Page 111 of In Search of a Husband
Kate stood before him in his room and reached up to slip the pins free from her hair. Long, black curls fell down to her waist. Her normally cool gray eyes burned with fire, pinning him there by the door, struck.
Christ, she was beautiful.
All tall grace. And power.
Did she have any knowledge of the power she possessed over him?
He should have known it would take a woman as spirited as she to bring him to his knees. He would crawl across the room to her for another taste of her mouth.
“Dinna leave me again,” he choked out. “Please,mo chridhe.”
“Then don’t give me another reason to, Gabe.”
He shut his eyes, swallowing the pain in her words that he had placed there. He had been an arse to her, sending her off, dismissing her as if she meant nothing when she meant everything.
“I—” He cleared his throat, slowly peering up to her. “My father passed when he was thirty-seven, and my brother died by his own hand at the same age. But I canna… I would burn down Scotland to bring ye back to me, safe. Do ye understand?”
Kate licked her lips and tilted her head before turning her back to him and pulling her hair to the side. “Undo my buttons.”
The air was heavy as he crossed the room, eating up the distance between them in long, hungry strides. He bent down and pressed his lips to the base of her neck, snaking an arm around her waist to draw her against him.
“Forgive me, Kate.”
His hands shook as he slipped each button free, pressing his nose into her hair, breathing in the sweet vanilla that lingered in the black curls with the smell of peat and heather. When she arrived at the inn that day, her dress covered in mud and her cheeks pink as she asked for a meal, he hadn’t expected for her to turn his world upside down.
He didn’t know then what she would become to him.
Kate melted against his chest, pressing her back against his front and sighing as he gently nibbled the column of her throat before soothing the sensation away with the cool press of his tongue.
“Help me undress,” she ordered next.
Slowly, he peeled the shoulders of her dress down until it hung loose on her arms. And still, he hadn’t kissed her. Couldn’t.
He was a man driven by some frantic urge to see her safe and well, and he planned to seduce her until she knew how much he loved her.Until she forgave him. Until he claimed her for him and him alone, and she would be ruined for all others.
Gabriel was desperate for her. To feel her. To feel her beneath him.
She hissed as he tugged the dress down her arms, and it collapsed around her feet in a puddle of fabric.
The constable and his men had hauled Duncan away only hours earlier, and probably for the best. If Gabriel ever saw him again…
He touched her with soft grazes, sliding his fingers over her shoulders and down her arms, untying her stays until she was free of those as well. She exhaled a heavy, pained breath, layer by layer, until she stood with her back against his front, naked.
“Katherine,” he whispered, his voice a low rasp. “Christ, what you do to me.”
She leaned back and rested the back of her head against his chest, peering up at the ceiling and slowly swaying her hips to some imaginary song.
“Do ye ken how much I love ye?” He splayed his warm palm over her flat stomach, dreaming only of giving her children, of growing a family with her. And to think he had almost allowed fear to rob him of that.
Time and years, all unknowns.
“We are all given a handful of years in this life, Gabe. I want mine to be with you, however many that may be. I don’t want to think about what could happen. Love me now, here. Show me. Make love to me.Please.”
Her voice broke, and he pushed his hand farther north up her body, trailing his rough fingers over the gooseflesh of her abdomen as she shivered beneath his touch, finally coming to cup her left breast in his hand, and gently teasing her nipple between his forefinger and thumb.
“I was coming after ye, do ye ken that? Ye wouldna have made it an hour before I chased ye down. I might be a lot of things, but I’m nothing without ye,mo leannan.Forgive me. Marry me. And I’ll love ye till my last breath.”
She pressed her bare bottom against his hips, sighing as he movedhis touch to her other breast, slowly undoing her with each stroke of his hand.
