She gasped. Uncertain what to say or do, she filled the air with mindless chatter. “It’s so wide open out here.”

He tore his eyes from her to gaze off into the distance. “Aye, so it is. Open and clean and sure. So much bigger than any plantation, or slave owner, or any of us.”

“And perilous too.” She followed his gaze, straining to make sense of the horizon. She imagined the hazy line where the earth itself curved out of sight. “There’s so much water—it’s overwhelming. Almost a little frightening. Do you ever worry about shipwrecks, or drowning?”

“Elspeth, afraid of something? I never thought I’d see the day.” He smiled and gave her leg a squeeze, and then, with a shrug, looked back to the horizon. “It’s not the sea that scares me. The sea will kill a man, but that’s who she is. She casts no judgment, sees no difference between a man with money and one with none. Even the storms have a kind of resolve—as though only nature herself knows what she’s truly about. You speak of all this water, but I didn’t know peace until I was on the water, headed back to Scotland.”

She inhaled deeply, thinking how shocking it must’ve been, the sea so clean and wide open compared with the oppressive life of an indentured slave. “It must’ve been so different for you, after you escaped. Did you not simply want to stay on the water, sailing forever?”

“I had to sail back to find you.” He’d said it playfully, but the words hung in the air, charged.

She knew in that moment how deeply she loved him.

She’d sensed it before, but this was a revelation that sheared her through, a bone-deep knowledge striking her like a thunderclap. Not only did she love Aidan, she could have no other man but him. She’d be incomplete without him. Unrealized without him.

His hand on her leg burned. She wanted it to move higher, wanted him to move closer. Her body ached with the wanting.

She wanted him to kiss her again, and more than kiss her, she wanted him to take her. She sensed she’d never fully be a woman until he did. She’d be trapped in some eternal limbo between girl and woman until she felt his body over her, in her.

She’d thought him handsome and strong. Dangerous for all but her. But Aidan was so much more than that. He was the other, unrealized part of herself.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

She knew he meant to ask only if she were ready to descend. But when she spoke, she answered quite a different question. “Yes, Aidan,” she said steadily. “I’m ready.”

Chapter 27

When they’d first met, Aidan thought Elspeth a skittish sort of girl, sheltered and easily frightened. How wrong he’d been. She was simply shy, and he was quickly finding out how large was the gulf that lay between fearful and bashful.

“Before we climb down, you must kiss me,” she said, as brazen as any wanton. She leaned down, tangling her fingers in his hair. They were cool, her touch gentle, but rather than soothe him, she inflamed him.

No, she didn’t have a scared bone in her body.

He was shocked, and he was grateful. Grateful to be in this woman’s life, grateful she found him worthy. And grateful too for all the damned books that’d put the thought into this innocent maiden’s head that she might climb a ship’s rigging and kiss its captain, despite his being in possession of a soul cursed by the devil.

“I’ll kiss you,” he said, his words sounding rougher than he’d intended, and he took control, pulling her down to him, seizing her in a kiss he’d been saving for years. His lips met hers, and he gave her the kiss he’d dreamed of, a kiss worthy of taming such a fanciful woman. Their tongues twined, and he gave her a kiss to show the world that he would take what he wanted, that he’d possess as any other man possessed.

But rather than tame her, his rough taking of her mouth had only inflamed Elspeth, and she writhed at his touch, pulling away to gasp for air only to come back down to him, her hands tangling in his shirt, her legs wrapping about his body.

The ship hit a wave and jounced. His hand slipped farther up her thigh, and he realized how close his fingers were to the thatch of hair between her legs that he so longed to touch.

The muscles of his legs, normally so strong, flinched with the effort of balancing so precariously high in the rigging. As much as he wanted to find a way to take Elspeth then and there, he summoned his resolve. “We mustn’t do this. We need to go back down on deck.”

She pulled from him, and she was a glorious sight, her cheeks red from the wind, her eyes bright with lust. “Why?”

Joy crackled through his chest at the feel of her in his hands. She had no idea the danger he posed to her innocence. “You want that I should steal your maidenhead, here in the crow’s nest?”

“No,” she said seriously. “We can go back to your cabin and you can take it there.”

A loud laugh burst from him. “Come, Beth. We’ll discuss this on deck, where I’m not in danger of being unmanned whilst balancing sixty feet in the air.”

