“Are…are you going to strap me?”
“Quite unnecessary. I shall simply withhold pleasure until you behave.”
Marjorie shuddered at the murmured words that tickled her ear. “I’ll be good.”
“Delighted to hear it.”
Soon Janet guided their hands down again, parting her nether curls and teasing her most secret flesh with feather-light strokes. The sweet torment made her pant, but she’d learned her lesson and neither closed her thighs nor thrust her mound higher. Her reward was a caress to her slick, petal-soft folds, and the briefest nudge of a spot so sensitive she cried out.
“Is that…?”
“It is indeed your pearl. Small but sensitive and craving affection.”
“Like me,” Marjorie replied with an unsteady giggle. “I…ooooh…”
How can anything feel so good?
Their fingertips were slick with musky wetness, and now Janet guided them to surround Marjorie’s swollen pearl. Circling. Rubbing. Unable to stop herself, she rocked her mound against their interlaced fingers, desperate for ease. As if she understood, Janet applied firmer pressure with the heel of her hand, forcing Marjorie’s fingers to cup her mound and shallowly penetrate her entrance with a fingertip.
Sounds escaped her mouth, raw and wild. Something was happening inside of her, something overwhelming that would change her forever. A part of her resisted, thrashing in an attempt to escape the intense sensation, while the rest begged for more.
“No, do not fight it,” said Janet harshly, holding her firmly. “You are going to be a good lass and spend for me. I want to hear your pleasure. Feel every spasm of that sweet virgin cunt.”
At the wicked words, a mighty wave of sensation began at her core and flowed outward with a rush. Barely able to muffle the scream that tore from her throat, Marjorie surrendered helplessly to her first release.
Eventually she slumped back against Janet’s chest, shaking.
“Shhh, there now,” Janet crooned, smoothing her hair. “How did that feel?”
“I don’t even know how to describe it. Like I swooned. Or soared. Maybe both,” she replied, knowing she’d sinned—with another woman, at that—yet too befuddled in the aftermath of intense pleasure, the sheer delight of being held and touched, to care.
“Let me—”
Something thudded into the side of the wagon, and they both froze. A heartbeat later, an arrowhead pierced the leather cover, and as Marjorie shrieked in fear, Janet shoved her onto the wagon floor before protectively covering her.
“Wh-what is happening?” she asked as icy terror gripped her, a stark contrast to the heat of moments before. Was it a raiding party? They could have no better champion than Sir Lachlan, but he was one man. Their driver was no warrior.
Janet didn’t lie. “The wagon is under attack.”
…
Never had Lachlan felt such ferocious rage, such pure bloodlust, as he did right now.
Lady Janet and Lady Marjorie had been threatened. But whoever these raiders were, they would never succeed. They would not abduct or hurt the ladies under his protection. He wasn’t a child, a frightened little boy who could be knocked aside now. He was the Highland Beast, the king’s champion, a hardened warrior who had killed countless men in battle. And in his current state of unrequited love and unsated lust for Lady Janet, the additional swirling confusion around his attraction to Lady Marjorie, he positively ached for a fight.
Lachlan unfastened his mantle and slid from his saddle, his longsword thumping against his thigh as he hit the ground. Storm, his pitch-black mount, nickered softly and pawed the ground. Eager, just like his rider.
“Guard the wagon,” he snarled at the ashen-faced driver, who nodded, dagger already in hand.
Then his gaze roamed the line of trees. The snap of twigs under feet and flashes of black and brown cloaks promised at least three people. Maybe more. But their ineptness eased him; skilled assassins didn’t clomp their way through forest or get so close. This was personal.
Moments later, four men burst forth from the trees, one bellowing, “A Kerr!”
A grim smile twisted Lachlan’s lips. So, his mannerless friend from the Great Hall had decided to attempt vengeance for his undignified departure. Or ransom the ladies. It would be the last mistake he ever made.
“Bastard knight!” called Lord Kerr as he and three men halted about twenty feet away, each brandishing a sword. “Give us the women, and we shall kill you mercifully. We have a taste for Jezebel and virgin this day.”
“Ride on,” Lachlan growled.
“You are but one man. You think to defeat four? Foolish bastard!”
In a movement so practiced he could have performed it half-asleep, Lachlan retrieved the dagger strapped to his thigh and hurled it. The second man in the row flopped to the ground, bright-red blood spraying from the neck wound.
“Three,” he replied, baring his teeth like the Beast he was. These Lowlanders were rock-headed to believe they could defeat him on the soil of his ancestors.
Lord Kerr stared at his fallen friend, his face paling. Then, with a high-pitched cry, he charged forward, sword raised, his two remaining men at his side.
Unsheathing his own sword, Lachlan waited. These fools could stumble over the slippery leaves, the barely dried mud, the unkempt road, and raise a sweat. They had chosen to engage rather than depart. He would not grant them a single boon this day.
Lord Kerr’s accomplices hindered rather than helped. It soon became clear they were accustomed to threatening rather than fighting; they swung their expensive swords in wide arcs that left their chests and bellies exposed, and their thrusts were weak and easily turned aside. Almost lazily, he helped them both unto judgment with two brutal slashes that spilled their innards onto the ground.
“Penniless, landless bastard,” spat Lord Kerr, now a defiant army of one. “Fed scraps from the noble table like a dog your whole life. I won’t kill you quite yet. Just maim. I’ll let you watch me fuck your women, over and over. They’ll scream and cry, but you’ll be able to do naught. Except know how badly you failed.”
Lachlan merely stared, his gaze unblinking. The word “bastard” had long ago lost the power to hurt.
