"Me laird."
The older man rushed past her then, eager to tattle, and for a moment, Iliana feared that her attempt to gain new plaids for her people was about to be nixed, for she feared her husband would not be thrilled by the idea. But whether he would allow her to buy them or not never became a concern, since he had no time for Mr. Cummins.
Ignoring the man's attempts to draw him aside, Duncan strode right past him to his wife. Grabbing her arm, he whirled back the way he had come. "I would have a word with ye, wife."
"A word, my lord?" Iliana asked worriedly, glancing over her shoulder at the consternation on Mr. Cummins's face and the amusement on his wife's face as she took it all in.
"Aye."
"What about, my lord?" Iliana panted, hurrying to keep up with his stride.
"Did I not say at table this morn that I would have a word with ye?"
"I...Did you, my lord? I am sorry, I do not recall."
"Well, I did."
"I see. Well, I am sorry. I may have been distracted."
"Duncan!"
Having just reached the steps to the keep, they both slid to a halt at that roar from Angus Dunbar as he crossed the bailey toward them.
"What the devil are ye doin', boy? Ye ken she's suppose to rest, yet yer joggin' her about like a--"
"Ye're absolutely right, Da," Duncan interrupted. "'Tis wrong o' me to hurry her about so." Scooping Iliana up into his arms, he arched an eyebrow. "Better?" Without waiting for a response, he whirled and jogged up the steps, bouncing her about in his arms as he went.
Chapter Nine
Iliana held on for dear life as Duncan charged up the steps to the keep doors, wincing when he paused to kick one of them open. A glance behind them, as he then started directly up the stairs to the second floor with her, showed his father in hot pursuit. Angus had just started determinedly up the steps after them when Seonaid appeared from the kitchen, hailing her father. Iliana saw the Dunbar hesitate, then he turned reluctantly to meet her.
"Open the door." Glancing around, Iliana saw that they had reached the bedchamber and reached out to do as her husband ordered, her gaze narrowing with suspicion as it fell on the bed. But in the next moment, Duncan had carried her inside, kicked the door closed and turned toward the opposite end of the room. When he set her down before the fireplace, she took a quick step away from him, and cleared her throat nervously. "You wished to speak to me, husband?"
Duncan nodded. He intended on wooing his way into her belt, but knew he would have to go about it with stealth and cunning. It was not unlike stealing a herd of cows from an enemy. He had to catch her unawares. Sneak up on her, so to speak. Which was why he had not taken her directly to the bed. She would have realized what he was about and built fences to keep him out.
"I've a wound ye must see to," he announced, noting her sudden concern with surprise pleasure.
"You do not appear wounded," she murmured, eyeing him.
"'Tis a trifling injury. Little more than a sliver, but 'tis festering and I have some worry over it." Slipping the top of his plaid off of his shoulder to hang around his waist, he quickly removed his shirt.
Iliana stood still, eyes wide as he half-disrobed before her. 'Twas not the first time she had seen her husband's naked chest, yet still it was an impressive sight. Her eyes slid over the skin he was baring as he shrugged off the shirt, watching the muscles in his arms and chest ripple beneath the velvet of his tanned skin as he dropped the shirt to the floor.
"I...I see no wound--" she began, her gaze devouring his chest, then paused as he held out his arm toward her, revealing that he did indeed have an injury, but she would hardly call it trifling. It was a two-inch cut in his upper arm, and it was indeed festering.
Frowning, she moved to the trunk nearest the bed and dug out some herbs and a small swath of clean linen. Then she moved to the basin of water at the head of the bed. "Come. Sit."
Duncan sat upon the edge of the bed, waiting patiently as she mixed some water with her herbs, then dipped a strip of linen in the mixture.
"Hold out your arm," she instructed, turning back to him.
Duncan lifted his arm, watching with interest as she cleaned the injury. He wasn't sure how he had gained it. Probably when he had taken that tumble over the bench while trying to stop Seonaid from starting the bedding ceremony. Whatever the case, he had first noticed it the morning after the wedding, but it had seemed insignificant then. He had only realized this morning that it was beginning to fester. He had thought to take a hot poker to it to burn off the poison tonight after sup. Infection was dangerous. It could take a limb, or worse, a life. Now he watched his wife minister to it and decided to give her herbs a day or so to work, then tend to it himself if they did not.
