Page 68 of The Guardian's Bride

“Remember the young captive at Bass Rock? I watched him fall in love with you. Just a few moments in your care, and he was yours, my lady.”

“If so, he is over it by now.”

“I will never be over it,” he said. “I believe I love you, Rowena Keith.”

“Love?” she whispered. Her heart pounded, grew, soared.

“So I fell in love with my healer, hey. It happens. And it was more than gratitude.”

“Aedan—”

“I have loved you—perhaps for years, in a way. When I was a lad, I loved your pretty name on a bit of parchment. Fancied myself a knight destined to wed that pretty name, daughter of a great Scottish house. I—even made plans for it.”

“But that agreement was broken. You must have forgotten it.”

“I never did, though we had not met. I wondered if you had married, if you were happy.”

She stared at him. “I never knew.”

“Nor would you.” He shrugged. “No matter. I just wanted you to know now. And I wanted to know if you—felt something at Holyoak, as I did. Even though you were not aware we had a canceled betrothal.”

“At Holyoak,” she said, “when I heard your name, I had the oddest feeling, as if I had forgotten something. It must have been a memory of that betrothal. I did not want to leave you, even healed, and I wanted to see you again. That wish came true.”

“Fate and the angels have had their way with us.”

“They have. And so here we are.” She angled to look up at him, breathless, marveling, feeling as if doors had flung open in some vast new place of starlight and dreams and treasures untold, if she dared take the risk.

“At the bidding of the angels.” He snugged her close, an arm around her. “Enough thinking. I am a man who far prefers doing to thinking.”

“You!” She gave him a wry glance. “You are as thoughtful a man as I have ever known.”

“Eh, I can have no secrets around this one.” He tipped a brow. “Alas, this bout of thinking and conscience has undone my plans.”

“What plans?”

He hooked a finger under her chin and tipped her face up to kiss him. She leaned into the slow caress of his lips. Then he let go. “Plans for another time,” he whispered.

“Aedan, stay,” she breathed.

“And who is the impulsive one?”

“Me.” She threw her arms around his neck and drew him toward her again. “I think I began loving you in that awful dungeon when you made me laugh when I was scared. And Iloved you even more when you went in the water and I was afraid I had lost you. And I loved when we were Hamish and Grizel—”

“Hush, Grizel. Enough thinking.” He wrapped her in his arms and pulled her into a deep, luscious kiss that spun through her body like honey and lightning. He laid her back on the bed, and as it sagged, they laughed. She rolled atop him, delighting in kisses, in his hands sliding along her shift, bunching it up, lowering his head to kiss her where she had not been kissed before, ever.

Then he stilled. “What the devil. Listen.”

“What is that?” She lifted her head. Barking, scratching, yelping.

He lay back and groaned. “Bean. I have to let her out.”

She rolled away, sighing, as he sat up and got to his feet.

“We have done a powerful lot of thinking tonight, my dear. When next we meet, we will not talk and think so much, hey.”

“When next we meet, we may be slathering wax over a wee boy’s arm.”

“Well, then, time after that,” he said, then bent to kiss her and left the room.