He assessed his surroundings. The copse consisted of four or five trees hugged close together. A giant oak, too large for him to even wrap his arms around, loomed like a parent over the others.
He approached, contemplating settling his back against it, when a figure stepped out from the other side of it.
Deep brown eyes blinked at him in surprise. A surprise that only mirrored his own.
Paget peered up at him. “My lord . . .”
“Miss Ellsworth. What are you doing here?”
She lifted a slim gloved hand, her voice lifting above the patter of rain. “I imagine doing the same thing you are . . . s-seeking shelter until the rain dissipates.” Her teeth chattered, a testament that not only was she wet but cold.
The hem of her cloak—and what he could detect of her dress—was muddied almost to the knees. With her hood pushed back, the ties pulled at her throat, reddening her flesh. He imagined the hood was heavy from rainwater.
“I would offer you my coat, but I feel it is as wet as your cloak.”
She shook her head. “Quite right, but I thank you for the thought.”
“You are welcome.”
An awkward silence sank between them as the words of their polite exchange faded.
Wild strands of hair spilled loose to frame her face. Wet as it was, the pale hair appeared almost brown. She was a mess and seemed to know it. Her hand patted at her hair as if that would help tidy the damage. Her dark eyes darted from him to the ground and back again. As if she did not know quite where to look.
It wasn’t the first time he’d witnessed her in a state of disarray. This was the Paget who climbed trees with Owen. But she’d been a girl then.
She was no longer that barely-out-of-the-schoolroom girl he’d last seen. She was a woman now and a feast for his eyes. His gaze strayed to the gentle swell of breasts pressing against the wet bodice of her dress. Gooseflesh puckered the milk skin there. His body immediately responded. His cock stirred against his trousers. With a mental curse, he jerked his gaze out at the horizon. The branches hung low, obscuring anything above shoulder-view and granting him only a limited glimpse of the landscape.
He inhaled deeply. They were well-shrouded from the world. Not that there was likely to be any other passersby even if they were not. Not in this storm. A fact that filled him with apprehension. He was alone, isolated with the first female to rouse his interest since returning to England.
Her soft voice stroked his frayed nerves. “I was warned that it would rain—”
“And still you decided for a stroll?” he countered, his voice sharper than he intended.
He had not anticipated another encounter with her so soon. After the last, she’d found her way into his thoughts far too often. If he wasn’t careful he might form an attachment. Unacceptable, that. She belonged to Owen. She always had. And when he returned home there would be nothing to keep them apart. No war. Not the span of a continent. And certainly not him.
The color rose in her cheeks. “As did you,” she replied hotly.
“I set out at dawn with no notion that the weather would take such a turn. You’d do well to take care of yourself lest you hope to sicken.” He snorted. “Wouldn’t that be some tragic irony? Owen returning home to an ailing . . .” His voice faded as something flashed in the dark of her eyes.
She angled her head to the side. “An ailing . . . what?”
Precisely. What term could he apply to her? He shook his head and looked out again at the water-washed land.
He felt her step closer. “Pray continue. What were you going to say?”
“Do I need to say it?”
“I wish you would.”
He whipped his head back to stare down at her. The sight of her gleaming dark eyes—always a bit otherworldly even when they were children, like a beast of the forest thrust amid mortal man—only managed to infuriate him more. It was her eyes he remembered most. The vast depth of her stare, the penetrating dark that swallowed him whole even now, made him feel exposed. As though there was no hiding from her. A terrifying prospect. And yet also tempting. That she might recognize his loneliness.
And his sudden desire for her.
It should shame him and make him turn from her but he held his ground, scanning her slight frame from head to toe, his imagination running, envisioning her stripped free of her sodden clothing. His palms tingled at the notion of removing the pins from her wet hair and letting the pale length fall around her body like Botticelli’s Venus. He was being foolish, of course. A woman of her inexperience wouldn’t recognize his interest in her. And coming from him, Paget surely would not expect it. Not with their past. “Owen and I fought side by side for years. We came to rely on each other out there.”
She nodded.
He continued, “We may have not been the closest children, but there’s little I don’t know when it comes to him now.”
She blinked. “I never implied you and he—”
“Suffice to say I’m aware of the regard you hold for each other. When he comes home, he’ll be coming home for you.”
She inhaled and stepped back. A flicker of something he thought to be unease passed over her expression. “But there is no understanding between Owen and myself.”
He let loose a single rough bark of laughter. Was she really that naïve? “Indeed? For God’s sake. Paget, there doesn’t need to be a declaration. Sometimes words aren’t necessary. You will marry, of course. Everyone knows this. Don’t tell me you do not?”
Color stained her cheeks and she glanced away as if unable to meet his gaze—or answer his question. He watched her swallow, the damp skin of her throat working.
His palms tingled and he curled his fingers into a fist, stopping himself from pushing back the wet tendrils that clung to that tempting expanse of skin.
Immediately, the thought of his mouth there, tasting her neck for himself, followed. He squeezed his eyes in a hard, punishing blink.
Such thoughts were . . . unthinkable. He was only tormenting himself. She’d likely slap him a second time. As she should. He’d do well to find a willing female and slake his lusts . . . forgetting about this inconvenient attraction.
