“You can’t look at everything properly while it’s in the trunk,” he chastised.
“I’m afraid I’ll tear them,” she said lamely, and her heart began to pound. “Tread on them or…ruin them somehow.”
But he was already reaching into the container, pulling out rivers of rose, snowy white, indigo, saffron, crimson, and tossing them into Glenna’s arms until she staggered and laughed despite herself.
Tavish Cameron laughed too as he stepped to her side and steadied her with his hands on her waist. Glenna smiled up into his face, and although she felt the merriment leaving her expression, she let the bemused curve of her lips stay.
“Why?” she asked quietly.
Tavish Cameron’s eyes sparkled. “Because you’re beautiful. I like beautiful things. And I want to see you in my hall, in beautiful clothing. I want others to see you.”
“Am I no more than a thing to you, then?” she asked, waiting for that spark of fury to ignite the blazing hatred she felt for him. But the warmth spreading through her body was not hateful, and she leaned into him, grateful for his strength. “Something to be purchased? Or strategically moved aside in order for you to get what you want?”
“I couldn’t find you earlier,” he said, his face drawing closer to hers, but it was no answer to her question. “Ididnotice your absence. And I didn’t like it.”
“You don’t own me, Tavish Cameron,” she whispered against his mouth, but she felt the tension drain from her then; he had come for her. He had thought of her. Perhaps…
“And yet you belong to me,” he replied and the vibration of the words and their meaning traveled from Glenna’s lips to the soles of her cold feet. “My own princess. Do not vex me so by hiding yourself away from me again when I am in want of you. I canna conduct my business, I canna think; I—”
It was she who rose up on her toes to fit her mouth to his. Her arms went around his neck, the fine, expensive gowns sliding to the floor, and his hands found her waist through the thin, gray wool. She felt his fingers rove up her back to the bare skin at her nape, then slide into her hair, pulling it free of its simple twist. Her curls fell around her shoulders as Tavish pulled her closer, deepening their kiss.
It was madness, the way she responded to him, the way she let herself go in his arms; as if Tavish Cameron wasn’t the reason her life was falling apart, would be the man who wanted to see her ruined, wanted to ruin her. And yet she clung to him as if he was the mast on the ice-slicked deck of a ship at sea. Her only hope of survival, and still the thing that could send her down to the very depths. She hated him, was terrified of him, but she could not tear herself away.
And she would not step aside and leave him vulnerable to Frang Roy’s fatal plan.
It was Tavish who pulled his mouth from hers then, his warm breath smelling of spirits fanning her cheek. “Take off that rag you wear,” he whispered. “I don’t want to see you in it again.”
Glenna stilled in his arms. It was to be tonight then—the night he collected the spoils from their agreement. Glenna thought of the ocean of expensive clothing around them, and realized that—like the time she was borrowing at Roscraig—the gowns were simply another form of payment. Payment for a whore. And Tavish Cameron wanted what he had paid for.
Glenna dropped her eyes as her trembling fingers went to the time-suppled leather laces at her bodice, holding the thin wool closed over her old underdress. She told herself that her hands shook with fear and humiliation; hatred for the man still standing with his hands at her waist. But her heart pounded, pounded in her chest in that now-familiar way when he was near.
“I like it when you are obedient, princess,” he said, and the smile in his words stirred something of her pride.
She slapped him without thinking, and Tavish caught her wrist and swatted her other arm away before she could make a second attempt. In the blink of an eye he seized both sides of the laces and ripped the gray wool kirtle down its front. Glenna staggered backward out of his reach, the coolness of the chamber causing her skin to prickle beneath the dingy underdress.
“Take it off,” he repeated, a devilish sparkle in his eyes that had deepened to indigo in the shadows.
Glenna didn’t know why she suddenly wished to provoke his anger when only a moment ago she had been willing to meekly do as he commanded, but she now she only lifted her chin.
He took a measured step toward her. “Is it your wish that I do it for you?” he asked, the smile back in his voice again and even lifting one side of his mouth.
Her stomach clenched, and she shrugged out of the ruined kirtle, dropping it to the floor. His blue eyes held her captive, acknowledging her game.
“Give it to me,” he said, and then pulled it from her hand when she offered it. He strode to the hearth, balling the old cloth between his fists. In a moment, it blazed against the stones.
Tavish turned and strode back toward her, glancing pointedly at her old underdress. “That, as well.”
Glenna shook her head. “I needn’t remove it for you to have me.”
“True,” he conceded, stepping even closer. “But what I want right now is to see your naked body. So…” He stopped. “Take it off.”
Glenna’s knees felt watery, her breaths came like ragged bellows. Tavish Cameron’s blue eyes held her just as surely as his strong hands had a moment ago, and she felt powerless against the sorcery of his words.
“Does it make you feel more of a laird to wield your power over me?” she asked in a breathy taunt.
To her dread and her delight, he began stepping toward her once more, and this time he did not pause. “I am laird here. And what I demand is only what you freely promised me.” He reached out and slid a warm, callused palm along her jawline, into her hair once more, and it took all of Glenna’s strength of will not to turn her face into that palm, press her lips to his skin. But she could not stifle her jagged inhalation.
Tavish pulled her gently but steadily toward him, and as she came up against his chest, his left hand slid over her breast through the thin underdress, cupping it, molding its roundness with his fingers. He leaned his head down but rather than kiss her again, his mouth went to her collarbone, and Glenna closed her eyes as the warm scent of his hair filled her nose and the hot, wet sensation of his tongue traced a fiery trail to the center of her chest.
