Page 36 of Never Tempt a Scot
“Thank you, lass. I’m sure we will.” He began undressing, and when she noticed, she halted midway through pulling the covers back on the bed.
“But you aren’t sleeping here!”
“I certainly am.” He smirked recklessly at her, and she wrapped her shawl tighter around her shoulders.
“But there are three rooms. One for me, the valets, and then you and Mr. Lennox.”
“Oh, no. I’m not about to share a room with Rafe—not when I can share a bed with you.”
That fear sparked in her eyes again, and he knew it was genuine. “I’ll not touch you, lass, no matter how you tempt me with your dancing.” He unbuttoned his waistcoat before he continued. “But you and I will share a bed. After all the misery you put me through, I am owed a few nights of feeling your sweet curves pressed against my body.”
He tossed his waistcoat over a chair and pulled his long white shirt over his head.
“Now, in bed, Lydia,” he commanded, though he kept his tone gentle. He gripped her shawl and slowly drew it away from her body, before letting it fall to the floor. Then he scooped Lydia up in his arms and tossed her onto the bed. She gave a little gasp of surprise at being plopped on the bed, before she scrambled under the blankets.
“I still think you should be staying with Mr. Lennox. It’s not like I can escape. Where would I go?”
“I’ve underestimated your cunning once too often, lass. Besides, I have no interest in watching him take a tavern maid to bed a few feet from me.” He removed his boots, stockings, and trousers. Lydia stared at him like she’d never seen a man before, but perhaps she hadn’t. Not like this, at any rate. He couldn’t deny he was starting to think she was more innocent than she’d first led him to believe. But then, she wouldn’t be the first lass to profess more carnal knowledge than she actually possessed.
He slid into bed beside her, wearing nothing but his smallclothes. The candle on the table beside him flickered, casting shadows over her face.
“Don’t be scared, lass.” He reached up to cup her face, and she closed her eyes but didn’t pull away.
“I’m sorry, it’s just that last evening you were still calmed by the laudanum, and tonight you are not hampered by it. I fear you will ...”
“I will not,” he vowed. “No matter how you tempt me.”
Her eyes opened, and a spark of fire flashed in them. “Temptyou? By simply being here? It isn’t a woman’s fault if a man is tempted by her mere presence. That is your fault and yours to control.”
“Aye, true. But you do tempt me, and I willna say otherwise.”
Her eyes cooled a little, and he saw a return to a reasonable expression now that she felt less threatened.
“Why don’t we talk a bit?” she asked. “Conversation will help you focus on being a gentleman.” Her tone sounded so calm, as though she were sitting with him in some drawing room and he’d come courting her with a bouquet of flowers like some lovestruck lad.
He chuckled. “Gentleman? You do say the most amusing things.” But she was right, talking would distract him, at least for a little while, from his fantasies of the pleasurable things he would like to do to her.
“Very well. What should we talk about?”
“Well, what about your home, or Scotland? I’ve never been and would like very much to hear you tell me about it.”
“You wish to hear about my home?” He hadn’t expected her to care about such things, but she’d enjoyed the Mungo Park expedition book he’d given her.
He rolled onto his back, his gaze fixed on the timbers above their heads.
“I come from the clan Kincade. We live in the southern part of Scotland. Some would call us Lowlanders, but we aren’t. Lowlanders are more English in their way of thinking. To a true scot, he can be a highlander even if he lives in the lowlands. All clans are different too, many would argue with the point I made just now.”
“What does that mean, to be in a clan?” Lydia asked. “It’s more than just a family, isn’t it?”
“In the old days, before the Battle of Culloden, it did mean one’s family. The wordclanitself is from the Gaelic wordclann, which means children.”
“Children?”
“Aye. A man in a distant time began a family, and his name was carried on in the lives of all of his family members. And the people of Scotland, even as divided as we are by names, are all like the wild deer herds that roam the remote glens and mountain passes. We, like the deer, appear and disappear, vanishing into the dense forests, only to reemerge whenever we wish. We are theClann a’ Cheò.”
“What does that mean,Clann a’ Cheò?” Lydia moved a little closer, and he placed his hands beneath his head.
“It means ‘children of the mist.’”
