The Lord's Right (12 page)

Piers lapped his way up her body,
still not allowing those restless legs to find each other and close
him out, but also not allowing himself the luxury of finding his
release within her, despite the impetus of dragging his swollen
cock upwards towards that which it most coveted.

He, too, prided himself on his
control.

He took her mouth with his, still
smelling of her, not allowing her to demure. His hands found her
breasts and worried those nubs till they were sensitive and just
slightly sore, ripe and ready for the affections his mouth was
watering to bestow. Piers wasn’t sure whether she enjoyed her
breasts being fondled almost as much as her little quim, but he
knew he wasn’t going to neglect either part of her.

When he finally descended again, his
fingers lingered at those moist, swollen crests and continued
tugging and twisting them, filing away each moan and coo for future
reference. But when he tried to capture her again in his mouth, she
succeeded in scooting herself away from him, arching her butt into
the furs enough that he couldn’t latch onto her as he had
previously.

He didn’t bother to make a rule,
though, which was what Amber had been expecting. Instead, he
brought his left arm down between her legs. He dipped his index
finger into the font of her juices, christening it for its further
purpose, then brought his bold hand to lie beneath her bottom, in
wait.

When his mouth returned avidly to try
to suckle her engorged button, she made the same move, arching back
into the furs, only fur wasn’t the only thing waiting for her
there, and her gambit had a quite different result from the one she
was intending, he was quite sure, when he heard the squeal she
emitted as his finger ended up, on her own accord, buried within
those two well-roasted bottom cheeks.

Piers let her buck and writhe and try
to dislodge that very well seated finger, but to no avail. It
wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was she.

Amber was beside herself. She’d been
driven there by his hand and various implements in his hand, but
nothing like this had ever happened to her. She could not abide
that his finger was inside her. She had to get rid of
it.

When he tired of her gyrations, Piers
said one word, quietly but firmly. “Enough.” And he expected that
that would be it—enough. No more fighting him. She was to submit.
And he had to give her credit. Her body stopped its overt movements
immediately. But he could still feel her clenching internally, as
if she thought that was going to coax him out of her.

“
If you hadn’t fought and
done everything you could to avoid my mouth, Amber, then you
wouldn’t have backed yourself into the situation you’re in right
now.” He didn’t want to argue with her, and he could feel how tense
she was, and he didn’t want that either.

So he simply placed his mouth where
he’d wanted it to be all along: directly over the most acute point
on her body, smothering it with his lips and his tongue, suckling
and licking and flicking and plucking until he knew she could take
no more.

When he felt the beginnings of her
orgasm, Piers adjusted his position and laid himself on top of her,
finding her entrance easily and claiming her with a move that was
as smooth as he could make it, having occupied her body with
something much more pleasurable when he seated himself within
her.

He knew it still hurt her; he was
sensitive to everything about her and caught that quickly indrawn
breath while she was still riding the wave of her own paradise, but
he hoped that it was much less that it might have been, considering
the multiple distractions he’d provided.

Amber looked up as Piers loomed over
her. He was physically a part of her, and she didn’t like either of
those things. Until he began to move. That great sword of his
seemed to scrape the insides of her in such a way that was almost
as pleasurable as his mouth or his finger on that other spot he
knew about, and, soon, she was near to another one of those strange
culminations he always brought her to.

But she didn’t like it. Oh, she liked
it plenty, but she didn’t like liking it at all.

This time, he was so close that she
couldn’t keep herself from grabbing onto him. She didn’t know if
she was hoping to control him or the rhythm or just anything about
the ride he was taking her on, but at least he provided a solid
point from which she was being catapulted about.

She lost count of the explosions he
put her through before he threw his own head back and roared in a
way she couldn’t and envied. And then he collapsed a top her, lungs
like a bellows in her ear, his bulk forcing her deep into the furs,
but even that wasn’t keeping her from suffocating.

“
My … lord,” she could
barely get out while tapping on his shoulder. “Get …
off!”

Piers was stunned by the violence of
his own release, and didn’t begin to listen until she began
pounding on his shoulders.

Coughing and choking, Amber got up
from the bed and nearly wretched all over one of the newer
carpets.

That was a wonderful way to start a
marriage, Piers thought, whacking his wife on the back to help her
try to regain her breath. Try to kill her by your sheer bulk. That
would be good. He knew better than to do that. He was a big guy,
and she was a little woman. He usually had to make adjustments like
that, simply moving a bit to the side as soon as he was done, so
that she didn’t have to bear his weight when his arms weren’t
supporting him.

But he’d been caught off guard by the
violence of his orgasm. Stunned was the better word.

It didn’t help, though, if he killed
his wife the first night they were married. He’d end up with
Josette, and that thought was no longer appealing.

When she seemed as though she was
going to live, he carefully lifted her off the floor and brought
her back to bed with him, sitting up against the wall and curling
her against his chest, examining her in minute detail to make sure
he hadn’t done any permanent harm.

She was fine, but cantankerous, as
usual, moving his hands and not being particularly cooperative. She
seemed sleepy, and to his surprise, she curled up on his chest like
a kitten and went to sleep.

* * * *

It was hours later when someone—that
he was going to have strung up by their genitals —knocked on the
door. When he found out it was one of the maids, sent by Mrs.
Tulane with a tray of food from the ongoing feast, he retracted his
thought, took the tray, and thanked the wide-eyed girl.

