Page 22

With a sigh, she looped her arm through his, donned her most charming smile, and let him lead her to supper.

Eve was glad to be seated beside Pitcairn, with Adam on her other side.

That way she could respond quickly to the laird’s questions without fretting Adam might blurt out something ridiculous.

As Lady Aillenn, she’d enjoyed many suppers with noble strangers.

She knew what questions were likely to be asked. And she had answers at the ready.

“So what brings ye to Scotland, m’lady?” Pitcairn asked, stabbing a large chunk of mutton from the pottage and shoving it between his teeth.

She opened her mouth to give her usual reply. She’d fled Ireland because her father had betrothed her to a withered old soldier. She would not return until she secured a husband of her own choosing.

And then she realized that her usual reply wasn’t going to work. Not with Adam portraying her husband.

In her instant of panic, Adam rushed in to fill in the story.

“We sought an audience with the king to discuss a possible match for Aillenn’s sister, Lady Blinne.”

Eve’s throat tightened. She was impressed. He’d remembered their sister’s name and that Eve had mentioned a meeting with the king. He’d even come up with a believable mission. But would Pitcairn believe it?

Indeed he did. In fact, his sudden interest in the idea gave his eyes a greedy shine.

“Is that so?” he asked, swallowing the bite of mutton. “But o’ course she couldn’t be as beautiful as Lady Aillenn?”

“No one is as beautiful as Lady Aillenn,” Adam said.

The ladies at the table sighed.

Eve knew he was only making flattering conversation. But something about the tone of his voice almost made her believe him.

“My husband is blinded by love,” she replied with modesty, placing a hand on his sleeve. “My sisters are far more beautiful than me.”

Pitcairn almost spit his wine. “Sisters? Ye have more than one? ” The prospect of an alliance with a beautiful Irish bride chosen by the king was likely compelling.

“Aye,” Adam replied. “Two o’ them. Blinne and Caitilin.”

Eve was still on edge, despite the fact he’d recalled their names correctly. She took a sip of wine to calm her senses.

“Tell me about them,” the laird urged.

Eve described them as she’d invented them, exaggerating their beauty a wee bit to keep him interested.

“And your father?” Pitcairn asked. “Is he eager to see them wed?”

“Oh, aye.” She thought quickly, placing her hand atop Adam’s. “Ye see, as the eldest daughter, the next in line for Tiarna will be my husband, Ronan.”

How curious to say that. My husband. She’d never portrayed a character with a husband. The words rolled with pleasing ease off of her tongue.

“But my father,” she continued, “would like to see my sisters wed to Scottish noblemen.”

“I see.” Pitcairn swirled his wine thoughtfully. Clearly he was weighing his odds of wedding into Irish royalty.

Meanwhile, the ladies, fascinated by Ronan, quizzed him.

“How long have ye been wed?” one of them asked.

“Two…” he said.

“Months,” she supplied, though in retrospect, she thought it might have been better to say “years.”

“So ye’re newlyweds,” another exclaimed. “How wonderful.”

“Were ye betrothed?” the first lady asked. “Or was it a love match?”

“Betrothed,” Eve replied. It was the easiest answer.

Unfortunately, at the same instant, Adam said, “’Twas love at first sight.”

Eve’s eyes widened. “That is, we were betrothed, but—”

“After the betrothal was signed and we met for the first time,” Adam interjected, “I knew I had to have her.”

The ladies sighed again. So did Eve.

“Where did ye meet?” someone asked.

Eve chose the most logical place. “At my father’s keep.”

But Adam waxed poetic. “When I first laid eyes on Aillenn, she was standin’ beneath a laurel tree…

outside her father’s keep…watchin’ the sun rise.

She turned at my approach, and I remember she looked like a saint, her dark hair haloed in golden light, and her beautiful eyes shinin’ like gems.” He clapped a hand to his chest. “When she smiled at me, I knew I’d ne’er love another. ”

He looked her straight in the eyes then, and Eve felt her heart catch at the warm affection in his gaze. Everything in her brain told her he was only creating a fiction to maintain their identities. But her soul told her something else.

“And what did ye think o’ him, m’lady?” another woman wanted to know.

She stared at the lady, struggling for words. Then she decided she could let inspiration answer for her. Moving her gaze to Adam, she spoke the truth.

“I thought he looked like…Adam.”

By the furrow in Adam’s brow, he feared she meant to expose his real identity.

She rushed to add, “The first man. Made by God in His image. Handsome. Heavenly. Perfect.”

There were oohs and ahhs over that.

Adam blinked in surprise. “Did ye really?”

She nodded, which seemed to please him.

Now the ladies wanted to know everything. “Tell us about the weddin’ feast.”

“How many guests were there?”

“What was served for dinner?”

“Roast venison,” he replied, just as she was saying, “Fresh salmon.”

He added, “Roast venison and fresh salmon.”

She said, “’Twas a magnificent feast with dozens o’—”

“Hundreds o’ guests,” he blurted, then amended, “At least it seemed like hundreds.”

“Oh aye,” she said. “My da spared no expense, so happy was he to see me wed to such an esteemed warrior.”

“Warrior?” Pitcairn scowled at Adam, as if his memory had been stirred. “What did ye say your name was?”

“Ronan. But I’m sure ye wouldn’t have heard o’ me. ’Tis my first visit to Scotland.”

