In Scot Water - Caroline Lee Page 0,29

cheeks, and when Malcolm had smiled in response, Evelinde had felt her knees go weak.

He was a good man. And she wanted him.

She stripped out of her gown, hanging it from the peg where the other gown now hung. With the floor drying out since Malcolm had fixed the leak, the croft seemed less dirty. But still, she took the time to clean her feet when she hurried through her ablutions.

Pulling her braid over her shoulder, she ran her fingers through the strands, loosening her hair to lie in heavy waves across her back. Then she smoothed her hands down the front of her chemise and took a deep breath to calm her frantic pulse.

It didn’t work.

A sound at the door had her whirling about.

Malcolm stepped through, already drying his hair on the cloth she kept by the door for just that purpose.

He was otherwise nude.

Hungrily, her gaze took in the sight, devouring the places where the single candle’s light lapped at his bare skin. His groin was shadowed, but when he lowered the cloth to dry his chest, their gazes collided.

Swallowing, she jerked forward, as if connected to him by some sort of string.

He slowly dragged the cloth across his shoulder and upper arm, then down his side to his thigh. But she suspected he was no longer paying attention to what he was drying. Judging by his gaze, at least, and the way it settled on her heavy breasts, pushing against the worn linen fabric of the chemise.

She reached him. Taking the cloth from his unresisting hand, she whispered, “Let me.”

And he did.

Without dropping his gaze, she dried him. She dragged that cloth against his skin, wishing it were her hands, her tongue. As he watched, she stepped forward boldly, her nipples brushing against his chest as she reached around to dry his back.

He was breathing faster than normal, and the long, stately column of his throat worked as he swallowed carefully.

When her breasts pushed against him as she moved, his nostrils flared. But his hands stayed carefully at his side.

And then he was dry.

It seemed somehow unfair that she was suddenly so very wet.

But…his legs were still damp, weren’t they?

When she dropped to a crouch to dry his thighs and knees, he groaned aloud.

“Evie,” he whispered hoarsely, as his hand dropped to her head.

Tilting her head back, she met his eyes, dark in the shadows. His erection jutted toward her, reminding her of the conversation about sausages they’d had that first evening, and her lips slowly tugged upward into a smile.

“St. Thomas, help me,” he muttered under his breath, at the same time his hip flexed forward. She thought it was unintentional, but the move pushed his cock closer to her lips.

Her mouth watered, the same way it had when she’d smelled the sausages he’d cooked that first evening.

Well, not the same way.

She inhaled, his scent still that intoxicating mixture of leather and her soap, and she was already leaning forward, intent on tasting him, when he pulled away.

“Lass,” he called in a hoarse whisper as he reached down and pulled her to her feet. “Ye dinnae have to—”

She interrupted him with a kiss. A kiss she pressed against his lips. It wasn’t a long one, or a hard one, but it stopped his protest.

“I want to,” she whispered when she pulled away, her eyes searching his. “I want ye, Malcolm.”

“Are ye certain, lass?”

Stretching up on her toes, she whispered against his skin, “More certain than I’ve ever been in my life. I want ye in my bed tonight.”

When he lifted her in his arms, giddiness flooded her veins, competing with the desire. She wrapped her arms around his neck and placed a kiss on his bare skin.

Then he was laying her in the bed and pulling her chemise from her body, dropping reverent kisses along her neck as he did so. He was murmuring to her, but either ‘twas Latin phrases, or her mind was too dazed to understand.

And then he was lying beside her, atop her; one hand cupping her breast, while the other snaked around the back of her neck to hold her closer.

Instinctively, desperately, she spread her legs, cradling his stiff member against her curls and bracketing his hips with her thighs.

“Malcolm, please!”

She pressed her pelvis against his, offering herself. The movement was just like that first night, when she’d rubbed her damp core against his hardness and had taken her pleasure from him. But this time, there was no wool, no linen