“What happened to Isobel?”
“She died in childbirth a few months after we buried my brother. In case you were wondering, it wasn’t mine. She and Alasdair had been married for over a year before I returned.”
“You cared for her, Gregor. What happened wasn’t your fault.”
He gave her a long, slow, wicked look meant to scare her away. “As I said, caring had little to do with it.”
“So because you care about me and don’t want me to get hurt, you will not act on your ‘lust,’ but because you do not care about those other women it’s fine to take them to your bed? Do you not think that is a bit backward?” She moved closer. “Why don’t you just pretend I’m Seonaid?”
He obviously didn’t appreciate her sarcasm. “You are nothing like Seonaid.”
That they could both agree upon. But the tension she could feel rolling off him in hot waves egged her on. She wanted him to take her in his arms and show her all the passion her body was clamoring for.
“If caring is not required, what is required?” she challenged, standing so close to him their bodies were almost brushing. “Are my breasts not large enough for you? Is my face not pretty enough?”
He uttered a curse she’d never heard from him before. She could feel the tension reverberating off him like a drum. The tic in his jaw pulsed angrily. “Stop it, Cate. It won’t work. I told you I am not the man for you.”
She heard the heavy warning in his voice, but she did not heed it. He was close to giving in; she could feel it. She pressed the tips of the breasts he seemed determined not to look at against his chest, forcing him to try to deny the attraction sparking between them. “Why am I so different? Am I not willing enough? Must I throw myself down at your feet like everyone else?”
He grabbed her arm, jerking her against him, his eyes hot with anger—and something else. “Is that not what you’ve been doing since I returned?”
Cate gasped. Was that what he thought? She’d never meant…She hadn’t thought he would see it that way. She didn’t want to be anything like those women. “I was trying to get you to notice me because I love you.”
“As if I haven’t heard that before.”
He glanced down at the breasts poking into his chest, and the heat of it scorched her. For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her. She thought his body was drumming with a need as powerful as hers. That the pull would be as irresistible for him as it was for her. That she had what it took to attract a man like him.
Instead, his mouth curved in a slow smile. “I’m not so easily trapped, little one. Believe me, if a pretty face and a pert pair of breasts were all it took, I would have found myself standing at the church door years ago.”
Cate wrenched away, drawing back in horror. My God, what had she been thinking? She hadn’t been trying to trap him into anything except maybe a kiss. But had she actually thought to use her body to do so?
She wasn’t sensual or entrancing. She didn’t captivate or intrigue. She wasn’t the type of woman men couldn’t resist kissing (as evidenced by the fact that she was twenty and had never been kissed!). She was “cute,” not beautiful. Her body was taut and strong from fighting, not soft and lush for lovemaking.
And his rejection reminded her of that. It crushed her womanly confidence, and worse, made her feel silly for trying.
She hoped the tears choking her throat hadn’t reached her eyes. “I wanted you to kiss me because I love you. Because every time I close my eyes and dream of what my first kiss will be like, yours is the only face I ever see. Because I’m twenty years old and I’ve never wanted any other man but you. And because I thought you wanted to kiss me, too. So if you are going to accuse me of anything, have it be for being a fool to think I had what it takes to tempt you.”
Nine
Gregor was fighting on his last gasp of air. He couldn’t fucking breathe. Have what it takes to tempt him? Did the lass have any idea how hard it had been for him to pull away? How that feel of her breasts against his chest had set off nerve endings he never even knew he had? How his skin had tightened, his blood had heated, and his cock had thickened until it was hammering against his stomach with need he hadn’t felt since he was her age? How much he wanted to push her up against the wall of the barrack and give her exactly what she was asking for—and probably a whole hell of a lot more?
Nay, he realized, looking into her shimmering eyes. She didn’t. She had no bloody idea. She was innocent and sweet and despite what he’d said, without any feminine wiles of which to speak.
He would be glad she was so in the dark if it weren’t for the tears. Tears she was fighting to hide. Tears that told him he’d hurt her in a way that he hadn’t intended, in a place that was vulnerable. The air of womanly confidence was all for show. The dress, the hair, the perfect lady of the castle—Cate was testing her femininity in a way she never had before. All he had to do was look at her now, and see how comfortable she was in her peasant’s rags on the practice yard, to know that it couldn’t have been easy for her. Just as he knew that if he let her think she wasn’t desirable, it would crush her feminine pride to dust.
If he were honest with himself—which he didn’t want to be, damn it—he would also admit that, selfishly, he wanted to be the first to kiss her. That he knew how close his brother had been to kissing her, and just picturing it still drove him half-crazed and filled him with a new emotion: jealousy. Not even when he’d returned to Dunlyon and seen the woman he thought he would marry by his brother’s side had he felt this way. That had been more shock—and then stung pride and shame when he realized she’d used him. Perhaps he knew better than anyone how fragile a young man’s—or woman’s—pride could be.
He squared his shoulders as if preparing for battle as he stared at the freckled, dirt-smudged face turned to his.One kiss, he told himself. He could manage one kiss for the sake of her fledgling confidence.
“Come here, Cate.”
His voice was so gruff, she eyed him warily. “Why?” He didn’t answer, but just held her stare. Nervously biting her lip, she edged closer to him. “What do you want?”
He tipped her chin back with the crook of his finger, holding her gaze with his. Christ, she was pretty. Big doe eyes under straight, delicate brows, a slender nose, high cheekbones in the perfect oval of her face, a pointy chin and softly curved lips that were almost too red to believe they hadn’t been stained with crushed berries. Even mussed, with her hair pinned back and dressed in some of the most hideous garments he’d ever seen on a woman, she took his breath away.
“You have more than enough to tempt me, Cate, and I’m going to prove it.”
The delicate line of her brows drew together. “How?”
