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

before.  This was an attack on her senses.  Her person.  His tongue plunged deeply, rasping across hers.  Scarlett’s head swam dizzily, blacking out her objections.  She stretched against him, her arms winding about his neck of their own accord.  Drawing him closer.  Urging him on.

This fire between them was downright irresistible.

Scarlett tore hers lips away with a gasp.  “This is crazy.  I don’t even like you.”

“I dinnae like ye either, lass.”

Tugging up her skirt, Laird slid his hand between her thighs.  Scarlett’s involuntary squeal was muffled against his lips, but instead of withdrawing, she lifted her leg, hooking it around his thigh.  Inviting him in.  Laird did not hesitate, stroking her wet folds deftly before dipping his fingers into her pulsing heat.

“I mean, look at us,” she stammered.  “I’m me.  And you’re so… you.”

A gasp of rapture robbed her breath and Scarlett threw back her head to find it, but unrelenting, Laird followed, raking his teeth down her neck.   “Ye talk too much,” he grumbled.

Tension spiraled almost immediately deep within her core as his fingers continued to circle her sleek, sensitive nub.  His touch was rough, unfettered but at the same time, gentle. Her body rocked against his hand as if of its own will, seeking, searching.  Building to a poignant ache that emanated outward, tensing.  Waiting.

He held her there.  Hovering between heaven and hell and an agonized moan escaped her between her panting breaths.  “Oh, God,” she sobbed, burying her face in his sweaty neck as she clung helplessly to him. Pleading.  Then with a cry, Scarlett threw back her head once more as her climax burst brilliantly, painfully.  A thousand parts of her body exploded.

Laird cupped her bottom, lifting her against him as he rocked her against the wall.  His hard, throbbing length beneath his kilt slid against her naked heat, the wool chafing her already overly sensitized flesh.  “I want to be inside ye, lass.”  His brogue was rough, thick.  “I want to hear ye scream as ye did before.”

“Oh, God,” she moaned again, covering her eyes with both hands as she wiped away the tears she didn’t even realize were flowing down her cheeks.  She was utterly flabbergasted by what had just happened and he just wanted to hear a repeat of what Scarlett now realized was an utterly incorrect imitation of true rapture?  Didn’t he realize she had experienced so much more than that?  Inexplicable.  Unfathomable.

Scarlett peeked from beneath her hands and looked at Laird, his features taut with desire that made him even more dazzling.

Did it matter?  Yes, it did.

A firm knock sounded at her door and he stilled, saving her the need to make a hasty decision.

The knock sounded again and with a soft oath, he rested his forehead against hers.

“What is it?” Laird barked before she could answer.

“A bath for Mistress Thomas.”

“I might hae to do murder.”  His lips pressed a warm kiss to her forehead before he released her.  Scarlett nearly melted against the wall but managed to get her feet beneath her though her heart was still beating madly.  Her skirts dropped back down of their own accord as he turned toward the door.

“Laird?”

He stopped with his hand on the latch and looked back.

“I guess, as far as apologies go, that wasn’t too bad.”

Humor lit his eyes; with a wink he was gone as Graeme entered leading a queue of men and buckets into her room.

18

 

Good timing or bad?

Scarlett couldn’t decide though she’d pondered the question thoroughly over the afternoon and into the next day.  Laird’s tantalizing lovemaking played over and over in her mind.  Silly girl, she berated herself finally.  Whatever she was here for it probably wasn’t so that she might have the liberty to engage in a clandestine affair with a divine, if somewhat ill-tempered, Scotsman.

Such thoughts weren’t like her at all, however Scarlett couldn’t deny that beyond the seductive freedom of these anonymous days, there was just something about Laird that drew her, enticed her.  Lured her to act in a way that she normally wouldn’t.  Couldn’t.

Uninhibited.   Spontaneous.

Breathless.

But Scarlett wasn’t sure if that was what she wanted.  She hadn’t lied.  Laird was turning out to be more than she had bargained for and because of that, key to getting home or not, she’d avoided being alone with him since then.  Avoided making a choice.  Did she want nothing more than a fling with Laird?  That was all it could be, of course, a casual affair to wait out her temporary situation.

Her stomach began to churn at the thought.  Surely, this whole kerfuffle was only temporary, right?  A moment with the man of every woman’s dreams?  Or was it to be a life locked in a nightmare?  The two conundrums battled for supremacy at the forefront of her mind.

Tucking both dilemmas aside, Scarlett instead spent a large portion of her time with Aleizia and Aileen, finishing off The Wizard of Oz and moving on to The Sound of Music.  On a lark, she had tried to break down the tale of Joss Whedon’s Firefly but the concept of space travel had been too absurd for them.  Surprisingly though, the young women loved chilling tales of the magic and mysticism so Scarlett had begun telling them a convoluted tale about a ring, a Hobbit and an improbable journey with a wizard named Gandalf.

Aileen especially ate it up and Scarlett was happy to spend time with her.  Recognizing almost too easily a young girl starved for attention, affection and friendship.  Forced to grow up far too quickly.

It was a rare opportunity to enjoy herself, as well.  No one at Crichton with the exception of Lady Ishbel treated her as a captive, nor did they treat her as a thing, a paycheck.  The publicized product she had become back home.  She hadn’t had such fun since before The Puppet War began filming.

She especially enjoyed the time she spent with Rhys.  He never expected to be entertained.  No, he just liked to talk, or rather, make her talk.  Talking