Page 24 of The Blacksmith’s Wish

Before she could finish, she was pulled against his solid hard chest into his embrace as his mouth claimed hers with such fervor that her knees wobbled. Her body’s response was immediate. Blood rushed to her head and down her limbs. Every sense instantly focused on him. On the kiss. The feel of his lips over hers. His strong thick arms encircling her. He tasted of wine and promise. His solid body like a fortress of protection.

A soft moan escaped her without notice, and Gowan responded with one of his own. When his lips traveled to the corner of her mouth to the side of her neck, Effie’s knees became unstable, and she clung to his wide shoulders.

Eyes shut, she threw her head back to give him more access to the sensitive skin of her throat. The warmth of his lips over inch by inch sent shivers of delight down her body to a very private place where heat pooled.

“Effie,” he groaned the word out as if it were a sort of torture. Then once again Gowan covered her mouth with his.

Pushing into him, she felt the unmistakable hardness of his arousal, which sent tingles of delight through her. Every thought fluttered away as she reveled in the fact that she could render such an incredible man like him, the most handsome bachelor in the village into such a state.

When his tongue teased at the center of her lips, she parted them only to be shocked when his tongue delved into her mouth. It was the most intimate thing she’d ever experienced. The intrusion connected them in a way she’d not expected. Timidly at first, she swirled her own tongue around his.

His large hands trailed down her back until cupping her bottom and lifting her from the ground to give him easier access to her kisses, not to mention the hardened part of his body.

Effie wrapped her legs around his waist, too far gone to care if they were seen, too heated to think about what would happen if, God forbid, her brother happened upon them.

To her surprise, he stopped kissing her and just held her tightly, his face buried into her neck, his chest expanding and lowering with breathlessness.

“I cannae,” he said, not clarifying what he referred to.

She didn’t want the moment to end, didn’t wish for him to end the most wonderful experience of her life with hurtful words.

Pressing her lips to the side of his neck, Effie whispered softly. “Let us just be in this moment. Ye dinnae have to say anything.”

Lifting his head, he peered into her eyes. “Ye are an extraordinary woman.” Then he pressed the softest of kisses to her lips.

Slowly he lowered her to the ground, and Effie leaned against him, needing reassurance that he did care, that it hadn’t been just a moment that he’d push away.

As she leaned into him, Effie let her hands drift slowly up his sides, wanting nothing more than to feel the reassuring strength of the man who held her.

The moment her fingertips brushed the edge of his ribs, Gowan stiffened. He caught her wrists with surprising gentleness, stopping her before her palms could travel any farther.

For several long heartbeats he simply stood there, staring down at where he held her, his breathing no longer unsteady from their kiss but from something far deeper.

“Please, dinnae be cross with me,” he said quietly. The single sentence carried such raw vulnerability that Effie’s heart twisted. His fingers loosened, though he did not release her entirely. “It is best that I escort ye back,” he murmured, his voice rough. “Folk will begin to wonder why we are no longer dancing.” He took a deliberate step backward, placing a painful distance between them.

Only moments before, she had been wrapped safely in his embrace. Now an invisible wall had risen between them.

Confusion washed over her. Had she done something wrong? Her gaze searched his face, desperate for an answer, but Gowan refused to meet her eyes. Instead, he busied himself straightening his tunic, his broad shoulders rigid with tension.

Only then did understanding begin to bloom. His scarred body. The burns that covered the side of his body. He had stopped her before she could touch them. Not because he feared her touch but because he didn’t want her to feel them.

Or worse…What she might think. A deep ache settled inside her chest. He truly believed she would recoil from him. That somehow the scars made him less worthy of affection. Less worthy of love. Nothing could have been further from the truth.

She took a tentative step toward him. “Gowan—”

He shook his head before she could continue. “Nay.”

It wasn’t harsh. It was pleading. “If ye say another word, I may forget every reason I have for moving away.”

Those words struck her harder than any rejection could have. He wasn’t pushing her away because he did not care. He was doing it because he cared far too much. He believed she deserved a man untouched by fire, a man without nightmares hidden beneath his skin. A man he no longer believed himself to be.

Without another word, he offered her his arm, every inch the courteous gentleman, though his eyes remained fixed somewhere beyond her shoulder. Effie slipped her hand through his arm, not because it was what propriety demanded, but because it was the only closeness he would allow himself.

As they walked back toward the lights of the festival, she looked up at his profile, at the hard line of his jaw and the sorrow he tried so desperately to conceal. In that moment, she understood something she hadn’t before. Gowan feared that she would discover his scars.

He feared she would discover them and be repulsed. That had to be the reason he kept away from others. Why he’d never married or courted any woman in the village. Although she’d never considered a courtship, instead thinking he considered her a nuisance, something had shifted. She was indeed very much attracted to Gowan Black.

Her heart broke for him. And she silently vowed that one day, somehow, she would convince him that every scar he carried only proved the strength of the man beneath them, not that he was any less deserving of being loved.