TemptationinTartan (9 page)

She was rapidly becoming a little ill from her position,
topsy-turvy over his shoulder, but could tell when they entered the Laird’s
Tower. He mounted the stairs, carrying her without strain or effort into their
room.

Kicking the door closed, he flung her onto the bed. She
landed in a dizzying tumble of skirts, but before she could compose herself
he’d seized her arms and pulled her upright.

“Take off your clothes.”

She stared at him.

“Take off every stitch or I’ll cut ’em off ye.” He drew a
small knife from his boot. The sharp silver blade glinted.

Her head spinning, she thought she’d faint but managed to
remain upright. She tugged off her gloves and, with quivering hands, fumbled at
the laces of her bodice. He leaned against the bedpost, watching her with cold,
onyx eyes, the eyes of an angry stranger—the same stranger who’d killed the
MacReiver.

Her fingers simply couldn’t work the ties and she watched,
frozen stiff in place, as Kier stepped toward her, his knife gleaming.

The tip rose toward her chin then came down, decisively
ripping through the laces. Her bodice opened, revealing her stays.

“Lydia.” His tone carried warning.

She tried again. The stays proved to be even more difficult.

Another slash of that wicked knife, and another. The stays,
cut at each shoulder, dropped to her hips. He ripped them off her.

She stood in her shift, knees weak, but with every muscle
alert and tight.

“Lydia…” His voice was hard, as hard as the member thrusting
against the front of his trews.

As hard as her nipples had become in the cool air.

She was not aroused. She couldn’t be! Yet a telltale
stickiness gummed her thighs together.

Her limp fingers strayed to the ribbon tying the neck of her
chemise. She fumbled at it. Her hands dropped. The shining knife’s tip winked
for a moment before Kieran set it into the shift at its top. He cut it off her,
the knife sliding through the thin pink silk with a hiss.

She stood before him, naked but for her garters, stockings
and boots.

He threw the knife and it thwacked into the wooden bedpost.
Boneless, she dropped onto the bed.

“Take off your shoon.”

When she was done, he hauled her to her stocking feet and,
turning her away, tethered her wrists to the upper rail of their bed.

She was stretched high, her toes barely touching the floor,
her knees bumping the mattress. Horribly exposed, yes, but her lifted breasts
ached for his touch. He ran a gloved hand down her quivering body and she
moaned from the pleasure of it, anticipating relief regardless of his temper.

He pinched her nipple, searched between her legs. He
caressed the moisture there and she pushed against him. When he pulled away,
she groaned in protest.

This was not so different from the twists and turns that
their lovemaking occasionally took… Had he forgotten her punishment? She
allowed herself to relax, closing her eyes and tipping her head back, enjoying
the sweep of her long hair against her naked back.

His gloved hand swatted her exposed buttocks, fierce as a
whip. The shock of it sank into her for a moment before the burn began. Shock
and sizzle… Though he’d spanked her rear before, she realized he’d been holding
back.

“Ye understand why I must do this, don’t ye?” His fingers roved
across her stinging bottom, delved into her crack, circled her rosette.

Swallowing her gasp, she said, “Yes, I do. But…”

“But what?” Each word was punctuated with a slap.

She squirmed. “Your power as laird…what of mine as your, as
your…?” What was she? Lady Laird? Lairdess? Surely not.

“Lydia, look at me.” Holding her hips, he turned her around.
Gone was the stranger. Kieran, her husband, had returned and he spoke with
authority. “Your influence as my wife and consort willnae be diminished. I
promise ye, any man or woman who disobeys ye risks the pillory or worse. See
here.”

He untied her and wrapped a plaid around her naked body,
then urged her through the door. “Get ye gone,” he snapped to a group of the
curious who’d clustered outside in the hallway. They scattered.

He took her to the window opposite, which overlooked the
courtyard, and stood behind her so she could see. He leaned against her,
forcing her forward over the deep embrasure. His cock pressed against her
tender bottom cheeks. She wanted to be worthy of her birth and rank, but was
quivering from a strange brew of dread and desire.