“I—” she started to say in a small voice before pausing. She began again, her voice stronger, “It’s not like that between Owen and me.”
He could only stare at her for a moment, her words sinking in slowly. “What are you saying?” A dangerous sense of foreboding crept over him, sliding up his nape and tightening his scalp.
“I cannot consider him as . . . as a woman should consider a man she’s to one day marry.”
He took a swift step forward and she took a hasty step back.
She must have seen something in his expression . . . some of the anger coming over him. She stared up at him with wide eyes.
He stopped, holding up a hand as though to pacify her. “You cannot mean that.” He shook his head slowly. “You’ll destroy him.”
“I’ve tried to will myself to feel differently!” She shook her head. “I cannot feel what is not there.” She looked up at him with large, pleading eyes.
He turned away. “I don’t care to hear this,” he muttered. The image of his brother as he’d last seen him, haggard and dead-eyed, exhausted from their last campaign where half their company had been decimated flashed through his mind. The guilt he’d felt on leaving had only been mollified by his conviction that Owen would soon be home. And Paget Ellsworth would be waiting for him.
She came after him, her icy-cold hand falling on his wrist, pulling him back around to face her. “Who else should I talk to? You’re his brother. You’ve seen him recently . . . you can tell me how I should best approach—”
“No,” he bit out. “Don’t ask me the best way to destroy my brother.”
Her hand dropped from his arm. “I cannot love him . . . not as he deserves.”
“Try harder,” he growled.
“I’ve thought long over the kiss we shared when he left . .
. it was not . . . it’s not . . .” She lightly brushed her fingers over her lips, as though she still tasted their farewell kiss there.
His stomach knotted as he gazed at those lips. The thin upper lip and plumper bottom. It was an elegant mouth. Demure and dusky pink. But he could well imagine it a deeper shade, red and swollen from kissing.
He jerked away and dragged his hands though his hair, ridding his mind of that image before facing her again. “You’re letting silly, girlhood notions fill your head.”
She squared her shoulders, her tone sharp with indignation. “I know my heart. I love Owen, but only as a friend . . . as a brother.”
He shook his head, thinking of Owen spinning fantasies of her as he fought for his life. She would never find a more worthy man. “You’re an idiot,” he snapped.
Her mouth sagged at the insult. With a blink, she regained her composure. “I don’t have to stand here and listen to this.” She marched past him.
He closed his eyes in a pained blink. Perhaps he could have spoken with more tact. “Where are you going?”
“Home,” she called over her shoulder.
“It’s still pouring.” He strode after her, motioning to the rain-drenched landscape.
“I don’t care. Better a soaking than remain here for your abuse.”
He seized her arm. She whirled around and struck him in the chest with her fist. “Unhand me, you brute!”
He caught her offending fist, small and cold in his grip. She pulled back her other arm and he caught that wrist, too. She glared up at him. Her chest heaved, lifting her breasts high against her bodice. It wasn’t a deliberate move. It couldn’t be. She didn’t know what she was doing . . . she could not fathom her effect on him. That every inch of him was wound tight and aching, suffering from her nearness. God, he needed release. A soft, willing body to ease him and banish her from his thoughts.
He fought for restraint, for calm, and swallowed deeply. “You’re romanticizing marriage—”
“I am not. I want passion. Desire.”
He snorted. “You’ve been reading too many novels, Miss Ellsworth.”
“Please remove that smirk from your face. It exists. I know it does.”
“Do you now?” An ugly suspicion took root. “Have you already found someone then to share this grand passion with you?”
He couldn’t say why, but he held his breath, feeling dangerously out of sorts as he awaited her answer . . . certain that if she said yes he would find the bastard and thrash him to an inch of his life.
“No.”
Relief coursed through him.
“But it exists,” she insisted. “I know it. I’ve seen proof in others. And if I’m not to have it with my husband, then where else shall I find it?”
A strained silence fell between them. Where indeed? She stared up at him, waiting for him to answer. Her gaze scanned his face, lingering on his mouth with a rapt fascination that tightened his skin. Was she even aware of where she was looking—and how it affected him?
“What of friendship? Loyalty?” His voice wrenched from deep in his throat, low and strained as he watched her watching him . . . his mouth. “Are those not sentiments valued within marriage?”
Her eyes flicked back to his. She looked troubled for a moment, and hope flared within him that he was getting through to her. He pushed his advantage. “You can’t crush Owen like this . . .”
She wet her lips. He followed the movement of her tongue, and something twisted inside of him.
“What of me? What of my needs?” She wiggled her wrist in his grip, but still he clung. “Shall I pretend each time we’re together that he makes my heart race when I feel nothing more than friendship? Is that honest?” she continued, her voice a soft rasp. “Is that fair to him? It has been four years, Jamie.”
“I don’t find most women overly concerned with honesty when it comes to dealings with the opposite sex. Why should it concern you?”
“Oh! You’re insufferable.”
“Friendship is more than many people ever find in a spouse.”
Her mouth thinned into a stubborn line. “Well, I want more than that.”
