And she wanted him.
He was either the luckiest bastard in all the world, or cursed beyond redemption, being tempted to heaven before he tasted the bitterness of hell.
He made no move to lie down again—or leave.
She rose to her knees as well, put her arms around him from behind, pressed her cheek to his back. “Stay.”
He caught her hand where it lay splayed over his chest, against his heart. He went over his rules in his mind. He didn’t dally with virgins, or women who belonged to other men—wives, fiancées, sweethearts—or even sisters, for that matter. Gillian MacLeod was all those things.
She was also everything he’d ever desired in a woman. He hadn’t even known that until he met her. He’d wandered around the earth for nearly thirty years without a clue, and now it was too late.
He knew he should fling her off, push her away, make a clever quip, laugh, and let her sleep alone. A long, cold night in the wood was just what he needed.
But she curled her hand against his chest, and her nails tickled him, aroused him, and he shut his eyes.
“Oh, lass, we can’t—shouldn’t.” His voice was thick. “Though I’ve never wanted anything more.”
She moved until she was facing him, the boughs creaking and whispering beneath her. He felt the soft brush of her lips against his.
With a groan, he cupped her face in his hands and kissed her properly. She answered in kind, kiss for kiss. She drew him back down onto their springy green bed.
He ran his mouth over her chin, her throat, the slopes of her breasts. He caressed the curve of her slender waist. He’d been here before, knew her body this far and no farther.
Her fingers fumbled with the fastenings on his leather jack in the dark, inexperienced and clumsy. He pulled them open for her, as eager as she. He groaned when she loosened the laces of his shirt and kissed his chest, her mouth gentle and reverent on his bare skin.
Don’t fall in love, his fevered brain warned him.
But he knew it was already too late.
* * *
It was too dark to see, but Gillian remembered how John looked at the farm, naked to the waist in the morning sun. She’d wanted to touch him then, to run her fingers over the silver scar, the smooth golden skin. She wanted it more now.
“The scar,” she whispered, finding it with her fingertips, then her lips. “Was it from the same attack?”
“Nay.” His voice was gruff, breathless.
She kissed it again and ran her hand over the hard planes of muscle and sinew, learning the shape of his body, wanting to know every inch of him. She reached down boldly and brushed her palm against the bulge in his breeches. He grunted and put his hand on hers.
“Nay, lass. It’s not my right. That belongs to—” She kissed him before he could finish the thought.
“This isn’t about anyone else, John Erly. It’s about you and I, and what we want. This is what I want,” she said tartly.
“There are ways to please each other without taking your virginity,” he said.
“That’s not good enough. A taste, a sip. I had that at the masquerade. It wasn’t enough even then.”
“One kiss in the moonlight, and I couldn’t forget you. This—This could kill me. I suspect once with you would never be enough.”
She curled her fingers against his chest. He touched her face, kissed her gently.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered.
“It’s dark,” she whispered back.
“Ah, but I can see you anyway. Your eyes are as green as the hills of Scotland, and heavy-lidded with passion. Your hair is tangled with fir needles and from the wind. There are soft tendrils around your face, and against your cheeks, which are flushed.” He kissed her. “Your lips are pink from my kisses, plump.”
He kissed her again, her poet, her rogue, her lover. “More,” she said on a sigh, arching against him.
“More bad poetry and inadequate compliments?” he said, and she heard the smile in his voice.
“Nay, more kisses, more of—everything. You’re also beautiful. Is it right to say so, to a man?”
“In the dark?” he quipped, and laughed as he kissed her again. She drank him in, opened to him, tasted him as her hands roamed. She pulled his shirt out of his breeches, caressed his skin, warm silk over steel. The soft endearments he whispered in her ear, in English, in Gaelic, in French, told her he liked her caresses. She knew the ultimate aim, wanted that, but she had no idea how to obtain it, what to do next, how to ease the ache in her body.
“I don’t . . . Show me what to do.”
