He smiled down at her, rolling to his side and tugging the sheet lower. “I caught a wee hint in the picture, aye. But I needed to see the original to get the full idea. And the painting did no justice to those interesting freckles.”
She caught the sheet before it slipped below her breasts. “So say it.”
“That’s my lassie. Implacable to the last.” His eyes were brilliant with admiration. “You still won’t take anything at face value, will you?”
“I can’t say I feel very implacable, lying here in this bed.” She didn’t smile back. “I believe I told you I love you.”
“Aye, you did, at that. Although you could have sounded a wee bit happier about it.”
“Should I say it again?”
“Aye, I’d like to hear it.”
“Very well.” Her lips twitched, but she didn’t release the sheet. “I love you, Ewan Alexander Ardmore Macrae. I must be as mad as my father, but you’ve carved a place in my heart that belongs to you alone.”
He nodded with satisfaction. “That’s better.”
She cast him a sidelong glance. Dear Lord, she’d caught herself an enviable specimen of a man, even if he was far too inclined to tease. “Your turn, Lord Lyle.”
He heaved a theatrical sigh. “You won’t let me out of this, will you?”
“No.”
His hand crept to the edge of the sheet, until she slapped it away. “I’m gey eager to see what’s under there.”
; “You know what you have to do first. Think of this as blackmail.”
“Och, you’ll make a braw countess, Charlotte Warren.”
“So?”
His smile faded, and he kissed her with a depth of emotion that caught her by surprise. She shivered under the wordless worship of his lips. There was passion—as he’d said, passion was integral to their love—but there was also tenderness, and care, and something that felt like reverence.
By the time he raised his head, she was boneless with longing and radiant with happiness. After that kiss, he didn’t have to say the words. She knew he loved her.
Dazzled she stared up at him, lost in cobalt eyes. While she was distracted, he’d swept the sheet aside, and she lay naked to his view. She didn’t mind. With such trust between them, there was no room for shame. She basked in the searing sweep of his gaze. Her nipples tightened, and that now familiar heaviness weighted her belly.
She waited in trembling anticipation for him to pounce. But his hand cupped one breast with the same reverence he’d betrayed in his kiss, and his expression was somber as he stared into her eyes. “I love you, Charlotte. I’ll love you forever.”
She’d asked for the declaration. Yet still it had the power to punch her hard in the heart. She blinked away stinging tears and spoke in a choked voice. “Show me.”
Chapter Thirteen
* * *
Charlotte stopped at the ancient stone bridge that crossed the brook flowing down the hill behind the house. The narrow structure was covered in weed and slime after recent submersion, but to her regret, passable.
“I’d hoped it might still be underwater,” she said sadly, tightening her grip on Ewan’s hand. Bill who had bounded in their wake all the way, wandered off to snuffle through last autumn’s rotting leaves.
“It’s only for a day, mo chridhe,” Ewan said, and she heard that he, too, struggled to accept their parting, however short.
He led the bay mare. She was loaded with the initialed leather luggage that had doomed his halfhearted attempt to play plain Mr. Smith. Around them, the world was fresh and fragrant and newly washed. The sun crept above the horizon, thickening the light under the trees. The air was cold, but smelled of spring.
“You never told me what that means,” she said, knowing he should go, yet not ready to say goodbye.
The tenderness in his smile squished her heart into a ball of sentimental goo. “Aye, I did.”