“Nay, as I am sharing quarters with three of my brothers,” he replied as he shed his clothes.
He was pleased that, despite her questions and concerns, she readily curled into his arms when he slipped beneath the bedcovers and reached for her. Brian quickly removed her shift and tossed it aside, his whole body growing taut with need as her warm, soft flesh touched his. He had found his empty bed unbearable. It galled him to have to creep into her bed as if they were doing something shameful, but, as he kissed her, he knew he would do it again. He would do almost anything to hold her in his arms.
“Ye go into battle soon, dinnae ye?” she said.
“Aye,” he replied with reluctance as he pushed her onto her back, for he wished to keep all talk of the battle to come out of the bedchamber tonight. “The enemy has been slipping inside the berm since the sun set. At sunrise they will be outside the gates.”
“They are already attacking?”
“Nay, just gathering for the attack on the morrow and nay too wisely. They are putting themselves between a berm with only one pass through it and a keep with high, weel-monned walls. Nay a good strategy.” He kissed the hollow at the base of her throat. “But I am nay here because I face a battle on the morrow.”
“Nay?” Arianna sighed with pleasure when he kissed her between her breasts and she ran her feet up and down his calves, enjoying the hair-roughened strength beneath her soles.
“Nay. I would be here nay matter what I was facing on the morrow, e’en if it was just mucking out the stables.” He grinned against her skin when she laughed.
“Good. And it will be e’en better if ye make verra certain that ye dinnae fall asleep and sleep beyond the sun’s rising.” She sighed and stroked his arms with her hands. “’Twould be e’en better if we didnae have to worry about that at all.”
“Aye, but I dinnae think ye want me and your kinsmen to be at odds with each other.”
“Nay, I dinnae.” She wrapped her arms and legs around him. “So best ye get right to work, my fine knight.”
“Your wish is my command, m’lady.”
How she wished that were true. If it was, her one and only command would be for him to love her as she loved him, for him to keep her close by his side forever. Arianna pushed away such thoughts, for they brought only sadness, and kissed Brian. Knowing it would be the last time she held him added an urgency to her lovemaking, but she did not care. She could be facing a lifetime aching for what only Brian could make her feel and she intended to fully indulge her greed until she was glutted with it.
“That was some verra poorly done sneaking about for a MacFingal,” said Sigimor as he shut the door he had been peeking out of and looked at the four other men in the room. “Going to drag him out of there?”
“Nay,” said Brett as he sprawled on the narrow bed he had been given. “She is a widow of three and twenty, nay some innocent maid.”
“True, but I am surprised that ye are being so reasonable. Nay sure I believe that is the only reason ye are nay all trying to rush out and beat my poor cousin into the floor. Unless, ’tis a wise fear that I will attempt to protect the fool with my deadly fists and lethal skill with a sword.” He grinned when all four men glared at him.
“He makes her happy,” said Callum. “I think she hasnae been happy for a verra long time and I willnae take that from her. ’Tis just a shame he is such an idiot. Ye would think such a weel-bred, highborn lass would have chosen more wisely.”
Sigimor shook his head. “Aye, he is an idiot.”
“Weel, we will allow him to remain one unless it begins to cause our wee cousin pain.”
“And then what will ye do?”
“Drag him outside and pound him into the mud until that idiocy is pummeled right out of his thick skull.”
“Fair enough.”
Chapter 18
“Send out the boys and the woman and we will ride away!”
“What boys and woman are ye talking about? We have a lot of them!”
Despite the thick walls and how high up the MacFingals stood on those walls, Arianna could hear everything from where she sat on the wide stone steps leading into the keep, and she winced at the mockery in Sir Fingal’s voice. That was not going to calm the belligerence of the men gathered before the gates of Scarglas. The laughter of the men on the walls was undoubtedly salt in the wound to the overweening pride of Lord Ignace and Amiel.
“I dinnae understand why they didnae just attack them by that berm,” muttered Fiona as she paced back and forth before the steps of the keep.
“They have a plan,” Arianna said.
Fiona snorted, stopped pacing, and placed her hands on her hips. “I ken it. I just wanted this done with quickly. They obviously wanted to play with the Frenchmen first. Men. They are all idiots.”