Page 19

Chapter

Nineteen

S omehow, she knew he would come.

He’d not told her as much. When they parted, it was with barely a word as her brother whisked her from the solar chamber to “speak with you on multiple matters.” Her outburst to their host. She and Niall.

If there was anything she did that Ewan took kindly to, it was certainly not on this trip.

She loved him and despised him all at once.

If only Ewan would be her brother and not attempt to be her father too.

Avelina knew not where Niall slept, but neither would it matter, since he’d mentioned sharing a bedchamber with his brother. Instead, she made use of the hot bath that had been sent to her. With a fresh shift and her hair braided courtesy of the maid, Avelina should have been prepared for bed.

Instead, she stood before the fire, her toes wiggling into the fur rug under her feet, the slippers she’d brought staying unused for now. And when the knock at her door pulled Avelina out of her reverie, she was not at all surprised.

Glad, aye.

Excited, also. But surprised? Nay. Something had shifted between them that eve.

So when she opened the door as she had the night before, allowing Niall inside, nothing was more natural than to fall into his arms the moment the door closed.

His hands were everywhere at once, grasping the material at her buttocks.

Squeezing them, along with fistfuls of her shift, Niall pulled her hips toward him as their lips came together as naturally as if they were made to kiss one another.

When he groaned, Avelina sighed, pulling Niall even closer.

He guided them closer to the fire, for which she was grateful, and the chill from under her door no longer crept up her legs.

Instead, ’twas warm, even as he lifted her shift up, breaking the kiss.

She wore nothing under it, so when her arms lifted to aid him, and Niall pulled it over her head, for the first time in her entire life, Avelina was nude in front of a man.

Yet, oddly, she felt neither shame nor embarrassment.

“By God and his disciples, Lina, you are perfectly made.” Niall removed his sword, still staring at her. “Your breasts are magnificent.”

He removed his boots next, but instead of disrobing further, Niall came to her once more.

He cupped both breasts, and she thought he meant to kiss her.

Instead, he lowered his head and kissed her chest, and then both breasts.

Moving to one, he trailed more kisses toward her nipple and then took her into his mouth.

As he suckled, his teeth grazing her, Lina still felt no shame. The sensations that arose in her were much too pleasant for such a thing. “Niall,” she said, her hands moving toward his head, grasping his hair with them both. “Please,” she begged, knowing not what she asked for.

He moved to the other breast, giving it as complete attention as the first.

And then he knelt before her. With the fire before them and Niall below her, Lina was only temporarily confused until she realized his intentions. Never had she heard of such a thing.

“Niall?”

But he would not be waylaid. Lifting one of her legs and placing her foot on his bent knee, he glanced up at her briefly, smiled, and touched her most intimate spot. Not just touched it, but used his thumbs to part her.

“What do you mean to—”

His head bent toward her. Surely he would not. . .

Kiss her there? Nay, not kiss her. Niall’s tongue swept her, more like a lick than a kiss.

There. Right on her most private area.

Surely this was not a thing people did. And yet, with his fingers holding her open for him, Niall continued to lick. To suckle. And then one of his thumbs pressed just above his lips and began to circle.

Lina’s fingers wrapped around his hair as if she meant to hold on. Which, in fact, she did. Because with the things Niall was doing to her now, Lina began to have some difficulty standing.

Her knees would surely give way at any moment.

“Niall,” she called out in between the other sounds escaping from her lips. Ones she’d never made before. “Please,” she begged him as he continued. But now his movements were slower, more deliberate. At least, his tongue swirled slowly as his thumb pressed more quickly.

“I cannae,” she said, hardly understanding her own words.

“I must let go,” she added, realizing now ’twas precisely what she wanted.

To forget the fact that a man who was neither her husband nor her betrothed knelt before her, between her legs, with his lips and tongue on her most intimate parts of her body.

He pulled from her. “Let go, love. Listen to your body and let everything go.”

Love.

’Twas nothing more than an endearment, but it made Avelina’s heart skip a beat nonetheless.

But then she had no more time to think. His mouth was on her again, and this time, Niall did not relent at all.

It was if all of him covered all of her, the suckling something she wasn’t sure she could continue standing for.

But somehow, she managed to as her legs began to shake, her core clenching.

Avelina called out Niall’s name as the pulses began and then continued. Her hands tightened in his hair as the pulses came, wave after wave. Breathing heavily, she felt as if her entire body were engulfed in that fire as the waves began to ebb.

When Niall stood up, Avelina was certain watching him wipe his lips with his fingers, the secret smile on his face just for her, was the single most pleasurable thing she’d ever seen. But certainly not the most pleasurable thing she’d ever felt.

The prize for that went to what Niall had just done to her.

“I’d not been expecting that,” Avelina said as Niall reached for her.

“I would not have thought you would, but I wanted to give you a taste of what will be between us.”

His arms were around her now, and Avelina had to look up to meet his gaze.

“Between us,” she repeated, feeling quite bare against his clothed chest.

“Aye.” Niall leaned down to kiss her, gently, before standing back up. “You know why I am here this eve. Do you not?”

“I do,” she said, still marveling at what he’d done.

“If we are to make love this eve, you will be my wife, Lina.”

“Aye,” she agreed. She’d not give herself to him otherwise.

“You are prepared for that?”

“Nay,” she said. “Of course I am not. You are a Duncraig. The Duncraig’s eldest son and second to your chief.”

His finger moved under her chin, lifting it. “Avelina?”

“Aye, Niall?”

“Are you prepared to become my wife? Will you marry me, lass?”

She was going to ask if she’d allow his face to be buried between her legs otherwise but thought better of it. This was the moment for brevity, not glibness.

“I am. And I will.”

Niall kissed her then, a kiss full of promise. Full of, dare she think it, hope.

And before she knew it, Avelina was being lifted into the air and carried to the bed. She was about to lose her virginity, something she had guarded carefully her entire life.

And was now giving it to her greatest enemy.