Page 37 of The Laird's Masked Passion

Instead, admiration moved through him so sharply that he did not trust himself to speak. She mistook his silence and put the cloth back between her teeth. That finished him.

Something inside of him burst open and he laughed. It wasn’t the short, unwilling sound that sometimes escaped him before he could kill it. A true laugh, pulled from somewhere low and forgotten. Elspeth’s eyes widened over the cloth, first in horror, then outrage. She looked so deeply affronted that he laughed harder.

She tore the linen from her mouth. “I fail tae see the merriment.”

“I dinnae doubt it.”

“If this is how ye begin ravishment, Laird MacKenzie, I must tell ye, it lacks solemnity.”

That nearly undid him again. He crossed the room. Her expression changed. The humor did not vanish from the scene, but fear returned to her body in one swift tightening. She tried to hide it by lying down again, as rigid as a plank and twice as stubborn.

Colin stopped beside the bed and looked down at her.

“Ye think I would force ye?”

“I think men take what they want and call it right.”

It was too calmly said, too well taught.

His amusement receded. “Who told ye that?”

Her eyes flickered. “Nay one.”

“Elspeth.”

Her lips pressed together. He lowered himself over her slowly, giving her time to curse him, strike him, flee him, or all three. She did none. She only watched him with wide, furious eyes, as if determined not to blink first before the monster devoured her.

He braced one hand beside her head and brought the other to her cheek. She flinched, so he stilled. A moment passed, then another. When she did not pull away, he touched her again, lighter this time, with the backs of his fingers grazing the heated softness of her cheek. Her breath caught.

“There,” he murmured. “Nay terror yet.”

“That is hardly proof of innocence.”

“Nay. But it is a beginning.”

Her hair was still pinned too tightly from dinner. He found the first pin and drew it out. Another one followed. Dark red-gold strands slipped down over the pillow, loosening beneath his fingers.

“What are ye daeing now?” she whispered.

“Untying ye.”

“I am nae a parcel.”

“Nay,” he agreed, watching her hair spill over his hand. “Ye are far more troublesome.”

She ought to have snapped back. He saw the answer rise in her eyes and fail upon her tongue when his fingers brushed the side of her throat.

Interesting.

He leaned closer. Her body went still again, but not in quite the same way. This stillness had listening in it. He lowered his mouth near her neck, not touching at first, only breathing her in. Lavender, smoke, wine from the hall, and beneath it something warm and clean.

Her pulse leapt beneath the delicate skin.

“Elspeth,” he said softly, “why were ye biting the cloth?”

She turned her face away a little, though there was nowhere to escape. “So I wouldnae scream.”

His hand paused in her hair.