At The Laird's Command (Sword and Thistle Book 3) by Laurel Adams

Author:Laurel Adams [Adams, Laurel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-01-15T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

When I came to awareness again from whatever blackness had taken my mind, my head was resting upon Ian’s outstretched arm, and I heard the deep breath of his sleep behind me on the pillow. My own arm was stretched across the laird’s broad chest, fingers lightly tangled in the short hairs there.

I thought that he, too, must be asleep. But I’d spent enough nights in his bed to know the laird’s habits; he was too still for sleep, his breathing too shallow.

My laird had told me that sharing me with Ian would ease his mind and take a burden from him; that he would rest easier if I did it.

So why was he still awake and restless?

“Laird?” I whispered into the dark.

His finger pressed softly to my lips to quiet me. That’s when I realized that he was not only awake, but staring at me. He’d been watching me in the moonlight all this while, and I wished I could see his features better. What would I see in his eyes? As I wondered, he took my face in his hands and brought me closer to him. So close that our foreheads touched, making a little space between us that admitted nothing and no one else.

His warm breath caressing my face, he whispered two words very softly in Gaelic. So softly I was sure that I’d misheard him. Then he said them again, with more intensity than before. “Mo chridhe,” he whispered. My heart. That’s what he was saying to me. I startled at this tender term of endearment. Truly I did. Especially when he followed it with, “I have never loved a woman before. Never let myself love a woman. Never wished to love. But, oh, how I love you…”

No. He couldn’t mean it; especially not now. Not when another man’s sweat and seed were cooling on my body. Not when another man’s skin was still naked against mine! Perhaps that is why I so breathlessly said, “What?”

“Shhh,” the laird whispered, pressing his mouth to my ear. “Don’t wake Ian. I would wait to say it until he had gone, but my heart will burst if I wait.” He took my fingers and held them against his heart, which throbbed hard and strong beneath my touch. “You have stolen this heart lass, little by little, each night since I met you. But tonight you claimed it completely. I cannot deny it to you, or to God or to anyone. Now you are my heart. Mo chridhe.”

Sudden tears of joy wet my lashes as I was overcome with emotion. I had his heart? Not only his protection, his kindness and his body, but his heart. It seemed to change everything. Such a thing seemed a miracle to me. A blessing beyond comprehension. I started to say as much. To tell the laird that I loved him, too.

When suddenly, the laird’s hand clamped over my mouth to hush me.

For a moment, I thought it love play. But then I realized that he wasn’t tensing for action; he was listening.

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