They made their way back down the ladder, and the sight of her rump cradled between his arms, nestled just in front of his face, did nothing for his hardened cock, now standing at merry attention as though it were a bizarre extension of the rigging.

Reaching the bottom, she leaped into his arms, and he stumbled back a step as he caught her. She was a spitfire in his arms, with unschooled but eager kisses. If she didn’t watch herself, he’d take her virginity there on the varnished cedar of his ship’s deck.

He kissed her, but fought to keep his head. Elspeth deserved much in this world, and though he could dream of a hundred different things he’d do to her body, taking her virginity before she wed was not one of them.

She pulled away, those beautiful lips parted and gently panting. “Aidan? Is aught the matter? Do you not want me?”

Reminding himself of his resolve, he set her apart to stand before him on the deck. “How could you doubt it?”

She had no idea of the battle that waged inside him. But he’d not take Elspeth’s virginity like an unruly ship’s hand.

She smoothed her skirts, explaining in a tone a politician might use to present a bill before Parliament, “I don’t see the trouble. I want you. Very much. Right now, in fact. There’s no better opportunity. And you know what folk say: ‘Fools look to tomorrow, wise men use tonight.’ ”

He laughed. “I don’t think that was their intent.” Some might call Elspeth quirky or strange, but he’d never tire of the unexpected delight that found purchase in his heart whenever she was near. “I can’t take your innocence, not like this.”

“But if you despoil me, then I’ll get to marry you, not Fraser.”

His jaw dropped—she was too much. She was lovely and artless, and he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. Very much. Right now, in fact. “Believe me, as much as I’d enjoy a thorough despoiling, we’ve the not-so-minor matter of Fraser to sort out, remember? I’ll remind you, you’re betrothed to the man.”

“Not for long,” she announced, striding across the deck in the direction of the companionway steps. Hiking her skirts, she began to descend belowdecks.

“Where are you going?”

“To your cabin, of course.”

Her words finally hit him. “Wait, Beth. What do you mean ‘not for long’?”

She froze, looking over her shoulder at him. She was halfway down the stairs already, visible only from her chest up. He’d yet to understand how it was that a landloving maiden in full skirts could be so damned fast at moving hither and yon aboard a moving ship.

He caught up to her, looking down from the head of the stairs. “What happened in Fraser’s offices?”

“We talked.”

He heaved a sigh. “Though I greatly appreciate that there are other pressing goals at the moment”—he shifted the seat of his trews in proof of his point—“I must know, what did you talk about?”

“With Fraser?”

He only narrowed his eyes in answer. She was clearly not going to make this easy.

“Oh, fine.” She squared her shoulders. “I told him I felt forced.”

“You told Fraser you felt forced into marrying him?”

“Something like that, yes.”

“Bloody hell, woman. How do you think someone like Fraser would react to that? Those are fighting words to such a man.”

“They were neither intended as fighting words, nor do I think they were received thusly.” She stood below him on the stairs, but even from that vantage point, he noted her chin lift defensively. “I simply explained how the farm has begun to succeed, and so I no longer require a husband.”

She no longer required a husband. Did that apply to him as well? Brooding, he stared down at her. It appeared his Elspeth had found her voice and her confidence.

He forced it from his mind, focusing instead on the issue at hand. “I don’t see how that offers a way out of the betrothal.” His words came out harshly, the thought of any man laying claim to Elspeth too infuriating to bear.

“It does, if it means my father no longer needs financial assistance.” She walked up a step, standing closer on the stairs. “Please, Aidan, can we put this aside for now? Fraser isn’t here.” She reached one of her delicate hands up, hesitantly touching his leg. “But I am.”

No words escaped his clenched jaw. Fraser might not be there, but the specter of him was, a barrier between them.

She climbed up another step, stroking him now. The fabric of his trews was thick, but he felt her touch as keenly as if it’d been on his bare skin. “Please just kiss me. Kiss me like you were kissing me up there.”

“You don’t understand,” he said through gritted teeth. Wealthy men inhabited a far different world from the one she was used to. Wealthy men could simply choose people, and have them. He’d experienced the phenomenon firsthand, for the past thirteen years. He knew if Elspeth was what Fraser wanted, Elspeth was precisely whom he’d have.