Plaid to the Bone (5 page)

Oh, God, his lips . . .
Cait struggled to form a coherent thought, but she had no words for the way Adam Cameron turned her world on its ear. She could only hold on and ride the waves of sensation as everything faded around her except the exquisite warmth and demanding urgency of his mouth on hers.

She’d only meant to kiss him with enough welcome to convince him not to delay their wedding. She didn’t think she could stand to drag out the farce a single day longer. The sooner she wed the man, the sooner she could carry out her father’s wishes and make herself a widow. A simple kiss should have been enough to seal the deal.

But there was nothing simple about Adam Cameron’s kisses. Instead of bringing them to the tidy, neat conclusion that postponing their nuptials would benefit no one, it unleashed this ungovernable longing, this wildfire that threatened to consume them both.

Adam’s mouth controlled her and she didn’t care. She gave herself up to the drumbeat pounding in her ears. His hands, big, rough, and possessive, roamed over her body. Even through her night shift, her skin rioted under his touch.

Cait pressed herself flush against him and he growled into her mouth, the feral sound of a male animal who’s cornered and can’t escape.

And doesn’t really want to.

Without breaking off their kiss, he grasped the neckline of her shift and ripped it open, popping off the neat row of horn buttons, one by one.

Gasping, Cait tore her mouth away. “I havena got another shift.”

“No matter.” Adam stared down at her bared breasts. The heat of his gaze made her nipples harden. “I’ll see ye have a dozen new ones, merely for the pleasure of ripping them off ye.”

He bent and kissed his way down to her breasts, nuzzling and nipping at the aching peaks. Cait’s breath hitched over her teeth. When he closed his mouth over one and sucked, her knees nearly buckled. Delight arced from her breasts to the folds between her legs. She’d never imagined such a delicious and dizzying sensation.

A small moan escaped her lips when he straightened and looked down at her. Her nipples still tingled. Why had he stopped?

“Ye’re beautiful, lass.” He cupped her cheek and thumbed her upper lip. “If I have my way, ye’ll trip about in naught but the skin God gave ye all the time.”

“That doesna sound verra practical,” she said, unable to keep from smiling at him. Her insides glowed under his praise, but she tried to tamp it down. She was supposed to keep her distance from the man, but every fiber of her being strained toward him. “I expect I’d turn blue with cold.”

“My Pictish princess,” he said, his voice caressing the words. “But if ye dinna wish to be blue, I’ve a remedy for that.” He scooped her up and carried her to the bed.

Cait pressed kisses to his neck. She hadn’t meant to, but he smelled so delicious, all warm leather and something indefinably male. She couldn’t resist tasting him. The salty freshness of him made her soft palate arch.

The heavy counterpane had been pulled back already, so Adam laid her down on the crisp linens.

She stiffened.

“Be easy, lass,” Adam said as he settled beside her. “I’ll see to it ye go to the altar a virgin yet.”

She swallowed hard. How could she tell him that was the least of what troubled her? This wasn’t at all how it was supposed to be. She was supposed to guard herself. Even once the words were said over them in the kirk, she’d planned to be icy and untouchable. She’d open her legs, but not her heart.

His intoxicating kisses had put paid to that scheme.

He leaned down to her again. “Dinna fear me.”

I fear myself
, danced on her tongue but she couldn’t make her voice work.

He took possession of her mouth again while his hand played a lover’s game with her breast. He stroked. He teased. He took the ache and made it worse.

And better.

Who knew such torment could be so pleasing?

She ought to stop him. She ought to scream. Barclay and Fife would come running if they were within earshot. But then Adam’s men would join the fray. Her guards wouldn’t stand a chance.

Neither did she.

The laird of Bonniebroch was relentless. He pressed his lips against the base of her throat, planting feather-light kisses up her neck and along her jawline. Then he raked his teeth against her tender skin.

She gasped at the shock of it. And at the greater shock that the slight pinch of pain registered as pleasure along with the rest of the wicked game he was playing on her flesh. His hand left her breast and skimmed over her ribs. He dallied near her navel for a few breathtaking moments, then moved steadily down her body. His mouth found her nipple again, and Cait’s eyes rolled back in her head. It was as if her breasts sent a message of need to other places in her body, leaving her panting and throbbing.

