A Scot to the Heart (Desperately Seeking Duke #2) - Caroline Linden Page 0,86

late, and this is one counterbalancing advantage.”

She didn’t really want to talk about that, the inheritance that would take him from Scotland and probably from her. “If you didn’t wish to discuss that, what did you want to tell me that was worth bribing a professor of botany for the use of this garden?”

“First, to apologize.” They had come to a bench nestled in a stand of spiky palms. Drew shed his coat and spread it on the seat for her. He sat beside her, one elbow on his knee so he could face her. “I asked to spend time with you, and then vanished for days.”

She waved one hand. “It’s nothing.”

“Not to me.” He caught her hand and brushed his lips over the pulse in her wrist. “I did miss you.”

“Some of that is inevitable,” she told him. “Even courtship is conducted at more leisure.”

She wished she could snatch back that word as soon as she said it.

“Indeed,” he said in that lower, rougher voice. “And here I’ve come to tell you I must leave again.”

Ilsa looked up in dismay.

“I’ve got to return to Inverness and resign my commission. It was fully half the reason I returned north, and my colonel’s not the sort to countenance a mere letter.”

“And are you subject to his disapproval any longer?”

He grimaced. “’Tis a deep-grained habit. But, more to the point, I wish to be done with it.” He still held her hand and now spread it open, palm up, on his knee. Idly his fingers swirled over hers. “There are other matters demanding my attention now.”

“Yes.” She watched his fingers as if in a daze. “Your family—”

“No.”

“The demands of your inheritance—”

“No.” Somehow he was closer to her, the heat of his body making her hot and flushed again.

“What?”

“You,” he whispered after a moment. “Nothing but you, Ilsa.” He raised her hand to his lips, sucking lightly at her palm. Ilsa gripped the bench to keep from sliding into a puddle on the ground.

“How long will you be gone?”

His eyes, glowing gold and green, flashed toward hers. “A fortnight.” He lowered his head and sucked the tip of her ring finger between his lips. “Dare I hope you might miss me?”

She hooked her finger and pulled his wicked mouth to hers. “Desperately,” she whispered, and claimed his lips in a kiss that felt like it had been eons in the making. He slid off the bench to his knees and crowded closer as he pulled her to him. Boldly Ilsa opened her legs and took him there, full against her.

His hand speared into her hair, dislodging the hat. His tongue teased hers. She cupped his face and kissed him back, deeply and absolutely, until his free hand settled on her collarbone, his fingers loose around her throat.

“Did you invite me here to seduce me?”

He drew his fingertips down her throat, pausing on the edge of the gauzy kerchief tucked into her bodice. “Not . . . specifically.” Slowly the kerchief came loose until it fell from her shoulder. “But if the opportunity arises . . . should I refuse it?”

“Never.”

The corner of his mouth crooked. “Shall I continue?”

“Yes.” She let her head fall back as he pressed his mouth to her throat. “Will someone come in?”

“No,” he breathed, his hand spanning the small of her waist and urging her forward on the bench. “For fifty pounds Dr. Hope would keep out the King himself.”

That was enough for her; when his hand skimmed up her calf, she put her arms behind her and arched her back, a wanton pagan sacrifice to his desire.

“I want you,” he murmured against her skin.

“Yes,” she gasped as his fingers stroked between her thighs. A spasm rippled through her as he touched her again with intent.

And there in the midst of exotic plants from around the globe, she let him seduce her, his hand under her petticoat and his mouth on her breast. When she felt climax licking at her nerves, she reached for him, dragging up the front of his kilt until he rose up on his knees and fitted himself against her aching center, thrusting home with a harsh moan that pushed her over the edge. Tears gathered in her eyes as they moved and strained against each other, absorbed in each heavy stroke of his flesh joining hers, each hungry gasp, each urgent touch and stroke and hold until he broke and shuddered in her arms. Still shaking from her own climax, Ilsa clutched his shoulders,