Warrior of the Nile (The Gods of Egypt) (16 page)

She grabbed at his hand. “Don’t stop.”

Khenet laughed softly. “My caresses pleased you?”

Tiya nodded shyly.

He picked the soap up again. “Let’s finish the bath first.”

“You intend to leave me aching?” She pouted.

“Not for too long, I promise. Aren’t you enjoying the bath?”

“I want to bathe you.” Pulling free of his grip, Tiya pushed him into the water with a mischievous laugh.

Chapter Ten

She perched on the ledge for a moment, grinning to herself. Surfacing with a huge splash, Khenet slid onto it next to her. Her whole body warm and liquid with pleasure, Tiya watched him move, the water cascading from his skin. She poured soap into her hands, raking her gaze over his hard-muscled body as she decided what to wash first. “You never let me touch you. Sometimes I thought you disliked being touched.”

“Your touch, your mere presence, stirs my body in ways hard to conceal. Many a time on this journey you’ve severely tried my willpower.” He laughed.

She lingered over his chest, circling the brown nipples with one finger, then running her hand languorously down his flat, hard-muscled abdomen to his belly button. “You have so many scars.” Lightly, she traced the longest one, across his rib cage.

“A Hyksos sword, in the battle for Thebes.”

Poor Khenet
. Her vision grew luminous with unshed tears. “So much pain and suffering.”

Catching her hand for a moment, he kissed the inside of her wrist. “I’m a warrior. Wounds come with the territory.”

“My warrior,” she answered with satisfaction, winding her arms around his neck and sitting on his lap, which put his hard manhood in close proximity to where she ached for it to be. “But
I’ll
never hurt you.”

“What happened to my bath?” he teased, lifting her away.

She soaped her hands again and began with his feet, washing his body as carefully as he had tended hers. She took his feet into her lap and massaged each toe with the soap, then rubbed the callused soles of his feet and worked her way up his calves to his corded thighs. She ran her hands over the tight curves of his buttocks and upper thighs before transitioning to wash his back and shoulders.

“You’re a shameless tease.” Khenet launched himself off the ledge and tugged her under the water with him for a breath. She laughed in delight as she surfaced again, water streaming from her body.

Khenet smoothed her hair back, his eyes hot. “Now wash the places you have missed.” He sprawled over the ledge, spread his legs suggestively, and watched her.

Coy, she ran her soapy hands over his flat, hard abdomen, circling his navel with one finger as he shifted on the ledge a little.
My warrior is a bit ticklish
,
it seems.
She stroked the sensitive skin between his legs, massaging his balls for a long moment, rolling them in her hands, then finally running her palms over his straining manhood. “I watched you from the deck of the
River Horse
, you know,” she murmured, “when you were with the sailors, digging the boat out of the sandbar.” Tiya slid her hand firmly from the base to the tip of his shaft, swirling her finger over the plum-shaped head. “I was embarrassed, but I could hardly stop myself.”

“I knew. I felt your gaze.” Gently capturing her hands, Khenet playfully dunked them both in the deep end of the water again.

When they emerged, sputtering and laughing, he washed her hair. “Your hair is so soft. It shimmers in the light.” He combed out the snarls patiently with his fingers, massaging her scalp.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been so relaxed.” Tiya tilted into his touch.

He stood with a great gush of water, sweeping her into his arms. “An excellent sign that we’re ready for the next step.” Khenet carried her out of the pool, his shaft nudging insistently against her hip with each step.

He swathed her in one of the generous towels, drying her body inch by inch, massaging slowly to remove all the water, then he carried her to the bed. She watched as he toweled himself off and moved to lie next to her. She was nervous and eager and excited all at once, butterflies dancing in her stomach. He rested one huge hand on her stomach for a moment, and she reveled in the erotic contrast of his hard, tanned skin against her pale, soft body. Kneading her breast, gently teasing the rosy nipple erect, Khenet lowered his head to lave the hard bud with his tongue. As he began suckling, she knotted her hands in his hair and squirmed with the unfamiliar, but still delectable, sensation of a man’s lips on her body.

“I love you, you know,” he said a moment later, raising his head to look deeply into her eyes.

Everything inside her went still. She closed her eyes to savor the beautiful words, the fact that he’d declared his love. Drawing in a long breath, happiness made her cheeks warm and her pulse race.

