She was extremely distracted. Even as she got her hair and makeup done, and was zipped into the gold gown that she had chosen for tonight.
She had been thinking about him far too much.
But it was okay, actually. Because she had made a decision about tonight.
Tonight was important. And she was going to sparkle, build connections and keep him on track for the whole of the celebration, and then she was going to seduce him.
Because she wanted him.
Because she felt they both deserved…
Were they friends?
It was the word that she had come up with when they had spoken.
She wasn’t sure she’d ever had friends either. The nuns were the closest thing. And they had been tasked with taking care of her, and also had very little in common with her in some ways.
It had been a contemplative life. But sometimes it had been fun, and sometimes they’d had deep conversation.
Yes. In the three years that she had been there it had definitely been something like friendship.
So maybe this could be too. Maybe they didn’t have to be at odds.
Maybe she could learn physical things from him, so that when she went out into the real world, none of it would be shocking. Perhaps it would be easier. She would know how to deal with men. How to be normal.
Preferable to going out into the world as a twenty-one-year-old virgin, she supposed.
She clung to the idea of a life opened up. Of a life where she made her own choices.
And in the meantime, where she could make her present situation all the more pleasant.
Where she could learn about herself.
She had done that thoughtfully, internally on the Isle of Skye.
Maybe it was time to do it physically.
Her makeup had been done expertly, in that way where it took quite a few products and skill to accomplish a natural look.
And her hair had been left curly and wild as she had come to prefer it.
She felt like herself. And that was interesting. To feel at home in her skin in this sort of dress, when that had never been true back in Cape Blanco.
The plan for them was that they would arrive thirty minutes after the guests. Wherein they would be presented to those in attendance. Fashionably late.
Her stomach fluttered. Not because of the entrance they were going to make soon, but because soon she was going to see Ragnar.
It was amazing what that did to her. How it made her feel. How in this short span of time he had gotten beneath her skin. He had found the power to affect her body.
The first time she had seen him, riding on that horse, the thunderous hoofbeats sending terror streaking through her, her reaction to him had been pure adrenaline.
But now? It was still adrenaline, she supposed. But it was something deep. Something more. Something nice.
It was…attraction. Need. This luxurious, wonderful feeling that she had been prepared to never, ever feel, in defiance of the life that her father had laid out for her.
As a way to maintain control.
And now she didn’t want that. She didn’t need it. Not in that way.