His gaze slid to Iliana's face and a slow smile tugged at his lips. She was nibbling away fiercely at her lower lip as she worked, her forehead drawn into a frown of concentration. He would not mind smoothing that frown away and nibbling at her lip himself. And he would. Her wariness was gone now.
"There." Straightening, Iliana discarded the soiled linen and retrieved a clean one. "I shall bandage it for now, but it shall have to be cleaned again this eve before we retire," she told him, beginning to wrap the strip of cloth around his arm as she spoke.
"Aye," he murmured, beginning to tense on the bed.
"You should have shown it to me earlier. "Tis dangerous to allow infection to grow," she lectured, tying off the bandage. Then she straightened to look over her handiwork. Satisfied, she nodded, then turned toward the table again, intent on putting her herbs away and returning belowstairs. But before she even grabbed up her pouch, she felt Duncan take her hand. Turning, she was surprised to find him now standing.
"I would thank ye fer yer efforts on me behalf," he rumbled, then tipped up her chin with one finger and dropped his mouth to cover hers.
Iliana went as still as death in his arms. Even her heart seemed startled into stopping. She simply stood there, eyes wide and mouth still beneath his as he rubbed his own lips across them.
One benefit of such a surprise was that she had been startled into holding her breath. At least she'd stopped breathing, which meant she wasn't breathing in the scent of him as he kissed her. It allowed her the opportunity to simply enjoy the sensations his touch awoke inside her, without suffering his scent. And oddly enough, he was stirring things to life in her with that soft caress.
Alarmed by the odd sensations, Iliana brought her hands up to push at his chest, her lips opening on a protest. Her mouth was invaded at once by his seeking tongue. Gasping in surprise, she found that the hands that had started out pushing at him began tugging at his bare shoulders instead as her legs suddenly grew weak beneath her.
Sensing her response, Duncan smiled against her mouth, the tension leaving his body. He was sure he had found the way to her key. In a few minutes she would be begging him to unlock her secrets. Placing his hands at either side of her waist, he slid them up to cup her breasts through the material of her gown. When she jumped slightly in his arms in surprise, then moaned, he squeezed gently, then continued to massage a breast with one hand as the other slid down to cup her behind and draw her against him. This time he was not startled by the hardness that pressed against his own. He savored it as the temporary obstruction he was now sure it was, then set about removing her gown, distracting her from the fact that he was doing so by deepening his kisses and caresses.
As soon as he had her gown undone, he urged it down her shoulders, then rolled it off her hips. It slid to the floor with a rustle as he quickly stepped backward to the edge of the bed. Catching Iliana up in his arms, he dropped to sit upon it, settling her on his lap and continuing to kiss her as he set to work unlacing her undertunic. Pushing that off her shoulders a moment later, he left it to gather in a pool at her waist as his hands slid to caress the soft flesh he had revealed. He enjoyed the weight of her generous breasts in his palms briefly, finding their hard centers with his thumbs a
nd teasing them to excited life, then found it wasn't enough and tugged his lips from hers.
In that brief moment after he abandoned her lips, Iliana blinked her eyes open, amazed to find herself seated on his lap, naked but for the undertunic gathered around her waist. Alarm bells began ringing inside her head at once. Then her husband closed his lips around one of the ripe nipples he had bared to the afternoon air, and she cried out in surprise and need, all protests forgotten as new sensations, more powerful even than those he had roused before, clamored to life.
Gasping and shuddering as he set to suckling at her breast, Iliana caught his head in her hands and pressed him closer. She arched against the arm around her back and wiggled in his lap as he slid one hand up her leg beneath the undertunic until it rested against the thick leather of her belt. But when he slid one finger beneath to explore her more intimately, Iliana stiffened in his lap, her head snapping up.
Catching her mouth quickly, he silenced any protest she might have given and continued to slide his finger between the leather and her skin. Grunting at the telltale damp heat he found, he did his best to increase her excitement with his touch as he kissed her.
Iliana's entire body clenched. Her legs tightened on either side of his hand. Her fingers knotted in his hair. Even her nipples seemed to clench in an agony of wanting. Part of her wanted to make him stop. The other part thought she would die if he did. Moaning, she twisted her face into his neck, then quickly away as the scent of him began to intrude on the excitement she was experiencing.
"Sweetling," he groaned as she twisted, rubbing against him, pressing the belt tightly against herself.
Barely hearing him, Iliana moaned and gasped as he nipped gently at her ear.
"Sweetling."
"Mmm?" she breathed.
"I want to pleasure ye, sweetling," he told her in a pained gasp.