Marin's Promise (Borderland Ladies Book 1) Read online

  Aye, she’d never been kissed like this before.

  He stroked his tongue against hers and reveled in the chords of pleasure humming through him, building the fire rising within him. She was bold with the spice of wine on her lips and the kisses she offered him in return, more curious than confident. He slid his hand from her waist, up higher to cup the swell of her breast, and she stiffened.

  He paused. Perhaps she was not as experienced as she had implied.

  He hesitated, but she leaned toward him, her mouth seeking his with the kind of carnal appetite he enjoyed. His hands found her waist and he ran his palms over the curve of her hips down to the pleasant firmness of her bottom. She arched against his touch like a cat being pet.

  He pulled her against him and fit their pelvises against one another where his powerful erection raged at full force. She gave a jolt of surprise.

  He pulled away. The open-mouthed expression on her face was not one of uncertain delight, it was one of shock and inexperience. Damn it.

  He adjusted the rock-solid shaft of his cock, so it fit more comfortably within his trews. “Where's yer husband?”

  “I don't have a husband,” she said resolutely.

  “Are ye betrothed?”

  “Does it matter?”

  He smirked. In truth, it didn't.

  “Are ye a maiden?” he asked.

  “Nay.” She shifted her gaze to the left and pressed her tongue between her full lips. Honeyed lips he'd been kissing only a moment ago.

  Encouraged, he stepped closer once more, and traced a finger over her delicate earlobe, down the length of her slender neck. He pulled his fingers back from her momentarily. “Have ye been ill-treated, Marin?” he asked.

  She shook her head, but the tension in her body did not dissipate. There was something she was not telling him.

  “Do ye want to be here, lass?”

  She caught his hand and brought his fingertips to her low neckline. Using his hand for him, she drew his touch over the tops of her breasts. Her nipples hardened merely an inch under his fingers, the tight buds apparent beneath the fabric of her dress.

  She pulled in a breath. “I want to be here.” Her eyes met his with starlight dancing in them. “With you.”

  He circled the pad of his thumb lower, to graze over one taut nipple. She gave a shaky inhale, and her lashes swept briefly closed.

  “I'll be different than what ye've had before, I vow,” he said in a low, sensual tone. “I want to take my time with ye, love ye all through the night. I want to ensure ye’re fully ready for me. Do ye know what that means?”

  Her breath quickened and her cheeks were a lovely shade of pink.

  He circled her nipple as he spoke and watched the pleasure play over Marin’s bonny face. “It means ye go slick between yer legs.” His fingernail drew over the bud and her eyelashes fluttered. “Are ye wet for me, Marin?” he whispered.

  Her cheeks went deep red.

  “If ye’re no’, we'll have to change that, aye?” He caught her face gently in his hand and those large blue eyes turned up to gaze at him, burning with desire.

  Many of these noble lasses had been married off to the worst of men, aging bastards who used them like mares to sire children and nothing more. Or they’d been seduced by some courtier who used them to slake their own desire. None of the noblemen he’d ever heard of knew how to handle a lady. At least not like Bran.

  There would be no stiff coupling where she lay beneath him with her eyes tightly closed. Nay, he would have her crying out, her hips meeting his with matched urgency, her hands on his body.

  He pressed his lips to hers. This time when he brushed his tongue against her mouth, she opened for him immediately, like a flower parting its petals to the sun. He drank her in, teasing and tasting her sweetness. She gave a moan and her tongue flicked against his with tentative curiosity.

  Aye, there. That was what he wanted.

  His body was on fire, his cock throbbing with want of her. He wanted to tear the kirtle off her and spread her legs to reveal her pink, damp center. In his mind he could see it perfectly, him positioning the head of his manhood at her entrance and sheathing himself in her tight, wet heat until they both cried out.

  He gave a little growl of desire and deepened the kiss, so his tongue tangled with hers. His hands moved down her back to the round shape of her bottom. He drew her to him again, so her legs spread over his thigh and his cock nestled against her.

