Free Reluctant (Heroes of the Highlands) (The MacKays #3) by Kerrigan Byrne Page A

MacKay not only had four thousand men left, even after the battle was over, but a Berserker protecting them, as well.
    When the last of the Sutherland forces fell or fled, Soren saw that Kamdyn’s predictions proved wise. A number of his men hadn’t survived the day, but those that did joined the post-battle frenzy with the air of brotherhood only shared by those who’d bled next to each other.
    Soren was satisfied by this, surprised to discover the depth of his anxiety for the future of his men only after that future had been somewhat secured. The fates worked in strange ways, he supposed, and pointed his boots toward his own short-lived destiny.
    His blood was high, pounding through his veins with all the feral intensity of his past Berserker rage, but with a new abject clarity.
    He found his mate surveying the battlefield with the surprising satisfaction of a warrior. Her hair caught fire as the clouds gave way to afternoon sunlight.
    “One last time,” he murmured in her ear when he came up behind her.
    Her response was instant and ecstatic.
    They escaped to the Kyle with their preternatural speed. Their hurried and frigid bath was made too long by their inability to separate their ravenous mouths for more than a handful of moments.
    Soren didn’t lose his frenzied sense of heart-pounding, gut-wrenching, almost fear-inducing need until he had her splayed naked in the grass beneath him. He was very glad she was an immortal, for he’d be afraid to break her with the strength of his passion otherwise.
    This time, it wasn’t just her legs he wanted wrapped around him, but her arms, her lips, her very soul. Soren had given her everything. Would still give more. But he wanted something from her before she put him in the ground. He wanted to take a piece of her heart with him to the afterlife.
    He couldn’t bring himself to ask for it. He didn’t know the words, in her language or in his. Instead, he busied his tongue in other ways that kept either of them from talking. He claimed her mouth, worshiped her breasts, and nipped a trail of alternating kisses and nibbles down to the womanly flesh he most craved.
    Splaying his fingers on each of her slim thighs, he spread them wide, settling his shoulders between them. She was so delicate. So small and soft. As Soren dipped his head to kiss her intimately, he gloried in her gasps of delight. In the demanding little fingers she threaded in his hair. She tasted of salt and musk and insatiable desire. Her pliant flesh parted for his tongue, the bud of her pleasure nestled and waiting for him to pay it heed.
    To be cruel, he danced around it. Using his lips and tongue to torture her to the zenith of yearning need, only to deny her when her body tensed in the anticipation of her release.
    “Soren.” His name became a demand. Her fingers gripping and pulling at his hair with insistent pressure. His smile curled against her glistening sex as he looked up over her mound, the quivering muscles of her belly, and through the narrow valley of her breasts. The look in her eyes would follow him into the eternities. The sweetness had vanished. The charming naiveté gave way to a new creature. This one as primitive and selfish as he.
    He wanted to meet this creature. Wanted to mate with her, as well.
    “Do not make me beg,” she warned in a voice that was too husky with sex to be stern.
    His chuckle vibrated against her, causing her to dig her heels into the soft ground as her entire body tensed and trembled. Before his mouth drove her to a long and loud final release, she’d not only begged for it, she’d pled, entreated, and beseeched.
    ***
    Finally able to breathe, Kamdyn adjusted her exhausted legs as her Berserker beast crawled up her body with predatory grace. He left slick kisses on her belly, on her ribs, her breasts, and in the hollow of her throat.
    In such a short time, he’d become her world. She was aware of the fragrant Scottish earth beneath her and the rare blue autumn