Page 63 of The Guardian
He sat up and scrubbed his face. After he dunked his head in the water to rinse the soap off, he felt fingers in his hair.
“Sìleas,” he said, smiling like a fool with his eyes closed and water streaming down his face.
She laid her hands on his shoulders, and he sighed as she slid them down his chest. But something was not quite right… He sat bolt upright and spun around—and discovered it wasn’t Sìleas who had her hands on him.
“Dina. What are ye doing here?”
“What’s this?” Dina snapped the cord that held the crystal over his head before he could think to grab her arm to stop her.
“Ye need to leave—ye can see I’m bathing.” He held his hand out. “Give that back to me before ye go.”
She swung it in front of him, just out of his reach, then laughed and put it around her neck. “This would be a lovely gift for ye to give me in return for what I’m going to give ye.”
“We’re not giving each other anything, Dina,” he said, losing his patience with her. “Now give that back to me.”
“You didn’t ask what I was going to give ye.” She ran her finger down the cord to where the pouch that held the crystal lay in the cleavage between her breasts.
“By the saints, Dina, what do ye think ye are doing?”
“I couldn’t help noticing ye been sleeping in the old cottage,” she said. “Seems a shame to sleep alone, when ye don’t have to.”
“I’m not interested in what ye are offering,” he said. “Now give me that and go.”
He leaned forward and grabbed a handful of the skirt of her gown and pulled. “Give it to me.”
She must have unfastened her gown already, because she stepped out of it as the damn thing came away in his hands. He looked up from the gown clenched in his fingers to see her standing in her chemise. Then, before he could say a word, the chemise was off.
Now, he was a man. He didn’t mean to look. She wasn’t the woman he wanted. But Dina did have attractive… attributes. And she was standing right in front of him stark naked. It didn’t help matters that Sìleas left him in a constant state of frustration.
Against his will, his cock sprang to life. That did not mean he intended to use it.
“I want ye to give me that back, get your clothes on, and leave the kitchen, so I can finish my bath and get dressed.”
“Come and take it.” As she intended, his eyes went to the pouch, which was lying between her naked breasts.
He looked around for the towel. Damn, he’d left it on the stool on the other side of the table. Dina must have followed his gaze, for she ran around the table, breasts bobbing, and snatched up it up.
Ach! He wanted to strangle the woman.
“If ye will not get dressed and leave, then I will.” He clenched the sides of the tub, hoisted himself up, and stepped out of the tub, streaming water. He was reaching for his clean shirt on the table when he heard a commotion behind him and turned.
Sìleas’s scream filled the small room as he saw her in the doorway. Her eyes were impossibly wide, and she was screaming as if someone had stabbed her.
“Sìleas,” Ian started for her, but then her gaze dropped to his groin and she screamed again. He’d forgotten he was naked. He grabbed his shirt from the table and covered himself. Although she was a virgin, he hadn’t expected her to get this upset by her first good look at him naked.
“It’s all right, Sìl,” he said, walking toward her.
She backed away, not with fright in her eyes, as he expected, but with such hurt that his heart felt pinched in his chest.
When her gaze moved from him to fix on something behind him, he remembered Dina. In his concern for Sìleas, he had forgotten all about that damned woman. And then he realized what this must look like to Sìleas—and why she screamed.
“Ye gave her my stone,” Sìleas said in a choked whisper.
Ian felt as if the walls of the room were crashing in on him, smothering him under their weight.
“No. No, I didn’t,” he said, as Sìleas turned and ran. “This is no what ye think!”
When he started after her, Niall took her place in the kitchen doorway, roaring, “Ye bastard!”
