Pretender's Game by Louise Clark

Author:Louise Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ePublishing Works!
Published: 2015-07-10T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Glenmuir,

August 1750

The dawn had not yet broken when Thea awoke. Slowly, she opened her eyes, aware of a deep contentment that she could not have imagined in those difficult weeks after she had married James MacLonan. She stretched lazily, then curled sensuously against her husband's side.

He was, she thought, two people. One was the public man—cool, decisive, and fair. This was the James MacLonan others turned to when they needed advice, or in times of trouble. They relied on him and trusted him to lead them to a place where life was better and at least a little bit easier.

But there was also the private man, the one Thea had come to know over the past five months. The man who had stolen her heart with his tender, thoughtful ways, whose eyes twinkled with amusement, and who smiled frequently, but didn't laugh enough. She had given her heart to the private James MacLonan, but she respected his dedication to his clansmen, and she was immensely proud of the work he had done to heal the scars still remaining from the rebellion.

Propping her head up on her hand, she looked at her husband. In repose, the tough inner strength in James MacLonan's features remained, but Thea had seen them blurred by desire and softened by tenderness as he made love to her. The thought of that made her sigh softly. The bedclothes had fallen away as he slept, and one broad, bare shoulder was tantalizingly close to her fingertips.

She reached over to stroke gently along his skin, enjoying the feeling of muscle and sinew beneath her hand. James made a soft sound of pleasure in his throat, then rolled onto his back. She waited for him to wake, but he slept on. Thea smiled faintly, a little disappointed, but she was happy just to watch him, to know that this was the private James MacLonan, her James, the man no one else ever saw. Alone with her, he relaxed completely, the only time he did so.

The past months had been difficult ones, for both of them. Thea had been faced with the problem of trying to adapt to Scottish life and customs, of proving her worth as an individual, and of learning a new language. None of these were easy tasks, but she knew that her success or failure in solving them would only affect one person, Theadora MacLonan.

James, on the other hand, had the onerous job of returning Glenmuir to its former prosperity and of leading his clansmen away from the bitterness that had consumed them since Culloden. As the son of the clan chief, in the absence of his father, he was also the source of law in this rugged Highland valley. He arbitrated disputes, dispensed justice, and directed the lives of his clansmen. The responsibilities were heavy ones, particularly for a conscientious man like James.

She trailed a finger down his jaw, tracing the line of bone from ear to chin. James smiled, but he slept on. Tenderness added a glow to Thea's features.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.