The Stolen Princess (32 page)

And then she knew. He was making up for last time.

“You could ride me,” he told her, his voice harsh with need. “It gives you the control.”

“Ride you?” She was intrigued. She straddled his body and then, a little awkwardly, positioned herself over him and guided him into her. She felt the smooth, hot length of him pushing into her and stopped. He groaned and gritted his teeth, but didn't move. She moved again, lowering herself until he was fully within her. It felt amazing. She leaned forward with her hands on the bed on either side of him, and moved experimentally. He moaned and thrust upward and sensation spiraled though her. She moved with him, flexing her inner muscles, feeling the whole length of him.

She moved again and he thrust and then, suddenly—there was no other word for it, she started to ride him—she, who'd never ridden any animal in her life—rode her husband, rode him as he thrust and bucked beneath her, moving within her. His palms caressed her breasts as she moved, faster and faster, with small, high cries of exhilaration.

And at the last minute he slipped his hand to where they were joined and caressed her and suddenly she was flying, flying and shattering into a thousand pieces around him. With a thin, high cry she collapsed onto his heaving chest, oblivious of anything.

Gabe held her against him, gasping for breath, unwilling to let her go, barely able to think past the thought that he'd just made her his wife in fact as well as in law. His arms tightened around her and he kissed the top of her head where she lay sprawled and sated on top of him. He pulled the covers over them so she wouldn't get cold.

He'd claimed her: now all he had to do was keep her.

G
abe woke some hours later to the sound of water dripping, slow and relentless. The rain had stopped. But that wasn't what had wakened him. He listened. It was some time in the still hours before dawn, when London was almost quiet. All he could hear was the last of the rainwater dripping steadily.

He reached out for her, but she wasn't there. He sat up and saw her, curled in the window embrasure, wrapped in her red shawl, her knees tucked up under her chin, staring out into the gray, miserable night.

He knew that look, the look of someone on the outside, looking in. Or in this case looking out, wanting something she didn't have, something out there. Yearning for it. Not wanting what she had: him.

Gabe felt suddenly cold. She had to love him, she had to. He would make her, force her to love him.

As if love could ever be forced, he thought desperately. But what else could he do? He had to try.

She'd liked what they'd done in bed, he was sure of that, he would bed her and bed her and love her until she cared.

She hadn't wanted to marry him. He'd had to work hard to convince her. And now it was their first night together and she was already regretting it?

He thought—hoped—he'd recovered from the disaster of his loss of control. Obviously not.

Unless it was not the bedding at all. He was sure she'd felt at least some of what he had that second time. If he knew anything about women he knew when he'd satisfied them and when he hadn't. He would have bet his life that this time he'd made it good for her. It had been more than good for him.

But she'd already left him, left his bed. She was sitting there, alone in the cold, hunched into a ball of misery, looking out into the chill of the night as if there was something out there she wanted, and wanted more than anything she had in here.

A cold stone lodged in his chest. All he brought to this marriage was the ability to protect her son: such a slender thread to catch her with. He'd hoped, he'd banked on his bedroom skills to hold her, as least for long enough to try and make her love him.

He wasn't going to lose her. He had to make her love him.

As easily cage the moon as make someone love you.

But he could perhaps reach her another way. Maybe she was worrying about her son. She was a wonderful mother. If she was given a choice between her son and her husband, Gabe knew what she'd choose: her son, the opposite of what his own mother had chosen.

Gabriel, always the loser to love.

But he was also a fighter and he wasn't going to give up. This small, beautiful, scrunched-up piece of misery at the window held his heart in her hands, whether she knew it or not, and he wasn't going to let her give it back.

He slid out of bed and came up behind her. The look on her face wrung his heart. “What is it?” he asked.

She gave him a bleak look. “We shouldn't have done that.”

“Why not?” The words came out roughly.

The question hung in the air. Her mouth trembled, but she just shook her head.

“We can try again,” he said urgently. “If it wasn't any good—”

“It was wonderful,” she said in such a small, sad voice it took him a moment to register what he'd said.

“Then—?”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

He stared at her, frustrated. If he didn't know what it was, he couldn't fix it. She was cold. He fetched an eider-down and tucked it around her, hesitated, and then gathered her against him. She made no objection, thank God, because he didn't know if he could let her go.

He held her in his arms, tucked against his chest, warming her with his body, supporting her. She stared out of the window, and a tear rolled slowly down her cheek.

Gabe felt desperate. How could he make her trust him enough to talk to him? “Whatever it is, I will make it right. Just say…” There was nothing he wouldn't do for her.

She shook her head. The tears came again, rolling silently down her cheeks.

“Was it something I did? Or didn't do?”

Her face crumpled. “No,” she said brokenly and turned to him in distress. She hugged him convulsively. “It's not your fault at all. What you did—what we did together was utterly…I've never…It was just…perfect.”

Her eyes filled with tears and she dashed them away. “I'm sorry; I don't know what the matter is with me. I felt—I feel wonderful and cherished, I really do.”

She felt wonderful and cherished, Gabe thought bleakly. That's why she looked so miserable.

What was a man supposed to do with that?

How could he teach her to want him the way he wanted her?

