“It makes no bloody sense.” He picked up his stride, as if moving farther from the castle—and from Robyn—would somehow help.

Lucy hurried to keep up. “Why? Because she’s not one of us?”

“Not that. You know me better than that.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

He stopped abruptly. “Luce, you know me. I’m never going to settle down with one woman. My family are the Adairs and you, Ery, and Mac. It’s one thing to be attracted to a woman who drives me up the bloody wall, it’s another that she also happens to be my best friend’s daughter.”

“It’s still so weird Mac is old enough to have had Robyn,” Lucy opined.

“It doesn’t matter. She’s Mac’s. She’s ten years younger than me. And I don’t do serious. So she’s off-limits. I just need to avoid her.”

Lucy made a choking sound. “Are you saying that you can’t control yourself around her?”

A memory of yesterday flashed before his eyes. He hadn’t expected the electric sexual chemistry between them.

“I can control myself. It’s just an itch.”

His friend patted his shoulder. “Baby, you and I are the same. And I agree. It’s just an itch. An infatuation heightened by the need to get laid.”

“Leighanne,” he murmured.

The thought of channeling his sexual frustration into Leighanne left him feeling beyond dissatisfied.

“You’d go all the way to Glasgow to get laid? That sounds like escaping to me. Does that mean … you honestly can’t control yourself around Robyn?”

That almost sounded like a taunt.

He eyed Lucy, but her expression was neutral. No evidence of the goading he’d been sure he’d heard in her voice.

“I can control myself. I have never been unable to control an attraction to a woman in my life.”

* * *

The rain came on before he and Lucy could make it to the beach, so they turned back. By the time they neared Loch Ardnoch, it was lashing down. Lucy yelled that she’d see him later and dashed toward Eredine’s studio. Lachlan hurried toward the castle. His white shirt was soaked through and water dripped off his beard and hair. He pushed the latter back off his face as he entered the side entrance near his office and froze in the doorway at the sight of Robyn leaning against the wall, trying to catch her breath.

Her gorgeous big eyes met his. They were a moss green today.

Strange, unpredictable, changing female.

As he closed the door behind him, the tension between them was thick, palpable.

Robyn pushed off the wall, her wet ponytail trailing over her bare shoulder.

Yesterday was bad enough … the tight T-shirt and yoga pants showing off every curve of her strong but feminine body.

Today was worse.

A sports bra her breasts strained against. Her nipples were hard. From the cold rain … or him? Wishful thinking?

Heat flushed through him, arousal heightening as a trail of water trickled down her toned stomach.

Lachlan’s mouth felt dry. All his blood rushed south.

Damn her.

“I hope you don’t mind I used this entrance,” Robyn said, breaking the tense silence. “It was the closest point of shelter.”

Rain moistened her lush lower lip.

Images of licking it off, of pushing her up against the wall and possessing every inch of her exploded through his mind, and he moved.

“Adair—” Robyn cut off as he grabbed her by the arm while roughly pulling his office key card from his back pocket. “Adair, what are—”

He hauled her into his office and used her body to close the door.

Chest heaving, desire for her fogging up every rational thought in his head, Lachlan braced his hands on the door at either side of her head, caging her in. “I don’t do relationships.”

Robyn looked baffled. “O … kay.”

“If we fuck, that’s all it will ever be.”

Understanding dawned.

Her face flushed as she glared up at him. “I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”

“Oh?” He leaned into her, letting her feel what she did to him.

Arousal flared in her eyes, and it was a wonder, with them both soaked to the skin, that steam didn’t rise from their clothing in reaction to the heat they generated.

Then Robyn pushed at his chest with force, anger clouding whatever lust she felt, and Lachlan let himself stumble back with an aggravated curse under his breath.

“One, I don’t need to know you don’t do relationships. It might be hard for you to believe, Adair, but you’re the last man I would want to be in a relationship with.”

Pride pricked, he glared at her. He wasn’t imagining things. This wasn’t one-sided. “You want to fuck me as badly as I want to fuck you.”

Her breathing grew a little shaky. “I can control myself. Better yet, I can find someone else to take the edge off. Anyone would be better than you.”

The thought of her taking what he’d provoked and giving it to some other man snapped Lachlan’s patience. He hooked a hand around her nape and hauled her against him, crushing his mouth over hers. Tell me you don’t feel this.