Taken by Angeline Fortin (great books of all time TXT) 📗

“Hey, watch it!” she cried, snatching up the bag and brushing it off.  “You can’t just kick it around like that.  It’s Stella McCartney!”

“Ye named yer bluidy bag?”

Scarlett just shook her head, cradling the leather purse like a baby.  There was no way to explain designers and fashion to a sixteenth-century Scottish laird but she had fallen in love with the soft brown leather tote with its silver chain link trim the moment she had seen it.  A treat to herself for giving up so much for her parents.

Now it and its contents were all she had in the world.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

Laird only grunted, clearly in agreement and finished spreading the plaid.  He dropped down on it, clad only in his long linen shirt and long stockings, and stretched himself out flicking an impatient wrist at her.  Hugging the bag tighter, Scarlett made a face, which garnered her nothing more than a roll of his eyes.

That wrist flicked insistently once more.

Shrugging out of Rhys’ bulky jacket and putting it aside with her purse, Scarlett gingerly eased down beside Laird since the evening was already turning chilly but left a foot or more between them.  With an impatient sigh, he none-too-gently yanked her close and wrapped the plaid tightly about them, ignoring her protests.  “We must both bear it, lass, unless ye wish no’ only to be bound once more but to find yer death in the cold this night.”

Well, there was no chance of that.

Still she wasn’t happy with either option.

Lord, she could feel the heat of his bare thighs through her thin dress.  There was little standing between them.  Laird seemed to read her thoughts, whispering when she began to protest once more, “When we reach Crichton on the morrow, we will find you some more appropriate clothing.”

As if the offer of clothing could make it all better.

Spooned against his big body within the cocoon of his plaid, Scarlett lay stiffly for as long as she could.  The proximity of his massive body was unnerving, but fatigue and the effects of the whiskey lulled her.

After a historically crappy day, she felt oddly safe cradled against his solid warmth with the steady rhythm of his heart beating against her back.  Logically she should have been terrified of what was happening but in that moment her worries faded and she slowly relaxed against him.

It didn’t matter that she didn’t like him at all.

She could resume hating him in the morning.

9

It wasn’t hard to identify the searing brand pressed against her bottom for what it was.  Scarlett sighed and sleepily wiggled her bottom, and was rewarded by a hard, manly – and rather pleasurable – nudge.  “Mmm.”

Warm breaths tickled erotically at the back of her bare neck, sending a shiver down her spin.  Scarlett stretched, arching away languorously and into the calloused palm curled about her bare breast.  Snuggling back again, she covered the hand with her own and pressed it tightly against her.

A low grumble vibrated through the hard chest pressed against her back, accompanied by a groggy murmur of desire.  Soft lips nuzzled her nape, a beard-roughened chin chaffing against her tender flesh.  The fingers covering her breast tightened, then kneaded.  Another hand clasped her hip, pulling her back against the rampant erection straining against her.   “Mmm, that’s nice,” she purred drowsily, reaching behind her to run her fingers up the well-muscled arm that held her.

The hand withdrew but a moment later it was back, searing against the bared skin of her thigh.  Pushing her dress higher until that rough palm cupped her ass and a sizzling length of male erection nudged against her, sliding with delicious friction against her bottom with only the thin barrier of her panties between them.  Her flesh blazoned in the wake of his caress as the hand skimmed over her hip and belly, lured by the mounting heat between her thighs.

“Oh!” Scarlett gasped, coming fully awake as pleasure pierced through her.   The warm cocoon she’d fallen asleep within had become an inferno!  She clasped her thighs around the hand between them.  The body behind hers stilled, then stiffened.

Slowly the hands withdrew.  An inch, then two gaped between them, letting the damp chill of morning air waft between their enflamed bodies, cooling them but no more quickly than the realization of what they had been doing… and with whom.

Scarlett rolled on to her back as Laird lifted himself on one elbow to look down at her.  Their eyes met and locked but silence reigned with nothing more than the tweet of a nearby bird or the rustle of the grass to greet the morning.  The magenta sky haloing Laird’s head told her just how early it was.  Scarlett imagined her face was about the same shade of red.  In shame, she told herself.

Who was she kidding?  Despite the situation and the fact that James Hepburn was an ill-mannered bully, she had enjoyed every moment of waking up with him.  And what a sight to wake up to!  The growth of beard darkening his jaw had just a touch of gray sprinkled through it, she realized.  It lent a fierce sexiness to the morning-after look.  Scarlett was tempted run her fingers along that prickly jaw and into the wayward tousle of the long, shaggy locks that framed his face.

God but he was gorgeous!  Beneath his dark, thick brows, his light eyes were like a silvery glimpse into heaven.  His lips, not flattened by irritation or anger, were soft and inviting.  Sensuous.  Without his perpetual frown, he just looked freaking sexy.

Scarlett bit her lower lip and his gaze fell to them, nostrils flaring.  Tension seized her as she waited, hoping he would… not kiss her, of course.

“My skinny body seems to be keeping you warmer than you thought it might.”  She meant to tease away the awkward moment but the words emerged husky, sensual.

Well, there it was.

A furrow appeared