“It’s a dance,” he said, kissing the sensitive place under her ear. “We move together, partners, learning how to please each other.” He ran his fingers over her shoulders, across the slopes of her breasts, a light, tickling touch along the edge of her bodice, and she shivered. “Sometimes we go slow . . .” She gasped and closed her eyes as his hand dipped past the layers of lace and silk and linen to cup her breast. He ran his thumb over the taut peak of her nipple, and she drew a sharp breath and arched against him. “And sometimes we go faster . . .”
She slid her arms around his neck, raised her mouth to his, and kissed him. He opened, and her tongue slipped into his mouth, shyly, then more boldly when he groaned softly. “Can we go faster now?” she asked.
He laughed against her mouth. “Slow is better.”
She whimpered. “John . . .”
He deepened the kiss, pulled her closer still, and she moved against him restlessly. “You’re making my intention to go slow almost impossible.”
It was her turn to smile. “Good,” she said, feeling deliciously wicked. “Then I suspect I’m doing this right after all.”
* * *
She was doing everything right. He was on fire. Her bodice was too tightly fitted to pull down, and his mouth watered to taste her, to feel her naked body against his own.
“The laces,” he said, reaching behind her. They were still face-to-face on their knees in the close confines of their shelter, just big enough for two, and for this.
He was an expert at all manner of laces, fastenings, and corsets—usually. He fumbled now. The strings were tangled, or knotted. Impatiently, he broke them, and loosened the gown, pushed it off her shoulders and down. He cupped the silken, perfect weight of her breasts in his palms, then lowered his mouth to take her erect nipple into his mouth. She sighed, murmured, and arched against him, her hands twined in his hair, holding him to her. He moved to the other breast, intoxicated by the sweet, feminine scent of her skin mixed with the aroma of their pine bower. Her small sounds of pleasure drove him wild. He reached for the hem of her skirt, and silently cursed the endless yards of silk that covered her, as he tried to find his way beneath it. She shifted, tried to make it easier, and he found her ankle, her booted foot, and her thick, sensible woolen stockings, made for riding, and at odds with a silk ball gown. They ended at her knees, and then there was only skin, warm and soft, along the back of her thighs. He skimmed upward to cup the round sweetness of her bare bottom. He pressed her against his erection, and she shifted, rubbing, driving him wild.
Mine, he thought. Mine, as he kissed her naked breasts, her throat, her mouth, marked her as his. For now, an inner voice warned him.
She wasn’t his to keep.
But that made him want her all the more, to ensure that she thought of him when the man she married touched her, took her to his bed, that she never, ever forgot this moment.
A dangerous game, but one he was powerless to resist.
He slid his hand over her hip, placed his palm over the nest of curls, let his fingers tickle the delicate lips of her sex, caressing her with the lightest possible strokes. She leaned backward over his arm, and he could imagine how her breasts looked, arched, peaked and perfect.
“Hmm,” she moaned, writhing. “I want . . .”
He grinned. She wasn’t shy now, here, with him. She was never shy with him, he realized. He knew exactly wh
at she wanted, what she needed.
He laid her down, parted her thighs, stroked her gently, a sweet, slow caress, and she cried out, urged him on, losing herself to pleasure in his arms. He licked her nipples, used his hands and his mouth to take her beyond madness. He wished it wasn’t pitch dark, that there was light enough to watch her climax rise over her face, to let him see her grow flushed and rosy, her eyes closed, her lips softly parting as she panted for him. Yet the dark made it more erotic still. He felt her response, heard it, tasted it. She gasped, mewed his name, and arched again, clinging to his shoulders, digging her nails into his flesh. He felt her release come over her.
He caught her soft cries in his mouth, held her, felt her heart pound with his as he opened his breeches.
He positioned himself between her thighs, nudged her, and she held her breath. “Breathe,” he said as he entered her with one swift, smooth stroke. Her body tensed for an instant under his. “Breathe,” he said again, as much to himself as her. He held himself still, allowing her a moment, though it was like trying to hold back a stampede of wild horses. When she was ready, soft and supple beneath him, her hips shifting in a silent plea for more, he withdrew and plunged again, slowly, teaching her, loving her. “Put your legs around me,” he said. “Move with me, sweetheart.”
