“I’ll see to arranging a room for ye when we get back. Father’s well enough I should no’ think ye need stay in his room at night anymore.”
“Thank ye,” he murmured, and then grinned and added, “But do no’ feel ye need send Betsy to me. Me tastes run more to prickly beauties with red hair, than blond amazons with large . . . lungs,” he finished delicately.
Evina blushed at the compliment and then blinked and speared him with a look. “How did ye ken Betsy was a blond amazon?”
Conran shrugged and grinned. “She already offered herself to me.”
“She did no’!” Evina said with amazement.
“Aye, she did,” he said. “The first night I went below for sup. She offered to be dessert.”
“She did no’!” Evina gasped out again.
“She did,” he assured her. “But as I said, I’ve found I prefer red-haired beauties, so I refused her kind offer.”
Evina stared at him uncertainly, unsure how she was supposed to respond to that. She had red hair, but didn’t consider herself a beauty, and he’d been so stilted and cold around her since that kiss in her father’s room . . . She wasn’t sure why he was suddenly so relaxed and easygoing with her.
“I thought ye were married.”
He spoke the words so softly Evina almost missed them. She tilted her head with confusion. “I was. I told ye that.”
“Aye. But I did no’ realize ye were also widowed,” he explained solemnly. “I thought ye were married still. And that ye kissed me despite having a husband.”
“I would no’ do that!” she cried with dismay, sitting up straight. “Besides, I did no’ kiss ye, ye kissed me,” she added quickly, feeling her face heat up with a combination of embarrassment and something else as she recalled the kiss in question.
“Aye, I did. But ye kissed back,” he responded, and Evina blinked as his breath brushed over her cheeks and lips. How had he moved closer without her noticing? He was just inches away now. Close enough to—
Evina stiffened in surprise when his hand suddenly slid around her neck, his fingers driving up through the hair at the back of her head to cup her scalp. That’s all. He just cupped her head and met her gaze. He continued. “But now that I ken ye’re widowed and would no’ be being unfaithful, I’d really like to kiss ye again.”
“Please.” Evina had no idea where the word came from. Her brain didn’t send it out. It was like her body had a mind of its own. Or at least her lips did, since they whispered the word. It didn’t matter though. She’d said it, and that was that. The hand at the back of her head pulled, his face came closer and huzzah! His lips were on hers, and it was as wonderful as the last time.
With pleasure and need rushing through her, Evina opened to him, drinking in the taste of cherries as his tongue slid in. Passion infused her and her body responded as if it had been sleeping for years and was being brought back to life, softening and pressing into him.
At first, the Buchanan merely kissed her, his lips and tongue dancing with hers, his head slanting one way and then the other, until she was moaning and pressing even closer, her arms creeping around his shoulders.
Evina wasn’t sure afterward if he lifted her into his lap, or she crawled there herself; she just knew she was desperate to be closer to him and suddenly was. Straddling him on the furs, she ran her hands into his hair, and kissed him desperately, and then gasped into his mouth when he clasped her bottom through the cloth of her gown and shifted her closer, until his hardness was pressing where it could do the most good.
Holding her tightly there with one hand, the Buchanan suddenly let his other drift up to cover one breast. Evina moaned with pleasure in response, and arched eagerly into the caress even as his hand urged her tighter against his hardness.
“Aye,” the Buchanan growled as he tore his mouth away, and then he pressed kisses across her cheek to her neck, and Evina gasped and tilted her head. She felt him tugging at the neckline of her gown, and the next thing she knew the cloth suddenly fell away, leaving her breasts bare. Some part of her mind was shocked, but then his cool hand closed over the warm flesh of one breast and Evina couldn’t