By Love Enslaved (36 page)

Dana had thought the future as dark as the shadows that surrounded them, but when she stepped into Brendan’s arms, nothing seemed to matter but the delicious excitement of his warm embrace. She had expected him to be sullen rather than loving, but she was wise enough to know that was a trick of passion rather than truth.

“You must talk with me,” she murmured against his already bared chest.

Brendan saw no reason for a conversation that would surely lead to another argument. “Words only get in our way,” he protested as he tilted her chin to recapture her lips for another near endless kiss. Her taste was delicious, with a uniquely flavorful sweetness that as always left him craving much more.
I am
using her just as she is using me
, he reminded himself, not understanding why that fact was so terribly difficult to recall.

Dana’s fingers slid through the coarse curls covering his chest, but her gesture was a caress, not an attempt to break free. Giving up as hopeless the effort to gain his full attention, she spoke as best she could between kisses. With frequent prolonged interruptions as a result, it took her a long while to convey the message that her father’s sole interest was in trade and that her only interest in Jarald was in the help he could provide Erik.

“That’s what I wished to tell you last night,” she confided when next Brendan allowed her a moment to breathe.

“So that I’d not be jealous?” the affectionate Celt teased, preferring to discuss Jarald rather than Haakon.

“You have no right to be jealous,” Dana scolded softly. “You have no more claim on me than Jarald does.”

“Oh, really?” Brendan whispered against her temple. Deciding to prove his point, with an agile move he pulled her down on the grass. She was clad only in a cloak and a flimsy silk nightgown that he easily cast aside, hurriedly followed by his own clothing.

Brendan had vowed to enjoy himself thoroughly, and with an appreciative grin he thought the perfection of Dana’s lithe body more splendid each time he had the good fortune to strip her nude. He moved his hands over her with an adoring caress, slowly tracing each luscious swell and inviting hollow, and all the while continuing an intoxicating barrage of deep kisses.

He knew her to be a wonderfully responsive woman, but he was seeking more than pleasure that night. He wanted to bend not only Dana’s supple body to his will, but her defiant soul as well. He was a man who relished a challenge, and she always provided that. His fingertips created a tingling pathway along the elegant line of her throat, over her pale shoulder to the flushed tips of her breasts. He then repeated that graceful trail with light kisses he gradually deepened to sample her taste more fully.

While he could feel Dana’s supple body fill with tremors of excitement as his tongue teased her budding nipples, Brendan’s lavish seduction had only just begun. He cherished the lush fullness of her breasts at the same time his knowing caress slid down her thighs, then back up to follow the curve of her hip before brushing over the flatness of her stomach. At last his touch slipped below her navel to comb through the triangle of fiery curls nestled there. Moving lower still, he parted the tender folds which lay hidden from his view, marveling as before at how quickly her body created an inviting wetness.

His fingertips were slippery now, easing their entry as he lured the breathless redhead toward the vision of paradise he saw so clearly in his mind. She held him tightly cradled in her arms, her hands slipping through his curls and then over his shoulders as she pressed him close. That she accepted his affection so readily inspired him to give even more. The haunting fragrance of her perfume was now mixed with her own captivatingly feminine scent, and Brendan longed to lose himself in the sensual wonder of her.

When he positioned himself above her, Dana raised her arms to embrace him, but in an instant he had eluded her grasp. He stretched out between her slender legs and spread adoring kisses on the soft, white skin of her belly. His tongue tickled, and she responded with a throaty giggle that served to inspire him to produce several more. In the most charming fashion, he coaxed her with a playful abandon until she was totally relaxed. Taking a firm hold on her hips, he rubbed his cheek against her inner thigh, cleverly spreading her legs wide so that when he lowered his head to enjoy the first of the intimate kisses that would send her to the edge of madness, she had no way to escape him.

