Why are you here if it’s so tortuous?’
Fraser shrugged as he leant his forearms against the railing, surveying the gardens in front of them. ‘Nothing so exciting—just family duty. The groom is my mum’s cousin. My mother insisted I be dragged into groomsman duty to make up the numbers even though I hardly know the guy.’
‘Ah, a mummy’s boy,’ Elspeth said with a smile, echoing Fraser’s knowing tone from earlier. ‘Interesting…’
Fraser bumped her shoulder with his and Elspeth held her hands up.
‘Hey, if it sounds like a duck, looks like a duck, and does what Mama Duck says…’
‘Enough—drink your wine,’ he said with a laugh, topping up her glass again. ‘I did not lure you out here to talk about my mother.’
‘Now, that sounds interesting.’
Elspeth looked up at him, pulling the blanket a little tighter around her shoulders, hyper-aware of the scratch of the fabric on her shoulders, the earthy smell of the wool, the barrier it put between her and Fraser.
‘I’m not sure I remember being lured, as such. But what were your motivations if you weren’t thinking about introducing me to your mother?’
Oh, she was sure that asking that question was going to get her into trouble. But that twinkle in his eye, the way he challenged her with his stare, egging her on, had tweaked at something inside her. She wanted to play.
He smiled back at that slight suggestion of innuendo, and she knew that she was right. She’d just got herself into trouble and she couldn’t bring herself to be sorry about it.
‘So you’re saying you’re not the kind of girl I want to take home to meet the parents, huh? Well, that’s good to know. I thought we were going to explore out here. Wasn’t that the plan?’
Elspeth drained her glass and gestured towards the steps down from the decking. ‘Lead on. Where do you want to look first?’
They wandered through the gardens, their shadows long over the lawns, until they came across a gathering of redwood trees: Californian giants, hundreds of feet tall. Beneath their shade, the light was lost completely, and Elspeth realised what a secluded spot they had found.
She leant back against the trunk of one of the trees, feeling small, humbled by the scale of them. As Fraser approached, still swinging the bottle by his side, Elspeth held up her glass like a shield, suddenly aware of the intimacy of their surroundings, how her attraction to Fraser had been bubbling under the surface of their banter since he had first approached her, and how he was looking at her now, like the wolf in a fairy tale.
But she was no innocent Red Riding Hood, and she had no plans to run or hide.
‘Do you think we’ve missed them cutting the cake?’ Elspeth asked, breaking the tension, wondering whether they’d come too far to take their conversation back to something inane and safe.
‘I’m not sure.’ Fraser came closer, topping up her glass, then closer still, so she wouldn’t have been able to lift it to her lips if she’d wanted to. The glass was trapped against her chest, along with her hands and her resolve. ‘Do you care?’
‘Not really.’ The words escaped her before she could stop them, but she couldn’t regret them. Not when they lit a spark in Fraser’s eyes that made the night seem a little less dark.
‘You don’t want to go back?’
Oh, there was so much more to that question, and she could see from the look in his eyes, lit only by the moon, that he knew it.
Surely it was late enough by now that she wouldn’t be missed at the reception? In her plan for the day, that was meant to be her cue to leave. To get home to her mum and her sister. Not to slope off somewhere with a stranger she would probably never see again.
Because if there was one thing she was sure about when it came to this connection she felt to Fraser, it was that it was never going to last more than a night. She had tried balancing a relationship, her work and family commitments before, and it hadn’t been possible. She’d got hurt. Alex had got hurt. And she knew her family had been hurt too, as they’d seen all their hopes for her unpicked and falling away.
But one night with this man—well, that could be something interesting. More and more, it was feeling as if it could be something irresistible.
‘I don’t want to go back,’ she said, looking up to meet his eyes, making sure that he couldn’t mistake her meaning.
She let the tree take her weight, surrendering herself to her decision, to her desire. The champagne glass slipped from her hand and she heard it hit the ground with a soft rustle. With her hands free, she brushed the front of Fraser’s jacket, taking a moment to really feel the fabric, the softness of well-worn wool on her fingertips. From his lapels she stroked upwards, inwards, and heavy fabric gave way to soft cotton.
His eyes never left hers as she reached the studs of his shirt and hooked her fingers into the fabric, pulling him down to her.
‘What do you want?’ Fraser asked, breaking their look at last and glancing down at her hands.
‘I think you know.’
‘Oh, I’ve got a pretty good idea. But I want to hear you say it.’
‘It’s going to be like that, is it?’ Elspeth asked with a shiver, hoping very much that it would be.
He was still looking at her as if he wanted to consume her, and she was good with that. She had too much in her head. Too much in her life. She wanted to be devoured, to devour. To lose herself in her senses, in the present. To be so overwhelmed that she couldn’t think about anything beyond the next second.
She slipped her foot out of her shoe and hooked it around Fraser’s calf, noticing the feel of every hair that slipped beneath the arch of her foot, the line of his calf muscle, taut and defined and bared to the elements.
As she slipped her foot higher, feeling the slide of his skin beneath hers, she couldn’t help imagining what she would find higher still. Wondering whether he was exposed to the elements, to her, beneath that kilt.
With the fingers of one hand still hooked in his shirt, keeping him close, she lifted the other to the back of his neck, feeling the softness of the hair curling at his collar. Meeting his eyes again, she smiled.
‘Enjoying yourself?’ Fraser asked, with a smile just the right side of smug.
‘You know I am,’ she murmured, dropping her eyes to his mouth and finding herself unable to look away from it.
She licked her lips, and watched as his mouth curved into a knowing, confident smile.
‘Good. Don’t stop.’
She had absolutely no intention of stopping. Gripping the front of his shirt tighter, she twisted the fabric between her fingers as she pulled him down to her. She held her breath as she closed her eyes, stretching up on tiptoes until at last her lips brushed against his. Sensation exploded at the touch of his warm mouth and she let out a quiet moan, revelling in every physical sensation assaulting her body.
In the press of hard wood and soft woollen blanket behind her, the creased cotton and tweed in front. The curling hair and soft skin beneath her hand. And the uninhibited mouth on hers. Tasting her, tempting her. Teasing her with its tongue and its lips.
Fraser’s arms wrapped around her waist, pulling her away from the tree into his solid chest. Elspeth let her lips trace the line of his jaw until she was close enough to whisper in his ear.
‘Let’s go.’
* * *
Fraser woke to the sensation of silk sheets beneath his body and a warm summer breeze caressing his back. And soft, soft lips pressing against his.
Elspeth.
With his eyes still