He made her want the most outrageous things. She ached to be touched, to be tormented in the most unlikely of places.

Then, as if he’d divined her secret thoughts, his fingers slid down and invaded her soft curls, exploring the slippery folds between her legs.

“Aye, lass, like that,” he murmured when her knees spread apart without her being aware of moving them.

Traitor,
she named her own body.

It didn’t change a thing. Adam Cameron continued to enslave her with pleasure and her body was his willing ally. He caressed her. He ran his knuckles over an especially tender spot and she sucked in a surprised breath at the joy that shivered over her whole being. She was swollen and achy and feverishly warm.

And, to her shame, she couldn’t stop herself from arching into his hand.

“That’s it, my Cait. Sing for me.”

She hadn’t realized till then that the small sounds of distress that reached her ears were coming from her own mouth. She wasn’t sure what she needed, but the throbbing ache grew deeper with each deft flick of his talented fingers.

Oh, how she
wanted.

But Cait wasn’t one to beg. Her hips rose to meet his strokes, as she felt a knot inside her tightening. She hovered at the edge of something, almost there, nearly . . .
Dear God, there must be an end.

Then the tightness broke. She came utterly undone.

She might have called out his name as her limbs bucked with the force of her release but she couldn’t be sure. Her mind was not working properly. Bliss washed over her, coating her, like the spray of foam had covered her while she waited for her selkie to come.

Then in a few more heartbeats, the ferociously joyful pounding faded and she was able to draw a deep breath.

But Adam didn’t move to take her. He simply smoothed his fingertips over her belly and pressed a kiss to her temple. Then he pulled her close in a surprisingly gentle embrace and held her still.

The man discomfited her out of all knowing. He was arrogant and brash. And patient and tender. Which was the real man? Or were they all him, light and dark, good and evil in some jumbled up chimera of a person? And if he continued to befuddle her like this, how could she find enough to hate about him to send him to his end?

“I may be a maiden, but I ken well enough what’s supposed to happen now.” She might know the mechanics of the ultimate act, but no one had prepared her for the devastating force of some of the preliminaries that had happened between her and Adam Cameron.

He’d
given
to her. And didn’t seem inclined to take.

“What . . . what about ye? Ye havena . . .”

“There’ll be time enough for that after we’ve said the words in kirk, lass,” he said as he rolled onto his back, lacing his fingers behind his head. “Though I’ll no’ say ye dinna tempt me sore.”

She struggled to sit up. Aye, she still had possession of her body, it seemed, but she felt so different inside her own skin now. Scattered. Out of control.

There.
Her womb clenched once more, a final, joyful squeeze. Even now, she wasn’t entirely her own. Adam Cameron had forced pleasure on her. And she’d liked it.

If a man felt even half as much pleasure in the act of marriage as Adam had just given her, she had to admit he was being chivalrous in the extreme by refusing to take her maidenhead.

“Thank ye,” she said softly. “I promised my father I’d be wed a virgin.”

He chuckled and rolled off the bed. Then he leaned down and gave her a final deep kiss. “And I promised your maid Grizel that I’d be on my best behavior.”

Her mouth sagged open. Her father would never consider a promise to her maid binding. He barely spoke to Grizel beyond issuing orders or railing at her for some imagined misdeed. “Ye would keep your word to my servant?”

“I have little choice but to keep my word.” He smiled down at her. “I’ve no great wish to find an adder in my boot, aye?”

Then his smile faded and his eyes took on a warm glow. “I doubt I’ll see ye again till we meet in kirk. Sleep well now, mistress.” One of his dark brows arched rakishly. “I dinna plan to let ye sleep much tomorrow night.”

Then he turned and left the chamber without a backward glance.

Cait burrowed into the bedclothes, pulling the warm linens up to her chin. Some of Adam Cameron’s unique scent had been grafted into the fibers and she inhaled him to her toes.

The man’s on his best behavior, he says. And all because he made a promise,
she thought drowsily as lethargy stole over her body.
Should he decide to be wicked, I’m truly lost.

Cait skimmed the surface of sleep, but didn’t manage to plunge into its blackness. Fragments of another promise kept rising in her mind to hold her in the waking world.