Exalting in that momentary triumph, Brendan tasted the salty sweetness of her and was instantly lost in his own desires. The need to possess her more fully than he ever had any other woman overwhelmed him. Dana was his! he shouted in his mind, and as the words echoed in his heart with an emotional truth he could no longer deny, he deepened his kiss to prove his possession would last into eternity.

At first Dana writhed beneath Brendan in a vain attempt to escape the shocking form his affection had taken, but she was soon floating upon an enchanted haze of wonder and surrendered completely to the generous rapture he bestowed. He did not simply give pleasure; he drenched her in a flood of erotic sensation that threatened to cause her heart to burst with the sheer joy of his remarkable devotion. The ecstasy of sharing so passionate an encounter swelled within her, finally cresting at a shattering peak and showering her with splendor.

Robbed of all thoughts save those of Brendan, Dana could only cling to him weakly when he at last sought to find his release deep within her. That their passion for each other could create feelings so intense both shocked and frightened her. Rather than being lulled into a contented sleep, she lay awake in his arms, unable to gather the will to depart nor the wits to fathom just what they had shared.

Brendan could not recall lovemaking ever being so exhausting, but he was completely spent. “Will you admit it now?” he asked in a slurred whisper.

“Admit what?” Dana asked, too confused to think, let alone remember their earlier conversation.

The days were long, the nights all too brief, and in the pale moonlight that filtered through the trees there was already the promise of the coming dawn. Brendan groaned sadly, unable to believe they might have to part before the stubborn beauty in his arms admitted her need for him ran deep.

“Admit what?” Dana asked again.

Brendan tried to raise himself up on one elbow, slipped, and had to try again. “Admit that you belong to me,” he began with a sly grin. “Your body knows the truth. Don’t you?”

When Dana sat up to face him, her long curls covered her breasts, and by bending her knees slightly, she demurely shielded still more of herself from his view. “All I know is that when I am with you, nothing else matters, but that’s merely an illusion, not the truth.”

Dismayed by the seriousness of her mood, Brendan reached out to take her hand and brought her palm to his lips. “What is the truth as you see it?”

Dana took a deep breath, and forcing her rebellious mind to be coherent, she hastened to explain. “You are too fine a man to be a thrall. I mean to set you free and send you home. It’s what you deserve, although it means we’ll never meet again.”

Until that instant Brendan had lived very much for the moment. Earlier that night he had been bent on taking his revenge on Haakon through his lovely daughter, but as Dana’s eyes filled with a mist of tears, he knew he should never have attempted such a vindictive quest. He could not dismiss his feelings for Dana, and he had been a fool to try. He despised all Danes, with one lovely exception, and he would never again try to trick himself into believing he hated her.

He was certain no Danish girl ever wed a slave, and even if Dana succeeded in arranging for his freedom, he would have nothing but the clothes on his back to offer her. Surely Haakon would not regard him as a suitable husband for his elder daughter. That Dana wanted to send him home was remarkably generous, but there was no joy in that hope if he would spend the rest of his life without her.

Dropping her hand, Brendan reached over to pick up Dana’s gown and handed it to her. He then rose and yanked on his breeches. To boast he was the son of a king seemed absurd to him when he had no way to prove that claim. What Haakon would demand for her would be chests of gold, precious jewels, and bolts of the finest silk, not the elaborate promises any beggar could make. He would never be able to convince anyone he was of royal birth. Furthermore, whatever status he held in Erin was completely irrelevant to the Danes. To them he was but a lowly slave.

“You’re right. I am too fine a man to be a thrall, and the sooner I’m granted my freedom the better off we’ll both be.”

Dana studied Brendan’s pensive frown, stunned he could dismiss her so easily when imagining a future that did not include him was unbearably painful to her. “You see, it’s all an illusion. We can’t escape the world for more than a night at a time.”

Brendan helped her up, then waited until she had donned her cloak before he drew her into his arms. She resisted him for an instant, then slipped her arms around his waist. He wanted to promise her a hundred things, but until he had his freedom and had regained his wealth, he could not.

