We hadn’t gone back to the printshop but had wandered down by the river, enjoying the coolness of the night air and chatting about the young couples and the excitements of the day.
“I imagine their nights are bein’ a bit more exciting still,” Jamie remarked. “Reckon the lassies will be sore come morning, poor wee things.”
“Oh, it may not be just the girls,” I said, and he sniffed with amusement.
“Aye, well, ye may be right about that. I seem to recall wakin’ the next morning after our wedding and wondering for a moment whether I’d been in a fight. Then I saw you in the bed wi’ me and knew I had.”
“Didn’t slow you down any,” I remarked, dodging a pale stone in my path. “I seem to recall being rather rudely awakened next morning.”
“Rude? I was verra gentle with ye. More than ye were with me,” he added, a distinct grin in his voice. “I told Ian so.”
“You told Ian what?”
“Well, he wanted advice, and so I—”
“Advice? Ian?” To my certain knowledge, the boy had begun his sexual career at the age of fourteen, with a prostitute of similar age in an Edinburgh brothel, and hadn’t looked back. Besides his Mohawk wife, there were at least half a dozen other liaisons that I knew of, and I was sure I didn’t know them all.
“Aye. He wanted to know how to deal kindly wi’ Rachel, her bein’ virgin. Something new to him,” he added wryly.
I laughed.
“Well, they’ll be having an interesting night of it, then—all of them.” I told him about Dottie’s request in camp, Rachel’s advent, and our ad hoc session of premarital counseling.
“Ye told them what?” He snorted with amusement. “Ye make me say, ‘Oh, God,’ all the time, Sassenach, and it’s mostly not to do wi’ bed at all.”
“I can’t help it if you’re naturally disposed to that expression,” I said. “You do say it in bed with no little frequency. You even said it on our wedding night. Repeatedly. I remember.”
“Well, little wonder, Sassenach, wi’ all the things ye did to me on our wedding night.”
“What I did to you?” I said, indignant. “What on earth did I do to you?”
“Ye bit me,” he said instantly.
“Oh, I did not! Where?”
“Here and there,” he said evasively, and I elbowed him. “Oh, all right—ye bit me on the lip when I kissed ye.”
“I don’t recall doing that at all,” I said, eyeing him. His features were invisible, but the moonglow off the water as he walked cast his bold, straightnosed profile in silhouette. “I remember you kissing me for quite a long time while you were trying to unbutton my gown, but I’m sure I didn’t bite you then.”
“No,” he said thoughtfully, and ran a hand lightly down my back. “It was later. After I went out to fetch ye some food, and Rupert and Murtagh and the rest all chaffed me. I know, because it was when I drank some o’ the wine I’d fetched back, I noticed it burned the cut in my lip. And I bedded ye again before I got round to the wine, so it must ha’ been that time.”
“Ha,” I said. “By that time, you wouldn’t have noticed if I’d bitten your head off like a praying mantis. You’d got it properly up your nose and thought you knew everything.”
He put an arm round my shoulders, pulled me close, and whispered in my ear, “I’d got it properly up you, a nighean. And ye weren’t noticing all that much yourself, besides what was goin’ on between your legs.”
“Rather hard to ignore that sort of carry-on,” I said primly.
He gave the breath of a laugh and, stopping under a tree, gathered me in and kissed me. He had a lovely soft mouth.
“Well, I willna deny ye taught me my business, Sassenach,” he murmured. “And ye made a good job of it.”
“You caught on reasonably quickly,” I said. “Natural talent, I suppose.”
“If it was a matter of special training, Sassenach, the human race would ha’ died out long since.” He kissed me again, taking more time over it.
“D’ye think Denny kens what he’s about?” he asked, letting go. “He’s a virtuous wee man, aye?”
“Oh, I’m sure he knows everything he needs to,” I protested. “He’s a physician, after all.”
Jamie gave a cynical laugh.
“Aye. While he may see the odd whore now and then, it’s likely in the way of his profession, not hers. Besides . . .” He moved close and, putting his hands through the pocket slits in my skirt, took a firm and interesting grip on my bottom. “Do they teach ye in medical college how to spread your wife’s wee hams and lick her from tailbone to navel?”
“I didn’t teach you that one!”
“Indeed ye didn’t. And you’re a physician, no?”
“That—I’m sure that doesn’t make any sense. Are you drunk, Jamie?” “Dinna ken,” he said, laughing. “But I’m sure you are, Sassenach. Let’s go home,” he whispered, leaning close and drawing his tongue up the side of my neck. “I want ye to make me say, ‘Oh, God,’ for ye.”
“That . . . could be arranged.” I’d cooled down during our walk, but the last five minutes had lit me like a candle, and if I’d wanted to go home and take off my stays before, I was now wondering whether I could wait that long.
“Good,” he said, pulling his hands out of my skirt. “And then I’ll see what I can make you say, mo nighean donn.”