Devils Highlander (Clan MacAlpin 1)

He hissed out his breath. She was avoiding his question.

The look she gave him belied her inexperience. It was the look of a seductress. “But Cormac, I thought we were talking about your heart. ”

“No,” he said in quick reply, eager to draw the subject away from dangerous waters. He couldn't remember the last time he'd thought of his heart as anything but a practical organ, good only for pumping battle lust through his veins. But that heart was waking back to life, and he realized Ree had been lodged just there for longer than he could remember. He'd dreamed of her for years. He'd cared for her — aye, if he had to admit it — loved her for years.

He couldn't let her know that, though; he couldn't let her in. The thought of it frightened him more than any battlefield. To be so vulnerable? He'd experienced loss once before; he'd not survive loving and losing her.

“We were talking about why you've not married,” he said firmly.

“Mm. ” She may have sounded her assent, but Marjorie's mind was clearly on other matters. She shifted closer and slipped her arm be

neath his plaid, placing her hand where she'd had it a moment before, only now it was the skin of her questing fingertips he felt on his leg.

“I wonder. Why ever have I not married?” The pattern she traced along his thigh made her words an innuendo. Her lips parted in the wicked suggestion of a smile.

He flexed his muscles, girding against Marjorie's onslaught. All he'd need to do was tilt his pelvis to her.

She'd know what he wanted. She'd wrap her cool, soft hand around him. He could teach her how to stroke him.

The mere thought of it made his cock pulse. Though he willed his flesh to calm, his blood pumped hot, leaving him hard and wanting. If she were to touch him, he knew there'd be no going back. And she deserved more than him.

More than this lie they enacted, more than Lord and Lady Brodie in a seedy, dockside inn. He'd not take her innocence from her.

Her touch drifted perilously close to his erection. He gently took her hand and tucked it along his side. “Why choose to live alone?”

“I don't live alone. ” Slipping her hand away, she reached around to idly stroke his backside, bringing his cock to stand at happy attention. She rubbed a thumb along his hip bone. “Why, only just last month, Uncle Humphrey—”

“You're alone, Ree. ” Tenderly, he lifted her chin to look her in the eye.

Her hand stilled. Sadness flickered in her eyes, and the sight of it speared him. He regretted his honesty, but she deserved more than this life she'd chosen for herself. And she deserved more than him.

He carefully removed her hand from where it rested heavily on his hip. “Humphrey's an old man whose only concerns are his books and botanicals. ”

“He takes care of me. ”

“You take care of him,” he insisted. “You take care of everyone, Ree. But who is there to care for you?” Cormac thought of his own situation. Waking, fishing, feeding his family, and sleeping alone once more. A life alone — hadn't they both made the same choice?

He'd embraced his solitude as a sort of penance. Is that what Marjorie did? The difference was, unlike him, she bore no sins on her lovely shoulders.

He pinned her with an accusing look. “Do you think by working with the folk at Saint Machar, you can right the wrongs of all Aberdeen?”

“I'm just trying to help. ” Her voice trembled.

He should've let it be, but he couldn't bear the thought of Marjorie choosing such a lonely life. It was fine for a worthless soul like him, but she had a right to more. “What imagined sin do you atone for?”

“What imagined sin?” She pulled away, tugging the plaid up to tuck it over her breasts. “How can you, of all people, ask that, Cormac?”

“Good Christ, Ree, is this about Aidan? You isolate yourself because of something that happened when we were children?”

“And what is it you do?” She propped herself up on her elbow, her voice finding its strength. “What do you call living alone in some tumbledown pile of rock, fishing alone all day?”

“This is about you—”

“You keep saying that, Cormac. You keep saying it's only about me. How could you possibly think this” — she gestured between them — “has naught to do with you?”

“You speak truly. ” He grew subdued. He was there, lying with her, God spare him. He sent up a desperate plea for forgiveness. “But I gave up on my life long ago. ”

“You gave me up,” she whispered, sinking her head onto the pillow.