He puts his arm behind his head. “A while. Ye seemed to be enjoying yourself.”
“I was trying to regain my senses,” I say haughtily. “I was overserved last night.”
“Aye,” he agrees. “Ye were past overserved and well on your way to blootered. I’d intended to be a gentleman and give ye the bed, but ye took my hand hostage.”
“I did?”
“Holding me like I was yer wubbie. Did ye have one of those as a bairn?” He’s openly grinning now and his biceps are flexing and the sheet’s covering the lower half of him and wondering what he’s still wearing is very distracting.
Realizing he’s waiting for an answer, I frown. “What’s a wubbie?”
“Ye know, a doll or a blanket or something? My sister Isobel had a ratty pink blanket that she’d barely let loose long enough for Mom to wash it. She patched it half a dozen times and Isobel still keeps it stuffed under her pillow.”
“Oh, I think that’s sweet.”
He rolls over on his side, so close now that I can see the tiny flecks of gold in his eyes. I’m fully dressed, over-dressed really, thanks to the cousin’s “code.”
But I feel stripped bare.
“Good morning, wife,” he says, glancing briefly at the window. “Actually, more like good afternoon.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sleep in so long.” I feel the familiar tension, muscles tightening, stiff with anxiety.
Get up, you lazy bitch, get moving!Marlena’s voice, harsh and grating.
“Have calm, there’s no rush. The suite is ours as long as ye like.” His grin is slow, suggestive this time. “Especially if ye’d like to stay in bed with me.”
If I leaned in just an inch or two, I could press my lips against his, find out if that blazing hot kiss last night was just a once in a lifetime thing, or if every kiss from this man feels like that.
He’s waiting, I can tell. Holding himself still, though I can feel the coiled tension in his muscles.
“We’ve only known each other for three days,” I whisper.
“Aye.”
“Suddenly we’re married and enormous men are kicking down doors and… do I remember you calling Logan a gerbil-headed spunktrumpet?” I slap my hand over my mouth, laughing uncontrollably.
“While this is true, I invite ye to recall that he called me degenerate corned beef faced syrup-wearing wankstain,” he says, attempting to look stern as I put my face in the pillow and howl with laughter.
“Oh, my god your family is just so extra,” I wheeze. My abdomen is still sore from laughing last night.
“Funny, that,” he says, “it’s what we all call Logan. I’ll have to tell you about the time he was sent in to blow up a rival family’s warehouses and incinerated the wrong buildings.”
“Whose warehouses did he blow up?”
“Ours,” he sighs.
That sets me off into another round of helpless laughter.
Wallace orders brunch and insists on hand-feeding me bites of smoked salmon over little crackers with herbed cream cheese, and croissants with Dundee marmalade. While I was in the bathroom, he’d buttoned up his shirt to answer the door for room service, an action I noted with some regret.
We talk for a while, secure on our feather-filled oasis, lounging in the cashmere blankets and pretending that there’s nothing waiting for us outside this room.
“Ye have a smear there,” he says, holding my chin. “A bit of cream cheese.” He kisses me lightly, his tongue swiping the corner of my mouth. There’s a moment, he stops, hovering over me, lips still lightly pressed against mine. Waiting.
Surging up, I kiss him back, wrapping my arm around his neck and pulling him closer. Thatkiss last night was no flash in the pan. Wallace knows how to use his lips, teeth, and tongue in one perfect, ferocious assault. He toys with me, soft kisses and harder ones, lips pressed firmly against my teeth as his tongue sucks mine into his mouth. When a groan rumbles through his chest, vibrating against my skin, it’s as powerful as if he’d thrust his fingers inside me.
My knees part, letting him shove his thick thigh between them, his knee nudging my center and I flush. “So warm, sweet wife. Are ye slick under these heavy joggers you’re wearing?”
