Midnight Honor

her arms above her head and snorted when she did not have the strength to hold it there without wincing. “Now get on over to yer blanket, drop yer breeks, an' cover whatever ye dinna want me to see.”
    Anne glanced around the room to see if anyone was paying attention, but they had kept their voices low enough not to disturb the sleeping forms. She went over to her pallet of blankets and gingerly unfastened the waist of her trews, pushing them down past her hips and sliding them, with difficulty, to her ankles. She was wearing one of Jamie's cambric shirts, the hem of which fell almost to her knees and could be tucked between her legs to spare her more tender parts the worst of the chafing.
    MacGillivray scarcely seemed to notice as he fetched the jar of liniment from his saddle pouch and rounded the fire. When she was lying facedown on the blankets, he smeared a healthy dollop in his palms and rubbed them together, warming the oily mess first before he knelt beside her.
    His first strokes were gentle, smoothing the slippery concoction into her skin and working it into her thighs and calves. He added more, warming it each time, and when he judged her slick enough, he began to knead the muscles withthe vigor of a biscuit maker. The heat of his hands combined with the heat of the camphor started a not uncomfortable burn down the length of her legs, and when he paused to nudge the hem of the shirt up to the crease of her bottom, she did not object.
    “You've not said much about Elizabeth,” Anne murmured.
    “Ye havna said much about Angus,” he countered.
    “You are going to marry her, are you not?”
    MacGillivray's sigh was extravagant. “We have talked about it, aye.”
    “Just… talked about it?”
    “Aye. I'm a great talker, have ye not noticed?”
    Whether she would have pursued the topic or not was cut short on a gasp as he lifted the shirt higher and sent his hands sliding all the way up to her shoulders. Her teeth clamped down over her lower lip and her fists curled tighter around the little hillocks she'd made in the blankets, but the massage felt so good and the heat produced by his big hands was so comforting, she stopped thinking of her bared bottom after the first few strokes.
    MacGillivray felt her shock and saw the clenching of her fists, but it was the only way he could think to end the conversation. He did not want to talk about Elizabeth of Clunas, or of his impending marriage, not while his hands were doing what they had ached to do for so many years. The pleasure of feeling her skin all sleek and warm and bared to his touch was so intense, it stirred sensations that had no right to be stirred, arousing needs that had no right to be aroused.
    He may well have been half sotted the last time their lips had met, but he remembered all too well how she had tasted, how she had felt, how she made those tiny sounds deep in her throat when he had kissed her. God's truth, he had dreamt of them lying together so many times, he imagined he knew exactly where and how to caress her until she was trembling with the madness of wanting his flesh inside her. And once there … once there, by God, he knew she would be as insatiable as a nymph, rising against him, engulfing him so completely with her own orgasms he would scarcely have need to worry about his own. But of course he would. He would feel her flesh slidingover his, feel it squeezing him, working him like little fists, and the climax would be cataclysmic.
    Wild Rhuad Annie. How many times had he regretted not taking her that day in the fairground? She had been willing. She had been more than ready. She had kissed him as if her soul had been in her mouth, his for the taking. But he had stopped himself, had slapped himself down, not wanting to risk tarnishing her reputation until they were well and properly married. He had known about the betrothal arrangement pledging her to Angus Moy, but when her fiancé had become the vaunted chief of Clan Chattan and it looked as though the agreement might be nullified, he had felt confident Fearchar would accept him, John Alexander MacGillivray, as a worthy alternative. The day—the very bloody day—before he had decided he could wait no longer to offer for her hand, he was told the wedding to The MacKintosh was to proceed as planned.
    The day of Annie's marriage, he had gotten so drunk, it had become necessary for Gillies to tie him down to keep him from tearing Dunmaglass apart plank by plank. He had