His answer seemed to satisfy the laird. “What’s your weapon o’ choice?”

She answered for him, fearing he might know nothing about Irish weapons. “He’s an expert with the axe.”

“Indeed? And do ye have your axe with ye, Sir Ronan?”

Eve paled. She hadn’t imagined the laird would want to see it.

But Adam knew what to say. “Nay. We came in peace. I thought it might be unwise to greet the Scottish king with an Irish axe.”

“True.” Pitcairn chortled. “It could be considered an ‘axe o’ war’.”

It was a terrible jest. But everyone at the table laughed, Adam most of all, who raised his cup to the laird in a salute.

The rest of the evening went smoothly enough. If Eve misspoke, Adam was there to soften her words. When Adam paid her husbandly attention, she was careful to mirror his mood.

After a few cups of wine, the border between fact and fiction began to blur.

The adoration Adam expressed felt real. His words of affection made her heart melt.

His warm glances made her blush. The touch of his fingers upon her arm stirred her blood.

The press of his thigh against hers seemed right… and comforting…and arousing.

How could it not be real?

After their simple meal of mutton pottage, they shared a dish of blancmange.

Adam spooned a bite of the sweet, milky dessert into her mouth, lowering his gaze to her lips.

It might have been moor muck for all the attention Eve paid it. She was far more intrigued by the soft glow of his gaze. His gentle smile of encouragement. The inviting temptation of his mouth.

Swallowing down the blancmange, she returned the favor, taking the spoon and feeding him.

“Mmm.”

That wee sound seemed to curl around her ear into her brain, bringing every nerve to life.

There was a tiny drop of blancmange left on his lower lip, and it took every ounce of her restraint not to lean forward to lick it away.

Adam recognized the smoke in Aillenn’s gaze. It was raw lust. And it wasn’t the blancmange she lusted after.

The smoldering glance she gave him shot a bolt of desire through him. His eyes darkened. His chest swelled. And betwixt his legs, the beast roused.

In one way, that was good. Healthy lust added authenticity to their claim they were newly married.

But they’d both had enough wine to be careless. And if they got distracted, mistakes might be made.

She was staring at his mouth now. She wanted him to kiss her.

He wanted to. God, how he wanted to. And he suspected she wouldn’t pull away.

But he couldn’t.

Surely it was unseemly to kiss at the table, wasn’t it?

On the other hand, perhaps everyone would assume they were simply enthusiastic newlyweds.

Or they could claim it was Irish tradition to kiss after blancmange.

He took a deep preparatory breath.

Then, before he could close the distance and press his lips to hers, the maidservant Tilda poked her head between them.

“If ye’re ready,” she said, turning her head to speak to each of them, “I’ll send the servants to fetch water for your bath now.”

Aillenn gave a stunned nod.

Tilda smiled. “Would ye be wantin’ assistance?”

“Nay,” Adam hurried to say. “We can manage on our own.”

He remembered the chairs positioned near the tub. The last thing he needed was Pitcairn deciding to “assist” Aillenn with her bath.

The rest of the dinner discussion was a blur to Adam. All he could think about was the sultry fire in Aillenn’s eyes and the tempting, forbidden fruit of her mouth. The animal raging in his braies refused to be leashed.

Somehow he managed to thank Pitcairn for his hospitality.

Somehow he bid farewell to the other nobles and bowed to the ladies.

Somehow he followed Aillenn and the maidservant up the stairs to the guest chamber.

But all the while he sailed adrift in a languorous haze of longing. Imagining Aillenn slowly removing her gown. Baring her lovely breasts. Sliding her leine over the graceful curve of her hips.

“The servants will be up presently,” Tilda told him.

He nodded, not truly hearing her words.

Then she closed the door to give them privacy.

He stared down at the latch, steeling himself to face the woman he desired beyond reason. The woman who seared his blood and confounded his brain. The woman he knew he dared not approach.

No sooner did he turn than she rushed at him, pushing him back against the door.

He sucked in a breath as she pressed hungry lips to his. Tasting him. Savoring him. Devouring him. She clenched her fists in his shirt and moaned softly in her throat.

She tasted of wine and blancmange and longing. And the sensation shredded whatever bit of restraint he had before.

He answered her kiss with a passion that bubbled up from his loins, overflowing reason like pottage overboiling on the fire.

Who was this woman who shifted from shy virgin to masterful temptress in a heartbeat?

A mistress of disguise, to be sure.

But which one was the real Aillenn?

Later. He would find out later. For now, as every fiber of his being was filled with the current of love’s lightning, he wanted only this. More of this.

Eve wanted more.

More.

More what?

She didn’t know. But her greed felt insatiable. Now that she’d tasted desire, her appetite was whetted for something deeper, more intimate, all-consuming.

She clutched at his shirt, pulling him closer. Yearning. Seeking.

He parted her lips with his own, delving into the warm hollows of her mouth with his tongue.

She gasped. Aye. This was what she craved.

She let her tongue tangle with his. A frisson of lust coursed through her body, awakening every nerve. When he groaned, the sound called to something primitive and feral inside her.

Her breasts swelled against him. Her nipples grazed with sensuous delight against the linen of her leine. Low in her belly, betwixt her thighs, she felt a taut need. A hunger. A demand.

In another moment, she might have explored that demand.

But there was a sudden scratching at the door.