Page 59 of Love with a Scottish Outlaw
He heard her gasp in a breath and not release it, as anticipation built between them. At the first touch of her bare thighs, it was his turn to release a shuddering breath. He let his hands span the roundness of her ass, his fingers meeting at the cleft, and she gave a choked whimper. He slowly moved forward around her waist, until his thumbs met at her navel. She was trembling.
“Should I stop?” he said against her hair.
“Nay, oh, no, please don’t.”
In the darkness, her features were indistinct, but he kissed her nose, her lips, her chin, even as he let his thumbs travel a slow journey down into the curling hair between her thighs.
Her breath came faster, mixed with these little sounds of pleasure that were almost his undoing. He wanted to lift his plaid and bury himself within her. Instead, he moved his thumbs deeper, where it was warmer, slicker, until he found what he was looking for and stroked.
She cried out into his shoulder, then whispered, “God, I want, I want—what do I want?”
“This,” he said with certainty, turning his hand so that he could caress her with his fingers.
She clutched his plaid to hold herself up, shuddering with each stroke. He tipped her head back and took her mouth deeply, using his tongue to mimic what he truly wanted. Sweet girl, she spread her trembling legs wider, and he moved deeper, caressed her but didn’t force his entrance. He wouldn’t risk her maidenhead.
Her little cries grew higher, gasping now, and he held her with his free arm as she shuddered through her climax.
At last she sagged in his arms, her head tipping back to rest on his shoulder, and he knew she was staring up at him as if to read him in the darkness. With great reluctance, he removed his hand and let her skirts drop like a veil between them.
“That was,” she began, but didn’t go farther, because he was kissing her gently, upper lip, lower. Her tongue touched his with sweet exploration, before she at last pulled back. “That is . . . how it is between men and women?”
“Some of it.” His voice was husky with restraint.
“Can I touch ye as ye touched me?”
“Nay,” he said quickly.
“It doesn’t feel good?”
To his surprise, a chuckle escaped him. When was the last time he’d laughed? “The pleasure ye just felt, so would I feel. But I cannot risk it, lass.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’d take your virginity.”
“Or take what is my husband’s by right—if I have one,” she added sadly.
“Ye don’t.”
“What?” she demanded, stiffening.
“I felt the evidence of your virginity. Do not torment yourself with guilt, Catherine. ’Tis not yours to bear.”
“I’m not married.” Her voice was full of tentative relief. “And yet I could be betrothed.”
They stood entwined for a long moment, as his guilt seemed a live thing, hovering about his legs like a fog about to rise and swallow him whole.
“Duncan, ye made me feel great pleasure. Can I not do the same for ye?”
The thought of her touching him that intimately—
“Ye’re not breathing,” she said with doubt.
“Because I’m trying not to imagine ye naked, letting my mouth taste your body as I wish.”
“Ye would . . . taste me?”
“Everywhere.”