“When?” She rolled onto her side to face him. “When did you fall in love with me?”

He pulled her close to him, so his cock was pressed into her belly. “I think when I first beheld you in Nephthys’s temple, back in Thebes. You were trying so hard to be brave. I admired your strength, especially after I knew Nephthys had told you the details of the task. Many noblewomen would have wept themselves sick in such a situation—well, like your cousin—but you’ve been so strong, throughout.” He trailed his hand over her body, lightly skimming the curve of her hip. “I fought the emotion for days on the ship.”

“I tried to suppress my feelings as well,” she admitted. “You obviously hated being assigned to take care of me—”

“No, I never—”

“You did—admit it.” Tiya tapped him lightly on the nose. “But you took such sweet care of me in spite of your discomfort, when I had the headache on the first day. No one ever cosseted me as thoroughly or as kindly. The more time we spent together, the more I loved you.” She rested her hand on his heart. “
You
. The man you keep hidden under a most impressive warrior’s exterior.” She lowered her eyes, shaking her head slightly, sadness sweeping through her like a cold chill as she remembered yet again what was waiting for them in the Viper Nome. “But you’ll die because of me if Nephthys has her way. What kind of woman takes her beloved to his death?”

He shushed her gently, finger on her lips. “We’re not going to think of those subjects right now. The magic in these temple walls holds our fate at bay. Here, there’s just you and me.” He leaned forward and kissed her, his tongue sliding between her parted lips to explore the depths of her warm mouth. He met her eager tongue while his hands stroked her body, finding their way eventually to the V between her legs.

Gently, he rolled her onto her back again, spread her legs, and slid his fingers into her, rubbing and massaging. The sensations were even better than they had been in the pool. He lowered himself on the bed and applied his clever tongue to her sex, keeping his fingers where they were and adding the stimulus of warm massage to her sensitive bud.

He set a hard rhythm, penetrating and withdrawing, then pushing again, not giving her a chance to stop herself from experiencing the climax he was working to give her. Moaning, Tiya rolled her hips against the silky sheets. She clenched the fabric with one hand and pressed the other to his head, bringing him tightly to her body as she stiffened and cried out in sheer, mindless pleasure.

Khenet waited a moment, then lay full length against her trembling body, nudging at her folds with his shaft. Keeping much of his weight on his elbows, he flexed his hips and pushed himself inside her the first few inches. She felt her channel sheath him and he stopped, holding himself motionless.

“What is it—what’s wrong?” she whispered, anxiety nibbling at her that she wasn’t pleasing him.

He dropped a kiss on her lips. “Nothing is wrong. Lying with you takes away all my willpower, makes me feel like a raw boy who can think only of his own pleasure. Tonight is for you, all about your enjoyment. I—I need a moment to regain control, avoid spilling my seed too soon.” Nuzzling her breasts, he slowly moved his hips to seat his cock more fully inside her. “You’re so hot, so tight, beloved. I’ve dreamt about being with you but the reality is beyond words. It’s like the gods made you for me.” He withdrew and then plunged deep into her, her juices making his passage easier.

Ripples of unfamiliar but delicious sensation tingled through Tiya. Tentatively she moved, matching his passion. Her hands stroked the sensitive sides of his body, reached between them to touch his shaft where they were joined.

“Put your legs around me,” he gritted out.

She complied at once, locking her ankles behind his back, the additional pressure on his cock apparently goading him with sensation impossible to resist. He pounded into her. Maybe he had tried to hold himself somewhat in check before, but now restraint was clearly beyond him. Striving to match his pace, Tiya experienced another climax that had her crying out in pleasure, locked against him, her channel milking his cock. Khenet’s hips rocked, driving himself deep into her, releasing his seed in a hot gush. He stayed in her embrace for a long moment while waves of another climax overtook her, clenching her sheath around him, Tiya clamping down on his shoulder with her teeth.

When she had gone limp, he rolled them over, so she lay on top of him, spent and exhausted. Raising one hand, he swept her hair out of her face. He kissed her softly on the lips. “Are you all right? I wasn’t gentle enough for your first time.”

She opened her eyes to stare directly into his, reaching to smooth away the frown. “I love you.”

He kissed her hand.

“I’m sorry I bit you.” She caressed the bite mark with her fingers and frowned. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“Me, that’s what.” His tone was satisfied and proud.

