“Maybe we’ll use both, but we’ll start with mine.”
Magnus sat on the bed at her hip. “Anything I should know? Last-minute warnings? No-tickle zones?”
He was getting it right, moment by moment, move by move. What a pathetic relief that was.
“I’m a traditionalist, if that’s what you’re asking. I haven’t known you long enough to be bored with the tried and true.”
“You’re a realist,” he said, leaning over to kiss her cheek. “I like that in a lover.”
A lover. How comfortably he used the term.
Bridget scooted down to her back, and Magnus followed, nuzzling her neck and chest, then climbing over her. For a moment, he lay on her, only the covers between them. He let her have some of his weight, but didn’t mash her into the mattress.
“What about you?” Bridget asked, ruffling his damp hair. “Any no-tickle zones?”
“Just be yourself,” he said. “Yell if you want to yell, steal the covers, tell me never to call you darling, laugh at me, but please be yourself.”
“Call me Bridget,” she said, patting his butt. “And I’ll call you Magnus.”
Chapter 3
His name was actually Horatio Rupert Magnus Cromarty, but what man—what creature of any species—wanted to be called Horatio or Rupert when his clothes were hanging on the back of the bathroom door?
Before Bridget left, he’d tell her his full name, because that was gentlemanly, not because a passing fancy should become anything more.
For the moment, Magnus concentrated on the pleasure of having Bridget stretched out beneath him on a bed. He’d purposely not gotten under the covers, even though he’d put his time in the shower to good use.
Whether he was reacting to the end of a drought, the fresh mountain air, or the woman herself, his fuse was short. He’d forgotten how that felt, forgotten that lovely, deceptive, I-could-go-all-night sense of erotic rejoicing.
Bridget ruffled his hair in slow, easy strokes.
“If I were a cat, you’d have me purring.”
“Get under the covers, Magnus.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She might have been a traditionalist in the sense of being at ease with a man sprawled over her in the most unimaginative of intimate positions, but she was an inventive traditionalist. She tugged gently on Magnus’s hair, all over his scalp, and that was oddly relaxing.
She ran her nose over his neck, chest, and brows, cheeks, lips, and chin, as if he were an intriguing glass of single malt and entitled to tasting-room protocols.
Bridget wasn’t shy about the purpose of the meeting either, wrapping her legs around his flanks and hauling him close.
Magnus reciprocated by exploring the caresses she liked best on her breasts, which was lovely, because he adored a woman who enjoyed having her breasts touched. The urge to join with her hummed through him, along with an odd sense of rightness.
Life should not always be about specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely goals, nor about quarterly earnings or mission statements. Sometimes, life should be about pleasure, connection, and being human.
Bridget brushed her thumbs over his nipples. “Magnus?”
“Aye, love?”
“Now would be nice.”
He sat back, wishing he’d left the lights on. Bridget’s hair was still in its tidy braid, though a few wispy curls had escaped.
She wrapped her fingers around his cock, and Magnus let her play until now became a necessity.
“You have the sweetest touch,” he said, reaching for a condom. He could get used to that touch.
“You’re not shy. I like that. If we’re not in bed to touch each other and be touched, then we’re not really in bed together, are we?”
To his sorrow, he knew exactly what she meant. Celeste had taught him what it meant to make love with a woman who wasn’t truly in the bed with him. He’d been a sexual accessory, a social accessory, a financial accessory.
And a willing one.
The condom was traditional—no fancy textures, flavors, or enhancements. “We have whisky-flavored frenchies in Scotland. I haven’t been able to bring myself to use one.”
He braced himself on his arms, then tucked closer. Bridget got a grip on him and showed him where she wanted him.
“Whisky-flavored?”
“And plaid. Can’t forget national dress for the tadger.”
Bridget was silently laughing as Magnus eased himself inside her, and the sensation was lovely. Intimate, affectionate, happy—and outstandingly erotic.
And then he paused, ambushed by tenderness. What a gift—to laugh in bed with a lover.