Below, Moira was bent over a barrel with her arms and head
locked in the pillory. Her skirts were rucked up around her waist, her naked
buttocks exposed. They were already red with weals, five distinct welts marking
each thigh. She’d been whipped. Lydia doubted that Moira would be able to sit
for a week.

Kier leaned out of the window. “Know this!” His voice echoed
through the bailey, and all activity below stopped. Heads craned to regard them
and to hear their laird’s latest orders. “I have been merciful this one time.
Anyone who endangers my lady or imperils her in any way will be severely
punished.”

As Lydia watched, one of the clanswomen spat in Moira’s
face, then slapped her. “And stay away from my man!”

“She isnae popular,” Kieran said.

“Except with some.” A line of grinning guards had formed
behind Moira. Most had their trews open and were fondling their parts while
they watched others use her. As one left, another began.

One of the guards approached her naked posterior, tugging on
his big, curved penis, which grew ever more distended. Lydia gasped. “He’s
huge.”

“Aye,
Bod an Deamhain,
we call him. Duncan’s got the
devil’s own cocky.”

She twisted her head to regard Kier, disgusted. “You
sound…admiring.”

He chuckled. “We males measure ourselves by our parts, ye
know?”

“That’s silly.”

Below, Duncan punched his devilishly large shaft into
Moira’s swollen cunt.

“He’s…he’s raping her!”

“Nay,” Kieran said. “Moira isnae chaste. She gives her
favors freely to the guards. Watch.”

Moira grunted loudly enough for Lydia to hear and pushed
back against Duncan with cries that spoke of pleasure rather than pain. He
swived her vigorously before he pulled out and came, spurting thickly on her
reddened arse. The onlookers cheered.

“It’s still wrong,” Lydia said, some slight sympathy for
Moira stirring.

“Ye cannae think that every time a woman is pilloried or put
in the stocks she escapes untouched. Even in your bonnie England.”

She bit her lip. “That’s true.”

Lifting the plaid, Kier ran gloved hands over Lydia’s
trembling body, caressing her hard nipples, questing between her legs until he
came to her bedewed quim. He plunged a finger inside. Rough and thickened by
the leather glove, it scraped her inner walls. She sucked in panting breaths
and raised herself onto her toes to get away from the probing, torturous pressure.

“Dinnae fight me, wife.” He rubbed his thumb up and down her
crack, then pushed it into her backside. Doubly pierced, she held as still as
she could, though her body was shuddering. “I ask ye again, do ye understand
why I must do this? For ye cannae disobey me.”

“I understand,” she whispered, remembering the fearsome
creature she’d met in the tower. “You’re right. I could have been hurt or
killed.”

“Blood for the clan.” He went deeper.

She gulped. “Blood?”

“Aye, mayhap. Can ye take it?”

Her mind was awhirl. She couldn’t think from sheer panic,
but her pulse beat a tattoo of want. Need roared through her. He moved his finger
and thumb inside her with surprising ease, massaging both passages internally.
She choked back a cry. Despite herself, despite the pain and the pressure, she
undulated against his wicked, probing hand.

“I willnae rape ye, wife. Dinnae claim ye’re not stirred.”

She closed her eyes. She wanted to scream and weep and come.
She could barely force out the words. “Blood for the clan.”

“Know that I willnae stop if you protest.”

She opened her eyes, turned her head to meet his gaze. Hard
as obsidian and implacable, but this was Kieran and she trusted him. “Yes.”

He dragged his hand out of her and she whimpered, as much
from the sudden emptiness as from the rasp of his gloved digits against her
tender channels. Again his gloved hand beat her bottom.

Her tortured cry rang through the bailey. The courtyard went
silent. Faster than she’d have dreamed possible, he hauled her back into their
room, shoved her onto the bed, grabbed his leather strop and cracked it across
her bare buttocks.

She crawled across the mattress to get away, shrieking as
the strike knifed through her. He pinned her down and whipped her again,
allowing her keening wail to be heard before slamming the door.

He bound her arms behind her with the strop. “Now,” he said,
panting from exertion. “Now.”

He opened his trews before pulling her onto his lap and
began spanking her with his gloved hand. With each blow she wriggled against
his wickedly hard cock, hoping to push her pearl against him to get some sort
of relief. For she was beyond aroused now, writhing with the fused rapture and
torment he inflicted.

