To Tame a Highland Earl (36 page)

“
I would like that very
much.”

Her heart sped up a notch. So he wasn’t
forcing her to return to England right away. She longed to ask how
long they would stay in Scotland, but the truth was, it mattered
little whether it was tomorrow or next week. When they returned,
the result would be the same.

They rolled two more times and Eve sent one
of his pieces to the middle of the board to start over. She
narrowed her eyes. “I think you are letting me win.”

”
You saw the roll of die. I
have played good moves. I told you luck was with you.”

“
I am not so lucky,” she
said. “Neither are you, for that matter.”

“
On the contrary, I am very
lucky.”

“
Rubbish. You have been
forced to marry when you did not want to, and to a woman you barely
know.”

“
I know you well enough to
know I like you.”

Eve stilled, the dice in hand. “You like
me?”

“
Had I not liked you, I
wouldn’t have stayed in Manchester.”

“
Why?” She rolled. “Why do
you like me, I mean?”

“
Because you are honest and
forthright.”

“
Forthright?” She scrunched
her nose in distaste. “That is a way of saying pushy.”

“
No. It is not.”

Eve recalled Lady Gallagher waylaying them in
the gardens. “Honest… unlike Lady Gallagher?”

“
So you remember her,” he
said.

“
I am not likely to forget
anything about that night.” Eve counted off her moves and was
forced to leave one of her pieces exposed. “Lord, that’s justice,
is it not? I planned to kidnap you, so fate had me kidnapped,
too.”

Eve glimpsed the upturn of his generous mouth
as he reached for the decanter. “Fate has a way of intervening at
the most importune moments.” He refilled their glasses.

“
I couldn’t agree more,”
she said. “If you had ended up in Gretna without me, you would have
married Grace.”

“
You do not know me at all
if you still think that, madam.”

“
You would have allowed her
reputation to be ruined?”

“
Eve, it was a hair-brained
scheme from the start. There was no chance of success.”

She wanted to argue, but her mouth had gone
dry at hearing her name on his lips. He rolled and was able to
position his pieces to capture her exposed game piece.

Eve took the dice and rolled. “I don’t think
our fathers would have let you off.”

“
No matter. I would have
returned her to Manchester, then taken you to Gretna and married
you.”

Eve stared. “That is utterly ridiculous.”

“
I don’t know why. Make
your move.”

She glanced at the dice, then made a quick
move.

“
Eve, you aren’t paying
attention,” he said. “There is a good chance I will take one, or
both, of the pieces you left vulnerable.”

“
I think you’re all
bluster,” she said.

He pointed at the board. “See for yourself.
You have—”

“
Good heavens. I’m not
speaking of the game. I am talking about you saying you would have
brought Grace home then forced me to accompany you to Gretna. That
is rubbish.”

“
If you say so. I am a
gentleman, and I will let you make a better move.”

“
I am sorry you are stuck
with me,” she said.

His head snapped up, his expression hard.
“
That
is rubbish. If anything, it is you who are stuck with
me.”

She was struck speechless.

“
Now, since you don’t seem
willing to reconsider your move, it is my turn. Beware, madam.” He
rolled the dice and one die landed askew against the side of the
board.

“
Double sixes,” he
declared, and moved one of his pieces to take her piece.

“
That is not a six,” Eve
said. “The die landed so that it might be a six or a three. You
must roll again.”

“
It is clearly a six,” he
said.

Eve straightened. “You are cheating!”

He reached for the dice, but she slapped his
hand aside.

“
I gave you the chance to
reconsider your move and you didn’t. Now you must pay the price.”
He laughed and tried to grab them again.

Eve shoved at his chest and he toppled
backwards as she snatched up the dice. He was upright in the next
instant and his arm shot around her waist. She squealed as he
dragged her onto his lap, scattering the pieces across the board.
The arm around her waist tightened as he tickled her with his free
hand. Eve gave a loud peal of laughter and kicked in reflex,
sending the board skidding across the carpet.

