Tempt Me With Kisses Read Free

hard times.”
    He tensed, his pride piqued. But this chamber and the equally barren hall below had already answered for him, so he could not deny it. “Yes.”
    “I have also heard the taxes on Llanstephan are very high, and you have not been able to pay them.”
    Was all his business common knowledge?
    Probably, he grimly acknowledged. People talked, and news of a lordly family’s difficulty would be much remarked upon by high and low alike. “Yes, that is so.”
    “How seriously are you in arrears to the crown?”
    Confirming what was already well known was one thing; discussing his debts and obligations were another.
    “Why should I tell you?” he demanded, barely restraining his annoyance.
    Her bright eyes brightened even more, and a wry little smile played about her lips, as if she was secretly and vastly amused by his troubles, a notion that increased his growing rancor.
    “I intend to provide a way for you to pay your debts and to rebuild Llanstephan’s prosperity.”
    His hands gripped the arms of his chair as he examined her face. How could this merchant’s daughter, who was little better than a stranger to him, do that?
    He steepled his fingers and regarded her as he might a peddler trying to cheat him. “What are you going to do? Give me a good price on this year’s fleece, for old time’s sake?”
    Taking a deep breath, Fiona MacDougal shook her head and looked as if she were preparing to do something astounding. “By offering to marry you.”
    Speechless, he stared in stunned disbelief. Of all the answers she might have made, he had not expected anything like this.
    “You are very poor, my lord,” she continued as if the worst were over, or as if she were certain there could be no disagreement. “That is no secret. I am very rich. All I lack is a husband, and what I want is a titled one. If I marry you, your financial problems will be solved, and my desire for a noble husband will be, too.”
    The reality of what she was proposing crashed into him, propelling him to his feet in outraged majesty. “You want to buy me? By the saints, woman, do I look like a whore to you?”
    She flushed, but rose and faced him squarely, as if speaking man to man, or warrior to warrior. Her green eyes shone with determined spirit, and her breasts rose and fell with each breath.
    A vision of her in his bed burst into his head. Her bountiful hair spread upon his pillow, her soft, shapely body beneath him, and her luscious lips parted in anxious cries of desire as he caressed and stroked and loved her…
    “If I were a titled woman and came to you with the same offer, would you say this?” she inquired, yanking him back to reality. “Or would you be relieved?”
    “Unfortunately, you are not a titled woman,” he replied, as he tried to focus his mind on the practical reasons for her proposal and why it would never be acceptable despite the furious longing surging through his traitorous body. “You are a wool merchant’s daughter, and you are a Scot. Lord Rhys of Wales would not be pleased if I marry a Scot.”
    She didn’t even blink. “He may be the most powerful nobleman in Wales, but you hold your estate by the grace of King Richard, not Lord Rhys. Besides, he rebels against Richard because the king snubbed him after his coronation. If you wish to worry about what such a man will think of your marriage, let me ask you this: What has Lord Rhys ever done for you? Has he offered to help you with your debts? Or does his childish rancor make your life more difficult?”
    God save him, for a mere woman she sounded well versed in the politics that interfered with his life.
    “And let us not forget King Richard, so busy and indebted with his foreign wars,” she continued just as matter-of-factly. “What will he care who you wed, as long as you can pay what you owe, especially when I bring no land or alliances to the marriage? Our union will be for financial reasons, not political, and both Rhys and Richard