A Scot to the Heart (Desperately Seeking Duke #2) - Caroline Linden Page 0,108

would never forget her or stop wanting her.

She kissed her way up his neck as her hands moved around his shoulders until she gripped his hair, tugging his face back to her. Rising up on her knees, she rested her forehead against his, her breath light and rapid against his lips.

“I love you,” she whispered. “I’m sorry, Drew, I’ve tried not to—”

With a harsh exclamation he seized the nape of her neck. “Why are you sorry for that?”

“Because I’m ruined now, and dragging you down with me.” She touched the corner of his mouth, shadowed by three days of beard. “I can’t stop, though. I still love you. I still want you. I think I always will.”

He pulled her face to his and kissed her even as he tumbled her backward onto the soft summer grass and yanked down her stays just enough to taste her plump nipple. She moaned and clutched at his hair, her knees coming up around him, and he rucked up her skirts with both hands, spreading her satiny soft legs, completely bare all the way up.

He touched her, stroked her, marveled at the way her eyes widened, reveled in the ragged gasp of want she made, and then he was inside her, where he longed to be, held tight in her arms and legs as she begged him for more, her teeth on his skin making his nerves crackle like lightning had struck him, her hips rising to meet his every thrust with the same urgency and hunger, until she broke and shuddered beneath him, so tight around him, and he let go and poured his very life into her.

But her words festered in his mind—I’m dragging you down with me—and he didn’t know what to say. All his hopeful plans laid on the road to Fort George seemed built on sand now, with the high tide of reality rising to wash it all away. She was no longer respectable, and he could no longer count on the good graces and indulgence of the duchess. There would possibly be warrants issued for their arrest soon.

The only thing he could say was the one truth he still knew. Holding her close, he pressed his cheek to hers and whispered, “Let the world go hang. I love you, Ilsa.”

And will for all time.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Glasgow was a small but handsome town, with houses built of stone and many impressive public buildings. It was a great hub of commerce, though the main harbor at Port Glasgow was several miles down the Clyde; here was where the tobacco lords built their mansions and flaunted their wealth, princes among the merchants.

Ilsa surveyed it with weary eyes. They had avoided inns for the last few days of hard riding across fields and through woods and along narrow rutted roads that were impassable except by horseback. Drew had promised her a proper room tonight, with a hot bath and fresh clothes, and she was irrationally eager for it.

They bypassed the large and well-known Saracen’s Head Inn and took a room in a small establishment away from the main street. Drew kept his word; servants were hauling in the bathing tub even as they climbed the stairs. He left her with a rueful smile and a soft touch on her cheek, saying he would be back in an hour.

Ilsa knew he was as tired as she was. When they slept in the open, he’d been awake and watching every time her eyes fluttered open. He only shrugged and called it army training when she protested, but she was keenly aware how much he’d done for her.

She peeled off her dirty clothes and sank naked into the tub when the maids left, content just to soak in the hot water and not feel linen against her skin. Unfortunately, that left her free to examine the darker corners of her mind and the thoughts that had been quietly growing there.

When she left Edinburgh, it had been on a wave of righteous indignation that Papa was being framed and slandered. It was easy to embrace a bold course when it was only her own reputation and name at stake. She believed in Papa; of course she would find him and save him, and curse the gossiping tongues of Edinburgh for saying otherwise. She was a lonely warrior waging her battle for redemption, and she was fine with that.

But now she was not. In her moment of weakness, when she gave in to her own longing and let