“
My lord, that—“ His
fingers dug gently but deep into her stomach so that the tickle
seemed to reach clear to her bones, and she threw her head back
against his chest in an effort to break free. He was laughing as
hard as she.

“
Let me go!” she gasped.
“This is—” she shrieked “--unfair."

“
Indeed, it is.” He seized
her knee and squeezed.

The compelling desire to squeal with laughter
crashed through her. Eve grabbed his hand and tried to yank it away
from the sensitive flesh, but his grip, though gentle, might as
well have been a vice. He squeezed and she kicked while yanking at
his arm with both hands. He released the leg, then tickled her
stomach again.

"I will avenge myself!" Eve shoved at his
chest, then froze, her face a bare inch from his. He stilled as
well, and she was suddenly aware of his hard thighs--and the hard
length of him--beneath her bottom. “I believe you are forfeit this
game,” she said in a voice she barely recognized as her own.

“
Have I now?”

She nodded. He lowered his head and brushed
his lips against hers. The hand he'd been tickling her with slid up
her arm and into her hair. The faint scent of the soap he had used
to shave tantalized her senses, along with something else--his
tongue traced her lips—his masculine scent, she realized, all him,
and all male. The smell made her want to rub herself all over him.
Her heart pounded in anticipation of his mouth sliding lower to her
breasts as it had earlier, but instead, he nipped at her bottom
lip. A flush of warmth radiated from her belly.

The fingers in her hair tightened, sending a
prickle of gooseflesh down her neck and along her arms. He covered
her mouth with his. An ache thrummed between her legs and she
recalled the way his clever fingers had touched her in the alcove
little more than an hour ago. Shame rolled over her at the
realization that she wanted him to do that to her again. He had
said she would be the most fortunate of women if she married him.
What kind of woman was she to want this from him when he would give
nothing else but this fleeting and most wicked pleasure? He flicked
at her lips with his tongue and she opened without hesitation. With
a low groan, he twirled his tongue around hers.

Eve closed her fingers around his shirt and
shifted on his lap. His erection, hard and insistent, dug into the
soft flesh of her buttocks. He stiffened as if in pain, then his
kiss turned fierce. Eve was startled to realize he'd liked it when
she'd shifted on his lap. His mouth ravaged hers, and her mind
whirled, but she focused through the gray and wiggled on his lap.
The fingers in her hair tightened and he pulled her head back while
his mouth skimmed across her cheek. She wiggled more ardently. The
arm around her waist gripped her more firmly and pressed her
buttocks hard against him. She wiggled again and he hissed a
breath.

His lips touched her ear. "You are very
naughty, madam."

The words combined with his husky voice made
her body heat like molten lava.

“
I stand ready to play
backgammon with you anytime you please,” he whispered.

Holy God, if this was how he played
backgammon, she wanted to play every day.

He released a slow sigh. His breath washed
over her ear and neck, and sent a shiver down her arms. He held her
close for a long moment, then drew in a deep breath, his chest
rising then lowering with the release.

"Will you go riding with me tomorrow?" he
asked.

He was asking about riding...tomorrow, on his
wedding night...at this moment?

"Riding?" she repeated.

He drew back and looked down at her. “It
isn’t Hyde Park, and we will not be seen by the ton, but Mull is
quite beautiful.”

“
As I told you, I care
nothing for
Society
.”

“
So you did.” He seemed to
hesitate, then sat her upright and lifted her off his lap and onto
the carpet.

She sat while he retrieved the board and
pieces and put them back into the table. He put the table back in
its place against the wall, then came back to where she sat.

“
It is nearly five thirty
in the morning. We had best get some rest.”

Her heart raced. She nodded. He pulled her to
her feet, kissed her gently, then turned and started toward the
door.

Eve stood frozen, uncertain what to do.
“Where are you going?” she blurted.

He stopped and turned. “To bed.”

