Once again he took her mouth. Anxious to fully participate, she moved her tongue into his mouth, but the groan that came from him made her pull back.
“Nay, lass. Dinnae stop.” His hands were everywhere. Across her back, up and down her arms. His fingers laced into her hair, and he turned her head, taking the kiss much deeper.
Her head was swimming with new and unfamiliar feelings. Her heart pounded, her lungs could not access enough air, and her stomach played host to butterflies doing a Scottish reel. With her clothes suddenly feeling quite restrictive, she had the urge to remove them, as well as Evan’s, in order to feel his warm body against hers.
Just as she was settling in for a long kissing session, Evan pulled back and held her at arm’s length, his hands anchored on her shoulders. “This is not right, Katie. We cannot do this.”
It took her a few moments to gather her thoughts, which resulted in anger. “It appears we are already doing it, my laird.”
Evan stood and ran his fingers through his hair. “Aye. That is the problem. We cannot do this again since ’tis not proper. Ye are a gently bred woman, and I have no right to seduce ye.”
Her eyes grew wide, and her heart started up again. “Ye were trying to seduce me?” Her voice rose on the last few words.
He stared at her, his green eyes dancing with mirth in the light from the low burning lamp. “What did ye think we were doing?”
“Are ye laughing at me?” Katie adjusted her gown and smoothed out her skirts, not meeting his eyes, since she felt like a bairn.
“Nay. Well, maybe. Aye.” He grinned.
In truth, ’twas not her first kiss, but the few busses she’d received from the lads at Stirlingshire didn’t compare to what this man had done to her. Certainly she’d never felt the way she did now.
Those had been youthful kisses. Evan’s kisses were from a man who knew what he was about. That was certainly true, since she had been so addlepated, she didn’t ken he was trying to seduce her.
“Of course I ken what ye were doing. That is, what we were doing…” She hopped up and raised her chin. “Ye are correct. ’Tis not a good thing, and ’twill never happen again. Now, if ye will excuse me, I shall retire.”
With that staunch announcement, she turned on her heel, and with her head held high, strode across the room, barely missing a table, and swept the door open. She passed through with all the dignity and elegance of her upbringing, then closed it with a solid click.
Only to discover her skirts were caught.
…
Evan smiled as Katie tugged at her skirts, then finally opened the door to release them. If nothing else, the lass made him smile more than he’d smiled in a long, long time.
She also made him burn as he’d never done before. ’Twas not just her comely form or her golden-red tresses that never seemed to stay where she wanted them to. Her deep-blue eyes enchanted him, and her smile raised his spirits, but aside from all that, the lass had a sense of bravado about her rarely seen in a young woman.
Bringing her clansmen across the country with no more than a faded piece of paper in her hand placed her into either the crazy-as-a-loon category or brave-as-a-warrior. He tended to lean more toward the warrior. Most times.
His past experiences with lasses had not boded well. Betrothed to Isla MacNeil since he was a lad of ten years—and she still in the nursery—should have made marriage and the requisite producing of heirs an easy matter. However, Isla had decided when she was no more than fifteen years that she wanted to marry the local blacksmith’s boy, and when her parents attempted to thwart her, she ran off, never to be seen or heard from again.
A year later, he’d courted Sophia MacNeil, a woman closer to his own age. His signature had barely dried on the marriage contracts when she’d been thrown from her horse and broke her neck. She’d been a strong-willed lass and had refused to obey his wishes not to ride the racehorses bred in her father’s stables.
The following year, against his better judgement, he’d accepted an offer from Laird MacAdams to wed his eldest daughter. Lorna, the daughter in question, had refused the betrothal unless Evan took her name, since she was to inherit her clan upon the MacAdams’s death. He still shook his head at that one.
His recent thoughts about marriage had been to let Alasdair do it so his brother could produce the necessary heir.
Could he dare once more to secure a wife? Was it something he really wanted to do? Needed to do? There were plenty of lasses willing to warm his bed, but of late something had been missing. He knew that would not be the case with Mistress Katie Stirling. The eagerness he felt in her, despite it being of an innocent nature, told him there was a lot of passion in the spirited lass.
’Twas not s
omething he wanted to dwell on. He needed her here, working for him, not traipsing off to Argyll with him. Besides which, he was still confident the lass was hiding something. For as clever as she was, she was not telling the real reason she’d brought her entire clan to Fife.
Before he dwelled any further on the lass and what a joining with her would mean, he intended to find out her secret.
Evan, Katie, and Alasdair were at breakfast in the Great Hall the next morning when Gavin, practically being dragged by Meggie, entered the room. Once they’d reached the castle a few days before, Gavin had taken one look at Evan and had hidden behind Meggie’s skirts. He had never joined them for meals again, and with all the other bairns running around the place, Evan had even forgotten about the lad.
“Gavin!” Katie’s shout of joy reached their ears. “I’m so glad ye have decided to join us.” Her chatter continued as she took his hand from Meggie and walked the young boy toward the table. He was a fine-looking lad, with the features of his sister but more masculine in nature.
He settled next to his sister, his eyes downcast.