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The curve of his mouth was a distraction. I needed to stop staring at it…but couldn’t seem to do it.
“But it isn’t as though I’ve never gone anywhere,” I continued, speaking too fast as though that could somehow slow down my heart rate. “I go to Vancouver, British Columbia sometimes. Or Portland. Boise.”
If I stopped talking and focused on his hands, and every little aspect of how they felt on mine, then, oh,thenI wasn’t sure what I might do. Or rather, I knew what I would do, I just didn’t have the guts to do it. So I rambled.
“Actually, I do a lot of camping. I think I mentioned that before. That’s actually a sort of travel.”Yes, sayactuallya few more times.I sounded sixteen years old. “All around the Northwest.”
He turned my hand over and moved the pad of his thumb in small patterns across my fingers and palm. It didn’t seem like a forward gesture, just a comfortable one, and that easiness electrified me more than anything else.
“That’s what drew me to this tour. We aren’t camping, but we’re spending every day outside, trying something new. I like that.”
I wasn’t sure if that last sentence was about trying something new or the way his fingers stroked mine.
“I don’t think you’re as buttoned-up as you make yourself appear,” he said. “I think you like adventure, but you’ve told yourself you need to be more practical.”
Bingo. How had I traveled five thousand miles to find this man who looked straight into my soul? Nobody else had ever seen me so clearly before. I felt like I couldn’t hide anything from him, but I didn’t want to anymore, either.
“Practical is safe,” I said softly. It had protected me from so much these last several years. Business failure, financial instability, embarrassment. Heartache.
“Adventure can be safe, too,” he said. “With the right person.”
His voice enveloped me like a full-body hug, warm and comfortable and achingly perfect. I liked the idea thatadventureandhomecould be one and the same person.
Him.
“I’ve never had that,” I said softly.
“Doesn’t mean you can’t,” he returned.
I adored this man’s certainty. Staring back into his eyes, it was hard to doubt.
“Do you take trips like this often?” Only a half-hearted attempt to maintain the conversation, really. All the nerve endings in my body might have existed entirely in the one hand he touched.
“Not quite like this one. I went to Italy for a week in the winter, and last summer I went to Australia.” He smiled to himself. “That one was also a guided tour. I didn’t want to die alone in the Outback.”
“That probably would have been a downer for your vacation.”
“Not the high note you want to end on.”
I finally stretched my fingers out to lock with his. My glass of wine wasn’t quite empty, but I felt as light and giddy as I had done from the whisky. I could have stayed at that pub all night, drunk on his touch and talking about anything.
“Why did you take a guided tour this time? Not much chance you would die alone in the Highlands.” If I just kept talking, I could distract myself from thinking about what was happening with my hands, and even less about what was happening with the rest of my body. Definitely ignore the inferno in my belly, and the flames that reached higher with every word he said.
“I enjoyed my trip to Italy, but I was alone. Mealtimes, sight-seeing, exploration—I was always on my own. There’s a lot to be said for solitude, but companionship certainly has its merits, wouldn’t you say?”
His thumb moved along mine until I shivered.
“If I had come here on my own, I might have spent the whole two weeks holed up in a hotel in Edinburgh.”
“That doesn’t sound too terrible to me.” His mouth quirked up delectably at his teasing.
I meant to laugh, but it came out a soft sigh. “Not terrible at all.”
“I feel like Tahiti is still in your future.”
When we finally left the pub, the evening twilight had faded to a blue sky streaked with purple. We let ourselves into the lodge and walked up the stairs in silence, my hand warm in his. On the landing, I turned to say goodnight and was instantly in his arms, taking up where we’d left off on our last kiss.
No one had ever kissed me with such surety. Purposeful but not insistent, content to drink me in at any pace. Every touch held a mix of sweet and spice, a tenderness rough around the edges. I ran my hands up his arms and shoulders, grazing the firm muscles beneath his jacket. Resting one hand at the nape of his neck, I lightly stroked the stubble on the back of his head. His hands were warm on my back, locking me against him.
