered the bedclothes around her naked body.

Arran had no such bashfulness. He lay sprawled on his belly, one arm hanging off the bed, his face turned away from her. She admired his physique, made hard and lean by his youthful thirty years and his lust for life. She had long appreciated his good looks and his strength, and had felt that flame of attraction from their first meeting when he appeared at Norwood Park with hair that was too long and muddied boots.

Yes, the spark had always been there. But the marriage had been wrong. Surely, in his heart of hearts, he knew that was true.

Margot leaned over him now. His hair had come undone from its queue. She could see a nick or two in his skin, as well. Fresh scars, undoubtedly earned in training his men for war. That was part of their marriage bargain—he would provide the renowned Highland soldiers for the British army. He would have lands in England, and she would have lands in Scotland, belonging to each of them outright. He was made a baron, too, and she...she was made the chattel by which two men had feathered their nests. She was the shiny bauble that had brought Mackenzie to the bargaining table.

How could such a glorious specimen of a man be a traitor? She touched one of the scars.

Arran instantly pushed himself up, coming off the bed. He ignored her and walked to the hearth, squatting down to build a fire. When he finished, he refilled his goblet and drank thirstily. He glanced at her over his shoulder, quite at ease with his nudity. But his hand, she noticed, was gripping the goblet. “Why?” he asked gruffly.

It was curious how two people, separated longer than they’d been together, could still understand one another. Margot knew very well that he was asking why she’d left. “You know why.”

“Was I unkind, then?” he asked impatiently. “Did I mistreat you?”

Margot sighed wearily. Her reasons had felt so sharp and urgent at the time, but had dulled with the years. “Not unkind. Indifferent. We were so different, you and I.”

He stared down at her for a moment, then looked away. “Aye. We still are.”

“You had no use for me, Arran.”

“No use for you? Was it no’ enough that you were mistress of all this?” he asked, gesturing around him.

“In name only,” she said. “I had no society, no friends.”

“Only because you’d not allow it,” he countered. “There are women in my clan who would have befriended you with the slightest bit of encouragement, aye?”

“That’s not true,” she said. “I tried to make Balhaire what I thought it ought to be, but they resisted me at every turn.”

“You wanted to do things in an English way.”

“What other way could I possibly have done them? I am English.”

He looked away, to the windows. “My own cousin Griselda was your friend.”

“Griselda!” Griselda Mackenzie was quite possibly the most unpleasant person Margot had ever met in her life. “She could scarcely tolerate me! She hated me for being English—you know that is true. Can you not see that you had what you wanted from our marriage, but I had nothing? I was miserable, Arran.”

“What I wanted,” he repeated. “Pray tell me, what the bloody hell did I want?”

Margot snorted and pushed her hair from her face. “The barony. Entry into England. Power, like every man before you and after you and around you now.”

Arran merely shrugged. “Aye, it’s what every man wants. But did you no’ want the same? Did you no’ want your own lands and a title, and all the trappings that come with it?”

“No,” she said, appalled. “I wanted a good match. A companion. I wanted a husband who wasn’t gone all day every day. I wanted someone who cared for finer things, who would take tea with me, perhaps bring me to Edinburgh—”

“This is the Highlands of Scotland, aye? No’ a bloody London or Paris salon.”

Margot could feel her hackles rising and checked herself. “You’re right. But that was the crux of it—I needed a more civilized existence.”

“Mind your mouth, woman,” he said, looking genuinely offended.

“You came to my chamber fresh from the hunt with blood on your shirt!”

“Aye, and I took it off!” he shouted. “Do you think it was easy to be wed to you?”

“Me!”

“Oh, aye, little lamb, you,” he said, pointing a finger at her. “You were so timid and disdainful of everything. Haughty! Aye, you were a haughty one,” he said, flicking his wrist at her. “Nothing was good enough for milady, was it?”

Margot looked away. There was some truth to that, she couldn’t deny it. She’d been angry she’d been forced to marry him, so determined to find fault with him and Balhaire. “I was so young, Arran. So inexperienced.”

“You were definitely that,” he curtly agreed.

She glanced at him sidelong. He was pacing now, dragging his hand through his long, unruly hair. “Why didn’t you come after me?” she asked softly.

Arran slowly turned to look at her for a long moment, his jaw clenched. “Because I donna chase after dogs or women. They come to me.”

Margot’s gut clenched. She could almost feel herself shrink and averted her gaze. “What a lovely sentiment.”

“I have my pride, woman.” He threw back the coverlet and got back in the bed.

“And I pierced it. So there you have it,” she said, drawing her knees up to her chest. “The only thing that ever truly existed between us was in this bed. It was the only place where we could agree.”

“The hell we agreed here,” he spat. “It is your duty to provide me an heir,” he said, bending his arm behind his head to pillow it. “And the last time I looked about, I have none.”

“I was to be your broodmare, is that it? Of course—I was bartered like one.”

“You came of your own free will!”

“My own free will! I had no choice, and well you know it.”

“Did I kidnap you and carry you off? We met twice before the nuptials, Margot. By God, if you’d had a doubt of it, you might have expressed it to me then.”

“We met two times!” She laughed at the absurdity of it. “Yes, of course, a sum total of two meetings is quite sufficient to determine compatibility for the rest of one’s life. Whatever made me think otherwise? I had to have reason to cry off, but I scarcely knew you at all.”

“What did you want, then, a bloody courtship?”

“Yes!”

Arran suddenly bolted up and over her, pinning her down with his body, his gaze dark and locked with hers. “If you found me and Balhaire so objectionable, why in hell have you now returned?”

Margot held his gaze just as fiercely. “I told you,” she said calmly. “Perhaps I’ve not given our marriage its due. I should like to try again.”

“Donna ever lie to me, Margot Mackenzie, do you hear me now?” he breathed hotly. “You will no’ like what will come of it if you do.” His eyes moved hungrily down her body. He bent his head and took her breast in his mouth, teasing it a moment before lifting his gaze to hers once more. “Never lie to me, aye? Am I clear?”

His blue eyes were two bits of hard ice, and Margot was terrified to feel her face coloring with her deceit. Could he see it? “Yes,” she said. She was lying to him now! Fate had made her a despicable liar.

Arran grunted. He kissed her belly, pushed aside the bed linens and moved down between her legs, his tongue and mouth on her sex, and Margot felt herself sinking once more. “Are you lying to me now, leannan?”