Amanda Scott (43 page)

“I’ll do it,” she said, suiting action to words. “But you are still dressed.”

“Not for long,” he said, pulling off his shirt.

“You should snuff all those candles before you come to bed,” Anne said.

“Did you order your father around like this?” Kit asked as he stripped off the rest of his clothing.

“You are not my father.”

“No, I’m not,” he agreed, getting into bed beside her.

“The candles,” she reminded him.

“I’ll put them out when I no longer want to see my naughty wife,” he retorted. “Lie back, sweetheart. I mean to feast my eyes
whilst I teach you more about proper wifely obedience.”

Every fiber of her body responded to the desire in his voice and his expression, and the game of obedience having suddenly
become much more interesting, Anne did as he commanded.

“Put your hands at your sides and open your legs a little,” he said, shifting his weight slightly and letting the candlelight
reveal more of her.

His interested scrutiny heightened every sensation, and when he reached to stroke one breast, she gasped and began to turn
toward him.

“Not yet,” he said firmly. “Lie still. I want to take my time with this unless you fear you might fall asleep.”

The thought was laughable. Gazing up at him, she said, “I should be tired, should I not? But I’m not, not in the least, so
do your worst, sir. Just do not forget that last time you promised that I can explore your body the way you explore mine.
I want my turn, too.”

He grinned at her. “Oh, aye, sweetheart, I always keep my promises. Now, spread your legs just a wee bit more.”

She obeyed, and he moved between them, stroking her breasts and body. When he bent to take one nipple in his mouth, she could
no longer keep her hands at her sides but caught his ears.

“Not yet,” she said urgently. “Kiss me first!”

He hesitated long enough to make her wonder how far he meant to take this business of obedience, but then his lips found hers
and his tongue slid deeply into her mouth.

With a sigh of relief and increasing passion, she wrapped her arms around him and held him tight, but although he kissed her
thoroughly, his hands remained busy with her body, and when he moved to kiss a shoulder, she did not try to stop him. He went
on to kiss her right breast, sucking long on her nipple before turning his attention to the left one and then to her belly,
and lower. By the time his mouth reached the juncture of her legs, she was lost to her own passion and to his.

The touch of his tongue and fingers was unexpected and stirred feelings unlike any she had felt before. Her mother certainly
had never mentioned married people doing this, but she trusted Kit and loved him. If this was what obedience got a woman,
let there be more of it, she thought wickedly, although she would never say that to him. Then her body leaped, and her mind
emptied of all but her own fulfillment as sensation after new sensation flooded through her.

As she lay gasping, he moved to cover her with his body and to claim her mouth again. She could smell her own scent on his
lips, and it stimulated her, so that when he entered her, she gripped him tightly, pressing against him and letting instinct
take over. His eyes closed as he savored the pleasure he felt. Then his body moved faster, and as it did, he turned, holding
her and lifting her so that she soon rode atop him. Then his eyes opened, and he watched, clearly delighted, as passion overwhelmed
her again. A moment later, his own release came.

Quiet reigned for several minutes before he shifted her to lie beside him again and put his arm around her. “Art happy, lass?”

“Aye,” she murmured, still awed by the feelings he stirred in her.

“I have never known anyone like you,” he said, pulling her closer.

“I love you, Kit,” she said, turning her head to look at his face.

“I know you do, Anne-lassie, almost as much as I love you.”

“More,” she said softly.

“Impossible,” he murmured.

Contented as she had not known she could be, Anne closed her eyes.

The candles in the wall sconces guttered simultaneously and went out, leaving only the one on the little table in a room redolent
now of wood smoke with a hint of lust. In its darkest corner, a shadow stirred, revealing itself as a small dark fox with
a white tip to its high, bushy tail.

It gazed for a long moment at the silent couple in the bed as they held each other lovingly, and then it began to fade from
sight. In the last moment, just before it disappeared, it changed to the plump figure of a little countrywoman, holding a
slender pipe from which a thin curl of white smoke drifted upward.

Smiling with satisfaction at a task well done, Maggie Malloch vanished.

I hope you enjoyed
The Secret Clan: Reiver’s Bride.
For those of you interested in the historical characters I included in the book, lll Will Armstrong really existed and was
hanged by James V along with Johnny Armstrong, but Ill Will’s son’s name was Sandie, not Willie. Sandie was the father of
Kinmont Willie Armstrong, whose ballad story formed the basis for my book,
Border Fire.

With regard to the games mentioned in the book, Poque is an ancestor of Poker, and has been played in Britain since the early
fifteenth century. Both Poque and its predecessor Poch were played on painted boards, and the Victoria & Albert Museum in
London has a Poque board dated 1535. Poch was first recorded at Strasbourg in 1441, which makes Poker and its ilk the oldest
identifiable card game known. (See David Parlett’s
A History of Card Games,
Oxford University Press, 1991.)

As for Fox and Geese, if you have played the game and wonder why Kit and company had only thirteen geese instead of seventeen,
the answer is that throughout the sixteenth century and for sometime thereafter, the number was thirteen. Seventeen was considered
an improvement, although if the person herding the geese knows what he or she is doing, the poor fox never has a chance.

