Return of the Scot (Scots of Honor #1) - Eliza Knight Page 0,74
back. Hard, passionate. Her tongue dueled with his as if neither of them could control themselves any longer. Two lost souls who’d been dying of thirst and finally found an oasis in which to quench their tireless craving.
Where one part of him had been aflame, now all of him was. Desire thrummed in his veins and pooled in his groin. The need for this woman to be his. To claim her utterly and forever.
He enfolded his arm around her waist and tugged her flush against him. Heated breath fanned across his face. And then there was a jolt, and they stumbled as the ship rocked from one side to the other—the only thing that kept him from lifting her and carrying her to the captain’s bed that was through the double doors at their rear. Their kiss broke as they both staggered, tumbling backward. Lorne lost his balance, falling with Jaime on top of him. Splayed fully over him, her soft breasts pressed to his chest, her hips on his hardened arousal…
She stared down at him, eyes full of passion, her lips a rosy red. She felt good, delicious and ripe. It was entirely too tempting to have her like this. So close, and yet not be able to claim her.
Her breasts pushed against the confines of her gown and tested the limits of his control. Supple, creamy globes. Only inches from his mouth and he wanted so badly to taste her.
Again, why hadn’t he slaked his need with some willing widow or courtesan? But he knew the answer to that, and it was because the only woman he truly wanted was currently lying on top of him. Tormenting him.
Jaime stared down where their hands were still joined on his chest, and then she bent and kissed his scarred collarbone, the heat of her lips pressing to his skin almost too much. Lorne groaned, and then…he felt something in his eyes as foreign to him as weakness—tears.
He blinked rapidly to dispel the emotion, the potent reaction. And then he closed his eyes, his head leaning back against the floor, his breaths heavy. Because the alternative was to roll her over and lift her skirts.
“Why did ye do that?” he asked, his voice tight, his throat closing.
“I may own this ship, but I’ll have ye know I do no’ own the ocean, and I can no’ make it rock us onto our arses simply by wishing it so.”
Lorne opened his eyes to stare at her, face full of teasing mirth. He chuckled. “Ye’re a hoyden.”
“Perhaps. But I would no’ change who I am.”
“And neither would I.”
“I used to be scared of who I was. Scared of being alone. Of relinquishing control if I did ever…” The column of her throat bobbed. “If I ever found someone.”
“I would never take away your control, lass. Well, perhaps only when I had ye naked and pinned beneath me.”
“Ye’re a rogue.”
“Aye, but I’m a rogue who wants ye, lass. A rogue who would never expect ye to give up the things ye love, what ye’ve worked for. I would give ye anything ye asked.”
“Even the thing ye prized the most,” she mused, referring back to his statement in the carriage that he would give her Dunrobin.
“Even that. I’ll ask ye once more if ye’d be my wife, Jaime.” Lorne was certain he could no longer live without her. She fascinated him absolutely. She was grounded, determined, independent. Someone he could lean on and confide in without judgment. Having grown up in an undependable world lasting into adulthood, she was what he needed most. No secrets. No games.
Exactly what he needed.
Jaime’s lips parted. However, nothing came out but a sigh. He thought she would pull away. Stand up and cross the room to put as much distance between them as she possibly could, as she had done every other time. But she didn’t. It felt as though she might have been sinking closer to him.
“Aye,” she whispered.
Lorne’s breath left him in a whoosh, and he hadn’t the power to suck it back in. Had he heard her correctly? Aye.
“I know ’tis wrong,” Jaime was saying. “To have wanted ye and loved ye for as long as I have, but I can no’ fight it any longer. Society be damned.”
Loved…
Lorne couldn’t breathe. Perhaps he’d fallen and hit his head when the ship jerked. That was it. He was hearing things all wrong.
“Say something,” Jaime said, her brow furrowing in that way he liked.