She didn’t pull away or resist him when his mouth covered hers.
For a moment.
But in that moment, Logan’s heart nearly burst from the fullness he felt. His legs nearly gave out under him—and it would have been the first time in his life that they did. Her lips were soft and yielding, while the scent and slight taste of wild thyme would forever haunt him if he never kissed her again.
She broke their kiss and touched her fingers to her lips as she stepped back, away from him. “Nae, I canna.”
His heart lurched, but it didn’t break. He wouldn’t give up on her. “Fergive me, then.”
“Mr. Cameron?” she said in her soft feminine voice. “Do ye expect me to ferget it all? Ferget my family and what tragedy befell them because of ye? Every horrible thing I have been through is because of ye. It doesna matter what yer crime was—if ye were not there spying on me, my whole life would have been different. Do ye understand that? If ye do, how can ye ask me to stay?”
“I dinna expect ye to ferget anythin’, lass,” he told her. “But a wound ye will never ferget still heals. I know what my actions have caused. If I could, I would change the past, but I canna. I can only try to make yer life better now.”
She shook her head. “I dinna want yer pity. Stop giving it to me.”
“Ye dinna need to carry so much on yer shoulders, El.”
“Stop calling me that!” She pushed away from him.
“Tis yer name,” he reminded her with a smile.
“’Tis intimate,” she countered.
He tried to keep his smile from growing. She was a fighter, but he was not her opponent. She was. She was fighting with everything in her to hate him for what he’d caused, but it was only to mask her guilt for whatshe’ddone to Dunley’s protection that night. She hated him so that it would keep her from remembering how much she hated herself.
Poor fae.
“I will call yeLass, how aboot that?”
“Fine.”
“Ye can call me Logan.”
“Nae. I will continue to call ye what I have been calling ye; Mr. Cameron, infuriating man, guilty fool, handsome ro—” She stopped, her mouth hanging open before she snapped her lips shut.
His smile softened on her with the deepest affection. “Ye think me handsome?”
She closed her eyes, breathed out, then opened her eyes and looked at him. “’Tis not as if ye didna know that ye’re hand—handsome. I am sure the women in yer life tell ye often enough. This is nae different.”
Should he tell her the women in his life are his mother, sister, and cousins?
“Aye,” she went on. In fact, it was as if she couldn’t stop, “yer hair is like a horse’s mane of glossy sable in the Highland wind. Yer gaze reveals emotions that are less armored than that of a more common man.” She stopped when her gaze dipped to his mouth. She stared at his lips for a moment then looked away and closed her eyes. She wasn’t ready to praise his lips.
He laughed softly into his fist.
That snatched her attention back to him. “My humiliation amuses ye?”
“Let me offer ye some amusement then,” he said, growing slightly more serious. “Ye’re like a dandelion blown bare by thewind, delicate and resilient. Yer eyes are haunted with pain too deep to utter. They are flames and I am unable to resist flying into them, even if I get burned. And yer lips…” he looked at them and then back at her, “will be mine.”
He had offered to amuse her, but seeing her laugh at his declaration stung. “Verra well, then,” he said, pretending to brood. Pouting often worked for Jamie. Mayhap, it would for him, as well. “Keep yer lips to yerself.”
She didn’t follow him as he hoped but laughed even louder.
When he heard the sound of her filling the vale, he let it fill him, as well. Like sunshine spilling over the gloom, her merriment washed away every thought, save one. He would show her he spoke the truth.
He turned back to her and, joining in her laughter, went to her and took her in his arms.
“May I kiss ye, lass?” He took the risk of her refusing him. And the risk was high. But he didn’t think she would.
