Chapter 14 #2
He clenched a fistful of her nightdress, gripping it at the curve of her hip, and then he let it fall again.
“Ye daenae ken the danger ye’re in,” he rasped, and finally lowered his arm from her neck.
“I am in no danger,” she replied firmly.
If he had wanted to hurt her or kill her, he would have done it when she crept in through his window. If he had wanted to be as cruel as his nickname suggested, he would have kicked her out of his castle or delivered her straight to Edwin.
No matter what he said now, she knew she was safe with him. She would not believe otherwise.
He stood straighter, putting a sliver of distance between them. Not nearly enough to make a difference. True, she could not feel the graze of his body against her anymore, but there was a hum in that tiny gap between them that seemed to want to pull them back together.
“I could have broken yer neck just now,” he warned. “All because ye couldnae follow simple rules.”
“And I know you would not have harmed me,” she countered. “I have trusted you from the moment you agreed to help me. That has not changed, simply because you didn’t know who was stepping into your… private domain.”
He pressed his palm to the wall beside her head. “Ye shouldnae trust me.”
“You don’t fool me, my Laird,” she insisted, her courage unwavering.
“You shaved your beard for a baby. You let us stay because we were in actual danger. You came running because you thought I was in distress at the loch. You are no more dangerous to me than that fox cub. No, I don’t think you are what you are trying to show you are, not at all. ”
She took a breath, adding with a daring smile, “And I came here to confirm that.”
“Daenae fool yerself,” he replied, those grey eyes shining. “Daenae pretend I’m anythin’ but a beast, Sunshine, or else ye’re settin’ yerself up for disappointment.”
Frustration fizzed in her veins. Had she not just proven her theory very clearly? Had she not just pointed out why she was not mistaken?
“I know what a real beast is, and he is an Englishman with red hair,” she shot back. “So, go on, tell me. Tell me what is so terrible about you. Tell me what it is that I am clearly missing, because I am at a loss.”
A bitter laugh tore from his throat. “Ye daenae want to find out, lass. Just stop. Just leave, daenae cross me path again, and spend the rest of yer time here dancin’ and singin’ in the garden with yer niece. Just take yerself back to yer chambers and stay there.”
“Or what?”
He grabbed her chin, though she was already looking him in the eye, fury burning within her.
“Or I’ll lose control,” he whispered. “Are ye so eager to find out what happens when I lose control, Sunshine?”
Her mouth opened to retort, but she didn’t manage a single word. His lips silenced any protest or further interrogation, his kiss hard and hungry, startling her.
In her daydreams as a younger woman, she had imagined her first kiss would be a gentle thing, a soft, shy graze, almost chaste. Not this… crush of passion, of need, that unleashed something within her. A wildness that life and circumstances and, indeed, society had kept restrained.
Like a taunt, she knew she could not let him have the last word.
Gripping his shirt in her hands, she responded, kissing him back with all of the anger and all of the curiosity and all of the want that had lain dormant inside her, just waiting for the right moment.
She kissed him fervently, even though she didn’t know what she was doing, following the press and ebb of his mouth, learning quickly.
It was almost like a fight, seeing who could kiss the other into submission, and she didn’t much care who won.
As her breathing grew ragged, her body blazing with desire, pressing against his, she could feel everything else falling away. There was only him and the journey of his hands as they grasped at her nightdress and her flesh, awakening her to sensations she hadn’t known existed.
How could it be that the skim of his palm over her breast could make her stomach tighten and her breath catch? How could it be that the grip of his hand on her hip made her legs tremble? How could it be that his cupping her backside, pulling her against him, could coax a moan from her throat?
He had claimed that this was him losing control, yet it seemed to her that he had complete control. Over her.
As if to prove his point, she gasped as he suddenly lifted her and pressed her against the wall.
Her legs wrapped around him instinctively, a soft cry slipping past her lips as she felt a hardness between her thighs—the part of him that she had almost glimpsed when he had given her his plaid to cover her and keep her warm.
You see, not a beast. What beast would give his own clothes to keep a woman warm?
She would have told him so, had she not been so busy kissing him, her hands running down his back, his arms.
His hand now gripped the back of her neck, his fingers splayed in her hair, while his other hand sank into the soft flesh of her thigh. During the lift, her nightdress had rolled back without her realizing, exposing far more of her.
She found she didn’t care, her mind dizzied by each rock of his hips, matched to the rhythm of his kiss. Each brush of his hardness against her was a spark of pure lightning, a struck flint that would surely ignite an inferno.
She couldn’t name the center of that rising bliss, and had not known of its existence, but it was like there was a tingling, crackling bundle of nerves that each stroke sent into a frenzy.
She wanted him. She had no notion of what that meant, exactly. All she knew was that she wanted him. Her body craved him, yearned to have him closer still.
But then he pulled back, breathing hard, and set her back down on her feet.
“This shouldnae have happened,” he rasped, backing away. “Leave.”
“But—”
“Leave, now. Before I do something that means ye’ll never be able to leave. Before I forget that this is fake,” he growled.
It didn’t escape Agnes’s notice that it was the first time he had used her name, not ‘lass’ or ‘Sunshine.’ But she was too crushed by his dismissal to find any cheer in it. And what did he mean, before he did something that meant she would never be able to leave? Was he threatening her now?
She didn’t understand what she had done wrong, didn’t understand why he had stopped something that felt so… good. The first thing that had made her feel truly herself in months, if not far longer.
But she was not going to beg or plead or let him have the satisfaction of seeing her disappointment. She would not prove him right.
With a sniff, she lifted her chin, wished him a terse “goodnight,” and left, just as he demanded.
You are no beast, Gordon. And I will not let you be what you are not.
If he thought this was the last he would see of her, that she would abide by his rule to keep out of his way, he was about to receive a nasty shock. About as nasty as one moment feeling as if she could fly, only to be rudely tossed back down to earth with a bump the next.