He’d hoped to keep from waking his
wife, considering everything she’d been through today, but that was
too much to ask for, apparently, because when he turned back to
bring the provisions into the room—their room, no longer just
his—she was awake. Still yawning, but sitting in the middle of his
bed and looking at him almost accusatorily.

“
I hurt,” she said
bluntly.

Piers put the tray down on the bed and
proceeded to feed her morsel by morsel, not allowing her to do it
for herself and slapping her hand the one time she tried to grab
some for herself. He liked the idea of feeding her by hand, as if
he was training some wild animal to his hand. “I should think your
bottom would hurt.”

“
I didn’t say it was my
bottom,” she informed him with a deep blush.

“
Oh.” Piers reached over
to the table next to the bed where Mrs. Tulane’s magic potion had
taken up residence. “Perhaps I ought to put some of this on you
now. It couldn’t hurt, I wouldn’t think, and it might
help.”

Amber reached for the vial, but he
held it away from her. Amber was indignant. “I can do
it!”

“
I’ve no doubt you can.
But I will see to things like this for you from now on, Amber.” He
tapped her on the shoulder, and she frowned, but lay back on the
bed. “After all, I am your husband.” He tipped the vial and wet the
tip of his middle finger, then transferred the liquid to that part
of her that was most recently damaged in the course of their
lovemaking. “Did it hurt terribly at the time?”

“
Did what
hurt?”

Piers had to smile. He guessed that
was a good answer, if she didn’t even know that he’d hurt her
during the process at all. He applied the potion liberally,
frowning when he withdrew his finger and found blood on it. He kept
that sight well away from Amber, lest it upset her, somehow. He
knew she was a hunter and all of that, but one could never tell how
a person was going to react to the sight of their own
blood.

They were silent for a few moments,
each eating thoughtfully, until Amber said something Piers never
expected. “I’m sorry you ended up having to marry me rather than
Josette. I know that she was the one you’d asked to marry you back
in France, and she’s got to be unhappy with this turn of
events.”

He was somewhat taken aback. He hadn’t
expected to speak about the subject, much less receive an apology
from his wife about the fact that he’d had no choice but to marry
her. What could he have done? The king had decreed that they would
be married. There wasn’t anything either of them could have done
about it, one way or the other. The only thing they could do was
make the best of it from here on out.

And that’s essentially what he said to
her. He didn’t tell her that he was intrigued by her and half in
love with her already, but then neither did she confess those
things to him about herself.

In fact, he knew that she probably
still considered that she was married to the enemy.

But what he said was, “It’s not
Josette being unhappy that’s the problem. It’s her mother, and
she’ll raise a big stink. Their family’s not that important, but
they could cause trouble for the king if he doesn’t do something to
make it right, especially at this delicate point.”

Amber took the mouthful of cheese he
offered, thinking. “What about Fitz? Wouldn’t being married to the
king’s son, bastard or not, be considered a coup? The king will see
Fitz well titled, won’t he?”

Leave it to his wife to come up with
the perfect solution. Lady Constance could hardly cry fowl about
their arrangement not working out when her daughter was being
offered a much better one. He’d suggest it to the king in the
morning.

In the late, late morning …

It turned out that the king was in
complete agreement with Amber’s idea. Piers did not put it to him
as her idea, of course. He didn’t want to give him a reason to
reject it. When the two had been married for a while, he might
reveal its origins, but not until then.

The Lady Constance was brought to them
in the great hall, and her face was as parched and pinched as Piers
remembered as she sat down opposite them, but it lit up when Fitz’s
newly created title of Duke of Umbridge was mentioned. Piers didn’t
even think that she was dismissed or curtseyed to them before she
turned tail and left to run upstairs to her daughter to share their
turn of good fortune. The entire keep could hear Josette’s squeal
of delight, and all Piers could think was that it was nice that she
wasn’t too terribly heartbroken after losing him.

Luckily, King William had a sense of
humor, and all he did was turn to Piers and laugh about the
vagaries of women, as he was well known to be demonstrably in love
with his wife, Queen Matilda.

But he wasn’t above teasing Piers
about his wedding night. “So, was the English flower worth all your
efforts, Sir Piers?” he asked with a sly smile.

Piers colored. Unlike most men, he
didn’t, as a rule, discuss his women. But this was the king, and
he, not unlike Amber in most situations with him, didn’t have a
choice. He grimaced at the comparison that his mind had just drawn.
“More than worth any effort, my liege.” And he was pleased to
realize that he meant it.

“
Good, good.” The older
man rose and began to walk about the hall a bit. “I should like to
see the site of the new fortress.”

Piers was going to protest, especially
since the workers were still barely laying the foundation and there
was very little to actually look at, to say nothing of the fact
that that area wasn’t the most secure, but the king forestalled
him.

“
I know there’s not much
to see, but it would be a chance to see more of my kingdom. Your
wife hails from that area, doesn’t she?”

“
Yes, Your Majesty. She
does.”

“
Then we should bring her
along. Perhaps she might have a chance to see her family. It might
make a nice wedding present, and it wouldn’t leave you short of
coin.” Having settled on an idea, King William wasn’t a man to
dawdle about it, so it was settled that they would move out as soon
as they could get things arranged.

The lady in question was pacing
upstairs, having been given explicit instructions by her new
husband that she wasn’t to leave their chamber until he returned to
collect her, and he’d gone so far as to lock the door when he’d
left. He’d even given her a mocking smile as he moved a huge
wardrobe in front of the door to the secret staircase that lead
down to her old room, so there was no hope of escape that way,
either.