Page 15 of Claimed by the Obsessed Laird (Highland Bride Hunt #1)

Ripples swayed out beneath her, shattering her reflection, and the sun glinted from the crystalline water.

She could feel him watching her, the weight of his attention almost more than she could bear.

A million questions nagged at her mind, and she wished she had the nerve to ask a single one of them.

Like why he seemed so keen to impress her the night before, or what exactly it was that had led him to agree to take her out riding, and if it had anything to do with the way she looked in her new outfit.

“Ye’re not worried that I’ll try to run away from you?” she joked as she straightened up again, making her way over to the horse and planting a hand on her neck. “Now that ye’ve given me the means to do so…”

He chuckled, moving to her side and covering her hand with his, a possessive grip that gave her little space to move.

“Let me make one thing very clear, lass,” he remarked, his eyes hardening as they met hers. “Try all you want, wife. But you will never escape from me."

Her breath hitched; her heart danced a drumbeat in her chest. She wanted to argue, but that would have meant coming up with some reason she should want to get away from him, when, at that moment, she wanted nothing more than to stay.

His fingers closed around hers, and he drew her hand to his lips, brushing his mouth against her knuckles in a touch so tender she would never have imagined him capable of it.

“And what exactly do ye mean by that?”

“I’d rather show ye than tell ye,” he murmured.

And, as he brought his hands to her face, she knew that whatever defenses she had put up to keep herself from falling for him had well and truly vanished. Her eyes drifted shut in the moment before his lips found hers, and, finally, she sank against him, the air blurring the distance between them.

He kissed her slowly at first, carefully, as though making sure that he did not rush her into anything she was not yet ready for.

And, as her hands found his shoulders, she marveled at the strength of him and the restraint he had shown in not taking her when they had first married.

He could have had anything he wanted from her, any time he had craved it, but he had allowed her to come to him.

And something about that only made her crave him more.

Her tongue brushed against his lips, silently speaking the things she had been too afraid to say out loud.

His hands coming to her waist, he pushed her against a tree, his mouth ravenous as his hands traveled all over her body.

She gasped as he gripped her thigh, lifting it so that he could push himself against her.

“Ye’ve teased me long enough, lass,” he murmured against her lips, the words almost dangerous if they were not so impossibly thrilling.

She grasped his head and kissed him hard as he busied himself with unbuttoning her new riding pants.

He slipped his hand beneath her garment, reaching for the deepest, most private part of her.

Her eyes flew open as she felt him slip his fingers inside of her, her hips rising to meet him as though some part of her could not resist at all.

Her slickness welcomed him in, her mouth panting against his.

He trailed his tongue along her lower lip, savoring the taste of her.

“Tell me,” he commanded her, his hardness still against her hip while his fingers thrust inside of her. “Tell me what ye want, lass…”

“I want you,” she breathed back to him, the words tumbling from her lips faster than she could stop them. “Please, Camron, I want ye.”

He guided her to the ground, moving on top of her on the soft earth, his hands trailing over her body as though he was roaming new ground.

Her breath caught in her throat as he popped open the buttons on her tweed jacket and tugged at the ribbon around her neck.

For a moment, he pulled back, sensing her reaction, his brow creasing as he checked in on her.

But she pulled him down to kiss her once more, only able to tell him what she ached for with her body.

“No more teasing, my Laird. Make me yers.”

Their clothes were shed in a frantic tangle of limbs, her shaking hands moving to pull off his kilt and push aside his shirt.

Under the bright sunshine, his skin seemed to have been hewn from marble, the muscles so strong and so intimidating that she could not bear to deny herself for a moment longer.

She raked her nails along his biceps, down to his chest, feeling the thud of his heart as she had against her back when they had been on that horse.

“Let me see ye, wife,” he growled, tossing aside the last of her clothes, then leaning back to take her in. His eyes traveled with a rampant hunger up and down her bareness, and, when she went to cover herself on instinct, he pressed her arms to her sides, drinking her in like he was greedy for it.

Once he had stripped her to nothing, he slipped his hand between her legs, parting them slowly, resting his knee on the turf to keep her open for him as he lowered himself on top of her.

She could only watch as he took his manhood into his hand, nervousness arcing through her like a spark of fire, but when he kissed her once more, everything in her softened, her whole body parting to accept him.

No more words were needed as he guided himself between her legs, one hand resting on her thigh, the other on her cheek to guide her gaze to him.

He did not avert his eyes for a moment as he pressed himself to her entrance for the first time, supping on the sight of her.

She gasped as she felt him push inside of her—it did not feel as she had imagined it would, far gentler, easier than she had thought, as if her body had been made to accept him in this way.

And the way he groaned as he entered her soothed any last vestiges of nervousness inside of her as their bodies connected for the first time.

“Just like I imagined,” he murmured to her as she gasped to catch her breath. The thought of him picturing her like this, imagining her giving herself to him, sent another helpless shudder through her system, and she groaned loud enough to disturb the birds in the trees above.

He moved his hands to her waist, wrapping his arms around her tight and pulling her into him with an almost-overwhelming passion.

His eyes flashed with need as he kissed her once more, deeper this time, his tongue delving into her mouth to explore every inch of her.

His tongue thrust into her mouth as his body moved against her, and she lifted her hips to meet him, giving herself over to him entirely.

She might not have acted much like a wife up until that moment, but now, there, in his arms, there was nothing she wanted more than to share this moment of marital bliss with him.

He let out a low growl against her mouth and pulled back so that he could watch her as he continued to move into her, harder, deeper. His movements were still slow, like he was intent on savoring every second of this, but the tension in his jaw told her that he would not last much longer.

Nor did she want him to. No, she wanted to feel what it was like for him to lose himself completely to the way she made him feel.

She had felt so out of control since she had arrived at the Keep, since he had taken her as his wife, but this, this would give her back everything she had been trying to cling to.

“I can’t get enough of ye, lass,” he whispered in her ear.

She was moving back against him now, a silent encouragement to give her what she craved. The pleasure bloomed deep in her belly as she watched his eyes darken and his lips part with a passion he could clearly no longer contain.

He drove himself into her one last time, and she watched as his whole body spasmed with pleasure.

She could feel the warmth of him within her, marking her in the most primal way imaginable.

She raked her nails along his back and pulled him into her like a woman starved.

It was like she felt her own pleasure crest, a sudden shudder rushing through her like her whole body had been waiting for this moment, and she cried out, the sound contained in the small valley that seemed to exist for them and them alone.

He grunted as he pressed his hips flush to hers one last time and held himself there for a long moment, making certain that the two of them were entirely spent in every way they could be before he drew back.

He sprawled onto the ground beside her, this huge, handsome vision of a man grinning as he lay next to her.

He reached out to lay his hand on her cheek, drawing her gaze back to him.

She struggled to keep her focus as she met it, her body still wracked with tension from the intensity of what they had just shared.

“Do ye think that’ll be enough to keep ye here?" he joked, and she giggled, the sound bursting out of her with a helpless abandon.

“Hmm, well, it’s a start,” she replied playfully, turning to face him and snuggling closer. “But I think I might need a little more convincing yet.”

And, as he kissed her again beneath the blue skies, she knew that something between them had changed. She had finally accepted him as her husband, and there would be no going back on it.

And, as she lay there in his arms, she found it hard to imagine ever wanting to, either.