Lachlan's eyes were narrowed and fixed on her. He did not look beset by strange feelings from their closeness. 'And you told me the truth before, that he has not touched you?'
'Yes.' She could barely get the word out.
He said nothing more, but his head descended slowly toward hers, his gaze trapping hers the whole time.
He stopped his mouth hovering just above hers, so close she could feel his warm breath on her lips. A strange kind of fearful excitement shivered through her. Was he going to kiss her then?
She should not want him to. It was wicked, but she did.
Lachlan's lips closed over hers not a second after the thought formed. They were warm and firm, unlike anything she had ever known and she strained upward, needing to feel more.
He made a sound low in his throat, his mouth molding hers. It drew a response from her that was wholly instinctive and she moved her lips in unison with his. It was the most amazing experience she had ever known. Her insides popped and sizzled like a sap-covered log in the fire. She never wanted him to stop kissing her.
In this moment in time, nothing existed that could harm her. No parents who would dismiss their own children as expendable, no angry Sinclair warrior who would send her home only to force her parents to send Abigail in her stead, no Balmoral warriors waiting to carry her to their castle where she would be prisoner.
She was no captive in this moment, but a woman. She had never felt so free and did not think she would ever feel such sensations again. Right or wrong, she wanted to feel them for as long as she could.
His body was so hard against hers, so different from her own… big and powerful, emanating a scent that filled her senses. It was spicy and uniquely male. And it called to something deep inside she could not name, making her feel hollow and empty. Not in a bad way though, not like true hunger for food. No, this felt all too good, as if she had a peculiar hunger only this man could fill. Warmth and an ache connected in some mysterious way to that emptiness pulsed between her legs.
Her hips moved of their own volition, brushing his hard thighs and increasing the maelstrom of feelings storming through her. She didn't understand what was happening to her. It frightened her, but it entranced her as well. She needed to get closer to him. She didn't know how though. Their bodies were as close as two beings could get.
It was not enough.
Her lips parted, softening against his and she could taste him. His flavor was sweeter than honey, which was strange because the man was so far from sweet, but she had never known anything as delicious as Lachlan's kiss.
Craving more of that flavor, she touched his lips with the tip of her tongue. He growled like a hungry wolf, his entire body vibrating with the sound. It shivered through her, too, making her shake and her knees grow weak, but she did not want to stop the kiss.
Far from willing it to end, she wished to do wanton things… to touch him and to be touched by him. She wanted his hands on her face again, cupping her cheeks while he kissed her.
She wanted to feel his skin, imprint his scent and the feel of him on her mind to carry with her into eternity. Her fingers itched to trace the pattern of the tattoo that circled his bicep and then the one of the animal on his back. She wanted to run her fingers through his hair and the dark curls scattered over the sharply defined muscles of his chest and torso.
She allowed herself to press one hand, open palmed, against the front of his chest on the side not covered with his plaid.
Everywhere her skin touched skin, it tingled. It was the oddest sensation she had ever known and it fed the desire burning her insides. It felt as if she were meant to do this, as if she had been born to connect to this man alone.
That could not be true. He was not her intended. She could never be his bride. Tears leaked from behind her eyelids from inexplicable pain at the thought.
She should pull back. She had to stop this before she lost her heart and her honor. Propriety and sanity demanded it, but her heart cried that this was her one chance to taste true desire. Once she was married to Talorc, she could never experience anything like this again. She couldn't. Not with him. Talorc did not smell right… he would not taste right.
Most likely, he would not even kiss her.
He hated her.
How could she belong to a man who hated her?
But her brain insisted that this kiss was still wrong.
Finally, she forced herself to listen and tried to break away from Lachlan, but he responded by moving his grip to her waist and lifting her into more intimate contact with his big body. The apex of her thighs met a hard ridge and with a groan, he pressed her against it. Pleasure suffused her on a wave of such overwhelming delight, she cried out against his lips.
'What the hell are you doing?'
The raucous voice infiltrated Emily's thoughts just as Lachlan went stiff, his hold on her biting into her waist.
He lifted his mouth from hers. 'Go away, Ulf.'
'Balmoral warriors do not bed married women,' Ulf said, spitting the words out with enough disgust to make Emily's face flame with shame.
She buried it against Lachlan's neck.
'She is not married.'
'She said she was.'
'She lied.'
'And you have only her word for this?' Ulf demanded.
'Yes,' Lachlan ground out as he lowered Emily until she was standing on her own two feet again.
He turned to face his brother, stepping away from her at the same time. Chilled by the loss of his touch, she rubbed her arms. He stood between her and Ulf, but she did not feel as if he stood with her—only in front of her. He was a barrier, but not an ally.
Shame that she wanted him to be suffused her. She was not married, but she was promised.
'Why should we believe you now, English? One way or another, you are a liar.' Ulf sneered at her.
'I'm not lying.'
He abruptly turned his attention to his brother. 'What the hell were you doing kissing her, regardless? She is our enemy.'
'She is not our enemy and you will not call her such again.' Lachlan's tone was so harsh, she could barely make herself believe he had been the man kissing her so tenderly only moments before.
Ulf did not appear impressed by his brother's ire, however. 'I bloody well will. Just because you're controlled by that beast inside you does not mean I will abandon reason for such base urges as lust. It's obvious to the other soldiers as well. They're back at the beach betting on whether or not you have tupped her yet.'
Emily gasped at the crude terminology and the implication of Ulf's words. The others knew that Lachlan wanted her? They thought he was having her… right now? By the saints, didn't they realize she was a chaste and honorable maid?
She hadn't been acting like either a moment before though. She'd touched a man's bare chest… and wanted to do more.
Perhaps she was depraved.
'I am not governed by my beast, I am benefited by him,' Lachlan said in a hard voice.
'So you say.'
What was all this talk of beasts? Was Ulf trying to say that lust was a beast? She'd heard it described thus by the priest that served her father's barony, but Ulf did not seem a religious man who would eschew the pleasures of the flesh. Did he mean to imply that he did not have the same beast raging in himself, or simply that he felt no such thing for her?
She suspected the latter and did not feel in the least offended by it. Relieved more like.
