Damn. She didn’t want him looking at her. She didn’t want to tempt him with what she had decided he couldn’t have. He would have to go to his next plan of seduction, and in his present desperation he couldn’t even remember his next plan.
Then the weight of her nightgown fell onto his wrists.
He didn’t understand.
She removed her hand and he, like a fool, looked down at his hands. They clutched the nightgown. The whole nightgown. She stood over him... and she was nude.
He dropped the nightgown as if it burned him.
She stepped back. Stepped out of it.
Did she mean for him to look at her? Because he couldn’t help it. For the rest of his life, she was all he ever wanted to look at—the long flanks, the gently curved hips, and the fine curly down of fiery red hair between her legs, the tiny waist, the breasts, so perfect, so round, her arms, strong and muscled from gardening and riding, her face... he loved her face. She smiled at him uncertainly, as if she didn’t know whether he would enjoy the view. And he needed to reassure her, but his breath was caught somewhere in the vicinity of his chest and he couldn’t find his voice.
So he extended a tentative hand, a gesture designed not to frighten her, and lightly stroked the outer curve of her hip.
She sighed, a sigh of simple pleasure.
That was all the encouragement he needed. He ceased vacillating. He rose, slipped his arm around her waist, and kissed her again.
He’d kissed other women, but now he wondered why. With Sorcha in the world, why had he bothered with other women at all?
She broke the kiss, buried her nose in his throat, and took a long breath. “I love the way you smell. I love the way you kiss... If we could do nothing but kiss, I’d be satisfied.”
He winced.
Against his skin, he felt her grin. “For now. I would be satisfied for now. Because it doesn’t seem to matter how close I stand to you, I want to stand closer. I want to be closer. I want to be part of you, and I don’t know how.” Lifting her head, she gazed at him, her blue eyes wide, her black lashes fluttering. “Can you show me how?”
Lifting her in his arms, he placed her on the bed on the clean white goose-down coverlet. She sank into it as if she relished the simple pleasure of its embrace. The scent of flowers rose around them. Totally without consciousness, without fear, she smiled at him.
That smile held such sweet and wanton seductiveness. She’d lived among nuns. She’d been with the prostitutes for less than two hours. Where had she learned such a primal feminine gesture of enticement?
And how could he resist?
As she moved her legs, lifting her knee, wiggling her toes, he caught glimpses of the softest part of her and realized—he couldn’t wait.
He needed to take off his clothes. He needed to be as bare and free as she was.
He stripped off his shirt.
She gasped and sat up straight. “Arnou, what happened to your back?”
Damn. He hadn’t meant for her to see the stripes that crisscrossed his flesh. “The sea is a rough master.” Not a lie, but not pertaining to him, either.
“Come here.” She made him sit with his back to her and with light fingers she traced the stripes Count duBelle had placed on him. “This is cruel.” She kissed the ridges where white scars met pink skin. “This is wrong.”
“There’s no pain now.” Turning, he took her hands. “It was over long ago. I barely remember it.” Amazingly enough, he meant it. Right now he could think about one thing, and one thing only—and it wasn’t his back.
She smiled. What a smile she had! Saucy, sexy, taunting, knowledgeable. She managed to look like a woman who knew how to give a man pleasure.
And damned if he didn’t believe her.
She stretched her arms over her head.
He removed his shoes and his hose.
She pushed her fingers through her hair, collecting two satin strands, then carefully arranged them to cover her breasts.
His face felt as if were set in stone.
It must have looked that way, too, for teasingly she glanced at him, then glanced again with widened eyes. “You look like my sternest tutor when I played instead of learning my algebra.”
Leaning over her, Rainger placed his fists on either side of her shoulders. “Did he spank you for teasing?”
“No.” Her lips were wide and moist and pink. “Are you going to play a game with me?”
“What kind of game?”
“The kind of game Madame Pinchon’s ladies said men like to play. Are you going to pretend to be my tutor and spank me?”
Damn her. Her words brought up the image of her pale body stretched across his lap. His hand would swat her once, but only once, and then the real punishment would begin. He’d sit her up facing away from him and plunge inside her. He’d make her ride him until—
She brought him back to the present with her palm kneading the bulge of his bicep. “I can be very, very bad. So are you going to spank me?”
The surge of blood to his groin almost drove him forward.
He fought the impulse to hold her down and take her. Sweat broke out on his forehead. Because he would not take her in a rush. He had her trapped in marriage. Next he must snare her with passion, so that when she discovered the truth, she’d be so head-over-heels in love with him, she’d support him and his goal to regain his kingdom.
Slowly, barely, he conquered the desperation.
Picking the strands of hair off her breasts, he said, “No. I’m going to do this.” Placing his lips on her nipple, he sucked strongly, bringing it into his mouth and working it with his tongue.
She gasped. Her hands went to his bare shoulders, and her fingernails dug into the skin.
He exulted in the small pain, knowing it was a sign she had lost herself in passion.
He lightly scraped her with his teeth, then blew on the moisture his mouth had left. Goose bumps covered her skin. Her chest flushed. Her nipple tightened to the size of a berry.
She responded to him so readily, he was both flattered and touched. And it was because she trusted him. She’d said so time and again. She trusted Arnou and, unknowingly, she trusted Rainger. That was all to the good, for Rainger intended to take very good care of her.
He suckled on her other nipple and at the same time his hand descended to rest between her legs. He pressed his palm against her in a slow rhythm that built and built until she writhed and gasped and tried to escape.
