He reached out a hand as though he were going to cup it around her elbow, but she took a step back, putting herself out of reach. There was no time to worry over how amused this madehim look because she did not trust herself to keep a cool head if he kissed her again.
She’d never… She hadn’t…
It seemed impossible that kissing could feel likethat.
She’d had one kiss before, an act of rebellion shortly after refusing to marry Ewan the last time. It had been with a stable boy about her age, stolen and quick and unpleasantly wet. She and the boy hadn’t been particularly fond of one another when they’d kissed; they’d been driven by curiosity more than anything else. But neither of them had felt any desire to repeat the experiment after that first awkward endeavor.
She had assumed the act was just… not her preference.
But this—this—was something else entirely.
And Ewan seemed to know it, the smug little thing. Or, rather, the smug not-at-all little thing.
It had been a profoundly confusing morning for Ailsa.
“Aye,” he said. “I wanted to, and so I just did. As I said, we’re to be wed soon. There’s no harm in us getting a wee bit closer, do you reckon?”
He didn’t make any movement toward her and yet she held up her hands in front of her like she intended to ward off a malevolent spirit. This, of course, made him laugh even harder. She knew she was blushing like mad.
“That was quite close enough for this morning,” she said tartly.
He made a playful grab at her, but she dodged again, smacking him on the arm as she went.
She held up a finger between them.
“Behave,” she scolded.
Before he could respond, she turned on her heel and began walking away, Geal following obediently.
She struggled to ignore Ewan’s comment from behind her as he grabbed his own reins and began to follow.
“Ah, lassie. I cannae say that’s very likely.”
It turned out that Ewan found few things more satisfying than making Ailsa Donaghey blush. He kept stealing glances at her as they rode back to the Keep. This had the delightful effect of making her blush harder every time she caught him looking.
He stopped trying to hide his glances.
Kissing Ailsa had been…
Well, it had been too brief.Fartoo brief.
But aside from that complaint, it had been a delightful jolt of a kiss. It was the kind of kiss that left a man wanting more. A lot more.
Her lips had been soft, and she’d hitched her breath in surprise when he’d pressed his mouth to hers. She’d pulled away before he could do much of anything else.
Which meant he could do little besides think of whatanything elsemight entail. Her mouth opening for him. The touch of her tongue against his own. Thetasteof her.
He forced himself to stop thinking about all of this before riding his horse gotveryuncomfortable.
They looped their way back around toward the training ground, where James and Vaila were still on horseback. As Ewan watched, James and Vaila spurred their horses into a gallop, they rose up on their fast-moving mounts and launched throwing daggers toward a lightweight target that hung from a nearby tree limb. It was a distinctly challenging target, one designed to mimic the movement of an approaching enemy. It fluttered in the breeze.
Of three daggers James threw, one struck the target, one missed, and one clipped the edge but didn’t stick.
Vaila’s all struck. All three. Right in the center.
The cluster of men who had gathered to watch this exercise roared their approval. That had to stick in James’ craw, Ewan thought. But the thing that interested him most was the way Ailsa regarded her sister’s triumph—and not just because he found Ailsa more interesting than perhaps he ought.
But she was looking at Vaila with approval, but not shock. She was impressed, but not unduly so. Which meant that she expected Vaila to make such a throw.
