Chapter 6

“You never told me why you don’t get along with Trent,” came Samuel’s question a week later. They were in the study filing the large number of notations from his lectures and the professor’s. It had been a busy year for both botanists.

A week when she had experienced unspeakable carnality under cover of the night. If she did not know better, she would have been scared about her own hunger.

Harriet stood by the desk sorting the sheets onto the right piles placed before her as her gaze snapped to him.

“I’m not sure I should tell you, since you both are friends,” she expressed, unwilling to interfere with their relationship.

“We’ve never been exactly friends, we got to Oxford in the same term,” behind the spectacles, his gaze studied her. “Besides, he’s too different from me for us to be close.”

She knew it to be the case, deciding Samuel had a right to hear what she had to say. Staring directly at him, her hands laced in front of her. “He propositioned me during his undergraduate period.” The memory was not pleasant at all and it showed in her stiff, unsmiling stance.

Samuel’s expression closed, transforming into a mask of distaste. His spine straightened to his full impressive height, hands fisting by his side. “The damnable villain!”

“When I refused, he started harassing me,” she added.

Now his posture had gone positively aggressive. “Did he—?”

“No. He had to watch his behaviour for I am under Professor Hayley’s protection.”

His response to what she told him surprised her. Most people, men or women, would have blamed her for the ruffian’s actions. In their eyes, women would always be held accountable for any harm come to them, even if they were the victims of such actions.

“And yesterday?” he asked, his jaw ticking, brows crumpled.

“Repeated the proposition,” she said, and paused at the loathing the memory evoked. “After implying I might get unemployed.”

At that, he rounded the desk in hard strides and posted himself right before her. “He threatened you.”

The anger darkening his glare gave a glimpse of his Scottish temper. “It’s nothing, really.” She tried to calm him.

“How can you say it’s nothing?” He paced back and forth, a hand spiking his slick hair, the other on his tapered hips. “The villain does not know the meaning of the word ‘no’!”

“Listen, Samuel,” she strived to use a level tone as he turned and met her gaze, “he cannot do anything. He’s not even a student anymore, or in an academic career for that matter.” He would never come close to the brilliant man before her. “You should not cease contact with him because of this.”

“You mean I must be civil with a potential rapist?” his tone implied it was utterly ludicrous.

“I mean there was no real harm done.” Of course she could not see the guts of him without becoming upset, but nothing had happened to her.

“Promise me you will come to me if he dares so much as to be near or less than ten feet from you.”

He looked too determined for her to hesitate. “Alright, I promise.” Her acquiescence seemed to appease him. “Can we resume our sorting here?” She took a deep breath, trying to put this out of her mind.

A long moment elapsed with him scrutinising her with detained attention. “Yes, let’s do it,” he answered at last.

They went back to work as hours passed without her realising it and she exclaimed in surprise when the housekeeper announced luncheon.

By mid-afternoon, the files had grown with their respective papers, and they came close to finishing.

Sam had taken a long time to put his rage under control after what Harriet had told him. Not in a thousand centuries would he have guessed the reason she disliked his former classmate. The knowledge had infuriated him. He did not have a single violent bone in his body, but he swore the force of it hit him hard with outrage.

Outrageous must be one way of putting it because the other sour feeling had undeniably been jealousy. Trent had made a pass on the woman he had wanted every day of these last seven years. The other man had not showed a particular preference for her, or any feelings by the looks of it. Certainly, he had propositioned out of a need for self-affirmation and to exert power. The notion not only sickened him, but also made severe possessiveness erupt in his guts. Another first for him.

He rose his eyes to her clad in a blue practical dress, the afternoon sun falling on hair rolled in a simple bun, transforming the wisps dangling from it in pure gold. Standing, half-bent on the desk, her demure neckline gave him a tantalising—and scarce—view of her full breasts. Arousal hit him like a furnace.

The above-mentioned possessiveness rocketed sky high with the idea that she was his, only his. And then he went hard as a rock.

Unbidden, he skirted the desk to reach her. His tall frame bent at her back, his splayed hands gliding on the blue fabric for his arms to band her firmly.

A feminine gasp saw the light of the afternoon. “Samuel! What are you doing?” she breathed.

His palms lined her breasts. “Let’s go to my chambers,” he invited hoarse before his mouth lowered to the curve of her neck.

The pressure of his body made her hands brace on the wooden surface now. “Are you crazy?” she asked, but her spine arched to him.

“Yes,” he nibbled her nape, “for you,” he rasped, cradling his erection in the crease between her buttocks.

Her breasts pressed into his hands. “The hour is—” Her head moved to give him more access.

“I know the hour,” he cut, and moved his pelvis further. “Please.” One hand slid down to her skirts. “Only once, I promise.” And bunched the fabric. “Not four or five times like these past nights.”

“Samuel,” his silky name on her tantalising lips did not help things even if it came as a reprimand.

Which drove him to boiling point. “I’ll go first.” He made himself go upright. “Give it five minutes.”

Swift, she righted herself and swung to him. “Samuel Bryce McDougal!” With an intake of breath, she crossed her arms over those delectable mounds, to dish him with a schoolmistress look.

His mouth twitched on the verge of grinning. “Yes, miss.”

“Your behaviour is deplorable.” When her eyes lifted to his he saw that she was not so serious as she led him to believe.

“I agree, miss.” Spectacled gaze lowered to her.

“You deserve a lesson,” her stern voice held a hint of amusement.

“What—ah—” She had knelt before him.

Delicate fingers undid the flap on his breeches. The simple fantasy of her mouth on him turned all of his skin crimson.

“A lesson you will not forget in haste,” she said to his underwear.

Feminine hands pulled it down, and his rampant erection popped out proud.

From his viewpoint, he watched her wheat head right in front of his leaky member pointing at her elegant nose. When she opened her mouth wide, he thought he would die with the expectation of it.

And when those wet, hot lips wrapped around him he saw stars.

Fuck! His hand braced on the desktop to be able to bear that first torturous suckling.

She sucked him to her throat, wrapping her fingers on his stem. The move made him harder. His own throat produced a moan, his hair falling on his brows as he did not wish to lose a single view of her. One of his hands snuck inside her bodice and captured one nipple. A sound came from her that vibrated on his stretched-to-bursting-point flesh.

She had not done this to him before as they had been busy with other ... lessons. Now her head bobbed back; his cock exited her mouth. She looked up from under her lashes before her tongue darted out to lick where the prepuce connected with the base of the bulbous tip, under it. That rosy tongue of hers produced unprecedented agony on the most sensitive inch of his entire body. When she engulfed him in her cavity again, he was on the verge of explosion. Combined with her mouth, her hands also glided up and down his stem.

“Bluidy hell!” he exclaimed, lamenting this would be of too little duration.

His testicles tightened as he approached the point of no return. But he saw her head retreat from his member, mouth heading on to drag on the ginger hair surrounding the base of him. The woman was going to make him wait.