“
But—” She looked
helplessly at him. “Downstairs in the alcove, you said you intended
to—” She broke off, unable to say the words.

He smiled gently. “That was perhaps unfair of
me.”

Eve stiffened. “I see.”

“
I doubt that you do,
love.”

Why did he call her words like that?

“
Tomorrow morning we will
ride together.”

“
As you wish, my
lord.”

For an instant, it seemed he would say
something, but he didn’t. Instead, he left. And Eve sat alone in
the room.  

Chapter Nineteen

Four hours later, Erroll approached the great
hall and the smell of freshly baked pie and roasted pig wafted to
him, but it was the aroma of baking bread that excited his senses.
He recalled the bread Miss Crenshaw—she’d been Miss Crenshaw then,
anyway—had baked in the ship’s galley, and his groin tightened with
the intensity of pent up lust. If this continued, he was going to
have to locate a private spot and alleviate his discomfort again.
Clearly his handling of the situation this morning had given him a
very temporary reprieve.

He entered the great hall and slowed. A pig
turned on a spit over the fire in the hearth and, combined with the
low chatter and bustle of activity in the kitchen sent a ripple of
warmth through Erroll that startled him by going soul-deep. He’d
forgotten what it was like to be amongst family. Would he be able
to achieve even a little of this same contentment in his own
home?

For the first time in his life, he imagined
returning home to a woman who waited anxiously for his return. The
vision blurred into Eve sitting in the drawing room and looking up
from a book that rested on her belly rounded with his babe. If she
were to smile at him at that moment—He reached the kitchen, his
desire replaced with an unexpected tightness in his chest, and he
entered to find Eve with his mother and Mrs. Henderson at the
worktable in the middle of the busier-than-usual kitchen.

Eve wore an apron tied around her waist just
as he’d envisioned, only she wasn’t naked—though her breasts filled
the bodice in a delectable fashion that was bound to send him in
search of privacy. The three women were intent upon the bread Eve
kneaded. Her cheeks were flushed with pleasure and her toned arms
flexed with each push of her palm edge against the dough. Erroll
recalled the fond light in her eyes when she recounted how her
father had demanded tribute from their cook in exchange for
teaching Eve to cook. She liked being in the kitchen—in the heart
of the home—among family.

Mrs. Henderson turned and saw him. “Good
morning, laird.”

His mother and Eve looked up as the cook
stepped over to the oven.

“
I see you ladies are hard
at work.” He side-stepped a woman who hurried past carrying a bowl
piled high with potatoes, and joined his mother beside the table.
He kissed her cheek, then looked at Eve. “Good morning, madam. I
trust you rested well last night?”

Her eyes widened in the instant before she
dropped her gaze to the bread and pulled off a section. She began
rolling it into a ball. “Very well, thank you.”

“
I don’t see your sister.
What is she about this morning?”

“
Oh, Grace would not spend
her time in the kitchen, even if she were awake. She will not rise
before noon, I imagine.”

“
And our sleep was
interrupted last night,” he commented.

“
You are up early,” his
mother said before Eve could vent the frustration reflected in her
eyes.

“
Not as early as you, from
the looks of things,” he said. “It seems as though you’re cooking
for an army and enjoying yourselves in the process.”

“
I am enjoying myself
immensely, for I have learned that my new daughter-in-law makes the
finest rolls in all of Great Britain.” She glanced at Mrs.
Henderson who stood before an open oven and was pulling out a large
tray of rolls. “You will forgive me, Mrs. Henderson.”

“
I must admit, they are
very good,” the cook said.

Eve laughed. “I will trade you the rolls for
a slice of that berry pie you made, Mrs. Henderson. It smells
divine.”

“
I think we should all have
a slice of pie along with rolls and tea,” Erroll’s mother said. She
sidled around between Eve and Mrs. Henderson, who had set the tray
of rolls on the stove and was quickly transferring the hot bread
into a cloth-lined basket. “Will you join us, Rush?”