Page 46 of Reclaimed By Her Scottish Duke

Magnus was standing by the cold hearth with a glass he was not drinking, and he was looking at her over the rim of it, nothing faultless in his face now. His jaw had set hard. Something dark and hot moved behind his eyes, fixed on her hand where it rested lightly on Lord Cathmore’s sleeve.

Rosaline understood, with a small illicit thrill she was ashamed of, that he was jealous.

Furiously, silently jealous.

A quarter of an hour later, a footman pressed a folded slip of paper into her hand as he passed with the ratafia, and was gone before she could ask who it was from.

She opened it below the table to see four words in that bold black hand.

The library. Ten minutes.

And beneath, smaller, as though added against his better judgment:

Before I say something to Cathmore that he will not forget.

She should not have gone.

She told herself so the whole length of the dim corridor, and she went anyway, slipping out while Samuel was deep in someone’s flattery. She let herself into the unlit library and shut the door on the distant hum of the party.

Magnus was already there, a dark shape against the tall shelves, and he turned when the latch clicked.

“This is madness,” she whispered. “This is my brother’s house, Your Grace. It is not the time nor the place for a lesson.”

“I didnae ask ye here for a lesson.” Magnus crossed to her, unhurried, until she had to tip her head back to hold his eyes. “Tell me somethin’, Rosaline. Those men out there. Bracewell, with his hunters. Cathmore, who couldnae find a thought if it were labeled. Do ye truly believe, in yer heart, that either of them could make ye happy?”

“Why on earth would you care?” She lifted her chin. “That is the entire arrangement, is it not? You teach me to charm men. You do not get to teach me the trick and then sulk when it works.”

“I’m nae sulkin’.”

“You are the most enormous sulk I have ever seen.” She stepped around him. “And I am going back, before I am missed.”

He moved, and his arm came up against the door, barring the way.

“A gentleman,” she said, her breath shallow, “would let me pass.”

“Aye, he would.” Magnus did not move his arm. “But I’m nae a gentleman, Rosaline. I’ve been tellin’ ye that since the maze. And I’m least of all a gentleman with ye.” He looked down at her, the teasing gone entirely out of him. “Ye deserve better than those soft men who hide behind their titles and count their consequence like coins. Ye deserve a man who kens what he’s lookin’ at when he looks at ye. Nae the quiet, proper wee thing yer braither’s tryin’ to sell. Ye. All of ye. Bold, clever, full to the brim with fire ye’ve spent yer whole life bankin’ so no one would see it burn.”

“Stop,” she breathed. “You should not⁠—”

“Ye deserve a man who’ll set that fire loose instead of smotherin’ it. Who’ll let yer mind run wild and love ye the more for where it goes. Who’ll stand up with ye in a room full of fools and challenge ye, argue with ye, want ye so badly that he cannae see straight.” His voice dropped to something rough. “Nae a man who’ll only ever stand politely at yer side. But a man who stirs yer soul, Rosaline. And every other wantin’ thing in ye besides.”

The breath caught clean in her throat and would not come loose.

She did not step away. She could not have found the will for it if her life depended on it. He was so close now that she could feel the heat radiating from him, could see his pulse fluttering hard in his throat. And just like that, every careful, sensible wall she had built her whole life came down at once, silent as snow.

“Magnus,” she whispered.

It was not a protest; it was the opposite.

That was all he had been waiting for.

His mouth came down on hers, and there was nothing careful in it, nothing of the gentle question from the garden a year ago.

He had watched her smile at other men all evening and reached the end of his tether, and he kissed her like he meant to erase every one of them, one slow, thorough claim at a time.

She melted into him, her hands fisting in the fine linen of his shirt, and when he pressed her back against the library door, she went willingly, her whole body arching toward his.

“Ye’ve no notion,” he murmured against her mouth, “what ye do to me. Laughin’ with those fools, when ye’ve never once laughed like that with me.” His lips moved to her jaw, the soft spot beneath her ear, the column of her throat. She tipped her head back against the door and let him, helpless. “This is mine. This blush. This breath. Say it’s mine, lass.”