“It feels—perfect,” she whispered, and put her arms around his neck. “There’s more, isn’t there?”
He grinned. “Much more. Everything.”
He began to move then, and she instinctively tilted her hips to take all of him. Her soft sighs became moans, then cries.
He felt her inner flesh ripple around him, drawing him in, enveloping him. He growled her name as he arched into her one last time. His release seemed to go on forever, powerful and perfect, and when it ended, he fell against her and gathered her in his arms.
He felt her heart beating against his. He didn’t want to let go, to withdraw and leave her.
He shifted, held her close, felt her relax and fall asleep, curled against him. He kissed her brow, her cheek, her shoulder, and drew the folds of her gown over them both, and sighed with contentment. He closed his own eyes and smiled in the dark, feeling pure male pride, and more.
Mine . . .
CHAPTER NINETEEN
When Gillian woke in the pale light of dawn, her first sight was John. He lay on his side next to her, with his head propped on his elbow, watching her. His gray eyes were heavy lidded, and a lock of hair fell over his brow, half hiding the injury there. She imagined how she must appear to him, though she wasn’t usually vain. But when this man looked at her, she wanted to be beautiful. Something in his expression now told her she was. She felt a thrill in her breast, and she smiled at him and reached to touch his face, running her thumb over the golden stubble on his jaw. He caught her hand and kissed her palm, his eyes on hers, filled with something that took her breath away.
“Is it time to get up?” she asked.
“Nay. It’s barely light. Go back to sleep.”
“With you watching me? I should check your head. I should—” She tried to rise, but he put his hand on her shoulder, pressed her gently back against the boughs.
“There’s nothing wrong with my head. Well, there’s a lump, but otherwise, it’s as good as it usually is.” She put her hand up to touch it, but he caught her fingertips. “Truly, I’m fine, Gillian. Let it be. And you, sweetheart?” He looked at the bruise on her cheek, ran his eyes over her and swallowed.
“I’m fine,” she said quickly. “Better than fine.” She slid her arm around his neck and kissed him. He kissed her back, pulling her close.
“Is it possible to do it again?” she asked as he kissed her ear.
He laughed. “Greedy wench.”
She frowned. “Am I? Is it wrong then?”
“Nay, lass, you’re perfect.” The bright light in his eyes darkened. “But it’s daylight now. There will be people looking for you, wanting to know you’re safe.”
“I am safe,” she said. “I’m with you.”
He rolled away from her. “Gillian, you belong to another man. What would he say if—”
She sat up and stopped his words with a kiss. “I belong to you, John.”
Hesitation and torment swirled in the gray depths of his eyes. “I wish that were true, or even possible.”
“Why can’t it be?”
He laughed. “Your father, your sister . . . my father for that matter. I have nothing to offer you.”
“Because you were disowned?” she said. “There’s more to your story, isn’t there? What happened when you went home?”
He laughed bitterly. “You want all if it, do you? Every detail?”
“Aye,” she said simply, wondering if he’d tell her. He scanned her face, and she waited for him to decide.
He looked away with a sigh. “All right then. My father was more angry than sorrowful when I told him. He blamed me for all of it—for Daniel’s death, for drawing him into my rake’s life of disrepute and sin. He said he’d see me hang before giving me his title in my brother’s place. But he needed an heir, of course, and my mother was long dead.”
He paused, was silent for so long she thought he’d changed his mind, wouldn’t tell her after all. She shook his arm gently. “There’s nothing you can say that would make you less in my eyes, John. I see—know—what kind of man you truly are.”
He stared at her. “You are a remarkable woman. I’m not sure if you’re just naive, or—Oh, lass. I’m not worth what I can see in your eyes. If I’d seen it last night—”
“Dawn always comes. It’s a new day, and I’m not ashamed of what we did. Are you?”
