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“How dare you?” Ewan, in contrast to Hamish, seemed irrational and unpredictable and Tia felt herself tensing in response, memories of her childhood surging to the fore. Memories were protective—they helped avoid getting hurt in the same ways, and right now, every single instinct Tia possessed was telling her flight, not fight.

But then Hamish squeezed her hand, and leaned closer to her, so his body offered not only warmth but physical protection, and she breathed out slowly.

“You’ve been gone this whole time. You’ve been nowhere. It’s been me putting it back together, looking after them.” He hitched his thumb at Rupert and Eleanor, the former of whom was still eating his hard-boiled egg, eyes on the smorgasbord as though contemplating a third.

“Darling, really,” Eleanor addressed Ewan. “I don’t know what’s come over you.”

“Seriously, mother?” Ewan turned on the older woman. He was spluttering now and Tia’s heart rate was accelerating.

“And then you swan in with your bloody wife and bloody trying-to-get-pregnant announcement and everyone’s bloody falling all over themselves to impress you, and God, I bloody hate your smug, arrogant face.”

Hamish stared at his brother for several beats and then turned to his mother. “I’m going to get Tia settled upstairs, and then I’ll come and help you with your paperwork.”

Eleanor was pale, but she did an excellent job of pushing a broad smile to her face.

“Very good, darling.”

Tia mumbled something like, “Thank you for breakfast,” as she stood, mortified by the outburst, by the part she’d played in all of this. But Hamish was holding her hand, pulling her from the room, into the wide corridor beyond.

They walked up the stairs in silence, still holding hands, both likely processing the awful interlude.

Once inside Hamish’s suite, Tia spoke. “I think I should go back to New York.”

“To hell you will,” he said, closing the distance between them and kissing her hard, as though he’d been thinking about it ever since earlier that morning, as though he needed to kiss her urgently or else he might die. “The hell you will. You aren’t going anywhere, Lady Ashcombe,” he said, lifting her so her legs wrapped around his hips and he turned, taking a few steps and pressing her against the wall, holding her there easily with his strength and kissing her until there was no air left in her lungs. Not because he’d swallowed it but because she’d forgotten how to breathe. There was only this kiss, this moment, his touch, their connection.

“Heaven help me,” she moaned, driving herself lower, seeking him, wanting him, no, needing him, with all that she was.

“I would do anything for us to be anywhere but here,” he said, into her mouth.

“Here is fine by me,” she said, grinding her hips to prove her point.

His laugh was throaty. “Tease.”

“Hey, it ain’t teasing if you intend to follow through.”

He pulled away from her then, gently easing her to standing. “And I do,” he promised, kissing her slower now, more of a ‘goodbye’ kiss. “But if I don’t go and help Eleanor, she’s going to come looking for me, and I’d prefer that not to be how we remember our first time.”

Tia’s lips twisted to the side.

“Can I ask you for a favour, Lady Ashcombe?”

Surprise ran through her. It was both perfectly like Hamish and yet somehow unexpected. “Depends what it is.”

His smile was knowing.

“Undress for me.”

Her breath snagged in her throat. “Did you just say…”

He moved forward, his knee pushing between her legs and instincts took over, so she pressed down, her sex against his thigh, pleasure sparking through her abdomen.

“I suspect I have a long hour ahead and what I really want is to be able to sit there and imagine you naked whenever I want.”

“What do I get in return?”

“Get undressed and I’ll show you.”

Her heart was racing faster than it had ever raced. With her eyes hooked to his, she caught the bottom of her shirt and started to lift it higher, over her body, her breasts, shivering not from the cold—it wasn’t—but from the desire that was rampaging through her system. She dropped it on the ground beside them, heard his satisfied intake of breath. Almost melted.