  She curled her hips toward him in an instinctive motion of coupling. The pressure of her body against the raging lust of his erection tightened pleasantly through him. He grunted and pushed against her.

  He had taken off his quilted gambeson earlier and now drew back to pull his leine over his head. It fell the floor, leaving him in only his trews with his cock straining at the leather.

  He’d never wanted a woman so badly in all his life as he wanted this fine noblewoman. To show her what loving truly was, to bring her more pleasure than she’d ever had in the whole of her life.

  Marin couldn’t drag her stare from Bran’s naked torso, his powerful muscles rippling in the firelight. Dark hairs dusted over his chest and various scars left his skin puckered. The body of a warrior. He was a man who had seen much war in his life. And doubtless many lovers.

  Everything within her spun with the most thrilling, dizzying sensation and her heartbeat pounded between her legs with a wetness she was too shy to admit.

  “Take off yer kirtle.” His voice was silky and so sensual, it made prickles of desire shiver down her skin.

  He wanted to have her, which had been her intention. He was sufficiently lulled into a sense of trust. Though she had not expected it so quickly, nor so enjoyably. A deep part of her wanted to comply with his request, to slip off her kirtle and let her curiosity be sated. But the blade was in her belt, and she would need the dagger to kill him.

  “I am not ready yet,” she said in a strong voice.

  He stepped back and put his hands up in an innocent gesture. “I willna force ye. In fact, ye may leave any time ye like.” His dark eyes glittered. “If ye stay, I'll kiss ye and touch ye until ye beg me to take ye. I want ye aching with longing. But I'll no' have ye with yer dress on. Ye’re far too lovely to no’ see all of ye.”

  Suddenly it was almost impossible to breathe.

  “Will ye leave?” he queried. “Or stay?”

  He closed the scant distance between them, and the light spice of the oil he'd used while bathing swirled around them both.

  “Stay.” She swallowed. “I want to stay.” And oh, how she wanted to stay. She wished she was in a different time, a different place, a different woman. She wanted this.

  His gaze drifted down her body and her nipples tingled as though he'd caressed her again. “I wager if I swept my fingers against yer center, they’d come away wet.”

  Fire flashed in her cheeks and she licked her lips. She wanted to squirm from the words he spoke, as if he knew the sinful sensation between her legs.

  His dark stare fixed on her mouth. “It drives me mad when ye do that, Marin.”

  She shouldn't like the way he said her name. And yet she did, his Scottish brogue making her name sound like a sensual purr. “When I do what?”

  “When ye lick yer lips.” He cradled her jaw in one large, powerful hand, his touch light. “It leaves them glistening and makes me want to kiss ye.”

  Her pulse raced faster at the thought of his kisses and the heat of his tongue against hers. “Oh.”

  “And it makes me want to feed ye my cock to suck.”

  Even as surprise took her, the lust between her thighs pulsed harder, burned hotter.

  “It isna only women who pleasure men with their mouths.” He stroked his thumb against her mouth, the blunt edge of the digit against the seam of her lips. “Men can also pleasure women in such a fashion.”

  His thumb probed between her lips and, heaven help her, she could not help but let it pass into her mouth. He groa
ned, a low, desperate sound that elicited a wild, thrilling power within her. Emboldened, she sucked at the digit. His brows flinched.

  “Aye,” he gritted through clenched teeth. “Like that.” He eased more of his thumb into her mouth. “And I would part yer legs and lap at ye with my tongue.”

  Such a wicked thing should have shocked her, and yet it did not. Nay, it made her hot with curiosity. She ran her tongue over the length of his thumb, the sensitivity of her mouth letting her discern every whorl of his fingerprint and the roughness of a callus.

  His eyes were half-lidded and dark as he watched his finger in her mouth. “I want to lick ye, Marin. I want to taste ye until ye cry out.”

  A greater part of her wanted that too, a wanton, hungry side. But the stronger part of her knew what she needed to do. It stuck in her mind like a thorn, through each tempting kiss and all the wonderful, lurid descriptions.

