Janet kept her gaze on the herbal concoction. Indeed, she would shortly be tending to Sir Lachlan most thoroughly. Not just for his benefit but to ease her unfulfilled needs too. After her earlier interlude with Marjorie—and Lachlan saving them both from those vile Lowland vermin before silently, stoically, serving them food on bended knee—her emotions were in turmoil and threatening to burst forth. But she could not allow herself to open her heart to either her ward or her protector. She’d already had Aileen and Fergus snatched from her, and she could not endure such terrible pain again.
No. Pleasure was the only thing required to restore her peace of mind. No hearts, no flowers, and certainly no falling in love. All she wanted was a willing, obedient man underneath her to ride into the blessed oblivion of release.
“Yes,” Janet replied softly. “I will tend to him. After I have tended to you.”
“You are so good to me.”
Before Janet could reply, Marjorie leaned forward and kissed her cheek. A brief, awkward kiss from a blushing virgin who hadn’t yet learned the power of her lips and tongue, but she felt it like a brand, a lightning bolt that scorched between her legs and caused her pearl to throb.
This most certainly would not do.
Janet set down the pewter goblet of sleeping draught and gave her ward a stern frown. “You forget my instruction from earlier this day. Impatience is disobedience. And what is the punishment for disobedience?”
Marjorie quivered. “Pleasure is withheld.”
“Indeed. When we get to St. Andrews, a good ward—an obedient ward—could learn all the secrets of love. Pleasure so great, her earlier release would be as a puddle is to a loch. However, a disobedient ward will remain innocent as a little lamb until the king decides her husband,” she finished idly, tracing a fingertip across the other woman’s lips before trailing it down the side of her neck, along her collarbone, delving under the bodice of her linen shift to stroke the tops of her ample breasts.
Marjorie whimpered, and Janet punished her further by allowing that fingertip free rein to circle the younger woman’s distended nipples but not to touch them. Once. Twice. Then she withdrew her hand and reached for the goblet. “Drink. You will feel much refreshed after a good sleep.”
Still trembling, Marjorie downed the contents in one swallow. Then she lay down on the bench and pulled up her fur covers. “You will be kind to Sir Lachlan?” she mumbled, her eyes closing. “He needs kindness. He’s so lonely. Like me.”
Janet froze, but moments later, her ward was fast asleep. Rather a relief, as she’d been on the verge of taking the younger woman into her arms. Holding her close.
Irritable at her own weakness and dressed only in her shift and a fur-lined robe, Janet climbed out of the wagon and stalked toward the campfire. In her hand, she held her leather satchel containing fresh batches of tonics, ointments, and neatly rolled linen bandages, and the small glass bottles and dishes clinked together with her strides. That sound was nothing compared to the driver’s ale-induced snores over to the left, but this night she would leave him be. In that he’d witnessed all Sir Lachlan’s kills, maybe assisted in the burials, the man deserved all the flagons he’d consumed, and good rest…
Devil take it.
Janet stared in dismay at the sight of Sir Lachlan perched on a fallen log, attempting to dab at a gash at his shoulder with a rag, his grimace visible even in just firelight. A dull resignation, too, as though long used to tending to himself.
He needs kindness. He’s so lonely. Like me.
“Stop,” she barked as Marjorie’s words echoed in her mind.
Sir Lachlan stilled. “Lady?”
Marching up to him, her shift and robe billowing about her legs, Janet halted and dropped her herb satchel to the ground. “Do not dare put that filthy rag near your shoulder. I shall tend your battle wound. The wound you neglected to inform me of.”
“’Tis but a scratch,” he said gruffly. “You need not scold…as my late mother did.”
“Clearly a woman of greater sense than you. I am the healer; I decide what a scratch is and is not. Take off your doublet and shirt.”
Sir Lachlan silently complied, and she caught her breath at the revelation of his chest, stomach, and arms. The kind of muscles sculpted by vigorous activity…vigorous deadly activity, for his swarthy, hair-roughened flesh was marred by countless scars. Some stitched. Some cauterized. Long-faded white to pink and healing.
It should have been ugly, enough to turn her stomach. And yet this warrior, this Highland Beast, caused a fierce lust in her that no man had before. Not the king. Not her late husband or any of the other men at court.
Only him.
“You don’t have to,” he rasped into the silence. “I know I’m…it’s not fit for…a lady.”
Janet gritted her teeth against another unwanted surge of emotion. Bad enough she’d been tempted to hold and soothe Marjorie, but now Sir Lachlan also? She needed to take command of the situation, reestablish control, and outline terms for a possible bedding-only affair. Certainly nothing more.
“Hush, now,” she said briskly. “And let me explain how matters will proceed. I know you are named Beast, but you’ll be docile as a newborn kitten while I attend to your shoulder. It is not a deep cut but needs to be cleaned and bound to prevent infection. Then…you and I shall talk terms.”
“Terms?” Sir Lachlan asked hesitantly, but there was a glimmer of something in his dark eyes that looked painfully like hope. Damn him!
“Quite. For an affair.”
…
Lady Janet wanted an affair.
Lachlan wrestled with the thought as she rummaged through her satchel, then withdrew two glass bottles and a neat roll of clean linen bandage.
As in the king’s chamber when he’d discovered his future, he was in two minds. A part of him rejoiced at the thought of having her in his arms, of obeying her instructions and bringing her
