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Chapter Eight

Nearly twenty hours later, Liam placed a tender kiss on Emeline’s forehead before reluctantly giving her a slight shake to awaken her. “Emeline, we’re here.”

This magnificent woman would’ve given herself to him last night. She’d put a stop to their passion. Not because she didn’t want to go on, but because she’d come to know him so well in such a short time that she knew he’d despise himself for losing control.

Since he’d stormed from the cottage and spent the night in the lean-to, she’d been unusually silent and distant.

Wasn’t that what he’d wanted?

He’d believed it was until he’d tossed and turned all night, visions of her moist mouth, rucked nipple, and impossibly long legs taunting him.

Fine. He wanted her. He was young and healthy. She had a body that begged to be loved. He’d simply responded to an animalist urge.

Liar.

Perchance if he kept telling himself that falsehood, he’d actually come to believe it.

He raked his gaze over her exquisite features, still relaxed in sleep. Her thick lashes fanned across her flushed cheeks dotted with adorable cinnamon-colored freckles. She breathed through her parted lips, dewy and tempting even as she slept.

It wasn’t just her beauty that attracted him. She was a complex, intelligent woman. A woman who put others before herself, and if he’d met her in a different time and place, there might’ve been room in his heart and life for her.

But since Kristin…

“Emeline.” He jostled her again. She’d been as difficult to awaken in the cottage, too. He’d never known a woman to sleep so deeply. “We’ve arrived and my kin awaits us, lass.”

At least he expected they would descend upon him when they arrived. Ten minutes ago, a laborer had dropped his hoe and torn across the field toward the great house. No doubt, on Mother’s orders to bring word the moment Liam had been sighted.

“Do ye want my family and servants to see ye splayed across my lap? For certain, they’ll get the wrong impression. Perhaps assume we’re lovers,” he said, unable to keep the teasing note from his voice.

Emeline eyelids flew open at that pronouncement. Treacle-brown eyes sparking with embarrassment and annoyance, she straightened so abruptly, she knocked his chin with her head.

“Ouch.” He rubbed the battered flesh, enjoying the rosy glow on her cheeks.

“Why didna ye say so the first time, ye clot head?” At once, she set to smoothing her hair, the ribbon containing the silky mass having long since been lost during the ride.

Despite her irritation, he chuckled. She was adorable when she went all prickly.

By the time they rounded the last curve of the long drive to Eytone Hall, she sat before him prim as a ninety-year-old virgin nun, eyes averted, and posture demure.

He leaned forward until his lips brushed the back of her head. “Relax. They’ll no’ pounce.”

“Hmph.” She fairly trembled with trepidation. Squaring her shoulders, she gasped as Eytone Hall came into view, it’s weathered buff-colored exterior and rows of mullioned windows catching the sun’s last bronze rays.

“’Tis magnificent. And huge, Liam.” Wonder colored her awestruck voice.

“Aye.” Pride infused him. “’Tis that.”

He loved his home.

For nine generations, the MacKays had overseen these lands. The very first feudal baron had commissioned the structure standing as a grand sentinel before them now. Constructed in the classical Scottish domesticated architecture style, the stately stone manor house boasted gables, towers, and several clusters of chimney stacks.

Stifling a groan, he flexed his shoulders and straightened his spine. Hours of holding her had wreaked havoc on the muscles as well as his libido. Rather than have her ride astride behind him, exposing her silky inner thighs to hours of chafing as well as the long milky-white legs to his less than chaste approval, he’d opted to seat her sideway in front of him.

The problem with that choice had been that her unforgettable, evocative scent filled his nostrils, and her lush curves had swayed against him as he held her upright. A raging erection had plagued him for miles.

Hell, if he were entirely honest with himself, he’d been in a state of half-arousal since awaking that first night and seeing the tempting shadows of her gorgeous form through that filmy shift in the muted firelight.

A niggling fear tormented him that he fought a battle he was destined to lose with this extraordinary woman.