“Hello, Magnus,” Bridget said, kissing him as she met him with a lazy roll of her hips. “Welcome to the Wild West.”
Even her kiss held a smile. “Hello, Bridget. A pleasure to be here.”
If a man paid attention, he realized that some women were more difficult to read in bed than others. Some ladies didn’t move, or moved out of sync, or to a rhythm Magnus couldn’t catch. Others made it hard to distinguish between growing arousal and frustration. Still others went about the whole business with a confusingly impatient air.
Bridget was perfect. Her sighs and reactions were entirely intelligible, and if she wanted Magnus’s hand on her breast, she simply put his hand there and gave his fingers a squeeze. Her timing matched his. Her tempo fit his as well.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this on a first encounter, or even on a honeymoon.
“Strong legs,” he muttered as she locked her heels at the small of his back.
“Time in the saddle,” she panted. “Do that up and over—God, yes, like that.”
He hitched himself higher, and she did something with the angle of her hips that sent him nearly to the brink.
Three seconds later, Bridget was keening softly against his neck and hammering herself against him. Magnus hammered back, and pleasure tangled up with a sense of relief, of coming home and finding all was well, despite a long, wearying absence.
He propped himself on his elbows, lest they both suffocate from a surfeit of satisfaction.
Bridget turned her head so her cheek was against his forearm. “Dayum, Magnus.”
That translated easily and wonderfully. She stretched, then nuzzled the crook of his elbow, which tickled. She wiggled next, and Magnus endured while she treated herself to a digestif orgasm—or two, possibly three.
“I needed that,” she said, stroking his shoulders. “Lordy, Lordy, did I need that.”
He kissed her nose. “So did I.”
For a moment, he wallowed in the pleasure of being close to the woman who’d wrung him out thoroughly, but the housekeeping wouldn’t wait for long. He sat back, the small of his back protesting.
“Water?” he asked.
“Please.”
Bridget propped herself on her elbows while Magnus held the glass to her lips so she could drink.
She flopped back to the pillows. “I need a nap, Magnus, but don’t run off. I have plans for you.”
He drank from the same spot on the glass she had, because he was an idiot, then he climbed from the bed and peeled off the condom.
“Back in a moment.”
The bathroom light was harsh, and the mirror reflected a man whose hair was sticking out in eleven different directions. Magnus’s heart, however, was happy. He’d gotten lucky, not in the sense people usually flung the term around. The sexual pleasure had been lovely—better than anticipated, certainly—but his sense of well-being went beyond that.
Bridget suited him, and he suited her in more than the erotic particulars. He and she might have only a single night to delight in each other’s company, but it would be a wonderful night.
He was overdue for some wonderful and suspected Bridget was too.
That it could be only a single night of shared wonderful was sad. He pushed the sadness away, scrubbed his fingers over his hair, and made a few plans of his own.
Magnus slid into the bed behind Bridget and wrapped himself around her. “You’re supposed to be napping.”
He cuddled up close, nothing diffident or standoffish about his afterglow manners. He draped one arm loosely around Bridget’s waist and tucked the other beneath her neck. His body radiated heat along her back and butt, and yet, he didn’t crowd her.
How was it possible she’d miss a guy she’d known less than a day?
“Tell me about Scotland.” For whatever time they had, Bridget wanted to spend it pretending they had more.
“Scotland the brave.” Magnus drew the covers up a few inches higher around Bridget’s shoulders, which had been getting chilly, now that she considered it. “Scotland is a complex little country. It would fit inside Montana four, almost five, times, but its experience—particularly in the Highlands and islands—is complicated. We’re some of the most formidable soldiers in the world, but our national identity is more conquered than conqueror.”
Magnus’s fingers drew lazy circles on Bridget’s nape and shoulders as he spoke. She could listen to him talk all night. The accent was part of it, but so was the sense that she was connected to him by the words he wove.
