How to Marry a Highlander by Katharine Ashe

standing at the back of the group, brow furrowed as she stared at Una and Tobias and considered what it might take in the next two hours to lead them to a secluded place and abandon them there, when a man’s large hand covered her behind.
    She gasped. But she knew whose hand it was, and she did not move.
    “What are you doing?” she whispered nonsensically because she knew perfectly well what he was doing.
    His hand slipped away. “Stroll wi’ me,” he said in that deep, slightly rough brogue that made her liquid inside.
    They left the group and followed a path that meandered toward a hothouse. When they were well away from the group she could bear the suspense no longer. She snatched open the hothouse door, poked her head in, and beckoned to him. He followed her inside and closed the door in an oddly pensive manner. Then he walked to her amidst exotic blooms and broad-fingered fig leaves.
    “Did you do that because of our wager or because you especially wanted to?” she said.
    He offered her a roguish grin.
    “Who is betrothed?” she asked.
    “It seems ma sister Lily has a fancy to bake cakes.”
    “Wishing to bake cakes does not make her betrothed to be married, my lord.”
    “Her bridegroom says otherwise. This morn he signed a contract to purchase a bakery for her.”
    “He did?” She clapped in delight. “Well, I am immeasurably happy for her. Monsieur Le Coq seems like a . . . a . . . that is to say, he is a—”
    “French chef.”
    Her stomach was all butterflies. The air in the hothouse was sweetly scented and warm. “Was that it?” she asked. “What you did back there? Was that the inappropriate touch I am to have?”
    “It suits the terms o’ yer wager.”
    “Our wager.”
    He moved close and the budding branches of a peach tree framed his handsome face and wide shoulders. “Our wager,” he repeated.
    “You startled me, you know. I am unaccustomed to men groping my behind.”
    His brows rose. “I should hope so.”
    “You sound like Lady Elspeth.”
    The twinkle she adored lit his eyes. “’Tis the first time anybody’s accused me o’ that, to be sure.”
    “About that inappropriate touch . . .” Her mouth was terribly dry. She licked her lips.
    “Do that again,” he said in a low voice.
    “Do what again?”
    “Lick yer lips.”
    She did it, and it felt like wicked sin to do it expressly for him.
    He took her face in his hands and covered her mouth with his. It was certainly testament to his extraordinary skill in kissing that she experienced the descent of his hand in a sort of molten haze of pleasure. When his palm came to rest at the small of her back then slipped down to possess her buttock, this time thoroughly and securely, she heard herself moan into his mouth.
    “I want to feel ye against me, Teresa Finch-Freeworth o’ Brennon Manor at Harrows Court Crossing in Cheshire,” he said huskily over her lips, his hand stroking her behind. “All o’ ye.”
    “I—” She grabbed hold of his coat and nodded. “I believe the terms of the wager allow for that.”
    He drew her against him and it did not feel distasteful like when the bounder had pushed her against the gunroom wall, but a little alarming and very good. His chest and thighs were hard and her breasts flattened as he crushed her against him. Nothing except resting on her belly had ever caused her breasts to do anything other than stick out too far, and then they always made it too uncomfortable to sleep. This was not uncomfortable. It was quite as though his broad chest and muscular arms had been made to cradle her breasts safely, securely, just as his hand was cradling her buttock. In imitation, her mouth seemed to want to make a home for his tongue, inviting him to enter her again and again, first gently, seeking, then with deeper, possessing thrusts that made her wild inside.
    Twining her hands into his waistcoat, she let him bear her back against the hothouse wall, and at that moment was introduced to