The Lady's Scandalous Night (2 page)

BOOK: The Lady's Scandalous Night
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“Because he had been ready to die so bravely?”

“Because he had been ready to die,” he concurred somberly.

Now Ru Shan was the rebel and both men were ready to die. The
Xining
had changed her brother. He’d trained as a warrior. He’d become hard and fearless, but in his soul River had known he wasn’t one of them.

“So after all that has happened, you came for him yourself,” she said quietly.

Chen’s eyes glittered, black and cold. “I asked Governor Li to allow me the chance to bring justice to Ru Shan with my own hand. He’s my burden.
My
responsibility.”

River could almost understand Chen’s anger. Her brother had betrayed more than just the warlord. She and Father were forced to go into hiding. Their home was lost and their future upended. Perhaps Chen was right. The last face Ru Shan looked upon should be one he knew and respected. Not the cold, blank stares of assassins or the shame of a public hanging.

The path of her thoughts shocked her. She would never side with her brother’s executioner, but she saw how Chen faced a decision as hard as her own.

“You don’t want to do this,” she said.

“But I must.”

Chen set his cup aside. The rest of the food had gone cold. It seemed neither of them had an appetite.

“Thank you for your hospitality,” he said formally. “It was good to finally meet you, Yao Ru Jiang, despite the circumstances.”

He spoke her name with care, savoring it. He sounded so sincere that her heart ached.

“It was good to meet you as well, Wei Chen,” she replied.

“With your permission, I’ll come by tomorrow to speak with your father.”

He was leaving.

“Wait.” This was the moment. She had to keep him distracted. If he left the house, there was too much risk that he’d discover the escape. Her throat went dry as she tried to speak. “Where are you staying tonight?”

“There must be some place in town.”

“But it’s late and the way back to town is dark and unsafe.” Her heart pounded so loud it would give her away. “You must stay here. In spite of everything, you and Ru Shan were once brothers.”

Chen looked troubled. “I can’t accept—”

“I insist.” She placed her hand at the crook of his arm in what she hoped was a meaningful and enticing gesture—except she was shaking.

He swallowed with some effort. Her face burned hotter with each moment he regarded her. The awkward, awful invitation dangled between them.

“I’m very grateful,” he replied, holding her gaze until she was the first to look away.

Chapter 3

He had to refuse her.

Chen lay in the soft darkness of the chamber, facing the ceiling and looking into nothingness. The bed was heated by coals laid beneath the mattress boards. River had put him in one of the innermost rooms at the far end of the courtyard; the most private and luxurious. Like their dinner together, it was more than he deserved.

It wasn’t possible that she had worn that dress for him. Perhaps the delicate perfume wasn’t meant to lure him, nor the coincidences which had the two of them dining alone. Chen could have been mistaken about her intentions, but if he wasn’t, then he had to refuse her.

There could only be one reason she would come to him tonight, and he didn’t want her that way.

Ru Shan had spoken often to him about growing up in this house with his sister and his father. Chen had asked Ru Shan to tell him about the smallest details. Usually when they were drinking, and Chen could hide his longing behind the wine and the lateness of the hour.

River hadn’t turned him away despite his confession. The family was too humble and too honorable for that. Public before private, the proverb said. Country before family. The family understood that Ru Shan had condemned himself. They must be mourning for Ru Shan the same way Chen mourned. He lay in the quiet house with reminders of his old friend all around him, while regret choked the life from him.

“Defeat me today and I’ll give you my sister in marriage,” Ru Shan had teased once, twirling his sword so it caught the sunlight.

It hadn’t been so long ago, had it?

Between the boasting and the insults, Chen had known what Ru Shan truly wanted. He was proposing that they become brothers in name as well as spirit. He was offering family. Ru Shan owed Chen his life. It was a debt that could never be repaid.

“If she looks like you, it would be a punishment!” Chen had retorted.

Then he had defeated Ru Shan soundly.

That night, Chen had lain awake imagining shining black hair and pale, smooth skin. He’d spoken her name aloud.
River
. The name itself sounded like a dream.
River
.

He no longer had to imagine. He knew her face and how she held herself. He knew how utterly beautiful she was in sadness and he knew he’d never be able to see her happy.