Words for the two wedding ceremonies come from a Missal used during the reign of Richard II (1377-99), which gives the ceremony
in English despite the contemporary influence of the Roman Church (which used Latin) throughout Scotland and England. The
ceremony was not significantly altered again until the King James Version of the Bible came into being in the seventeenth
century.

The wheel-lock pistol that Kit teaches Anne to shoot was common in the Borders as early as the first half of the sixteenth
century. As mentioned at the end of
Border Storm,
the wheel-lock is thought to have been invented by Leonardo da Vinci, the great Italian artist and engineer. It worked on
the principle of a modern cigarette-lighter. For more information on the weapons of this period, see
English Weapons and Warfare, 449-1660,
by A.V.B. Norman and Don Pottinger (London, 1966). See also
Weapons Through the Ages
by William Read (New York, 1976), and
A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration, and Use of Arms and Armor in All Countries and in All Times
by George Cameron Stone (New York, 1961).

I generally end my letters to you by thanking the people who have helped me with my research or with my career, but it occurs
to me that you, dear reader, are who I should be thanking each and every time. This is book number 43, and you have been in
my thoughts with every sentence I have written. Therefore, I want to take this opportunity to thank you for your tremendous
support, for all the letters you have sent via Uncle Sam’s ponies or cyberspace, for coming out in all sorts of weather to
book signings and to Scottish games, and most of all, of course, for continuing to buy and enjoy my books. So I thank you,
each of you, most sincerely.

Many thanks also to my wonderful editor, Beth de Guzman, my superb agents Aaron Priest and Lucy Childs, and to my longsuffering
family and friends, who put up with me even when I’m at the tail end of a book and tend to be a bit testy and forgetful (but
can still put a dynamite Thanksgiving dinner on the table!). I love you all and appreciate you more than mere words can express.

Slàinte mhath,

http://home.att.net/~amandascott

A
MANDA
S
COTT
, best-selling author and winner of the Romance Writers of America’s RITA/Golden Medallion and the Romantic Times’ awards
for Best Regency Author and Best Sensual Regency, began writing on a dare from her husband. She has sold every manuscript
she has written. She sold her first novel,
The Fugitive Heiress—written on a battered Smith-Corona—in 1980. Since then, she has sold many more, but since the second
one, she has used a word processor. More than twenty-five of her books are set in the English Regency period (1810-20), others
are set in fifteenth-century England and sixteenth- and eighteenth-century Scotland. Three are contemporary romances.

Amanda is a fourth-generation Californian who was born and raised in Salinas and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history
from Mills College in Oakland. She did graduate work at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, specializing in British
history, before obtaining her master’s in history from California State University at San Jose. After graduate school, she
taught for the Salinas City School District for three years before marrying her husband, who was then a captain in the Air
Force. They lived in Honolulu for a year, then in Nebraska for seven years, where their son was born. Amanda now lives with
her husband in northern California.

Dear Reader,

Fate has a funny way of bringing together two people who are meant to be, whether they realize it or not. And, with a little
bit of mischief and just the right amount of time, Anne Foster and Lady Anne Ellyson are about to get the surprise of their
lives in our two Warner Forever titles this September.

Mary Jo Putney raves “Joan Wolf writes with an absolute emotional mastery that goes straight to the heart” and that couldn’t
be truer in
Joan Wolf’s THAT SUMMER.
Veterinarian Anne Foster grew up in the rolling hills of Virginia horse country, helping her father train Thoroughbreds at
the Wellington family racing farm and longing for Liam Wellington, the boy just out of her reach. But when a beautiful and
sought-after girl in the town disappears, Anne’s life is changed forever. All evidence points to Liam and his friends, but
Anne refuses to accept it. Running from her own memories of that night, she leaves Virginia—and Liam—behind and vows to begin
a new life. Now, ten years later, with the death of her beloved father, Anne returns to Wellington Farm and runs into Liam.
Drawn into the love she could never forget, Anne is determined to clear Liam’s name and risk losing her heart all over again.

Moving from the horse country of Virginia to the rolling hills of medieval Scotland, we find
THE SECRET CLAN: REIVER’S BRIDE
by
Amanda Scott
who
Affaire de Coeur
has called “a master.” When reivers descend upon Lady Anne Ellyson one moonlit night, she is shocked to discover their leader
is none other than Sir Christopher Chisholm. Long presumed dead, Kit had been betrothed to Anne’s favorite cousin Fiona before
his disappearance. Now, determined to reunite them and to prevent her cousin’s marriage to another, Anne must risk both her
reputation and her life to help Kit overcome a false murder accusation. But dare she risk her heart? With the enchanted matchmaking
mischief of the Secret Clan, the wrong heartstrings are becoming entangled and romance gets more deliciously complicated each
day.

To find out more about Warner Forever, these September titles, and the authors, visit us at
www.warnerforever.com
.

With warmest wishes,