“That business about necessity being the mother of invention rings true for us,” he went on, “and we take great pride in our innovators and entrepreneurs, and yet, it’s as you say: We try to look after one another. Looking after people who don’t want to be told what to do—ever again—is a challenge.”
“What’s good about Scotland?”
“The whisky,” he said, kissing her shoulder. “The humor, the scenery, the courage, and the resilience. The resilience of the Scots who immigrated here is half the reason Americans aren’t still a colony cowering along the Eastern Seaboard of North America, but there’s ruthlessness and greed too. We’ve a lot of Viking blood, especially in the west.”
He rambled on about obliteration of Gaelic culture, Clearances—they had something to do with sheep—and the idiot Tories, until Bridget could no longer keep her eyes open. She drifted off for a nap and woke to the realization that her lover was aroused.
Magnus moved in lazy strokes, rubbing himself against her intimately.
“Not without me you don’t.” Bridget extricated herself from his embrace and straddled him. “How about like this?”
He covered her breasts with his palms. “Like this is lovely.”
When the man was right, he was right. Bridget didn’t usually care for girl-on-top, because it left her less privacy—which didn’t make a lot of sense, considering the context. With Magnus, she wanted to enjoy the view and to enjoy herself.
He made that so easy. He was positively gifted when it came to pleasuring a lady’s breasts, whether he was using his hands or his mouth. He could be playful, challenging, relentless…
Bridget loved the relentless part. She got him dressed for the party and crouched over him.
“Inside me now, Magnus. Please.”
He settled his hands on her hips and drove home in one slow glide. “Exactly where I want to be.”
They smiled at each other in the shadows, and then Bridget got the festivities started all over again. She meant to savor him, to treat herself to a few teaser orgasms, because with Magnus she could.
Her plans went awry—the Scots had a saying about that. She caught fire, and Magnus—the fiend—poured everything she’d ever craved in a lover onto the flames. His hands were everywhere, on her breasts, tangled in her hair, stroking her back. He was with her as she surrendered to desire and with her as she drifted down from a wild, beautiful ride.
“So that was Scottish ingenuity,” she panted, subsiding onto his chest.
“More like Highland hospitality.”
He made her smile, made her wish that in the morning she didn’t have to leave. That was sweet and surprising. Nothing and nobody had ever tempted her away from the Logan Bar ranch.
Except… that wasn’t quite accurate. The ranch was beautiful, but it was a Montana ranch, the most jealous of mistresses. If the livestock wasn’t demanding attention, the land was, and if the land and livestock were running smoothly, the finances and equipment never did.
Bridget wasn’t that attached to the ranch. She hadn’t been born there and didn’t particularly want to die there. What held her in Montana was her distillery.
Magnus kneaded the muscles of her backside gently, a comforting intimacy as passion faded and the next day’s realities threatened to harsh the glow. He slipped from her body, and yet, Bridget didn’t want to move.
“Will you stay with me tonight?” he asked.
She lifted her head to peer at him, but there wasn’t enough light to read his expression. “You mean as in stay until morning?”
“And for breakfast. I see no need for you to sneak off like some cattle reaver who’s been up to no good.”
Staying until morning was a bad idea, a tempting bad idea. “More Highland hospitality?”
“Greed,” he said, brushing her hair back from her brow. “Pure, selfish greed, lass, and that’s not my tadger talking, though I’m a well-pleasured man at the moment.”
And that was probably an example of Scottish courage.
“As it happens,” Bridget said, sitting up, “I’m feeling greedy myself. I warn you, I’m as possessive about my butter and maple syrup as I am about my cheesecake.”
She’d like to be possessive about Magnus, but the last thing she needed now was a complication. Magnus had complication written all over him, and he wasn’t offering anything more than a shared breakfast anyhow.
Lovely of him to offer that though. To Bridget, it meant more than he’d know.
“If you’ll keep the bed warm for me, I’ll nip into the loo,” he said, patting her butt.
She almost said, I could get used to this Highland hospitality. Instead, she pitched off of him, drew up the covers, and took the warm spot when he strolled over to the bathroom.