He shifted his attention from the fullest rounds of her
buttocks to the curve where they met her thighs, a sensitive area he’d not
previously touched.

“Nooo…” She moaned, unsure if she could take any more.

His rod swelled beneath her, prodding her cunt. “Yes.” Five
more strikes down her legs to her knees before he stopped, stroking and
squeezing her burning flanks.

He rolled her off his lap and onto the mattress, where she
squirmed helplessly, wrists bound at the small of her back, imprisoned by the
sensual web he’d spun. She rubbed her nipples and mound against the coverlet,
frantic. Gripping her hips, he tugged her back until she was on her knees, her
legs wide apart and cunt presented to him as he stood at their bedside.

She whimpered, tears flowing from pain and tension and the
sheer emotion of the day.

“What,
kylyrra
?”

“Please, please, please, please…” she sobbed.

“Please what?”

She moaned.

He fumbled between her legs, giving her a brief swipe across
her pearl that wasn’t quite enough.

“You bastard!”

“Language, my lady wife. Ye’ve earned yourself more
punishment.”

“No!”

“Yes.”

She panted, trying to speak.

“Tell me what ye want. Now.”

She couldn’t deny that the brutal treatment had forced her
to a level of desire she’d never before experienced. She needed his cock more
than her next breath. “I want you. I want you!”

“Verra well.” With one long surge, he sank into her to the
cods, the way moistened by the rich flow of her honey.

She screamed as her body, no longer her own, bucked and
jerked, but he didn’t allow her release, instead pulling out.

“No!”

Another hard swat, the leather stinging. “Ye must learn,
lady, that ye’ll do it my way. I’m your husband and your master and your laird.
Remember it, always.”

She buried her face in the covers. She hadn’t wanted to
shame herself by sniveling but it was far too late for that. She wept from
frustration before she felt his cockhead bump against her back door.

“No!”

“Yes. I know ye’re afeared of this, and it’s a suitable
punishment for your acts this day.” He rose and left her to worry about what
was going to happen. Turning her head, she saw him strip, finally removing
those tormenting gloves. Despite her anger—was this punishment equal to the
crime of trespassing? Surely not!—she was still drawn to his pale, sleek,
muscular body, the body she knew could deliver ecstasy.

Or torture, as she’d learned.

He hunted on her dresser until he found what he wanted—a pot
of lotion. Opening it, he smeared some on his thick, fully erect cock, his gaze
never leaving her bottom.

He rubbed the lotion up and down and his tool grew larger,
redder, its vivid color contrasting with the nest of black hair from which it
rose and the skin of his torso, pale as the whitest marble. He came to her and
seized her buttocks in his cold, steely grip. Renewed arousal smoldered and she
moaned, half in fear, half in anticipation of the pleasure she knew he could
deliver.

What would he choose?

He kneaded her flesh. Desire bolted through her and her moans
rose when he pried her buttocks apart to enter her.

She wasn’t entirely tight. William’s exertions and Kier’s
own fingers had opened her back portal again and again. Still, she twisted
against a disquieting fullness that seemed to possess her unto her vitals. It
didn’t hurt, exactly, but a startling fusion of sizzle and sting seized her and
didn’t let go. She let out a shuddering cry as Kier took her arse with hard
strokes that left no doubt that he was her master. He embedded himself inside
her rear until his sex hair scratched her sensitized rump.

Then he reached around, parted her folds and caressed her
pearl with a slippery hand. A banshee wail of shame and surprise came from her
depths as a firestorm of bliss consumed her. His weight pressed her down into
the bed, his thickness stabbing deep in quick, heavy thrusts. She thrashed
against the bedclothes, lifting her hips and pushing back, desperate to take
all of him inside her despite her topsy-turvy emotions.

He bit her neck as he came, with his big body sprawled atop
her, his groans of completion sweet in her ears before her world went dark.

Chapter Eleven

After he’d left Moira in the pillory for an hour, Euan
scattered the guards and clansmen who’d come to take their pleasure of her, as
well as those who’d thrown rotten vegetables at her head. Then he released her.
Dugald slung her battered body over his shoulder and carried her to an upper
floor of the Laird’s Tower.

