Chapter 23
“Ye have nay issue sleeping on the floor, aye?” Emily asked cheekily as she sauntered into the room, her hips swaying a touch more dramatically than they needed to.
The wine had warmed her skin and made her acutely aware of every point where her clothes touched her body. She kept focusing on the way her skirts swished around her legs. Even more effort was needed to keep away the memories of Kaden’s hands under her skirts.
Being alone in a room with him was the very last thing she wanted.
Well, that wasn’t technically true. But it was what she was going to convince herself was wholly factual.
“And just why would I be sleeping on the floor?” Kaden asked.
She heard a shuffle and then a heavy thunk as his boots hit the floor. She spun around to find him making himself comfortable.
It was so difficult to convince herself that she needed to tear her eyes from his muscular figure. It was simply not what she ought to be focused on at a time like this.
But he was taking off his his tartan and his shirt clung to his muscles in ways that made her want to trace each one of them with her fingers. What was wrong with her?
Well, maybe seeing him in only his shirt and kilt was…distracting. He stepped forward to wrap the tartan around her.
“When we are married, ye will have to share me bed, ye ken?”
Emily was now almost too distracted to notice.
She ought not to accept the warmth of his tartan, but it smelled nice, and it was far warmer than she had expected.
She tracked his movements across the small room as he skirted the corner of the bed and started to build up the fire in the grate.
The ease of said movements was mesmerizing.
The way his muscles flexed underneath his shirt with each piece of wood he added painted pictures of him carrying her somewhere.
Or him being on top of her somewhere. Oh dear.
“Do ye think Maggie is afraid?” she blurted, not wanting to think about being in his bed for a second longer. Least of all when she could still see the muscles in his back rippling as he worked.
“Nay.”
“Nay?”
Kaden shook his head and sat back on his heels. It was the closest they had been to eye level since—
Emily shook her head to clear that thought. At least at dinner, there had been a table between the two of them.
Honestly, what was the matter with her? She must just be feeling overly permissive because of how generous he had been today. Certainly, that was the extent of it.
“She’s a wild pup,” he explained. “While her fur might have gotten her stuck once, this isnae the first storm that she’s experienced, and it willnae be the last.” He shrugged. “She’s more than likely pleased to be inside.”
Emily nodded and sat on the edge of the bed, pulling the tartan around her shoulders. She scooted closer toward the fire. How had the temperature dropped so suddenly?
Kaden turned and grabbed her foot to start unlacing her boot. “The rug’s warmer than yer boots, lass. I’m sure of that.”
It did look comfortable.
“Daenae get any wise ideas.”
Kaden smirked, but lowered his head so that she wasn’t able to see his eyes. “Me? I wasnae aware ye thought of me as the smart type.”
Emily returned his smirk. “Well, ye have to have somethin’ between yer ears if ye are a laird. At least, I would hope so.”
Kaden pulled her other boot free. “Isnae that what a wife is for? Telling her husband what to do and when to do it?”
Not in the household she had grown up in, that much was for certain. Yet, it was how any marriage she was in should be. That was how she had always pictured it. She was just as good a markswoman as any man. She was just as good on horseback and any number of other things.
She liked to think that she was a far superior tracker when she didn’t have so many layers of skirts around her legs.
She knew that it was ‘improper’ for a lady to rule, but she had thought that any man who managed to capture her heart would think of her as more of an equal.
She didn’t want a marriage like her mother’s or other women’s.
“Is that how it was with yer maither?” she asked.
“From what I can remember, it was something like that,” Kaden admitted, resting his hands on his thighs as he looked up at her from where he knelt on the floor.
“Whether or nae me faither took her advice, that’s nae something I can remember.
” He lifted a shoulder in a shrug. “She certainly did a good job running things with the help of the council all these years.”
“She led?”
“After me faither and I were taken, what other choice did she have? She couldnae allow the lairdship to fall to another. She couldnae just lie down in her grief and lose everything. She thought that we were dead, ye ken? She didnae want us to have died for nothing.”
Suddenly, Emily found herself wanting to know the woman who had birthed him a whole lot better.