When Magnus came back to bed this time, Bridget spooned him. “What do you dream of, Magnus?”
He was quiet for so long she suspected he’d fallen asleep.
“I thought I knew,” he said, drawing her arm more snugly around his middle and lacing his fingers with hers. “A business that supports my elders. Commercial success to wave in my cousin’s face. A respected place among my peers and maybe a bit of revenge on those who assured me I’d fail in two years flat. Those are all understandable goals, but they don’t sound very lofty, do they?”
“They sound human.” Bridget could understand those goals all too well. I am not married to my distillery, Luke Logan. She wasn’t married to anybody or anything else either.
Which was just fine. Mostly.
She tucked close and let sleep claim her, until Magnus woke her at dawn. They made love a third time, slowly, drawing out the pleasure and putting off the parting. Breakfast was a friendly affair over a room-service tray of flapjacks, coffee, and bacon.
After separate showers—ladies first—Magnus walked Bridget to her truck and gave her a final kiss to her cheek.
She climbed into her Tundra, gave him one wave good-bye, and turned her mind to the challenge awaiting her at home.
Her brothers had invited some fancy Brit to the ranch with a view toward selling the bastard her distillery. She had until Sunday night to convince them that their betrayal would fail. Come fire, flood, famine, or fraternal disloyalty, nobody was going to take that business away from her.
Nobody.
“Elias, you bastard. I hope your tadger falls into the River Tay the next time you’re trying to impress one of the ladies with your angling.”
Two in the goddamned a-of-m Montana time, meant Elias was probably enjoying his second cup of some exotic Italian caffeine while a lovely spring morning got underway in Scotland.
“Fishing analogies,” Elias replied around a loud sip. “I’d forgotten your fishing analogies. Does this imply you’ve been casting a line or two?”
Magnus lay back against
the same pillows he’d shared with Bridget the previous night. “The spring fishing in Montana would make your piddly Deeside antics look like Uncle Fergus swatting at the midgies. A different hatching begins each week, the variety is unbelievable, and the guides appreciate a good whisky.”
He’d spent his Saturday with one of those guides, a young man who’d known every bank, bug, and tall tale related to the valley’s angling industry.
“Are we overworking your analogy, or did you truly go fishing?” Elias’s question was casual, but then, Elias was at his nosiest when he was trying to appear casual. He’d learned that tactic from the aunties, who could pry a young man’s worst fears from him over a cup of tea and a nibble of tablet.
“Do you know what a streamer is, Elias?”
“Of course I… What’s a streamer?”
Magnus launched into an explanation of a curious type of tied fly—much longer than the usual variety—and how it could be manipulated to lure trout.
“So you got your pathetic arse into a river,” Elias said. “I thought you were supposed to be in Denver today.”
Elias was the best of cousins, despite his excellent memory for detail. “I’m ahead of schedule. I’ll drive up to a couple ski resorts tomor—this morning and then arrive at the Logan ranch this evening.”
Another loud, luscious sip of coffee. “You’re going skiing?”
Scotland had a few ski resorts, though they were backyard bunny slopes compared to the American version.
“I’m going on reconnaissance, Elias. The nearest resort includes more four-star accommodations than most cities in Scotland, covers more than five thousand acres, and includes a conference center, multiple spas, summer resort facilities, and—”
“You’re off to sell goddamned whisky,” Elias growled. “I send you on the first holiday you’ve taken—not in years, Magnus. The first vacation you’ve ever taken, and you can’t be content to go raiding at some boutique distillery as a means of writing off the expenses, you must turn the whole exercise into business.”
“Selling whisky is what I do, Elias.” Though Magnus recalled Bridget’s question: What do you dream of? He’d been dreaming of her when Elias had interrupted his sleep. “Did you call to scold me for pursuing my livelihood in a location where that might be quite profitable? They are catching onto the concept of food miles here, whether they know it or not. Local distillers have cachet.”
Big Sky Ever After: a Montana Romance Duet Page 26