He lowered her into a cool bath and she sighed as the water
soothed her abused haunches. She let herself slide beneath the water. A bath
was a luxury she didn’t often enjoy, and now that her public humiliation was
over she began to think that mayhap she’d be all right.

The water penetrated to her scalp. She tipped her head back
as she surfaced, letting her long red curls drape down her back, aware that the
two men were watching.

Confidence buoyed her. She could handle them. The worst was
over and she guessed that her enemy wasn’t faring well. As she’d been carried
up the tower stairs, she’d been able to hear Lydia’s shrieks.

Moira smiled. She’d had most of the Kilborn men, with the
exception of Euan, the castellan. And what could he do? He’d been old when
she’d been born.

“Out of the bath, wench,” Euan said. “’Tis for our pleasure,
not yourn.”

“What do ye mean?” She turned her head to look at him.

“I dinnae enjoy hot buttered buns, not when they’ve been
greased with the spunk of twenty men.”

Dugald hauled her out of the bath and carried her squirming
form over to a refectory table. Euan shoved the used plates and mugs aside to
make room, and they bound her in a St. Andrew’s cross to the table’s legs.

Turning her head, Moira saw Euan smile at her, his teeth
gleaming, but it wasn’t a happy grin. Though she’d known him all her life, she
noticed for the first time the unnatural perfection of his smile. His seamed
visage wasn’t that of a cheerful young man, but his teeth shone unnaturally
white and even except for the incisors. Those were pointed, almost like an
animal’s, she thought. Like fangs.

Dugald twisted his fingers through the red nest of curls
atop her mound and tugged. She tried to think, to remember, but blood rushed
through her veins as her heartbeat tripled. Like many clanswomen, she’d
experienced Kieran and Ranald’s odd sexual tastes more than once. They’d liked
to bite her, their sharp teeth slicing her thigh or her neck or nibbling on her
cunt while in the throes of their insatiable lust. Despite the feminine cries
nightly heard from Laird Kieran’s chamber, despite Lady Lydia’s bruised neck,
Moira envied her rival with a jealousy so gnawing that she’d plotted Lydia’s
downfall.

But…auld Euan?

Moira’s mind couldn’t grasp the reality of the ancient
castellan’s glistening fangs until he bent over her and sank them into her
neck.

* * * * *

At sundown, when they’d finished, Dugald and Euan washed
Moira again. They covered her eyes and wrapped her limp, trembling body in a
sheet before Dugald slung her over one brawny shoulder.

He climbed the stairs of the Laird’s Tower to its topmost
story and exited behind Euan. His tread heavy on the upper walkway, Dugald
followed Euan to the old keep and after Euan had unlatched the door, Dugald
dumped Moira in the dusty room beyond.

Euan locked her inside, then looked at Dugald, who said, “’Tis
a cruel punishment.”

“But fitting to the crime.”

“What will he do, do ye think?”

“I dinnae ken. My brother was ever a man of refined tastes.
Moira might not be to his liking.”

Dugald licked his lips. “I found her tasty enough, as did
ye.”

“Aye, my thirst is slaked for the nonce. But as for himself,
well…he isnae sane, do ye ken? So we lock him in the tower as best we can. I
dinnae ken if he’ll stop at a wee dram or two. And as for his other desires…”

“Who knows?” Dugald asked.

“Who knows,” Euan responded flatly.

* * * * *

Moira awoke warm and cozy in a sumptuous bed, but couldn’t
move, not with her arms over her head and her wrists trussed to a bedpost.
Darkness enveloped her and she realized she was blindfolded.

A man’s thumb rubbed back and forth over her engorged clit,
forcing shards of desire through her. She groaned…how much more could she take?
She had lost count of the climaxes that had claimed her imprisoned flesh since
she’d been pilloried. Each pleasure, sharpened by pain, had been more intense
than the last.

Weak from lack of food and loss of blood, her tug against
the bonds was feeble.

“Good evening.” The voice was deep and cultured.

She froze but his continued fondling drew her gasp. A finger
entered her. She opened her thighs and thrust her hips toward pleasure’s
source.

