Page 46 of Highlander’s Captive

“Ye’re a mystery,” he whispered. “I am usually good at solving mysteries. Why canna I solve ye?”

She leaned closer to him. “Because you shouldn’t.”

With a moan he couldn’t stop, he covered her mouth with his. Her mouth met him like lush velvet, her lips like petals, her tongue like fire. She tasted delicious, and he wanted more. Desire ran through him in a hot, burning wave. Mine, mine, mine proclaimed his heart.

He wanted her. She was his wife. She was his by right.

He turned her chair towards himself and pulled her closer. Her waist was delicate and strong under his hands, like the curve of a bow. His groin throbbed, the need for her thick and hot and heavy.

“Lass,” he said into her lips. “If ye dinna want me, tell me now. I canna stop myself a moment longer.”

She froze, and he felt the flutter of her eyelashes as she opened her eyes. She leaned back, and he looked at her, frowning.

“Yes, I think it’s best to stop, Craig.”

He breathed out. Frowned. Her eyebrows knitted together, her red and swollen lips parted as she tried to regain her breath.

“Why?” he said. “Dinna ye like my kisses?”

“I—that’s not why.”

“Ye’re my wife. I’m yer husband. I have the right to bed ye. Or are ye still saving yerself for the Earl of Ross?”

Jealousy stabbed him in his gut at the thought.

“What? No.”

“Then what is it?”

“I just think it’ll complicate things.”

“What is there to complicate? It’ll certainly make our time together much more enjoyable than it is now.”

She licked her lips.

“I will show ye all the ways a man can love a woman. All the pleasures ye didna think were possible.”

She exhaled, slowly. Her chest rose and fell quickly. The vein in her neck pulsated. Aye, she wanted him. He reached out for her hand, but she jerked it away from him and jumped to her feet.

“I’m really tired, Craig. I’m going to bed.”

“Ye barely ate—”

But she turned and left, leaving him frowning, confused, and feeling rejected.

He went to sleep in the room in Comyn Tower which was under their bedchamber. But he couldn’t rest. His thoughts returned to Amy, his muscles burning with unsatisfied need. Aye, he wanted the lass, although she was his enemy. And he was a fool for it. She was a beautiful woman, but he had started to see more.

He had started to see a caring heart, and skill. Strength and cleverness.

But caring about her would cloud his judgment, make him overlook danger. Make him miss a blade in his back.

So he couldn’t trust her. He couldn’t like her. Not just because she was a MacDougall, but because she was hiding something. Her shaking hands, her nervousness about how different she was, basic things she didn’t know. She was lying to him. But whether it was because she wanted to harm him, and Bruce’s cause, or because she was afraid of something, he couldn’t tell.

A shadow stood over Craig, and his hand jerked to his dirk under the pillow.

“’Tis I, Hamish,” the man whispered. “I see ye canna sleep, either. Mayhap an uisge can help to ease us both into sleep?”

Craig frowned. An uisge to slow his thoughts and lull him into sleep did sound like the right idea.