Page 38 of Abducted By the Highlander
“Moving on?” she repeated. It was the last thing she’d expected Hugh to say, but she appreciated how he’d made certain she knew what was happening. “Where are we heading?”
“East.” Frustration threaded through the word. “To meet up with another branch of the clan.” He flexed his jaw, and she had the strangest certainty he was battling the urge to say something else. It appeared caution won when he exhaled a deep sigh and scrubbed his hand over his face. How could such a seemingly exhausted gesture cause her heart to flutter in her breast and her lingering resentment against him to flee?
“Well, we just need to make the best of it.” After all, what else could she do? “At least my sisters will soon know I am well.”
“Aye, that they will.” He still looked tortured, though. What had he decided not to tell her? Maybe it was nothing at all. She had to stop imagining there were unspoken messages everywhere. “Look, Roisin, I didn’t mean to offend ye back at the inn. I couldn’t risk us saying something that might give Symon an inkling of who we both truly are.”
Relief spilled through her. In this, at least, she had been right. “’Tis fine, I understand. It would be a disaster if he saw through our subterfuge.”
Something akin to awe transfigured his features, or maybe it was a trick of the light. “Ye were playacting when ye said those things to me?”
It would be so much easier on her pride to agree with him that her retorts in the inn had been part of an admirable strategy. But she couldn’t do it. Because, in the end, she didn’t need to lie to Hugh to keep herself alive.
“No. Ye irked me greatly, and I couldn’t keep my thoughts to myself.”
He grinned and the lines of worry that had carved dark shadows on his face vanished. It was a wondrous phenomenon, and she couldn’t stop herself from smiling back at him.
“I hope ye never feel the need to keep yer thoughts to yerself when ye’re with me.” And then he sighed. “Unless we’re not alone.”
“I shan’t make that mistake again. The truth is, and I know it makes no sense, but I had forgotten Symon was in the room with us. I would make a terrible spy, wouldn’t I?”
“I’m sorry ye need to think before ye speak. It shouldn’t be this way.” His callused hand cupped her face, as though he couldn’t help himself, and the gentle caress of his thumb over her cheek caused her breath to catch in her throat. “I wish to God we’d had more time together on Eigg.”
She threaded her fingers through his, pressing his palm more securely against her face. Her chest was tight, and her heart thundered against her ribs, and all she wanted to do was melt against him and feel his strong arms hold her close. But first she had to know one thing. “Why did ye kiss me, Hugh?”
He swallowed and the sight was more enticing than it had any right to be. “Ye know why.”
Thrills skittered over her skin at his implication. But it wasn’t enough. She needed to hear him say the words. “Because ye needed anyone who looked our way to believe we were wed?”
“No.” His denial vibrated through her body like ripples of flame invading her veins, and fiery need bloomed between her thighs. Her breath hitched as he loomed over her, and even though it was too dark to see the color of his eyes, his intense gaze ensnared her, nonetheless. “I kissed ye because I needed to taste ye the way a man needs air to breathe or bread to live. Ye’ll never be mine, Roisin, but for a brief moment I dreamed that ye were.”
Thrills cascaded through her, sparks of pleasure but also shards of pain, as the truth of his tortured words sank into her mind. So many times since she had watched him sail away from her eighteen months ago, she’d imagined Hugh declaring undying devotion to her, even though as time had passed, she’d slowly lost hope of ever seeing him again.
But nothing her imagination had conjured came close to the tortured, bittersweet words he whispered nor the unmistakable despair that throbbed in the hot air around them. How certain he was they could never have a future together.
“I can be yers.” Her voice was so soft she wondered if he would even hear her, but his fingers tightened against her face and a harsh breath escaped him. Emboldened, she closed the small distance between them, pressing herself against his hard body. The heady aroma of worn leather and wild grasses enveloped her in a sensual cocoon, heightening her senses and a maelstrom of need and desire collided deep in her core. “I’ll always be yers, Hugh.”
“Don’t say that,” he responded harshly. Although he kept his voice low, his words were filled with anguish that pierced her heart. He raked his fingers through her hair, and she flattened her hands against his broad chest, where his heart hammered as erratically as her own. “I cannot offer ye anything, Roisin. Don’t make this harder than italready is.”
“We have this,” she breathed, as she trailed her hands up his chest and across his magnificent shoulders. It was hard to find the words she needed, when all she wanted was to lose herself in his arms, but somehow she managed. “’Tis enough for now.”
His burning breath fanned her face. “This will never be enough.”
He may have fallen in with rebels, but his honor was as intact as it had been in Eigg, where he’d done no more than briefly touch her hand. But they were no longer on the isle of her birth nor constrained by the rules she had lived with all her life. And although he had kissed her in the town, there was a certain safety in such public places that was missing from this tent, pitched so far from all the others.
If she wanted more, it was up to her to take it.
Exhilaration surged through her. Hugh wanted her, and that was all she needed to know. Before she could think better of it, she went onto her toes, linked her hands behind his neck, and pressed her lips to his.
Her eyes fluttered shut as his admirable restraint crumbled and he wrapped his arms around her, crushing her so close she could scarcely breathe. But who needed to breathe when Hugh claimed her mouth as though he were a dying man and she his only hope of salvation?
His tongue teased the seam of her lips and shivers of delight danced across her skin. She opened her mouth, and he pushed inside, and she reveled in the sensation of him possessing her so intimately. An unintentional moan escaped, and his deep-throated growl in response reverberated through every particle of her body.
Feverishly, she speared her fingers through his hair, gripping his head in case he had the mad idea to step back. But he didn’t try to break their kiss. Instead, he leisurely withdrew his tongue, caressing the soft flesh inside her mouth with infinite promise, before pushing inside her once again.
It was decadently arousing, and her head fell back in silent submission.He didn’t relent, teasing and exploring and when she swirled the tip of her tongue against his, his grasp hovered on the precipice between pleasure and pain.
Without releasing her from his possessive embrace, he caressed her back and cradled her bottom. Sparks of desire ricocheted between her thighs, and she shuddered as she instinctively dug her nails into his head.
