A Winter Wedding: Strangers at the Altar / The Warrior's Winter Bride

They began to walk together up to the castle. ‘Mhairi’s mother was the village fey wife when I was wee. A witch, though a good one, of course.’

‘Better and better. She could make up some potions. You could sell them in the teashop. And some of the local tweed, too,’ Ainsley said, handing Innes the keys to the main door, for they were going to inspect the Great Hall together. ‘Before you know it, Strone Bridge will be so famous that the steamers will be fighting to berth at this new pier of yours.’

Innes paused in the act of unlocking the door. ‘You’re not being serious?’

She had forgotten, in her enthusiasm, how he felt about the place. Ainsley’s smile faded. ‘Don’t you think it’s a good idea?’

‘I think it’s a ridiculous idea. Besides the fact that I have no intentions of wasting my fortune having the place made habitable, it’s a monstrosity—no one in their right mind would pay to see it.’

‘Ridiculous.’ She swallowed the lump that had appeared in her throat.

Innes looked immediately contrite. ‘Don’t take it like that, I didn’t mean— It’s not the idea. It’s the place.’

‘Why do you hate it so much? It’s your home.’

‘No. I could never live here.’ He shuddered. ‘There are more ghosts here than even Mhairi knows of.’

They were in the courtyard. Ainsley followed his gaze to the tower that stood at the centre. A huge bird of prey circled the parapet. She, too, shuddered, not because she thought it an omen, but at the look on Innes’s face. She’d thought she was beginning to understand him, but now she was not so sure. That bleak expression could not merely be attributed to feelings of inadequacy or resentment. There was a reason beyond his quarrel with his father for Innes’s absence from this place for fourteen long years. Ghosts. Who would have thought such a confident, practical man as Innes would believe in them, but he very obviously did. Something in his past haunted him. Something here, in this castle.

Above the tower, the sky was empty now. ‘Come on,’ Ainsley said, slipping her hand into Innes’s arm. ‘Let’s go inside.’

She led him through to the Great Hall, their feet echoing on the stone flags. Innes seemed to have shaken off his black mood, and was now wandering around, sounding panelling, looking up with a worried frown at the high beams. ‘I’ll get Robert, my surveyor, to take a look at this while he’s here. He’ll be able to tell me if there are any structural problems.’

He said it hopefully, no doubt thinking that structural problems would give him the excuse to pull the place down. The castle seemed sound enough to her, no smell of damp, no sign of rot, but she was willing to admit she knew nothing about it.

Watching him out of the corner of her eye, Ainsley got on with her own measurements. ‘I think we’ll have to plan to feed about two hundred, including bairns,’ she said. ‘Mhairi is overseeing the work in the kitchens. I reckon we’ll need to light the fires a few days in advance, once the chimneys are swept.’ She scribbled in her notebook, which she had reclaimed from Innes, and began to tick items off from her list. Quickly absorbed in her task, she was struggling to pull the holland covers from what she assumed must be the laird’s chair when Innes came to her aid.

‘Let me,’ he said.

A cloud of dust flew up, making them both choke. ‘Good heavens, it’s like a throne.’

Innes laughed. ‘Now you can get some idea of the esteem in which the lairds of Strone Bridge have held themselves.’

Ainsley sat down on the chair. It was so high her feet didn’t touch the ground. ‘Mhairi would have a fit if she could see me. I’m probably bringing any amount of curses down on myself for daring to occupy the laird’s seat.’

‘I’m the laird now, and I’d be more than happy for you to occupy my seat.’

‘Innes!’ He was smiling down at her in a way that made her heart flutter. ‘I don’t know what you mean by that, but I am sure it is something utterly scurrilous.’

‘Scandalous, not scurrilous.’ He pulled her to her feet and into his arms. ‘Want to find out?’

‘Do you even know yourself?’

He laughed. ‘No, but I am certain of one thing. It starts with a kiss,’ he said, and suited action to words.

The second kiss of the day, and it picked up where the first had left off on the cold pier. Just a kiss at first, his hands on her shoulders, his mouth warm, soft. Then his hands slid down to cup her bottom, pulling her closer, and she twined hers around his neck, reaching up, and his tongue licked into her mouth, and heat flared.

He kissed her. She kissed him back, refusing to let herself think about what she was doing, concentrating her mind on the taste of him, and the smell of him, and the way he felt. The breadth of his shoulders. Her hands smoothing down his coat to the tautness of his buttocks, her fingers curling into him to tug him closer, wanting the shivery thrill of his arousal pressed into her belly.

Hard. Not just there, but all of him, hard muscle, tensed, powerful. She pressed into him, her eyes tight shut, her mouth open to him, her tongue touching his, surrendering to the galloping of her pulses, the flush of heat, the tingle in her breasts. Kissing. Her hands stroking, under the skirts of his coat now, on the leather of his breeches.

His hands were not moving. She wanted them to move. Took a moment to remember the last time, and opened her eyes to whisper to him, ‘It’s fine. I am— I won’t.’

‘Tell me,’ he said then. ‘What am I to do?’

She shook her head. ‘Can’t,’ she mumbled, embarrassed.

He kissed her slowly, deeply. ‘Tell me, Ainsley,’ he said.

She was losing it, the heat, the shivery feeling, but not the desire. John had never asked what she wanted. Despite all the vague advice Madame Hera doled out about connubial bliss and mutual satisfaction, she had neither the experience nor knowledge of either. ‘I don’t know,’ Ainsley said, sounding petulant, feeling frustrated. You do it, was what she wanted to say.

‘You do know,’ Innes insisted.

He kissed her again. He cupped her face, forcing her to meet his eyes. His own were not mocking, not cruel. Dark blue, slumberous. Colour on his cheeks. Passion, not anger or shame, though it was being held in check. She realised why, with a little shock, remembered how she had been the other night. ‘I don’t know what to say,’ she said.

‘Tell me where you feel it when I kiss you,’ he said, putting his hand in hers, kissing her. ‘Tell me where it makes you want me to touch you.’

‘Here,’ she said, putting his hand on her breast.

His hand covered the soft swell. Her nipple hardened. She caught her breath as he squeezed her lightly through the layers of her gown and her corsets. ‘Like this?’ he asked, and she nodded. He kissed her neck, her throat, still stoking, kneading, making her nipple ache for more, then turned his attention to the other breast, and she caught her breath again.

‘You like that?’ Innes said.

His thumb circled her taut nipple. ‘Yes.’

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