Cait threw back the bedclothes and clambered out of bed. How could she wallow in the scent of her father’s enemy? How could she let the man touch her, and not just her body, but her spirit as well? What a conniving devil Adam Cameron was. He was halfway to convincing her he was a decent gentleman with his promise to her servant and all.

She paced the length of the room, welcoming the cold that shot through her bare feet and up her shins. Cold was better than warmth. It helped her see things clear again.

She had a charge to keep. It didn’t matter that her betrothed was a man who could charm her into bed and take her body to a place of unspeakable delight. He was Wallace Grant’s enemy and, therefore, hers as well. Her father’s fortune—the fate of Scotland’s young king, come to that—depended upon her keeping her word.

It had all seemed just words at the time, eerie, mystical words of some dark incantation. Morgan MacRath had been in his glory as he conducted the weird ritual in the Grant crypt. It was a sealing, he’d said. A bargain with the powers to see their goal to an end. The light of triumph in his eyes when she swore reminded her of the soulless glow of a predatory animal’s eyes peering from the forest at midnight.

If she failed, would it mean her father’s head was truly forfeit?

She stopped in the shaft of moonlight and looked up at the cold ball in the black sky. She needed to be like the moon. No warmth. No constancy.

She had no choice. She had to succeed. She’d sworn. On her own blood and the head of her father.

Cait set her face like flint and resolved to spend the rest of the night plotting her bridegroom’s demise.

Cait rose early. It was easy since she’d hardly been to bed. She bypassed the main hall, where most of the castle’s residents were breaking their fast and made her way to the walled garden off the kitchen.

Cook didn’t question her interest in the small plot. As chatelaine, Cait would be expected to doctor the ills and hurts of the castle folk. She was required to have a working knowledge of healing herbs and such. Nothing was more natural than the new lady of Bonniebroch apprising herself of the plants available to her.

There were neat rows of rosemary, thyme, and fragrant lavender. Basil and chamomile, licorice root and mint grew in profusion in the sheltered garden. Everything was disquietingly wholesome. She’d almost given up hope of finding something she could use until she spied the purplish-blue flowers in a shaded corner.

Cait knelt and pulled the small knife from the busk of her bodice to cut a few stems.

“Careful, milady,” came a voice from behind her.

Cait rose quickly—guiltily, she feared—and discovered the small man she’d saved from the pillory behind her. He stood in the doorway to the garden, fingering his damaged ear. “Oh, it’s ye, Mr. Farquhar. Ye gave me a start.”

“Ye remembered my name. Aren’t ye kind?” A smile broke over his thin face; then his gaze darted back to the plants in the corner. “Ye’ll want to be wearing gloves before ye cut wolf’s bane.”

“’Tis only poison if it’s consumed.”

He arched a wiry brow. “Aye, that’s true. But if ye’ve so much as a small cut on your hands, ye might take in enough of the malevolent properties of the plant through your skin to poison yerself by accident.”

Her father had neglected to warn her of that.

“If ye dinna mind me asking, what might ye be needing it for?” he said with a small dip of his head.

She was grateful she had a story ready, but the lie still came haltingly to her lips. “My maid Grizel. She suffers at times . . . from the rheumatism, ye see. I’ve heard a poultice made with wolf ’s bane applied at the point of pain can be a great help.”

A small amount taken in a hot drink could also drop a grown man in a few seconds, but she wasn’t about to let Farquhar know she was aware of that use for the herb.

He nodded. “It may indeed help your maid. It may also help
ye
into the next world if ye’re no’ careful how ye prepare aconitum.”

“Aconitum?”

“Ah, that’s the educated name for wolf ’s bane. Comes from the Greek and it means, rather appropriately, ‘without struggle.’ Certain tribes in the Romanian mountains tip their arrows with it and drop their prey between one step and the next. Powerful stuff, that.” He reached into his sporran and pulled out a pair of serviceable work gloves. Then he advanced toward her, holding out his hand for the knife. “If ye please, milady.”

She handed it to him. If the fellow wanted to be chivalrous, there was no harm in allowing it. As he knelt to harvest the herb, Cait cast about for something to say that would keep him from pondering further about why she might want something that was so virulent.