Chen’s eyelids grew heavy a moment before the door creaked open. Languidly, perfunctorily, he stretched toward his sword, but there was no danger there. At least not the kind that a sword could defeat.

A tentative hand covered his. Cool, delicate fingers.

“River,” he said.

She sat on the edge of the bed and freed the pin from her hair in one perfect motion. He lay back and watched it fall, afraid to move. His breath came and went in uneven pants. She was here, in his bed as he hoped and feared. He had to refuse her, but he didn’t want to.

“This—” He swallowed past the dryness in his throat. “This won’t change anything.”

“That’s not why I came.”

She was dressed in her sleeping garment, a pale tunic over loose trousers, as if she’d already retired to bed before rising to come here. A band of moonlight slanted across the lower part of her face, leaving the rest of her in shadow. He followed every line and curve of her in the dark.

“I can’t spare your brother.”

“I don’t want to talk about him anymore,” she whispered. She came closer. “I don’t want to talk about anything.”

They did share one thing. They both loved Ru Shan as a brother and shared the pain of his betrayal. Did she need to close her eyes and forget as much as he did?

Maybe there was no answer to that. River touched her fingers to his wrist and he went hard beyond reason. He raised himself up and her jasmine perfume surrounded him. By the time he curved his hand over the back of her neck, he was blind with desire.

A small gasp escaped her lips before he crushed his mouth to hers. She was soft. She was soft and warm, and he was being too rough, but she tasted so right.

He pulled away, but couldn’t let her go. The pulse in her throat fluttered beneath his fingers. She regarded him with wide, startled eyes, and in them he saw decision. Resolution.

She reached for his tunic. He reached for hers. He tugged at the linen until her arms were free, her breasts bared. He removed the rest of her clothing, but all he could think of was the soft sloping curve of her breasts. The entire time he reminded himself, be gentle. Be gentle. Be gentle.

He stopped her hand when she reached for his trousers. Instead he laid her back against the bed and stretched himself over her, shoulder to hip, legs intertwined. He needed to press himself against as much of her as he could, breasts, thighs. His
yang
member strained against the final cloth barrier between them. His mouth scraped hungrily at the base of her throat. There was nothing gentle about it.

River was panting. Her chest rose and fell beneath him. When her arms found their way hesitantly around his neck, his heart opened and bled. Heavens, she was innocent.

He raised his head to look at her. “You’ve never done this.”

It wasn’t a question. He could tell from the way she trembled when he kissed her.

She trailed her hand down his back. “Show me,” she murmured.

He couldn’t refuse her, or himself. Not when his blood was pumping hot through him, and she was looking as if she could only see him before her and nothing else. Not when he hadn’t felt like this, hadn’t felt anything for too long.

He bent and took her nipple between his lips. River stiffened, her entire body arching up. He should have started slower, as untried as she was. Kissed her mouth, her throat. Whispered how beautiful she was. And River was beautiful. He’d tell her a hundred times.

After.

 

River sobbed with tortured pleasure as Chen’s tongue stroked over her breasts. He circled his arms beneath her to drag her tight to him. She was grateful for his strength. She needed to be held fast or she would come apart.

From the first moment she touched him, she couldn’t hide any longer. She told herself she was deceiving Chen, but she had been deceiving herself as well. Part of her didn’t want to flee and disappear into the far reaches of the empire. Her spirit demanded that she stay and fight her battle here, in this very chamber. She was as rebellious as her brother after all.

Chen’s hair was untied. It fell over his face as he bent over her. She wound nerveless fingers through the black strands. He was licking and, dear heavens, biting. His teeth nibbled fleetingly over a sensitive spot below her nipple, on the curved underside of her breast. Who would ever think of such a thing?

She let her head fall back, eyes closed to let the sensations flow over her. This was duty, she had told herself on the cold walk from her chamber. She needed to distract Chen to save her brother and her father.

But this surge of desire was certainly
not
duty. Not when her body was damp and restless with yearning.

When he pulled away, she tried to kiss him again. Her knowledge was so poor. She wanted to entice him, but what did she know beyond a few kisses, an awkward embrace or so? Chen was a rich expanse of hard muscle and heated skin. She wanted to run her curious hands over all of him, but she was afraid. So she tried to press her lips to his, even though she knew it was clumsy.