She stroked her hand over his broad chest and kissed him. “Who hurt you?”

He scratched the white, hard scar lazily. “I told you, a Hyksos sword—”

“No. I mean who hurt you here, in your heart?” She laid her hand where she could feel the powerful, steady beat inside his chest. Tiya raised her head, studying him. “Someone must have hurt you badly. You’re so negative toward women of my station.”

“Not to you. Never to you.” He pulled her into a lasting kiss.

“You haven’t answered my question,” she reminded him when they moved apart.

“Why do you want to know?” He reclined against the many pillows heaped at the head of the bed.

“Because I want to know all there is to know about you,” she said. “Because I want to soothe the hurt, make it better.”

“Sweetheart, you’ve already done that.” He settled her comfortably on his shoulder, keeping her warm and close. “It’s a common enough story.”

Tiya regarded him expectantly.

He exhaled. “There was a noble girl in the nome where I grew up. Shemera. I believed she loved me. I was such a naïve young fool in those days. She saw me as a way to join the royal family. To my face she was honey, and behind my back she told jokes at my expense and took other lovers.”

“How did you learn the truth?”

Lying back, he stared at the canopy overhead. “Ashayet told me.”

Tiya was astonished, her mouth forming a perfect O. “The Queen?”

He laughed. “She wasn’t queen then, just younger sister to Tenuheten the Heir. A pest to me and Nat, for all that he later fell in love with her. And, as Asha had told her entire family by the time she revealed the truth to me, Shemera knew her game was over. She admitted she was only using me, that I meant nothing to her. Then she married one of her other lovers and left the province. I never encountered her again. Nor wanted to.”

That she-dog slut.
Tiya frowned. Her fist clenched on his chest. “I hope she’s a toothless old crone with twenty children. I hope Ammit the Destroyer eats her heart.”

“So fierce! I have a brave defender in you, beloved.” Anxiously, Khenet met her gaze. “Truly, I don’t think of her.”

Settling against his shoulder again, Tiya circled his navel with the tip of one finger. “But you never trusted another woman to get close to you.”

“Not until I met you.”

She sat bolt upright, wringing her hands, her voice hoarse as she wailed, “And I may be the cause of your death, which makes me as bad as Shemera. No, worse.”

“I won’t listen to you compare yourself to her. You’re as far above her as the sun is above the Nile riverbed.” His brown eyes were steady, focused on her with an intensity beyond anything she’d ever seen before. “I was prepared to live without the blessing of true love. Such happiness wasn’t destined for me. I watched Nat—Pharaoh—with his bride, and I was so jealous of what they shared. Now I’ve found you. You are the woman I want to marry, to have children with. To enjoy grandchildren and grow old together. I want so much with you, beloved, but if all I can have is this one night, let us make it equal to an entire lifetime of loving.”

She closed her eyes and tears fell.
Beautiful words
,
exactly what I want as well
,
but close to impossible for us.
Keeping her eyes shut, she whispered, “How can I love you as I do and let you go to your death?”

He wiped the tears away with his thumbs and kissed her tenderly on the lips before gathering her close to his chest. “We’ll find a way to circumvent our fate, to be together. In Pharaoh’s Own Regiment we believe we’ll prevail, no matter what the odds or the obstacles. Believe in me.”

“Nephthys is surely going to punish us tomorrow when we step back into her grasp,” Tiya murmured, her heart skipping several beats at the thought.

“I don’t care. At least we’ll have had this one night together—at least we have a chance to make a plan.” Khenet tugged her closer, settled her in the curve of his body, her head resting on his shoulder. He sighed. “I never knew such contentment as I feel now, being here with you.”

* * *

Much later, they lay on the bed, dining lazily on the choicest tidbits from the banquet provided for them. Khenet took a drink of wine from a golden goblet inscribed with the upraised cartouche of the goddess Amanuet before putting the cup decisively on the bedside table. “So. What do you know of Nephthys’s plans for us once we reach the nome?”

Tiya swallowed a morsel. “I’d rather forget harsh reality tonight.”

“As would I.” Leaning over, Khenet kissed her nose. “But we only have until dawn and, I guarantee you, Nephthys will give us no other chance to be alone once she reacquires us outside this temple. So, what do you know?”

“Before we get to that, don’t you want to know where I went in Zauimu? What Isis said?”