His anger mounting, he asked, “Aren’t you so very fortunate that you can afford to be so selfish?”
An outraged huff of breath escaped her. “You don’t understand. You would have to possess a heart . . . and feelings. All of which you clearly lack.” She pulled free and spun around again. She was almost clear of the overhanging branches when he caught her again.
It occurred to him he should just allow her to go. Until he thought of Owen, and the rejection he would face upon his return. He needed her to see reason . . .
He wrapped a hand around her waist and pulled her back beneath the canopy of leaves. She struggled against him as he carried her deeper within the copse and dropped her so that she was pressed against the tree.
Her dark eyes glittered with outrage. “How dare you?”
“Passion . . . desire . . . it’s not all it’s made out to be. It fades. Usually after the first taste.”
“Not when it’s combined with love,” she countered.
He rolled his eyes. “Oh, you want love, too? You might as well wish for the moon. You’ll toss aside Owen on a fantasy.”
“I can’t change the way I feel,” she said through clenched teeth. “You can’t change the way I feel.”
Can’t he?
Frustration rose up inside him as he stared down at her upturned face.
“No?” he growled. “Perhaps I can prove to you just how meaningless passion can be.”
He took her face in both hands while keeping his body pressed to hers, trapping her between himself and the tree. Not that she made any move to escape.
She stilled utterly, her eyes wide and dark as his head swept down and his mouth claimed her lips.
CHAPTER FOUR
* * *
Perhaps I can prove to you just how meaningless passion can be.
There was no time for the meaning of his words to sink in. There was only him. His hands holding her face, his mouth covering her own, the great length of his body sinking against her.
She froze in shock, horrified, confused . . . and admittedly thrilled.
Curtained in the shadow of dripping branches, the lightly pattering rain a distant drum in her ears, she could almost believe this was a dream. That Jamie, Owen’s brother, had not backed her against a tree and covered her mouth with his ravaging lips, chasing the last bit of cold from her body. That it wasn’t real. It was too delicious, too good to be real.
Before this moment, she had not permitted herself to acknowledge that he roused something within her. Perhaps she did not fully know it herself until this moment. With their first encounter, he had occupied her thoughts, but now she realized why.
This was desire.
He was the passion she’d been waiting for. The more . . .
Her hands hovered at her sides, unsure where to go. To shove him away? Or clutch him closer. Not that they could get any closer. She’d danced with gentlemen before, of course, but she’d never felt a man’s body like this. So closely aligned with her own. The solid length of him, so strong and hard. Her kiss with Owen had been so sudden their bodies never even touched. Now, with Jamie . . . they touched everywhere. She imagined that she could feel the thump of his heart.
Her hands finally moved, drifted down to his shoulders. He tensed beneath her palms, his muscles bunching. A delicious heat swept through her.
His mouth wasn’t tentative or gentle. He deepened the kiss, slanting his head to the side, taking her top lip between his, sucking, making her gasp. He took full advantage of her parted lips, sliding his tongue inside her mouth.
She jerked, tensing at the first stroke of his tongue against hers.
His mouth pulled back slightly, breathing husky words onto her lips. “Touch your tongue to mine.”
Her belly clenched at his command. She complied, and his lips came over hers again, his open
mouth hot and devouring, his tongue stroking hers again, coaxing a response.
She moved, tentative, uncertain, licking at his tongue once, twice.
He growled low in his throat with approval.
The sound emboldened her and she opened her mouth wider, copying the parries and thrusts of his tongue.
“That’s it,” he encouraged, his voice a rough rasp on her lips.
She rose on her tiptoes and pressed herself even closer. His fingers delved into her hair, loosening the knot and sending more tendrils falling around her face, tickling her cheeks and jaw.
She dug her fingers into his shoulders, tightening her grip as their kiss grew more intense. She moaned, pleasure eddying through her, pooling low in her belly and creating a tormenting ache.
He dragged a hand down the slick column of her throat, the rough pads of his fingers an erotic rasp against her wet flesh. His fingers clutched the edge of her bodice before delving in, the back of his fingers sliding deeply beneath the fabric, grazing the swell of her breast. Her heart constricted at the sensation of his fingers on her breast, edging a nipple.
Heat zinged through her from that sole contact, spreading to both breasts, tightening them until they almost hurt, throbbing for his touch.
She moaned and slid her arms around his neck, arching into his hand, yearning for more . . .
He answered her unspoken request. His mouth left hers and trailed down her throat. Each wet, open-mouthed kiss made her gasp and whimper, wiggle and writhe against him.
His hand tightened on both the corset and bodice of her gown, tugging them lower, as much as he could without ripping the fabric. Her breasts rose up, pushing free, the twin mounds exposed to the air, only a lacy chemise shielding them. Her skin puckered to gooseflesh in the cold. The chemise afforded little protection. He pulled loose the ribbon and then shoved the flimsy material aside. Her exposed nipples pinched and tightened in the frigid air.
She inhaled sharply, watching him cautiously, biting her lip in agony at the intense way he scrutinized her. His piercing gaze heightened everything inside her. The clench of her stomach muscles, the pull of her skin, the heavy ache of her breasts.