He accepted her offering. A low rumble rose from the back of his throat as he took command and showed her how to really kiss. It was an exploration, she learned. A dance. Lips parting, caressing. Different angles. Feeling for pressure and give. And taste. His tongue found hers. He tasted of spice. Cloves and the sweetness of plum wine.

Emboldened, she slid her hand down the sculpted plane of his stomach. But Chen stopped her just as her fingers dipped below the waist of his trousers.

“I don’t understand.” Her voice sounded thick like sugar syrup.

He trapped her wrist and pinned it over her head. She would have protested, but her body wanted him to do to it whatever he willed. And he was kissing her again. An all-consuming kiss.

His next touch was light, against her knee. Her heart pounded. He was still kissing her, but she could no longer concentrate on his mouth. The next touch after that was not as light. On the inside of her knee, parting her legs. She couldn’t breathe. Her skin was flushed and alive.

She whimpered as he found her center, drawing her open with two fingers. One moment a cool rush of air and then heat. He was touching here down
there
. Stroking her first, and then circling. Indescribable pleasure with each small movement. Hard fingers slipping over soft flesh. More pleasure, growing. She bit down hard on her bottom lip.

She had expected to be taken quickly. Perhaps a bit rough—not with any cruelty. Cruelty wasn’t in him, she was certain of that from the first moment they met. Chen’s touch was rough in an unexpected way. He was direct and unrelenting, drawing out the sensations within her without mercy, while she writhed beneath him.

“Later, I’m going to put my mouth there,” he promised.

A shiver ran down her spine. Could she even bear such an act?

His voice was harsh, but his touch went featherlight. Just the tip of his finger now. Quick and subtle. She’d never been so aware of her own body. She wanted to scream and cry.

Her muscles clenched suddenly. She struggled against the hand that pinned her wrist and against the weight of him draped over her. But it wasn’t a struggle for escape. Her pleasure sharpened to a single point.

She did scream. She suffered a moment of bliss and anguish, and there was nothing to do but cry out.

“Shhh….”

She became conscious of the frantic beating of her heart. Still fast, gradually slowing. She was breathing in gasps. Chen was breathing hard too, though they had barely moved for the last of it. His face was above her. His eyes glowed.

There was a hint of low laughter in his voice as he hushed her. “The servants will hear you.”

Her first coherent thought in a long time was that he didn’t need to worry. No one would hear them.

His smile faded until only the glint in his eyes remained. Rising up, he removed his trousers and stood naked beside the bed. She tried to take in every detail at once. Bronze skin, broad shoulders, narrow hips. And between his hips…She wasn’t too sated to blush.

He climbed over her, his muscles flexing as he positioned himself. Once again he parted her thighs. She opened willingly, knees lifting to accept him.

Her breath caught as the smooth tip of him rested against her. He paused at the sound of her gasp. A tiny barrier of doubt returned. They had become suddenly familiar with each other’s bodies, but they were still strangers. She explored him in the darkness, her hands running over his shoulders and down the muscles of his back.

This was what had remained unspoken between them throughout the night. She would have never dared to sacrifice herself, even for the sake of her brother, if it hadn’t been Wei Chen who had arrived at their shop.

Chen must have seen the question in her eyes, because he kissed her again, giving her precious moments for her body to relax, before taking hold of her hips and easing his hard length slowly into her.

 

Heat. Slick, encompassing heat and nothing else.

Gradually he became aware of River clutching his shoulders and the rhythmic pant of her breath as he thrust steadily into her. He groaned her name, watched her eyes close and her lips part.

His release was going to come too soon, but he wanted this to last.

The pleasure rose and took him over until he could think of nothing but thrusting deeper into River’s welcoming body. He tangled a hand into her hair. Her legs curved and locked about his hips. They became nothing but shapes and sensation in the darkness.

River. His River. The reason why he’d come all this way. One final, fierce thrust and he spent himself into her.

Afterward, they lay together unmoving, skin flushed and damp with sweat.

“I dreamed of this,” he murmured, letting his head sink onto the curve of her shoulder. “I dreamed of you.”

BOOK: The Lady's Scandalous Night
8.83Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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