Rowen might have been doused with icy water for how she gaped at Alec, his husky words shattering the spell that gripped her.
He had sworn not to touch her, the liar! She tried to step backward, but he still held her so close that all she could do was raise her hand to slap his face, the blow leaving a red mark upon his left cheek.
Yet she wasn’t looking at the mark, but into his eyes that had darkened to a stormy hue.
His jaw had tightened, too, and she felt a raw tension in his body that was different than how his arms had felt around her only moments before.
His embrace seemed punishing now as he pulled her closer, and he looked at her as if daring her to strike him again.
“Go on, lass. Curse at me. Swear at me. When I said last night I wouldna touch you, I meant the consummation of our marriage—and not kisses or embraces as any husband would wish from his wife. I can tell you liked it well enough?—”
“I didna like it!” she cut him off, astonished that Alec had read her mind so clearly. Yet she lied—she lied!—as her lips still burned from the stirring pressure of his mouth upon hers, which only infuriated her further. “Let me go, Mackay, damn you?—”
Too late her words died upon her tongue as once again Alec pulled her against him to kiss her with such fervor that her knees went weak and she clung to him again…all thought of protest fleeing from her mind.
Yet when his kiss an instant later became not so much passionate as tender, his warm breath merging with hers as his lips seemed to savor her, Rowen was certain she had never known so wondrous a sensation.
She could not help herself but to kiss him back, her tongue tentatively searching for his, only to hear him groan against her mouth…a sound just as stirring.
She felt him shudder then, and his tight hold upon her lessened as he lifted his head once again to look into her eyes with an emotion she hadn’t seen there before.
A longing as if he searched for something similar in her gaze, though she felt so overcome by the unexpected tenderness of his kiss that she could but close her eyes and take a deep, trembling breath.
She felt so strange, so unlike herself…with a flaring in her heart of something she had never known before that nonetheless, made her grow stiff suddenly in his arms.
No, no, no, this couldn’t be happening, Rowen railed at herself even as Alec seemed to have sensed the change in her and tightened his embrace.
Still she didn’t open her eyes—wouldn’t open them for fear of seeing again the ardent longing in his gaze that mirrored the emotion sweeping over her only an instant before, until she had forced it away.
She had never fallen in love before with anyone…and she would not allow it to be Alec, she couldn’t! She had no intention of remaining with him any longer than it would take to free herself from this marriage, which meant only one thing—ah, God, might Errol be anywhere near?
Rowen snapped her eyes open into sunlight so blinding that Alec’s face was lost to her and she heard him sigh and finally release her.
Her knees still so weak that she faltered, but he caught her arm to steady her and gave a low laugh.
“Aye, I know exactly how you feel, lass. Come on, it’s best we continue our ride.”
He led her without protest to her mare, still nibbling grass, though his gray stallion tossed its head and pawed at the earth.
“You see, Tempest is anxious tae be on our way as well. If we head back now, mayhap we’ll not be too late for the midday meal.”
Rowen nodded…but for a reason she still could not believe, she had nothing to say and Alec’s quizzical look didn’t spur her to curse any further.
She was stunned at herself, aye, so deeply astonished at the undeniable emotion he had awakened within her that she even allowed him to lift her up onto her horse.
Her fingers trembled as she took the reins, and it seemed that no reproaching herself was going to work as Alec mounted his horse and drew up beside her.
“How about a race back tae the castle? I will even give you a head start?—”
“Och, I need no head start!” she blurted, grateful that she suddenly felt more like herself even as Alec’s face broadened into a smile.
So handsome a smile, too, that she felt her heart seem to skip a beat, which made her spur her mare into a gallop.
“Go on, Snow, run like the wind!” she urged her horse with a shout as she glanced over her shoulder to see how closely Alec followed her.
Yet to her surprise, he seemed to be fighting to keep his seat, his stallion reared upon its hind legs and squealing as if in pain.
Now her heartbeat seemed to stop as a burly figure of a man with a sling poised in his hand emerged from a copse of pine not far from the rocks.