“I didn’t really think you would marry Jarald after knowing me,” he remarked in a joking attempt to put an end to the discussion of their dismal situation. “I promise not to be jealous of him, and I won’t give him any reason to be jealous of me either.”

In no mood for levity, Dana issued a warning as she pulled away. “Better make certain that you don’t. I think he might be more of a pirate than a trader, and I don’t really trust him, although I know my father does.”

He had not forgotten that Haakon was probably also a pirate, but Brendan wisely kept his opinion to himself. He helped Dana mount Dawn’s Kiss, then gave her knee a loving pat. “Even if you are an illusion, no more than a dream, I still want to make love to you as often as I possibly can. Will you try to be here again tomorrow night?”

Had he said he loved her and would fight for her at whatever cost, Dana would have found it easy to reply, but because he had not, a painful lump filled her throat as she again promised that she would try.

Walking back through the woods, Brendan came to the swift conclusion he would have to return home, gather a band of men, construct a ship, and then return to Fyn for Dana. The Norsemen and Danes kidnapped beautiful women all the time, so why couldn’t he? It was a bold plan, and perhaps an impossible one when so much of the voyage would have to be made through waters infested with not only Norse pirates, but Danes as well, but it provided the only bit of comfort he had as he made his way back to the clearing where Erik’s new house stood.

It was still dark enough for his approach to go unnoticed, but as Brendan reached the edge of the woods, he felt the eerie sensation he was being watched. Certain Dana would not have followed him, he glanced over his shoulder quickly, then scanned the tents the men had set up for shelter but nothing looked amiss. Thinking that his lack of sleep was playing havoc with his imagination, he left the trees, but before he had taken more than a single step, he was felled by a fierce blow that caught him on the left side of the head.

Landing facedown, and immobilized by an excruciating pain that encircled his head and shot down his spine, Brendan had to endure the further agony of waiting for the unseen assailant to strike him a second and fatal blow. He could feel blood flowing down his cheek, forming a gruesome puddle beneath his chin, and he tried to call out for help, but managed to utter no more than a hoarse croak that was muffled by the dirt in which he lay.

He was certain that death would swiftly overtake him. A vision of sunlight dancing on Dana’s flame-red curls filled Brendan’s mind. He had always loved her hair, and he reached out, his grasp feeble as he tried to catch the end of a curl to draw her near. When an intense heat seared his fingertips, he yanked his hand back, horrified to find the alluring flames were real.

At first there were only a few wisps of smoke. Then it billowed up around him in suffocating waves as the flames shot high into the air. The brush at the edge of the woods had ignited quickly, and now several trees were ablaze. Again Brendan tried to call for help, and this time, terrified he was about to be burned alive, he managed a shriek that echoed through the whole meadow. He heard an answering shout, and then another voice he recognized as Erik’s, but the smoke was too thick for him to catch his breath. Unable to call out again, he was certain they would never find him in time.

He wondered if there would be anything left for Dana to bury, or if she would know to put a cross over his grave. He saw her face so clearly then, the red of her hair as bright as the flames licking his sleeve, and it pleased him that his last thoughts were of the only woman he had ever loved.

Chapter Eighteen

Brendan had not expected to awaken, so he was doubly amazed to find himself stretched out on a bench in the expansive hall of Freya’s home. He had regained consciousness slowly, and at first had only been dimly aware of the voices that echoed all around him. Gradually the words had become clear, and he realized the people clustered nearby were discussing him. His head ached too badly for him to join in, but as usual he was infuriated not to be given a say in decisions concerning his welfare.

Dana had been keeping a close watch over Brendan, and when she saw his eyes flutter open, she stepped in front of him to prevent the others from making the same observation. When Erik had brought the Celt slave to them at dawn, she had feared her feelings for him would be instantly apparent, but fortunately the controversy surrounding the mysterious cause of his injuries had captured everyone’s attention and the depth of her concern had gone unnoticed.