On A Wicked Dawn (40 page)

Ducking under a branch, he led the way, Amelia's hand in his; as they walked out into the thick grass, he could almost hear the high-pitched voices, the laughter, the whispers, the soft murmur of the water a constant counterpoint. He stopped in the center of the grassy area, and drew in a deep breath. It brought with it the scents of summer, of sun on leaves, of grass crushed beneath their feet.

“It's just like it always was.” Amelia slipped her hand from his and sank down on the grass, lush, green, and, courtesy of the warm day, dry. She looked up, met Luc's eyes, smiled. “It was always so peaceful here.”

Arranging her skirts, she looked around, then hugged her knees, set her chin upon them, and fixed her gaze on the gently swirling water.

After a moment, Luc sat beside her. He stretched out, long legs toward the water, booted ankles crossed. Leaning back on one elbow, he, too, considered the river.

It was a constant, something that had been here over the generations, over the centuries—something that tied them
to this land, to its past, yet whispered of its future.

She let the feeling sink to her bones, let the warmth in the air, the music of the river and the shifting leaves soothe and reassure. Confirm.

Eventually, she looked at Luc, waited until he met her gaze, then, smiling lightly, raised a brow. “Well—can I call the pup Galahad?”

His midnight blue eyes darkened; she knew why, knew what he was recalling. The events of the past night when she'd paid the price he'd asked—and his bribe, too. This close, she could feel the sensual power that was his to wield, could sense, too, the rise of that other emotion, the one she sought to evoke, to provoke, to draw again and again into their encounters, until he recognized it and acknowledged it, too.

The former was the tension infusing his long limbs, hardening his muscles, sharpening the angles of his face. The other was more ephemeral, a distilled force, the very essence of power and compulsion.

She could see both in his eyes as they held hers.

“It's warm,” he said. “Open your jacket.”

Such simple words; they sent desire flooding through her. His gaze held hers; his tone—deep, quiet, controlled—was one she recognized. She now knew to obey him to the letter, that that was how the game was played. Assuming she wished to play . . .

Her eyes locked with his, she uncurled her arms, sat up, and unhurriedly undid the buttons closing her light jacket. He hadn't said to take it off, so she didn't, perfectly willing to follow his experienced lead.

As her hands lowered, so did his gaze.

“Face me and tuck the halves back.”

She swung to him and did as he asked, so he had an uninterrupted view of what she wore beneath the jacket. Her blouse was of fine gauze, essentially transparent. She'd omitted to wear a chemise.

Luc's mouth went dry as he noted that last. His hand was reaching for her before he'd even thought. Gaze fixed, with
his fingertips, he traced, then caressed, then closed his fingers about one pert peak. He took his time examining her, a sultan assessing a slave. Knowing she was naked under her skirts, knowing she'd be heating, softening, her body preparing to receive his.

When his hand was shaking with the effort of holding to his heavily restrained script, he let his gaze rise, to her throat, to where her skin glowed, lightly flushed. Lifting his gaze to her jaw, he saw the two ringlets she'd taken to letting loose bobbing by her ear.

He reached for them, wound them about one finger, then drew her evenly, steadily, toward him. Splaying one hand on his chest, the other curving about his shoulder, she met his gaze briefly, her eyes wide, pupils enlarged, circled by sapphire blue, then her lids fell and she let him pull her close, let him take her mouth.

Ravage it—he made not the slightest effort to hide the hunger eating him from inside out.

The hunger she'd teased and fed and incited. The hunger he was perfectly certain she'd seen in his eyes.

He kissed her as if she was indeed his slave; she met him, drew him in, urged him on. Hand curved about her jaw, he held her steady as he plundered, commanded, demanded the surrender she was so very ready to give.

His hand returned to her breast, his touch hard, driven. He kneaded, and she moaned. He found her nipple and tugged, tweaked, until her spine arched, her breath strangled, caught.

He lay back, grasped her hips and lifted her astride his thighs. Her hands started to slide down his chest.