“Come back to bed and let me cherish you some more,” he said hoarsely. He had no idea what to do, other than to love her. All he could think of was that he needed to wipe that desolate look off her face. If he could make her body sing with passion, and keep it singing, then maybe…

He kissed her, and she kissed him back. It was a start, he told himself. She kissed as if she meant it.

He carried her back to bed and made love to her for the third time, very slowly and thoroughly, cherishing her with every fiber of his body and soul. She returned kiss for kiss, and caress for tender caress with a kind of desperate earnestness that almost broke his heart.

She was trying too hard. He knew what that meant.

Their eyes locked as he brought her to a slow, intense climax, the pressure building relentlessly until she thrashed and shuddered and collapsed bonelessly against him as he shattered also and drowned in her eyes.

She fell asleep with her cheek against the bare skin of his chest, cradled against his heart. He held her to him, unwilling to let her go, even for a moment.

He was going to lose her. He could see it in her eyes.

Oh God, what was he going to do?

G
abe awoke much later to find the day well advanced.

It was still wet and gray and chilly.

She slept curled like a cat against him, her lashes long and dark and silky against her satin-pale skin. He watched her sleeping, her mouth fallen a little open, her breathing deep and regular.

He leaned over and kissed her lightly, and though she stirred a little she didn't wake. He nuzzled the hollow between her jaw and her shoulder and inhaled deeply. If he lived to be a hundred, he'd never forget the scent of her.

He slipped out of bed and, naked, padded across the thick carpets to the fire, which was almost out. He fed it with chips of wood and then coal until it was blazing again.

He turned to return to bed and found her sitting up on one elbow, watching him. He crossed the room, feeling a little self-conscious with her eyes on him. She inspected him with frank interest, a small smile—he hoped of appreciation—playing about her lips.

He slipped back into bed with her and kissed her.

“Good morning,” she murmured and reached for him again. Her palm curled possessively around his hardened flesh, and the most adorable mouth in the world curved as she registered the evidence of his desire.

“Good morning indeed,” he murmured, feeling a surge of new hope. “And it's about to get even better…”

A
fterward he rang the bell and ordered hot water for himself and her, which she amended to a bath. He ordered breakfast to follow.

Then, with a self-consciousness that amused him, she excused herself to take her bath in her dressing room and sent him off to his, to dress and shave.

For a moment, Gabe considered the possibility of assisting her with her bath, but decided against it. Despite her years of marriage, she wasn't used to sensual delights, and he didn't want to throw his entire battery at her at once. It was going to be a long, slow siege. He could wait another day, he thought. Perhaps tomorrow.

Callie sat in the bath, soaping herself and thinking about the extraordinary few moments of utter despair she'd experienced in the middle of the night. Strange that it had occurred just hours after she'd experienced the most intense moment of bliss in her life.

Not really strange, she realized. The bliss had caused the despair. Last night in Gabriel's arms, he'd shown her what she'd missed all her married life, and worse—showed her what she could have if this wretched marriage was real instead of merely legal.

She hadn't been able to talk to him about it then—not when she was feeling so raw and vulnerable. All her defenses…he'd destroyed them making love to her as he had. She hadn't known it was possible to feel like that.

She wanted her marriage to be real, wanted to have this man for herself and love him with everything she had in her.

He was everything she'd ever dreamed of: kind and strong and loving, a man to be cherished and loved, not used and discarded. She wanted him forever, not just for a day or a week or a month.

But no matter how she looked at it, she couldn't see how it could work. A marriage was more than just feelings, it was a living, day-to-day partnership. His life was here. Hers, eventually, as soon as Count Anton was dealt with, had to be back in Zindaria.

Zindaria was Nicky's future, his heritage. What sort of a mother would she be if she traded her son's glorious future for her own selfish happiness?

Gabriel's whole family was in England: his brothers, his aunt, the many others who'd come to the wedding. His friends were here, too, and they were close, more so than many brothers.

Callie knew the importance of friends and family, she who had so few of either. She had a few distant cousins she'd never met scattered across Europe, and almost no friends in Zindaria. A princess lived a very isolated life. How could she ask him to exchange his full, exciting life for her lonely, routine existence in a foreign land.

He had family, friends, a home, land, and responsibilities. He belonged. What man would give all that up for her?

None. So she should face that and move on from there.

She scrubbed at her skin briskly and tried to count her blessings. She'd made Nicky a little bit safer by her marriage. And she had a wonderful husband, albeit for a limited time. She could mope around feeling sorry for herself, waiting for the day he would walk away, or she could make the most of what she had now. Seize the joy while it was hers to enjoy.

She soaped herself meditatively, aware of her body in a new way, soaping her breasts with their tender, aching tips, and recalling the way he'd suckled on them, lavishing her with pleasure. And the pleasurable soreness between her thighs, aching in places she'd never known could ache.

The last time she'd felt like this about her body was when she'd been carrying Nicky. She remembered being fascinated with its female power and its mystery—this seemingly ordinary body of hers that was actually creating a baby, a living miracle.

Last night her body had amazed her again. She'd never imagined the pleasure it was capable of feeling—that she could shatter in a thousand shards of ecstasy and afterward feel like she was floating in a bubble.

And she'd never in her life imagined it could bring a strong, disciplined man like Gabriel Renfrew to his knees with uncontrollable lust. And it had. Three times in the night. Four, if you counted this morning. She smiled to herself. Again.