“I see ye’ve replaced the twine in your ear with a horse nail. Most folk who’ve been pilloried try to let the hole close if it will.”

“I hope I am no’ most folk, milady.” He carefully placed the plants in her small basket, then cleaned the blade on his handkerchief before returning it to her. Only then did he remove his gloves. “I believe in learning from my mistakes, and by keeping the hole in my ear open, I’ll be forever after reminded of my brief but terrifying time in Bonniebroch’s pillory.”

“So ye intend to give up thimblerig?”

“Och, no.” He offered her his arm and she took it as they strolled back to the castle kitchen. “Why would I be doing that? As long as there are fools in the world, they deserve a wee skinning from time to time.”

She laughed. “It doesna sound as if ye’ve learned much from your mistake.”

They zigzagged through the kitchen, trying to stay out of the way of Cook and her assistants. Breakfast might be nearly finished, but the laird of Bonniebroch was taking a wife this day and Cook was in fine fettle ordering the feast that would celebrate the union of Adam Cameron and Cait Grant.

“I understand your confusion,” Farquhar said as he ducked under an approaching tray laden with a haunch of venison. “My mistake wasna in running a game of thimblerig. My mistake was in no’ choosing my mark with more care. I ought to have let the steward win.”

“Ye didna ken he was the steward, I dare say.”

“He was someone who was puffed up with his own importance. It ought to have warned me, but the takings had been so lush that day, I wasna as cautious as I should have been. I usually read people better than that.”

“Read people? Ye speak as if they were a book.”

“Oh, aye. In many ways, they are just so,” he said as they continued to walk through the Great Hall toward the staircase that led to her chamber on an upper floor. “Unless a body’s a complete knave, and can lie with impunity, everything a person thinks generally shows on the face.”

Cait gave him a searching look. “I have no idea what you’re thinking, Mr. Farquhar.”

He laughed and patted her hand. “That’s because I’m a complete knave, o’ course. But I must confess ye have me a bit puzzled, milady.”

She nearly missed a step. Could he tell she’d had him gather that wolf ’s bane with murder on her mind instead of her maid’s stiff joints?

“What puzzles you, Mr. Farquhar?”

“Ye’re a bride—a condition much to be desired by every maiden, if my past experience is anything to go by. Ye’ve a fine strapping bridegroom who seems to dote upon ye. There’s a whole castle full of people who are ready to take ye to their hearts as their good lady.” He stopped walking and looked her squarely in the eye. “Ye ought to be brimming with joy, but ye’re not.”

“How do ye know I’m not?” She forced a brittle smile. “I might just be the sort who keeps her feelings to herself. Nothing wrong with that.”

“No, no’ a thing,” he agreed with a shrug. “But if ye were that sort what keeps to themselves, I dinna think ye’d have been forward enough to step up to the pillory when I needed a friend most desperately. No, ye’re the sort who has deep convictions and even deeper feelings. And despite that cat’s smile ye’re trying to foist on me, ye’re no’ happy.”

She yanked her hand away from his arm. “Whether I am or no’ is none of your business.”

“Perhaps no’. But I only say these things to remind ye that I’ve pledged my life to ye, milady.” He thumped his rather hollow sounding chest. “Callum Farquhar may be a cheat and scoundrel, but he’s no’ one to swear to something and then change.”

Since Cait was struggling with her own oath, she was impressed that Farquhar seemed determined to keep his.

“If there’s aught I can do for ye, whatever it might be, I stand ready to do it.” He capped this grand statement with an equally grand bow.

Cait brought her hand to her mouth and coughed to hide her snort of derision. Mr. Farquhar was no taller than she and if he outweighed her by a stone, she’d have been surprised.

“I ken what ye’re thinkin’, milady. Admittedly, I’m no one’s idea of a knight errant at first blush, but such skills as I have, I commit to your cause.”

She smiled, genuinely this time. Farquhar’s gift of self-deprecation made him impossible not to like. “What makes ye think I have a cause?”

“All women do. Maybe ye’d like my help in reforming whatever flaws ye see in your future husband’s character. That seems to be a popular feminine pastime.”

“If the laird of Bonniebroch has flaws, I’ve no’ seen them yet.”