The digit withdrew and she didn’t stifle her protesting
moan. Cool hands pulled her knees high and wide. She was ready to be mounted,
but by whom?

She only half-believed the legend of the mad blood drinker
in the Dark Tower. He had long been a threat parents used to keep bairns
obedient, like the kelpies or the fae folk. Nay, she had hoped that Kieran
would catch and punish Lydia, or p’raps that her rival would come to grief in
the crumbling, dangerous keep. Anyone falling through its rotting floors could
drown in a sea cave overwhelmed by high tide.

“Who are you?” She was ashamed of the weakness of her voice.

“Very nice,” he said, ignoring her question. His voice held
a Scots accent tinctured by something else…English, p’raps. Something odd,
almost like the elegant tones Milady Lydia affected.

His moist finger circled her bud. “Delightfully clean and
fresh. My brother always knew my tastes.”

“Your brother?”

“Aye, lass. Euan.”

Her mind buzzed. “That cannae be!”

“It is.” He again speared her channel with one, then two
fingers, spreading them so she opened. His other hand seized her knee and
smooth, cool lips caressed her thigh for a moment before pain lanced through
her.

She thrashed, but he held her firmly as he drank from her
thigh for many minutes, until her head swam. His fingers inside her excited her
despite the bite, the sucking, the dread… Euan’s brother. The mad vampire in
the tower. Could it be?

When he finally stopped, she was near to fainting and feared
for her life. Then his mouth, now warm, sought her cunt again and she sighed
with relief as his stiff tongue urged her to completion.

She cried out and her hips bucked before an engorged shaft
breached her. He sank his thick pole deep, swiving her powerfully. Shouting
with rapture, Moira came as his hot seed pumped into her. As he climaxed, he
tore away her blindfold.

An ancient face with bloodied lips, framed by stringy white
hair…one look, and Moira knew nothing more.

Before dawn, Moira staggered out of the old keep. Wrapped in
a tattered plaid, her hair and eyes wild, she made her way to the open
portcullis and left Kilborn Castle.

* * * * *

Warm and cool…

Lydia’s body was warm where her belly pressed into the
feather bed, but cool above, where ribbons of sweet comfort delivered blessed
relief to her sore bottom and thighs. She smelled roses, and awoke realizing
that her husband was gently stroking her flanks, smoothing scented lotion into
her skin.

“
Madainn mhath, kylyrra
.”

“Er, good morning.” Hesitant, she wondered how the turbulence
of the day before would affect their marriage.

“Ye ken why I had to punish ye so severely?”

Her buttocks and thighs still ached, though the soreness was
diminishing beneath Kieran’s gentle fingertips. Had she developed bruises? When
would she be able to sit again? Nevertheless, she said, “Yes, I do.”

Setting down the lotion, he lay beside her and she turned
her head to regard him.

His eyes were serious. “I’ll no’ deny there was pleasure in
it for me.”

She bit her lip. “And for me also, but…” How could she be a
lady and still enjoy the bizarre perversions that Kieran preferred? Her
devilishly clever husband knew what brought her to the heights of ecstasy or to
an abyss of shame. She didn’t know who she was anymore, and that frightened
her.

“It was too much,” he said, as if divining her thoughts.

“Yes. Too much.” Relief swept her.

He understood.

He understood and shared her feelings.

A trembling sort of giddiness possessed her and a smile came
unbidden to her lips as she examined her husband with an intent gaze. “You
mean… Milaird was wrong?”

“Aye. I was wrong.”

“The great Kieran Kilborn was wrong?” His wife’s eyes
widened. One eyebrow lifted and she gave him a wide, disbelieving smile edged
with mockery.

“Now, Lydia.” On his side, he tucked an arm beneath his
head.

“P’raps the sun has risen in the west, or the sheep fly and
instead, birds crop the grass. I must check.” She rose from the bed, wincing a
little. He watched her bonnie pink arse twitch as she pranced over to one of
the arrow slits and peered out.

When she returned, she held lengths of the worn linen they
used as towels. She again smiled at him.

He distrusted that impish smile, accompanied as it was by
twinkling eyes.

“So,” she said. “Kieran was wrong. Kieran’s been a naughty
fellow indeed.” She took his arm by the wrist, brought it to the bedpost above
his head and wrapped a strip of linen around both, binding him.