  He drew his thumb from her mouth and kissed her again, his mouth hot and tasting of the spiced wine he'd drunk earlier. It would be too easy to give in to the seductive words.

  Rather than allow herself lustful thoughts, Marin pushed to the forefront the things she ought to recall.

  Eversham's sacrifice in his attempt to save Cat. The way her sister had so valiantly hit Bran, a man twice her size, and how the younger girl had pleaded with Marin to let her die to save the castle. Her soldiers locked in the dungeon below the castle. The anticipation of Father's reaction when he discovered Marin had lost Werrick Castle.

  She touched Bran's naked chest. His skin was warm and soft, the soap clean scent heady. The coarseness of his hair was masculine and appealing. He pushed closer to her, so her hands pressed to him more firmly. She let her fingers work down the bands of his flat stomach to where their hips touched. To where she hid her dagger.

  The metal had heated from where it sat between the heat of their bodies. Marin had to skim its surface several times before finding the hilt. In her efforts, her fingers brushed the hard column of manhood beneath Bran's leather trews. He groaned and ground his hips harder against her.

  Pleasure tingled through Marin and made her want to elicit more of his groans, more of his enjoyment. She steeled herself, closed her hand around the hilt and drew out the blade. It slid from its sheath with a telltale metallic hiss. Before surprise could reflect in Bran's eyes, Marin pushed it to his throat.

  She meant to keep shoving it until her hands were wet with the life gushing from his body. She meant to kill him and remove his head from his body to show to his men and strike fear into their hearts.

  Except he stared at her with as much hurt as he did surprise. It should not have stayed her hand, but it did. And that was her greatest mistake.

  It took only that one fractured moment of doubt, of care, for him to grip her hand and twist it so all the strength drained from her fingers and the dagger clattered to the floor. Marin was familiar with the move; she'd used it many times herself. She knew better.

  The dagger glinted from the floor.

  “Marin,” Bran said, his voice light with chastisement.

  That was when she slammed her forehead into his, for no daughter of Werrick went down without a fight.

  4

  Marin pulled free from Bran's grip, out of danger. He clutched his face with his hands where she'd injured him.

  He loosed a string of curses, but she was not done with him yet. She swooped down to reclaim the dagger, then swept her leg toward his, knocking his feet out from underneath him. He crashed to the ground with an “Oof!”.

  Marin would not hesitate this time. The man had to die. It was the only way to keep everyone else safe.

  She fell on top of him, her legs spread over his hips to keep him pinned in place. His body was solid beneath her, and his panting breath made every sinewy muscle in his torso show against his skin.

  His manhood still rose hard with lust between her legs where she straddled him. Even in such a dire circumstance, lust teased the back of her mind, begging her rub the length of her body against his. She shoved aside all the innate yearnings. She drew the dagger up and thrust it down with all the strength she possessed.

  Bran brought his arm across his body and pushed her blow off course. A thin line of blood arched over his chest. Merely a scratch. Marin tried to jerk her arm up once more, but Bran had his fingers locked around her wrist in a powerful grip.

  “Drop the blade, Marin.” He spoke in a low voice, not unlike the one he used when they were so intimate only minutes ago.

  She didn't need a dagger to kill him. She did as she was asked and twisted her arm free from his grip. Using all of her body weight, she shoved her elbow toward his throat. Again, he shoved her assault aside, his movement far defter than a man of his size would usually possess.

  He locked her elbow in his vise-like hold and rolled them both over. His weight atop her was considerable, certainly enough to keep her in place. He had his hands atop hers, so she couldn’t defend herself, his legs spread over hers in an effort to still her kicking. She was completely pinned into place with his hips resting between her legs, the column of his arousal quite obvious.

  This time the connection between them sent a jolt of fear through her. She had lost her power. Women in such situations could be easily raped.

  Exactly like what had happened to her mother. Marin dragged in a harsh breath, but it did not quell the rise of panic.

  “Don’t,” she gasped. “Please.”

