Free The Chieftain's Yule Bride - a Highland Christmas novella (Clan MacKrannan's Secret Traditions #10) by Jonnet Carmichael Page B

floor."
     

     
    It took all the willpower he had no' to grab her up and go.  Her body was as ready for him now as his own had been when first they met, but her heart needed a bit extra time.  This was a physical thing for her still, tagged onto the connection made for them by her ancestors. He'd be having more than that from her... and would have laughed at himself for his thoughts had his shaft no' been aching fit to burst.
    All those years of keeping clingy women at bay, keeping it strictly fun, and now he was denying the only one he would ever want again because she was no' clingy enough.
    She opened the dishwasher and busied herself with shoving the dinnerplates into the rack, so he helped her with that by passing dishes to her.  It was as cosy a domestic scene as they'd be getting this night and quickly over when she hit the start button.  With the only chore complete, Freya was biting at her lip.
    "Want to watch TV?" she said vaguely.
    Awkward she was with him now, thinking how else she could entertain him outside of a bed.
    "No, I don't, Freya.  Let's get something out the way.  The woman I've been seeing is a doctor.  My tests are clean."
    Her chin came up defiantly.  "More of your chivalry?  Okay, I see what you're asking.  It's on every bride and groom's ticklist nowadays, isn't it?  Shop for wedding rings and visit the clinic – a real romantic day out that was last Monday.  And I'm on the pill too.  Can't be too careful about the pregnancy bit."
    "Your man's idea."  He didn't say it as a question and she didn't argue.
    "The rest of this week we've been in different countries and met at the airport on Friday to come up to Scotland... and we haven't... I just couldn't at the castle.  Tell me why that is, Callum!  From the minute I met you in that Banqueting Hall my whole life has been torn up the middle.  It's more than the portrait, isn't it?  More than recognizing you from god knows where!  Why am I doing this..."
    He pulled her into his arms to soothe her but it only reignited the spark and they were kissing again.  He had to find some distraction.
    "Tomorrow, lass.  Show me the Harper landscapes now, if that's alright when Isla's out."
    That calmed her.  "It's fine.  She'll expect me to show them to you before she gets home.  They're in the parlor.  Some of them, anyway.  Auntie will know where the rest are."
    She led him through to a land of faded chintz and a different cat lying on a hearth rug, ignoring them.  The Celtic patterning was in here again, this time all round the ceiling coving.  Nice molding, that.  Along the mantelpiece was the Cailleach in a row of nine, as Freya had said, and the other gods and goddesses on every available surface.  A homely place for a MacKrannan, had Isla known it, which he was damned sure she would by now.
    "These are the ones he painted at home in Orkney.  I don't know anything about them.  This one's really a seascape and takes in his own home near Stromness.  So Auntie told me.  I've never been.  We've no family left there."
    It was clearly the same artist as the portrait and he watched a tremor run through Freya now that she knew what else her ancestor had painted that she hadn't known about.  He moved behind her and slid his hands round her trim wee waist.
    "I've never been either.  Want to go?"
    She took a minute to think about it, knowing he meant it as far more than a sightseeing trip.  He'd been right to keep her downstairs for now.  This fair lass was unready for more than a slaking of lust born of physical attraction and fired up by the portrait's nearness.  He could hardly believe he was passing up the chance of that.
    Once her mind was made up she was all practicalities.  "Alright, but this is my research – I'm paying."
    "No' in me to let you do that.  And the minstrel's portrait belongs to the MacKrannans."  He gave her a tickle.  She squirmed round and they were kissing again.
    This time he didn't care who