He studied his hands. “I have more experience. I know better than to play with innocents.”
“Even an innocent can know what she wants, what’s right for her.”
He laughed harshly. “Then you should hear the rest of the story. I’m not blameless or shameless. It will clear the stars from your eyes.”
She simply waited, gave him space to speak, to trust her.
He sighed. “After I spoke to my father I went to see Daniel’s betrothed, to tell her she was free. I left out the part about Hurit, gave Dorothea and her family the barest details. Dorothea’s mother wept. Her father knew how Clive felt about me. He wisely suggested that I give my father time to grieve. He believed that he would see things more clearly in a few days. Dorothea looked—cold. I thought it was shock, that she’d fall apart later, in private, cry for the man she’d known and loved all her life. I thought she loved him.”
“But she didn’t?”
“Nay. There was a ball planned for her birthday, you see, a masquerade. She refused to allow anyone to cancel it, even for mourning. It had been six months since Daniel’s death, and there was no body to bury, no funeral to attend. Dorothea said she’d been grieving Daniel’s departure for over a year, and that was enough. She insisted I must come, wish her happy. I’d known her all my life as well, thought of her as a sister, a dear friend. So I went to the party. I donned a mask and domino, and drank too much. I let a masked woman take my hand and lead me into the garden.”
She gasped and he looked at her sharply. “Aye, Gillian—that’s why I should have known better than to go with you.”
“Why did you?”
“I didn’t intend to. I intended to go back to my cott—alone—as soon as I could get away from Fia’s party. But you—” His eyes roamed over her face. “I can’t recall ever wanting to kiss a woman as much as I wanted to kiss you. I should have known better—”
She sat up and cupped his head, turned his face to hers. “I wanted to kiss you, John Erly. I wanted—” She bit her lip. “I wish I’d been braver then, now I know. My sister said you weren’t for me, not for a beginner. She warned me—”
He pulled away. “You should have listened to her.” He indicated their tiny shelter with a wave of his hand. “This—has only served to prove her right.”
“I’m not such a fool as to be
gulled into giving what I don’t wish to give. I wanted this. It was my choice.” She hesitated. “Was it yours?”
For a moment he scanned her face, and she held his gaze. “God forgive me, yes. I wanted you. Have I done wrong?”
“Of course not.”
“But Fia—”
“Fia isn’t here, nor is anyone else. This is between us, what we want, what we think. Tell me about the other masquerade ball,” she said.
He swallowed. “I set out to seduce the masked woman—any women would have done. I wanted to forget everything in her arms, in her body. She was willing . . .”
He closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “Then Dorothea’s mother arrived with three footmen, carrying torches. She knew exactly where to find us. My father was there as well, though he hadn’t been a guest at the party. My would-be lover was half undressed, and so was I, and I did my best to shield her from prying eyes and accusations.”
A flush of hot blood rose over his face, even now. “She took of her mask. It was Dorothea. “You’re too early,” she said to her mother. “He hasn’t—” He swallowed. “And I knew. I knew that my brother’s betrothed had planned a seduction to force a marriage so she could still marry my father’s heir, become countess. There was no regret in her eyes, no shame for what she’d done. My father drew his sword and insisted that I must wed Dorothea the very next morning. Perhaps I should have, for honor’s sake. But I saw the cunning in her eyes, knew she wanted only a title and a fortune, that she wasn’t the woman I thought I knew. For Daniel’s sake—and for my own—I refused to marry her. You asked about the scar on my ribs. My father stabbed me. That’s the truth of where it came from. My father tried to run me through at a masquerade ball, while my family’s dearest friends cheered him on.”
He met Gillian’s eyes. “Clive was the magistrate. He had me arrested for rape, had his men drag me to the darkest cell of Coldburn Keep, said he’d see me hang.
“I was thrown into the same cell as Dair Sinclair, a mad, tortured, beaten Scot. In the cell next to his, they held his cousin Jeannie. They’d been there for many days when I arrived. My father ordered that as well, Dair’s capture, all of it.”
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