The Highlander’s Rescued Maiden by Anna Campbell
Chapter 10
When determination filled Will’s striking face, Ellen wanted to back away like a frightened rabbit. She felt torn between her natural urge to stay safe and a devouring curiosity that made her blood rush. She was also painfully conscious that she only wore a transparent shift. Will Mackinnon now knew just what her body looked like.
He said that she held the power, but with every second, she fell further under his spell. He was experienced. She was innocent. He was large and strong. She was small and fragile. He risked nothing in this encounter. She risked everything.
Yet even knowing those things, she couldn’t summon up a denial. Curiosity held her here, and something stronger, a physical attraction that had struck the first time she beheld this complicated, red-haired adventurer. An attraction that had only strengthened since.
She wanted Will to touch her. She wanted his kisses. She didn’t want to spend their time together hiding how she ached to be in his arms.
The moment for proud pretense had passed.
So when he stepped forward and caught her up against him with a fervor that both terrified and thrilled her, she yielded. When he kissed her with a heady passion that made her shake, she opened her mouth and sucked in his tongue and pressed closer to that impressive chest with its light covering of russet hair.
The evocative ocean scent made her head reel. Under that, something musky, familiar from his kisses last night. Male arousal.
His hands explored her, running down her arms, shaping her waist and hips, kneading her buttocks. Everywhere he touched, he made her burn, until surely she must flare up into a column of flame. As her breasts crushed into his chest, her nipples tightened. She wanted him to touch her there.
More wicked than that, needy heat concentrated in the private place between her legs. Will made her feel restless and empty, as if she’d die unless he filled her.
Ellen struggled to remind herself that he wouldn’t be filling her. He’d promised, and while she might be a fool, she believed he’d keep his word. But as his mouth ravaged hers and his hands discovered her dips and curves, every muscle softened in preparation for possession.
His lips performed an enchanting dance across her face, before they trailed an incendiary line down her neck. She whimpered when he discovered the place where her neck met her shoulder. The scrape of his teeth against that sensitive hollow made her quake.
Her knees turned to soup, and she clung to his sinewy shoulders to stop herself buckling to the floor. With every touch of those hard, competent hands, curiosity stirred more powerfully.
When he’d kissed her, she thought she learned the meaning of desire. Now she realized how he’d held back. He didn’t hold back now. Through his kilt, she felt his insistent hardness. That should frighten her, but she trusted him. More, she loved knowing that she excited him as much as he excited her.
As he raked his hands through her hair and he raised her head for more kisses, she launched her own exploration. Her gaze had eaten him up since she’d first seen him, even when she’d feared him. The impact of those extraordinary looks had only become more powerful. Now touch discovered what sight had hankered after.
She ran her hands down his powerful neck and the muscles of his arms. The delicious warmth of his skin made her palms tingle. Eager fingers threaded his mane of hair. She pulled back from his seeking lips to stroke the expanse of his chest. Discovering firm pectorals and male nipples that hardened under her seeking fingers. His reaction made her nipples tighten to the point of pain.
“You’re so beautiful,” she thought. When he grunted, she realized she’d spoken aloud.
“Och, can a man be beautiful?”
She dared to lean in and kiss his chest, as her hands drifted down his ridged abdomen to the thick black belt that held up his kilt. Apart from his silky hair, he was hard everywhere, thrillingly so. Yet his touch at her waist was tender. Her heart compressed, as she realized that even now, he leashed his strength to protect her.
“You are.” Ellen lifted her head until her gaze met his. His eyes were dark and heavy, and drooping eyelids lent him a sensual air. “The way a storm is beautiful, or a wild ocean, or a shower of shooting stars. Everything untamed and powerful and magnificent.”
His expression changed to startled pleasure, before he kissed her with an intensity that had her toes curling. “I’m flattered.”
“It’s true,” she murmured, twining her arms around his neck and stretching up in pursuit of more kisses.
His touch changed, became more commanding. He curved his hands around her buttocks and a draft against the back of her legs told her he’d raised the hem of her shift. When his hands met her bare rump, she started. Her stomach lurched in arousal. All of this was so unfamiliar, yet with every second, fear edged further out of reach.
“Let me touch your breasts,” he murmured.