Bold she was, and lust curled deep in his belly. His prick
twitched with dawning arousal. “I daresay I’ve been a bad, bad boy.”

“Oh, yes.” She took another linen strip, rolled him onto his
back and trussed the other hand high.

Then she walked away from him. What did she have in mind?

She had evidently learned plenty during the few weeks they’d
been married.

She dipped a third swatch of fabric into a ewer of water and
let the chilly liquid drip onto his chest, then swished it back and forth from
nipple to nipple. They tightened into taut little kernels and his cock jumped,
stiff and hard as an oaken club.

Her smile broadened. “I like this,” she said.

So do I
, he thought, but made a show of struggling
against his bonds. “Lydia—”

She chuckled and slid the cold, wet linen down his belly to
his staff. Despite the temperature, despite his already intense arousal, he
thickened and lengthened.

“I wonder…” she said meditatively, scrutinizing his cock.
She ran the cloth through her fingers and smiled.

She rubbed him with the wet linen and despite the chill he
swelled. She tickled his rod so it became even harder, then wrapped his member
in the fabric until only the broad, round head was exposed. With each caress of
her clever wee hands and each touch of the soft, damp towel, he grew bigger and
more aroused until he was about to explode.

Bending over, she gave him a little flick of her tongue and
he groaned, his hips jolting up.

She laughed. “How does that feel?” She kissed his cockhead
again, opening her mouth wide to encompass all of his roundness. Lightning
flashed through him and he wondered if his trapped flesh was going to burst.

She gave him a little nip and he started violently.

“I asked you a question.” Her voice was cool and even. She
nibbled on him again.

He jerked up, hoping to force his rod further into her mouth
and p’raps get some relief, but she was too quick for him and the wicked bond
holding his cock kept him on the boundary between pleasure and pain. He could
not come until she chose to release him.

He was hers to control, utterly. “Lydia, please…”

“Please, what?”

“Please! I’m afeared this will do me harm.”

“Really? As much as a beating?”

“Are ye angry with me?”

“Nay, husband, but what’s sauce for the goose…” She left the
remainder of the quote unsaid.

“What would ye have me say or do?”

She ran her hand over his ballocks and they contracted. He
was frantic to shoot his load, and writhed on the sheets.

“You’re mine, do you hear?” She tugged on his cock.

“That was never in question!”

“You’re my slave as much as I am yours. Admit it!”

He tossed his body from side to side. “Yes! Yes!” He sensed
the justice of her actions and did not want to fight her. And he’d give up one
of his balls to come.

“Very well, then.” She tugged away the binding, then pinched
the base of his rod, hard.

A blast of pure pain shot through him and he clamped down on
his frustrated shout. She climbed atop him to rub her slick cunny over his
cock, and he was instantly ready again. He twitched with need, pushing his rod
upward toward her slit.

Kneeling, she lifted up then dropped down, her magnificent
breasts bobbing. His cockhead lodged inside her. He groaned with need and relief.
She liked what she was doing, he reckoned, because the walls of her quim were
fluttering and clenching. Tight, hot and wet… She eased down onto him.

He’d surely died and gone to heaven. He shouted, “
Rach
air muin!”
and came in thick jets, coating her channel. He lifted his hips
and thrust until he hit the barrier of her womb.

She took all he had, bearing down on him so her cunt slid
against him, taking her pleasure as he took his. She flung her head back as she
came, riding him like a stallion, gripping his shoulders for support. The
little stabs of her fingernails drove him higher and he swiveled his hips,
swirling his cock inside her. With a gasp, she collapsed over his chest. Her
splendid breasts caressed his nipples, shooting him into ecstasy one more time.

Minutes later she stirred, then reached up and released his
wrists. He grabbed her in a tight embrace, locking her to him without
restraint, taking her mouth in a deep kiss. Their tongues tangled, warred,
played…eased into gentler loving.

They lay side by side, regarding each other, startled, sated
and pleased. He looked into the warm chocolate depths of her eyes, seeking and
finding her soul. His gaze rested within hers for a long while. Gradually, her
breaths and his slowed, evened and matched.