“No. Sit still.” If she touched him . . . he seriously doubted he'd remain in control, and he wasn't sure either of them could yet deal with that.

She obeyed, albeit reluctantly. The irony that this was one of the few areas in which he could count on her obedience hadn't escaped him; how long that would last he didn't like to think.

Pushing back the folds of her voluminous skirt, he quickly undid the buttons at his waistband, laid open the flap
of his breeches, released his throbbing erection. On his chest, her fingers curled, but she didn't move.

“Gather the front of your skirt.”

She blinked, glanced at his face, then quickly complied, shifting on her knees to free the folds, lifting them.

As soon as there was no longer any fabric between them, he slipped his hands beneath her skirts, gripped her naked hips, lifted her, then drew her ruthlessly down.

Impaled her upon him, sheathed his length in her very willing body.

She gasped, eyes wide; she'd expected him to touch her, not to simply take her. Fill her.

Luc felt the now-familiar bliss roll through him as she closed, hotter than summer heat, about him. Something in him eased, even while desire's tension increased.

He'd had her like this, above him, last night, while she'd paid the price for her teasing. The memory flared in her eyes as they met his; the vivid sensual recollection of how he'd had her ride him to oblivion—of how long he'd kept her there, trapped on the cusp of ecstasy while he'd sated his senses, his desires, with her, in her, drawing out the moment to a cataclysmic climax that had left them both shattered.

But that had been last night. He gripped her hips and held her down, allowing her no leeway to move. Then he undulated beneath her, holding her, guiding her, as he took his pleasure in her body—and gave her a new pleasure in return.

Amelia closed her eyes; she'd been shocked by the ease, by the rapidity and completeness of his penetration, unprepared for the crashing wave of sensation that had rolled through her and swept her wits away. Her breasts were full and aching; between her spread thighs, he moved rhythmically, buried within her, stroking deep. Not the usual thrust and retreat, but a subtler, deeper, more intimate movement.

Vulnerability and an aching, familiar need rushed up and over her, filled her, overflowed her heart. She bit her lip against a whimper, a primitive sound of wanting; her fingers
curled on Luc's chest. She started to lean forward, to press her hands flat.

“No. Stay as you are. Sitting up.”

His tone was definite, authoritative. She complied, straightening her spine, feeling him press deep inside her. Her fingers barely touched his shirt—she didn't know what to do with her hands . . .

“Put your hands on your breasts.”

Startled, she lifted her heavy lids enough to look down at him, only then realized how rushed her breathing was. His eyes were dark, black as they captured hers; his chest rose and fell rapidly. “Do it. Now.”

She did, not quite understanding; she cupped her breasts, uncertainly at first, then more firmly as her own touch added to the building pleasure.

“Knead. Gently.”

She obeyed, eyes closing, leaving him to move her upon him as he wished. When he told her to take her nipples between her fingers, she did, mimicking what he had so often done, squeezing, circling, squeezing again, knowing he was watching.

Then the glory descended; she felt her body tighten, coiling about him. Heard him gasp; he gripped her hips, fingers sinking, holding her down as he thrust deeper still.

And it took them, shattered them, fused them. Who went first, who followed, she couldn't tell.

She cried out, heard his answering groan. Felt the warmth within as he emptied himself into her womb, as her body rejoiced, rippling about him.

The tension faded, not so much draining away, as easing into the background, letting them, temporarily, free.

Luc slid his hands from beneath her skirts, followed her silken thighs to nudge her knees back, then he lifted his arms, drew her down, wrapped her close against his heart.

Listened to that organ pound in time with the beat he could sense where they joined. Waited as both slowed, his lips on her hair.

He had no idea what game she was playing, only that she
was intent on gaining something through an escalation of their sexual play. He seriously doubted he'd approve of her goal, however, after what had passed between them last night, he'd realized that attempting to deny her—deny the passion she evoked—was a sure road to madness.

He wasn't capable of refusing what she offered.