“Aye, please…” It was difficult to speak over the mad gallop of her heart. Anticipation seethed inside her like a wild Highland storm. Her flesh swelled with longing, as if he already put his hands on her.
Will stepped back and cupped her bosom in gentle hands, squeezing until she was shaking. When his thumbs brushed the peaks through her transparent shift, the charge of sensation made her cry out.
“That’s…that’s wicked,” she sighed, angling forward to encourage him.
“But nice?”
“Definitely nice.”
When he bent to take one nipple between his lips, an even more powerful surge of arousal overtook her. While his hand toyed with her other breast, he drew on the beaded tip.
Ellen buried her hands in his hair to keep her balance, making a silent plea for him not to stop. In all her sheltered life, she’d never felt anything so marvelous as Will’s lips on her breast.
Except perhaps his kisses. It was difficult to think of anything better than his kisses.
Her heart raced, and she had trouble taking in enough air to fill her lungs. Already she felt overcome, although despite her innocence, she recognized that they’d just started. The thought was both daunting and thrilling.
At the point where she wasn’t sure that she could endure more and remain upright, he raised his head. His gaze burned like flame. She moved to ease the weight in the pit of her stomach. Heaven help her, she was in such a state that even a look from him made her mad.
“May I take off your shift?” His guttural purr set her very bones vibrating.
She studied his features, reading desire and more dangerous for her sanity, something that looked like affection. “Do ye always ask permission?”
That fascinating mouth quirked. It was even more fascinating now, because she knew how it tasted. “Of course no’.”
He caught her face between his hands. This time, she wriggled for a different reason. The piercing honesty of Will’s stare left her nowhere to hide. His candid gaze swept away all defenses.
What then remained to her?
Ellen feared the answer to that question. But she’d wandered too far down the path of pleasure to save herself.
“I want ye to ken that you’re in charge.”
She’d seen enough to realize that playing second fiddle wasn’t his style. “Ye like to call the tune.”
“If I can.”
“No’ this time?”
“I placed myself at your service.”
“Is that difficult?”
“I’ll survive.” Another self-derisive twist of his lips. “There are compensations.”
“I suppose when you’re with a lassie, ye usually know that she’ll give you what you want.”
“A man lives in hope.”
For a fleeting instant, she wondered if he hoped for the same from her, but however heady the pleasure, she couldn’t ignore her untenable situation. No matter how much she wanted to give herself to Will, she’d never risk conceiving a child. “I suspect those girls didn’t say no.”
Thick auburn lashes veiled his gleaming eyes. “A gentleman never tells.”
Her short laugh surprised her. She hadn’t expected his dry humor to leaven the intensity. “Aye, ye may remove my shift.”
“Thank you, Miss Cameron.”
As he tugged the shift over her head, the gentle mockery had her smiling. The room was warm, so nerves alone made a cold breeze whistle around her.
Ellen waited in an agony of suspense for Will to take her in his arms. She wished to Hades he would. Thought shifted out of reach when he kissed her, and she felt so devilish self-conscious, standing here without a stitch to cover her.
Her hands moved to shield her sex before she forced them back to her sides, closing them into fists. She trembled like a bird in a winter gale, and apprehension made her mouth as dry as dust. Apprehension and excitement. Because despite fear and embarrassment, it was thrilling to stand naked before this man she wanted so very much.
She summoned every ounce of courage to meet his eyes. “Say…say something,” she forced out through a tight throat.
“You’re so bonny, ye steal the words right away."
Astonishment thundered through her, left her floundering. This was a man with a smooth tongue. She’d noticed that from the first. Even come to appreciate it. But as she took in the raw emotion in his expression and heard it scrape in that deep voice, she realized that the sight of her body had struck this sophisticated man dumb.
How…marvelous.
Most of her life, she’d felt inadequate. Given she lacked the basic grace of a whole body, the name Fair Ellen had always seemed a snide joke. But as Will’s gaze ranged over her nakedness with an awe she couldn’t mistake, she felt beautiful. New and unfamiliar confidence seeped through her, and her stiffness ebbed. She sucked in a ragged breath as her fingers slowly straightened.
Ellen wasn’t sure who moved first. Perhaps they moved together. But on a soft sigh of anticipation, she found herself lashed to Will’s tall form.