It was a bit puzzling that Adam Cameron didn’t seem to be at all as her father had described him—despotic and power-mad. Of course, Lord Bonniebroch was a bit full of himself, but she’d never met a titled gent who wasn’t. And he did have the power of life and death over his retainers, but he wore that authority lightly and, if his actions toward Mr. Farquhar were any indication, with benevolence.

It was an unfortunate thought, because it dredged up memories of his “best behavior” in her chamber the night before. Heat crept up her neck and made her cheeks burn.

If Farquhar noticed, and she was certain he must have, he was at least politic enough not to mention it.

“I hope, milady, you will allow me to prepare the poultice for your maid’s rheumatism. I have some skill with herbs and would not have you come to harm through mishandling this one.” He gentled the basket containing the wolf ’s bane out of her hand. “The drying may take some time, ye ken. In the meantime, I expect ye’re aware that willow bark tea will give your servant some ease.”

He did know his herbs. Well enough that if she should try to hurry Adam Cameron to his reward with a tincture of wolf ’s bane, Farquhar was likely to recognize what she’d done. She doubted his oath extended to helping her murder a man, but she could hardly turn down such a well-spoken offer to process the herb for Grizel’s use.

“Thank ye kindly, Mr. Farquhar,” she said as she turned to ascend the stairs alone. “I appreciate your help.”

“Remember, milady. Whatever I can do, I will.”

Cait nodded graciously at him and climbed the staircase. Since the wolf ’s bane was no longer an option, she’d have to consider another, probably messier and riskier, way of ridding herself of the man she intended to wed in a few hours.

Why couldn’t Adam Cameron have been the petty tyrant her father claimed he was? It would make what she had to do so much easier if she could only hate the man as she ought.

When she entered her chamber, Grizel was already there, shaking out the green kirtle Cait would wear for the wedding ceremony later. The ensemble was the most elaborate Cait had ever owned. It would likely take Grizel an hour to dress her, what with the many separate pieces—corset, tight-fitting bodice, slim detachable sleeves, an underskirt and overskirt of scarlet sarcenet, all to be draped over a farthingale—a wicked-looking collection of stiffened cane hoops that reminded Cait of a fishing weir. There was also a lacy partlet to tuck into her bodice to cover her bosom and ensure she looked a suitably demure bride.

For a moment, she imagined what it would be like for Adam to remove the partlet and bare her breasts nearly to the nipples.

Cait’s wedding gown had been packed with lavender sachets and as Grizel fluffed the fabric pieces in the air to smooth out travel wrinkles, the fragrant scent filled the room.

When Adam caught a whiff of it later, would he recognize it as the smell of betrayal?

Cait gave herself a mental box on the ears. Nothing would be served by being double-minded. She’d sworn. She’d deliver.

“Och, there ye are, milady,” Grizel singsonged when she spied Cait from the corner of her sharp eyes. “Just in time to see what the laird brought round for ye.” She waved a gnarled hand toward the small wooden box resting on the foot of Cait’s bed.

“Why did he risk coming to my chamber?” Cait demanded, more tetchily than she ought. Perhaps Grizel would put it down to maidenly nerves instead of the frustration of a thwarted murderess. “Does the man no’ ken ’tis bad luck for the groom to see the bride before they meet in kirk?”

“But he didna see ye, did he now? So, no harm done. Besides, his lordship was quite insistent that ye have this gift before the wedding.” Grizel gave the kirtle another quick shake, making the fabric snap as the last of the lavender tumbled out of its folds. “Open it, child.”

The box was of dark wood, ornately carved with mother-of-pearl inset along the corners, but Cait approached it as if an adder was coiled inside. Instead, when she opened the hinged lid, she discovered a breathtaking string of matched pearls. Each small orb had developed the luminous glow of age. A finely worked gold pendant in the shape of a filigreed “B” hung from the center.

“B for Bonniebroch, I’ll be bound,” Grizel said. She knew her letters, but had never learned to write much more than her own name. “He said as there’s a note for ye as well.”

True enough, a small roll of foolscap bound with a blue silk ribbon rested beside the pearls. Cait picked it up and walked over to the window for better light before she unrolled it. The script was rough and angular, and an inkblot marred one line of the missive. These were not the precise strokes of a scribe. Adam had written the note with his own hand.