  Bran’s grip on her loosened immediately, though not enough for her to break away from his hold. “Marin.” He said her name gently and she realized he had been calling to her several times. “I willna hurt ye, lass, but I canna allow ye to try to kill me either.”

  “What will you do with me?” She writhed under him, still desperate to be free. “What will you do to my people? My sisters?”

  “I dinna intend anyone harm. I told ye that. But I will have to put ye in the dungeon.” He gritted his teeth. “Damn it, woman. Be still.”

  “Afraid I will escape your hold and kill you?” she asked, trying to appear as though she’d recovered more than she had.

  His expression relaxed with lust. “Ye're driving me to distraction as ye continue to grind yer heat against me.”

  Mayhap it was his reassurance he would not hurt her, or the draw pulling her to him, but prickles of desire warmed through her center. He was not like the man who had taken her mother, she knew that. She was also old enough now to realize many men gave pleasure to their women, as this one obviously intended to do for her.

  Still, she should not enjoy this so much. Rather than give in, she glared up at Bran. “If you put me in the dungeon, I will escape, and I will kill you. I do not know what you want with my home, but I cannot allow you to take it.”

  He held her for a moment longer and Marin's skin tingled with incredible awareness. It wasn't the same as when she battled, but it was as primal. Lust.

  A new sensation for certain, yet one she would not soon forget.

  “If I let ye up, will ye fight me?” he asked.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Aye.”

  He nodded. “As I thought.” He sighed and appeared regretful. “Ye're going to the dungeon whether I have to take ye, or my men have to drag ye, there. I'll give ye the option.”

  “How kind.”

  “Considering your intent to murder me, I think ye should appreciate my generosity.” He spoke slowly, as if he had limitless patience.

  “You killed my soldier, held a child hostage, forced your way into my keep and declared it yours. You expect me to be gracious?”

  “I expect yer love for them would extend to ye having a wee more care for yer person. Yer cooperation is better for the whole of yer household and ye know it.”

  He was right, and it only served to make her seethe more. Bran slowly got to his feet. She remained where she lay, refraining from leaping to attack him. He extended his hand down to her, as cordial as any courtier. “My lady.”

  Sh
e slapped her hand into his and curled her fingers around him with the force she’d use on a blade hilt. He drew her to her feet, ignoring her powerful grip.

  Once he had her standing, he locked her arms behind her back. “I dinna want to do this.”

  The room spun. “And yet you are.” She twisted and pain laced up her arm. She tried to keep from crying out, the sound squelched into something of a grunt.

  “This will only hurt if ye move,” he cautioned. “If ye thrash, ye could break yer arm.”

  His hold on her was strong and the heat of lust she'd experienced only moments before chilled into something cold and ugly. “You have no soul.”

  “If I had no soul, ye’d be dead, as would yer sister the moment the portcullis opened.” Bran nudged Marin forward, forcing her to walk.

  Frantic fear scrabbled through her. “Will you hurt them now?”

  “I told ye I wouldna.” He detained her with only one hand, his grip still strong, and unlatched the door and pulled it open.

  “And I’m to trust you? A reiver.” She glared at him over her shoulder.

  He returned his second hand to restraining her and steered her forward. “It would appear ye dinna have a choice.”

  Tears of helplessness blurred in her eyes. Some of Bran's men appeared in the halls as she was led through, their gazes bright with malicious curiosity. She hated the low-cut kirtle she wore now, and the way it left her vulnerable to the molestation of their leering stares.

  She blinked rapidly to keep the tears from spilling over. And then she saw them, the solemn faces of her sisters, bearing witness to her great failure. She had put them all at risk.

  Of all her stricken sisters, it was little Leila who strode forward and stood in Bran's path. “Where are you taking her?” Piquette left Anice’s side to accompany Leila, his front paws squared so the bulk of his chest stood out menacingly.

  “To the dungeon.” Bran steered Marin around her sister and Piquette. “And if ye try to stop me, little lass, ye'll join her.”

  “Leila, no,” Marin cried. “Please. Leave it be.”

  Leila's large eyes went luminous with unshed tears. “But I love you.”