She was going to have to make a much more serious effort to get to know Ailis and Kaden’s sisters more.
If what he said was true and there was honestly nothing between him and Shona, she might as well make more of a place for herself here with them.
She could lower her guard a small amount. Could she not?
“That’s nae exactly what most men seem to want in a woman,” Emily said. Though it would be a lie to say that she wasn’t testing his reaction to that comment.
He shrugged. “Insecure men, perhaps. What fun is a useless woman?”
“Or man,” she added.
Kaden flashed her a genuine smile and nodded in agreement. “Aye, or man.”
Emily just now realized that he was still holding the back of her calf under her skirt. She tried to pull away from the warmth of his hand, but he only tightened his grip.
“Perhaps we ought to rest, since we will have to leave early tomorrow.”
Kaden’s thumb brushed across her calf, and she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. “Is that truly what ye want?”
Was it?
Emily’s chin dipped, and she shook her head. “I daenae wish to keep playing this game, Kaden. I daenae like the hot and cold attitude, the back and forth. If that is what this is to ye, I would much rather that we keep a clear boundary until after the year is up.”
She glanced up in time to see confusion flicker across his face. He was good at concealing his emotions, but she was getting better at reading them every day.
“Is that what ye think I am doing? Playing a game?”
Emily nodded, but couldn’t make eye contact as he rose to his knees, pushing himself into the space between hers. He hooked a finger under her chin and forced her to look at him.
“Normally, people have fun when they are playing games, nay?” His gaze pinned her in place; she couldn’t have pulled away even if she wanted to. He was barely touching her, and yet he might as well have pinned her to the bed. “Usually, I only ache when ye are present.”
Something in her softened as she leaned into his touch.
“Ask me.” He leaned closer, his lips close enough for her to smell the sweet almond-flavored whiskey on his breath.
“Please,” she whispered.
She had barely finished speaking the word before he kissed her.
How did he manage to kiss her with his whole body every time he touched her? What magic was this?
Kaden wrapped his arms around her as he deepened the kiss. Heat pooled in her core as he tightened his grip on her. Her knees parted further to give him better access, the weight of him pulling closer warming every inch of her body.
A soft gasp escaped her lips as he tore his lips from hers, a whisper of contact that traced down her jawline to her neck. He spoke directly into her ear, his deep voice making her shudder.
How was it possible to want someone this badly without having truly touched them?
Emily only wanted to make him feel as good as he made her feel. She wanted to make him feel as crazed and desperate for such soft touches. Yet, he always seemed in complete and total control.
Slowly, she placed her hands on his shoulders in the hope that he wouldn’t pull away. He always shrugged out of her touch every time she tried to get closer to him.
He didn’t pull away this time, but he did lower himself once more and leaned back on his heels.
“Ye ken, there are a few more things that we can do that willnae leave ye with child.” Kaden bent to the exposed inside of her knee and pressed a soft, lingering kiss there that sent a shudder right up her spine.
She knew that she ought to stop him from running his hands up her inner thighs like that. She ought to have more control over the situation and stop him from making her core heat the way it did.
But how was she supposed to do anything of the sort when she was wholly and utterly pinned in place by his gaze? His deep brown eyes held her prisoner as her breath caught in her lungs.
“Aye?” she breathed.
The devilish look that overtook his features had nearly undone her, and he had barely even touched her.
The warm air in the room kissed her skin in between each brush of his lips against her inner thigh.
Anticipation of the pleasure that he had given her before curled in her belly as he pulled her closer to the edge of the bed, nearly knocking her off balance.
He parted her thighs until they were stretched, readying himself to feast upon her.
He kissed the inside of one thigh and then the other, teasing her by never kissing her right where she needed him most. Over and around, until she felt his thumb brush against her sex, running along her slit.
He used her wetness to part her nether lips, then slipped one long finger inside her, and she nearly collapsed onto the bed.
Perhaps Emily ought to be embarrassed by the sounds she was making; there were people in all the rooms around them. She certainly didn’t wish to endure the shame of facing someone who might have heard the noises she was making as they walked down the hallway past their room.