Sileas’s husband. Of course, they could take the castle without a rightful claim—it was done all the time—but that would draw the Crown into the dispute. Connor and the MacDonalds didn’t need that kind of trouble on top of what they already had.
Which meant Ian needed to consummate his marriage. Bed his bride. ’Twas fortunate, indeed, that the needs of the clan matched his own precisely.
Everything was arranged. Ian had convinced his mother and Niall that taking his father out on a sail around Seal Island would do them all good. Of course, Alex had no trouble persuading Dina to disappear with him for the afternoon.
Finally, Ian would have Sileas alone.
He found her in the kitchen. She was leaning over the worktable, pressing an oat mixture into the bottom of a flat pan. He sucked in his breath as he imagined lying on that table and having her work over him. She looked fetching with her hair pinned up, save for a few loose tendrils curling down her neck and the sides of her face.
“Smells good,” he said. The kitchen was warm and smelled of oats and honey.
She started at the sound of his voice and looked up, wide-eyed. “I didn’t hear ye come in.”
“What’s that you’re making?”
“A treat for your da,” she said with a smile. “He has a sweet tooth, ye know. And I’ll have some left over to take to Annie up the road. She’s just had a new babe.”
Ian rolled up his sleeves and came around the table to stand beside her. “I used to help my mother in the kitchen.”
She gave him a sideways glance. “I’m sure you were a verra big help to her.”
“Ach, I’m hurt ye don’t believe me,” he said. “Come, I’ll show ye how good I am.”
She raised her eyebrows, showing him she suspected he wasn’t just talking about his cooking skills.
He wasn’t.
She dipped a wooden spoon into the honey jar and dribbled honey over the oat mixture.
“Dina was supposed to be helping me.” She gave the wooden spoon a hard whack against the side of the pan. “There it’s done.”
“Ye won’t be seeing Dina this afternoon,” Ian said, taking the spoon from her to lick the honey off. “She and Alex are… keeping each other company.”
Her hands stilled, and her cheeks turned a couple of shades of red. “So that’s the way of it.”
Ian was pleased for the opportunity to warn her off Alex. “I hope Dina doesn’t expect to be the only one.”
“I hope Alex doesn’t, either.”
He laughed, then added for good measure, “Alex is not the sort of man to stay in one woman’s bed.”
“I don’t think ye are in a position to criticize Alex, when ye can hardly claim to have been living the life of a saint yourself.” Sileas picked up the pan and slapped it down so hard the table rattled. “That helps settle the mixture. I’ll wait to cook it ’til they’re home.”
Ian leaned into her. “I’m living a monk’s life now, if that’s any comfort to ye.”
“Ach, such a sacrifice,” she said, as she moved ingredients around on the table for no purpose he could discern. “What has it been, all of a week?”
He moved behind her and took a firm hold of her hips. Ah, she felt good against him.
“A week seems a verra long time,” he said as he nuzzled her neck, “when every moment of it I’m wishing I had ye naked.”
He kissed the side of her neck and felt her pulse racing beneath his lips. She drew in a sharp breath when he pressed his throbbing erection against her buttocks.
“I’d love to lay ye back on the table here,” he said, as he ran his hands up her arms.
“Shhh! Someone might come in and hear ye.” She sounded scandalized, but she shivered at his touch.
“No one else is at home,” he said, nipping at her earlobe. “ ’Tis just you and me.”
Her breathing changed when he slipped his hands around her ribs and stroked the underside of her breasts with his thumbs.
“I’m thinking that the first time I make love to ye ought to be in our marriage bed,” he said. “But if ye say here on the table, I’m a willing man.”
Sileas wiped her hands on her apron and made a show of pushing at his forearms. “Let me go now.”
This was no serious resistance. When Sileas told him no and meant it, she hit him with a skillet and stood over him with a blade in her hand.
He blew on the back of her neck and was rewarded when a “mmmm” escaped her lips. Her skin was soft and creamy as fresh butter and smelled of cinnamon and honey. Needing to taste her, he ran his tongue along her skin above the edge of her gown.
He cupped the soft fullness of her breasts and had to squeeze his eyes shut against the surge of lust that filled him. Oh, God, how he wanted her.
When he found her nipples, she made a low sound in the back of her throat that drove him mad—and he was determined to hear it again. As he rolled her nipples between his thumbs and fingers, she dropped her head back against his shoulder, and her breath came fast and shallow.
He tried to catch his own breath. She was like soft wax in his hands now, hot and molding to his touch. This
