Chapter 21
The candles burned softly and bathed the library in amber light and shadow. Emma slowly moved along the shelves, the leather bindings cool under her fingertips. She did not rush. The silence instead felt honest.
She couldn’t imagine how long she had been standing in this room, marveling at the number of books here. Books she couldn’t imagine Jack had. Books she had heard of but never seen. Books she didn’t even think existed.
Jack had left a few minutes ago to speak with some guards, and in those precious moments of solitude, Emma had read through a few other books.
Her eyes settled on her dress as she placed a slim book of poetry back in its place. She didn’t exactly know what she had been expecting while Ava was dressing her earlier that evening, but coming into a library in a red silk dress suddenly felt like immense overkill.
Ye didnae think this one through very well, did ye?
Jack came back a few minutes later. He did not speak at first, did not make a noise. He stood close enough that she could sense him, then he stepped beside her and plucked a thin, worn volume off a shelf.
Emma squinted her eyes as the book settled on his fingers. The front page glistened in gold yellow, and he read it aloud just as she did.
“Tales of Eve,” he said. “I doubt half the tales are decent.”
“Decent?”
“Eve McAllister,” Jack resumed, his voice clear. “She was a friend of me grandfaither’s. According to his story, Eve was a rather… curious woman. She gave in to many of her desires and documented her experiences.”
“I see,” Emma murmured, at a loss for words. Jack could see it as well. “So why do ye still have it?”
“Because it is a rare volume? Because I have found that sometimes truth can be found in the midst of indecency rather than in sermons?”
Emma swallowed, her words failing her once again. From where she stood, the line of Jack’s jaw was visible, and so was the stubble on it. She swallowed and shifted her gaze to the book instead. He opened it to a page that had been thumbed more than the rest.
His voice was low and even as he read a few lines. The verse was bold and sure of itself. Perhaps a bit too sure.
They had more vulgar details than needed, and the way he read them…
Good God, the way he read them.
Heat rose in her face before she could stop it, and she closed her eyes for a second, then opened them with as much composure as she could gather. Except his eyes were no longer on the page. They were on hers and were twinkling with mirth.
“Daenae laugh,” she huffed, feeling the heat spread to the roots of her hair.
Good going, Emma.
“Hard nae to when ye keep lookin’ at me like that,” he teased.
“Like what?”
“Like the words are crawling across yer skin.”
She opened her mouth to speak, perhaps to snap at him, but he gave her the book before she could get any words out. She swallowed, smiled at him, and closed the book. Feeling his eyes on her, she slid it back into place. “How about we try again, me Laird? This time, maybe something with less bite.”
“Less bite,” he repeated, as if weighing the words. “Or perhaps more.”
“Less,” she said, her voice firmer now, though she was still smiling.
A brief silence settled between them, but she could feel it even without saying it aloud.
Something had changed. The silence no longer felt comfortable, though just a bit unsettling. Now, it felt tense and charged. With what, she couldn’t tell. However, his words, when they broke the silence, told her all she needed to know.
“Ye think such wild tales of Eve could ever happen outside the pages?” he asked.
She felt warmth spread through her body. His gaze was now boring into her, and there was something behind it. Something ravenous. Something she, as hard as it was for her to admit, would love to see him unleash.
“Have ye ever tried enacting the tales?” she asked, her voice as sultry as it could be.
A smile crossed his face as he leaned forward, as if that was all the permission he needed.
“Nay,” he murmured.
“That is quite surprising, to say the least,” she breathed.
“Shall we put that to the test?” he asked, taking a step closer to her.
She meant to respond with something neat and clever, but his nearness stole her words. He stepped even closer, and she got a whiff of that scent she could never place. His breath stirred the short, loose strands near her ear, and a shiver rushed through her.
“What do ye want?”
Her eyes fluttered shut, relishing the feel of his breath against her neck and the heat radiating from him.
“What?” she muttered, unable to speak another word.
“Tell me what ye want, Emma,” Jack said again, his voice rough.
“Why?” she asked. “Do ye have something in mind?”
“Ye have nay idea the things I have in mind.”
She opened her eyes and held his gaze, feeling her pride rise fast. Her usual sense of habit followed right behind.
“Really? And what are those?”
