Devil in Tartan (Highland Grooms #4)(81)
“Do you want to kiss me?” she whispered, lifting her face to his.
“Do you want to be kissed?”
“Desperately.”
He twisted her around and put her back against the wall of the gatehouse. He braced his hands on either side of her and leaned in, his lips only a whisper from hers. He felt restless, his body’s desires drowning all rational thought.
“Kiss me,” she said.
He bent his head and casually ran the tip of his tongue along her bottom lip. Lottie sighed softly. Aulay had hardly touched her, and yet it felt like the most sensual, decadent moment he’d ever experienced. He lifted his hand to her jaw and angled her head just so, catching her sigh of pleasure as it passed through her lips. He drew her bottom lip lightly between his teeth and teased her body forward by slipping an arm around the small of her back.
She opened her mouth to him and her hand found his waist, clutching at his coat as if she feared he might slip away. Aulay’s kiss was slow and thorough as his hand explored the shape of her body.
Lottie moaned into his mouth at the slow torture, fanning the fire that was smoldering in him. Aulay was of a mind to carry her into that little room in the gatehouse and have her there, but the sound of footsteps began to filter through the carnal fog that had enveloped him, and he reluctantly, regrettably, lifted his head.
Her lips glistened in the moonlight, and she looked up at him with such desire and affection that it made him feel a wee bit dizzy. He stroked her cheek with his knuckle and unwillingly stepped away to open the door to the gatehouse. “Sleep well, leannan,” he murmured.
She slipped inside, but once in, she turned around, walking backward, her eyes fixed on his, her smile luminous, before she disappeared into the shadows.
Aulay returned to his rooms, and sent the sleepy lad who appeared to inquire as to his needs home to his bed. He didn’t bother to undress and collapsed onto his bed and pillowed his head with one arm, gazing out the window at the starry night. His thoughts were far from Balhaire, but for once, they were not on the sea. They were on a tiny island called Lismore.
He would be eight and thirty in a month, a confirmed bachelor, a man of the world...and for the first time in his life, he fancied he might be in love...with a woman he wasn’t certain he could trust and could not have.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
WITH THE EXCEPTION of the first night when she’d fallen into bed and had collapsed into exhausted sleep, Lottie had spent every night since tossing and turning, awakened over and over again with the ache of missing her father, or worry of what would happen to her, or fear of what would become of her brothers, of the ways she might make this right, if given the opportunity.
But in the last few nights, she’d been awakened by an unsettling case of desire.
Now was not the time to indulge in a fantasy about Aulay Mackenzie, and yet, she did. Over and over. What was she to do? Sit in a corner and mope all day as she waited for the arrival of the justice of the peace? These could very well be the last days of her life, or at the very least, the last days of her freedom. By all that was holy, she would not end without having experienced love—real, raw, expansive love.
It was the best distraction she could hope for.
As the nights slowly gave way to day in the endless wait, the endless rumination, the endless review of all the possible scenarios, Lottie would wake, dress in one of two day gowns Catriona and Vivienne had loaned her, then go and tend to her clan.
They had settled in at Balhaire perhaps too well—Mr. MacLean missed his wife and children, and had made use of the library to write letters to them. He proclaimed he’d deliver them personally after they appeared before a judge, but just in case, he’d extracted a promise from Billy Botly that he would see them delivered if Mr. MacLean did not go home again.
Duff missed his wife and children, too, but he had discovered an unlikely friend in Iain the Red, who, as it turned out, had once thought of being an actor. One night at dinner, the Mackenzies and Livingstones were treated—or tortured, depending on one’s perspective—to a reading of a sonnet performed by those two.
Gilroy and Beaty spent quite a lot of time wandering about the bailey, arguing about various things. Ships. Winds. Whether or not the Jacobite rebellion had begun in the Hebrides or the Highlands. They were like an old married couple with nothing important to bicker about, but determined to bicker all the same.
There was another curious development that warmed Lottie’s heart—Lady Mackenzie had taken an interest in Drustan. There was something about the regal lady that soothed Drustan, and more than once, Lottie had found him wandering around after her, picking up a chair and moving it at her direction, or helping her draw open draperies.
“Drustan,” Lottie whispered one morning, and gestured for him to come away, fearing that he was bothering her.
“You will not take my helpmate from me, Miss Livingstone,” Lady Mackenzie had said, and smiled fondly at Drustan. “We’ve forged our acquaintance quite well on our own, thank you.”
“But he—”
“He is a help to me,” she’d said flatly, and made a shooing motion at Lottie. “Go. Walk on, now. Take in the sun, but leave us be.”
When Drustan wasn’t following Lady Mackenzie around, he was carving, and at last, Mathais had found something to admire about his brother. He eagerly showed the carvings to Lottie—a gull, a ship, and Drustan’s latest, a dog that looked exactly like one of the mutts that was constantly underfoot in the great hall. The most amazing thing about Drustan was that between Lady Mackenzie’s need of him and his newfound talent in carving, he was much less prone to fits of frustration. Her father had always said that Drustan was too simple to be of any help to anyone. Perhaps her father had been wrong about that, too.