He stayed still, didn’t reply, and the breeze rushed across the water, raising wavelets on the surface and riffling his hair.
“I-I love you.”
He groaned softly. “No,” he said. “Oh God, no, Gilly, you don’t. You might think you do because I was the first, but it was fear that night—a kind of battle lust, perhaps, the shock of what happened—” He stopped. “It isn’t love.”
Gillian felt a hot wave of annoyance fill her breast. She crossed her arms and glared at him. “Do you think you would have been the first if I didn’t have feelings for you? You’re a daft man, John Erly.”
“Then why me, Gillian? Is it because I was forbidden, because you were warned to stay away from me? Did you think you could have an adventure before you were married, an affair with a rogue who had no heart to break?”
Surprise coursed through her. “I broke your heart?”
He hesitated a second too long. “Nay, of course not. It was only an example.”
She paused. “All my life people have told me what to do. Because I’m quiet and shy, they imagine I’m dull and stupid and I cannot think for myself. Well, I can. I am perfectly capable of knowing what I want and choosing my own destiny, my own—”
“Your own way to go to the devil?” he asked. He spread his arms. “Look at me, Gillian. This is all I am, all I have—a sword and a flute and the clothes on my back. I am an outsider, a rogue. What would your father say, or your sisters? God, If I’d known it was you behind that mask, I would have steered clear, saved us both the heartache. I wish I had. I have rules about that. Iknowbetter.”
She took a step toward him. “Rules. I am sick of living by other people’s rules. I knew who you were when I kissed you, what people said about you. I also know it isn’t true, John. I knew then. I saw . . . Even if you hadn’t told me about your past, I saw for myself that your are a good man, an honest one, kind and true. Did you tell me about your past to drive me away? It didn’t work. I love youbecauseof the things you’ve endured, because you are more than you let people see. You are everything to me.”
He swore, stepped closer. “Am I? I like women. I like the kind who don’t care, who want the pleasure of a brief hour or two in my bed, who don’t want to know what I think, or how I feel. It’s neat and tidy and easy. There are no complications. That’swho I am, Gillian, not some fairy-tale prince you’ve made up for yourself.” He gripped her arms. “Do you understand?”
She pressed her hand to his heart. “Liar.” She said it again. “I know you love me. No man touches a woman like that, to her very soul, if he does not love her.”
“How do you know? With all your years of experience? You know only what I taught you. I know how to kiss a woman, how to pleasure her so she believes—”
She stood on her toes, put her mouth against his. For a moment he resisted, then his arms slid around her, pulled her close, and he kissed her with desperation and passion. She felt his arousal and her own, her body restless with desire, the points of her breasts and the place between her legs aching for him.
But he pushed her away, bent forward with his hands on his knees, panting. “Not here, not now, Gilly. Not with a hundred clansmen so close. Not ever again.”
“No, you’d never risk harming me. You’d never hurt anyone.”
He straightened and glared at her. “You’re a child, Gillian. You aren’t a brave heroine—you’re a coward. You stole a kiss I would never have given freely while you hid behind a mask.”
“My mask is gone.” She kissed him again, a simple brush of her lips against his, and stepped back. “I hope before it’s too late, you’ll unmask as well, though I know who you are, what you are. That man, the naked, imperfect, arrogant, honorable, gentle one, is the man I want, the man I love.”
She turned to walk away, her heart jagged in her breast.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” he called after her.
“It means I love you, John Erly.”
* * *
The woman was daft, John decided, crazy, without a shred of sense. She’d left him standing beside the loch, in the dark, alone.
Did she expect him to go after her? Perhaps she thought he’d take her away, elope, or carry her to the nearest patch of heather and make love to her again.
It was impossible—all of it—love, seduction, and everything else. He ran his hand through his hair and paced. He’d have her army of Highlanders to deal with if he so much as touched her hand. They’d hang, draw, and quarter him—and then they’d kick what was left of his carcass back over the English border. Or the Fearsome MacLeod would hunt him down, castrate him, and wear his balls as a sporran. And there was Gillian’s betrothed—no doubt a man who’d not take kindly to any man poaching his bonny wife-to-be. He wouldn’t, if it were him.
She was indeed daft—mad as a hare, crazy.
And she loved him.
He was the luckiest bastard on earth—or the most unfortunate.
He leaned back against the trunk of a tree and considered that. He wasn’t afraid of anyone’s disapproval—just his own. If he’d been halfway worthy of her, and he knew which window she’d climbed out of, he’d climb in after her. But he hadn’t a clue, and it was better that way.
She’d forget him in time, when she was in her husband’s arms.Oh, how he hated that idea.
He stood on the shore of the loch and watched the moonlight glitter on the surface. Wedding jitters, he decided. She was shy, perhaps anxious about all those people watching her wed or about her wedding night.
But she hadn’t been shy with him. He frowned.
She loved him.
And she was right—he loved her.
He ran his hand through his hair. There wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.
Not honorably.