He did not respond. Instead, he lifted a hand and set his fingers, light and deliberate, on her waist. He did not pull her in. He waited for her to make the next move.
She leaned toward him without thinking, her shoulder brushing the edge of a shelf in the process. Two books slid free from the impact and fell straight to the floor. A third slipped from above and grazed Jack’s boot. They both glanced down, then back at each other, and almost laughed.
“Careful,” she said softly.
“Aye,” he murmured. “Careful.”
She noticed that he did not crowd her. Instead, he let the space close at a pace that seemed chosen by her rather than by him. The candles around the room flickered at that moment, and a gust of wind slipped through windows she couldn’t see.
She could have stepped back, but she found she did not want to.
“So tell me, how much of these books have ye actually read?” she asked. “I need ye to be honest with me.”
“Enough,” he replied. “Enough to ken how to read people.”
She shook her head. “Is that why ye read books? To read people?”
“It helps a lot,” he said, still holding her gaze.
“Is that why ye are so confident?” Her breath was heavy, but her voice was steady enough. “Why ye seem to believe ye have everything under yer thumb?”
“Nay,” he said. “Nay man ever has everything under his thumb. Ye’re clever enough to ken that.”
“Am I?”
“Emma.”
“Ye cannae win me like a tourney,” she said.
“I daenae expect to.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “And what if I accuse ye of saying things ye think I want to hear?”
“I am saying things because of what I have learned about ye. If ye want me to wait, I can do that as well. I can learn how ye want to be held—” His voice dropped, low enough to send shivers down her spine. “How ye want to be touched.”
She swallowed. “And what if ye are unable to learn it?”
“That is impossible,” he declared.
She let out a small sound that might have been a laugh, had it not been so quiet. “I may be one of those women for all ye ken. Maybe yer words daenae work on me. Maybe I am only waiting out the five days as promised, so I can return to me clan.”
“If ye wanted to return,” he murmured, pulling her closer, “ye wouldnae have waited till now.”
She swallowed.
“Admit it. Admit that a part of this thrills ye as well. Ye cannae wait to see where this all leads to, and we both ken that.”
“Jack—”
“Ye daenae want to leave because ye want to ken what I am capable of. What ye are capable of if left in a room alone with me. What I might make ye do. How I can make ye feel.” His hand pressed into the small of her back, almost as if he knew it would further stoke the heat in her belly.
“Whether or nae I can make ye scream me name.”
Emma swallowed, struggling to disperse the wave of red that had crept onto her face. Fortunately, the light in the room was dim, or else this would have been an entirely different story. The last thing she wanted to do was grow vulnerable before Jack at this stage in their relationship.
“Ye ken, ye always walk a very fine line between arrogance and confidence. It is quite remarkable.”
Jack smirked at her. “So ye admit it.”
“Admit what?”
“That ye want me here,” he purred. “That ye want me in this room. Ye want me this close to ye. Even closer.”
She did not look away. “Ye are so sure of what I want, are ye nae?”
“Well, here is what I can admit. I want to kiss ye. I want that more than anything on this earth,” he admitted, leaning in.
The space between them was barely an inch. The hair on the nape of her neck stood on end. She could feel the heat pooling between her legs.
She studied his face in the dim light, his jaw, the way his lips moved as he spoke, the hunger in his eyes. At that moment, she couldn’t imagine anything else.
Anything but kissing him, too.
“Aye,” she whispered.
Their lips met.
He kissed her fervently, like a man claiming a prize, and his hands roamed over her body as if he needed to discover it immediately. Like his body needed hers to survive.
His tongue invaded her mouth, and she let it, his dominance driving her closer to insanity with each passing second.
Her hands, which had been hanging at her sides the entire time, curled into fists, slowly uncurled, and before she could stop them, rose to his chest. The flat of her palm pressed hard against the fabric, feeling his heartbeat and nothing else.
His mouth left hers and trailed down her neck, teasing and biting her skin. A small, broken sound escaped her throat, almost as if it was her final act of surrender, of yielding the last bit of control and resistance.
Amid the frenzy and haze and the smell of books and smoke from the candle flames, one thing was clear. At that moment, in this library, between the bookshelves, she wanted him.
Good God, she wanted him more than anything.
His right hand rose to the back of her head and cradled it, while his other hand curled tighter around her waist, pressing her against him.