That in itself was enough to shake him, to illustrate just how dangerous she and her latest direction was, how right he was to be wary. Unfortunately, his only option was to play her game. He glanced down at her golden curls, at the sliver of her face he could see. Her breasts were warm mounds pressed to his chest, her body a soft weight on his.

The passion she evoked, that she was so deliberately and repeatedly inciting, held a powerful compulsion. There was no name he could put to what it made him feel; it was brutal, violent in intensity, but not intent. It wasn't a power that demanded hurt to appease it, but something quite different. And when in the grip of that compulsion, he wanted only one thing.

To surrender to it. To ride its wild tide regardless of all else.

Condemned to madness if he resisted; insane if he gave in.

With her locked in his arms, he lay flat on his back, stared at the sky, and wondered how he'd come to this.

Midnight came and went, and if he hadn't definitively identified the answer, he was starting to suspect what it was. Amelia lay slumped beside him, sound asleep; knowing that—where she was, exactly what she was doing—freed his mind from its obsession with her, left him free to think.

That evening he'd let her retire without him, feigning a properly cool husbandly discretion. Her eyes had touched his, her lips had quirked as she'd turned and left him. At least she hadn't laughed.

He'd forced himself to wait for half an hour, then climbed the stairs to their bedroom.

She'd been waiting in the darkened room, clothed in moonlight and nothing else.

He'd taken her then and there, had her kneeling naked on the bed before him, gasping as he filled her and drove them both to ecstasy. Then he'd stripped and joined her on the bed, and made love to her thoroughly, to the depths of his soul, to the very limits of his expertise.

And there it was, the little word he was avoiding. Shying away from. Even thinking that much had him shifting restlessly. Made him aware of her hand on his chest, of how she habitually slept with it there, spread over his heart. He lifted her hand, placed a kiss in her palm, then replaced it and covered it with his.

Love. That was the simple truth. He could hardly go on denying it, unexpected though it was. For himself, he couldn't see that it would alter very much. It wouldn't alter his behavior, wouldn't change how he dealt with her. It might alter his perceptions, and his motivations, but that wouldn't show in the consequent actions. He'd always been able to conceal what he thought, and he'd been born with arrogance enough to do whatever he wished, whenever he wished, without any need for explanations.

Being under the sway of that dangerous emotion wasn't the end of the world. He could cope, and easily conceal the truth.

At least until he was sure enough of her to let her guess it, as she assuredly would when he confessed about her dowry.

Meanwhile . . . there was her game to be endured. It had taken him some time to discern her direction. She didn't know he loved her, but she knew he desired her. Lusted after her to a highly uncomfortable degree. Given she was a Cynster female and as managing as they came, given she believed she'd arranged their marriage, given he was certain he'd hidden his secret well, she wouldn't be expecting to tie him to her with love.

She did, it seemed, expect to tie him to her with lust. With desire.

He had to admit her line of attack was sound.

Provoking him in venues more associated with forbidden
lust than marital connubiality was a sure way to heighten the desire that flared between them. The surest way to stoke the fire. And no matter the actual outcome of her daytime plans, when they repaired to this room, she would reap her reward.

Every day, every night, saw the sexual stakes raised higher.

Today, he'd accepted that he was, regardless of his wariness, along for the ride. In whatever interpretation.

Aside from his damningly weak resistance, ultimately her game might work to his advantage. He wanted—needed—her to love him; he was too experienced to imagine lust or desire would do. It had to be love, openly acknowledged, freely given. Only that would be strong enough to allay his fears, soothe his vulnerability, allow him to confess his deception, to feel safe in doing so. To feel safe in acknowledging the reality of what he felt for her.

He didn't think she loved him yet, had seen no sign that she did. However much he lusted for her, she returned the passion, but that wasn't love—none knew that better than he. Once, he might have been gullible enough to imagine that for a woman, a lady like her, giving herself, her body, as she now did to him, unreservedly, was an indication of love. The experience of the last ten years had burned such innocence out of him.

Women, especially ladies, could be as lustful as any man. Even him. All it needed was a certain sense of trust, and unreserved surrender could come into play.