He didn’t let her. She needed to learn the desperation of unfulfilled passion. That would bring her to his arms again and again. And perhaps he enjoyed tormenting her as he was tormented, with desire so fierce it burned out of control.
But she knew how to torment a man, too. She wrapped her arm around his lower back and caressed his spine, worked down to the edge of his breeches, and slid below. She cupped his buttocks, squeezed them in a slow rhythm that made him pump his hips. With her other hand, she explored his belly, counting his ribs with her fingers and circling his navel before plunging inside.
Everything she did imitated intercourse.
How did she know... ? But of course. The ladies of the night had told her. But how did she know exactly how to drive a man wild? She was a princess, a convent-bred princess, yet she showed not a shred of self-consciousness as she unbuttoned his breeches and freed his cock from its onerous confinement. She didn’t look at it. In fact, she closed her eyes. But only, apparently, to better explore its shape and silkiness. She seemed fascinated with the head. She circled it and traced the teardrop-shaped slit. Finally she wet her fingers and ran them up and down his length.
He wanted to flop on his back and let her service him until he expired from bliss. And when she cupped the sack of his balls, investigated the shape and texture, he found himself on his feet and yanking off his breeches.
They were in the way. They had to be removed.
At last he stretched out beside her. He held her gaze as, time and again, he inserted
two fingers inside her. He stretched her until she whimpered in distress, then immediately he erased her memory of the pain with his mouth on her mouth, or on her breast, or between her legs. He made her suffer; he made her come. She accepted his caresses with transparent joy. It was a cycle he taught her, all in preparation for the moment when he possessed her.
When at last he slid inside her, the candles were in their last moments. Their flickering light showed him her exhausted, satisfied face against the pillow. He watched her as he pressed inside, as her face slowly came back to life... as the pain took her... as he swept it away... and when he led her again to climax, then thrust deep and filled her with his seed, he saw her shock as she realized—he had made her his own.
Then the candles guttered out, leaving them in darkness.
Arnou.
Sorcha couldn’t believe how much she trusted him.
Arnou.
She didn’t understand how a man of his background could be so skilled in the fine art of making love.
Arnou.
He was a Shakespearean sonnet, the very essence of love. He was a fine cognac sipped in a tall easy chair before a warm fire. He was a mighty peak swathed in the first blush of spring green, an airy cake bathed in creamy custard, a perfume created just for her.
Had she believed she had to seek her destiny? What a fool she’d been! Her destiny had found her. He was her destiny.
In his arms, she rediscovered the warmth, the safety, and the magic of the stone circle. The promise of enchantment that had started there had culminated in this—their union.
She was a woman in love.
And she owed Arnou... everything.
“Darling?” She placed her head on his bare chest. She listened to the steady beat of his heart. She caressed his hip.
He wrapped her in his arms. “Yes?”
“You are a prince.”
He stiffened.
“What do you mean?” He clipped his words in an almost intimidating manner.
But of course he would. He probably worried she was making fun of him.
“I mean, you’re a prince in my heart. My prince.” Taking a deep breath, she made her objective clear. “I intend to make this a real marriage. I’m not going to lie to Grandmamma about what we did tonight. I’m going to tell her the truth. I’m going to make you my consort.”
“Your consort?”
“Yes.” Perhaps he didn’t understand the term. “A consort is the husband of the queen, the man who stands behind her when she rules, who escorts her and is the father of her children.”
His chest expanded in a deep breath.
“Would you like to be the father of my children?”
“I would like nothing more.”
“So I will make you my consort. But do you understand what it means? Do you comprehend my deeper meaning?”
“You love me.” He relaxed beneath her.
“Yes. I love you. You’re my husband in every way possible.”
“Good. Good.”
The flat satisfaction in his voice surprised her. It was almost as if he expected to hear her declare her adoration, as if some great plan of his had borne fruit.
Then he sat up, tumbled her on her back, leaned over her, and made her forget everything but this marvelous passion between them.
When Rainger finished making love to Sorcha for the second time, she slid immediately into slumber.
He slipped a pillow under her head and gazed at her face in the fading firelight. The coals cast a rosy tint over her sleeping features. Unable to resist, he traced the curve of her cheek, the jut of her chin. He layered a kiss, a single light, sweet kiss on her lips.
She smiled in her sleep.
The cross around her neck glinted blue in the darkness.
She said she would face up to her grandmother to make him her consort.
How much more simple for her when she discovered she loved not Arnou, a one-eyed, unsophisticated sailor from Normandy, but Rainger, her prince and her betrothed.
Seducing her, making her love him—it had been so easy. Of course, he had hoped Sorcha would declare her love for Arnou, but he hadn’t really expected it. Life had taught him to expect a thorny road.
Now he knew—she could be controlled with passion. He could get what he wanted through the skillful application of sex. For the future, this was a lesson he needed to remember.
Well. He shoved that damned rag off his face. He rubbed his eye, the eye he was so tired of pretending was gone.
Think of how thrilled Sorcha would be when she woke to discover it wasn’t Arnou she would have to take to her grandmother, but her long-lost fiancé, Rainger.
He couldn’t wait to hear her words of joy.
Chapter 19
Sunlight seeped through the windows and into the bridal chamber. Birds perched on the windowsill and cheeped softly. Sorcha shouldn’t have been awake; she’d been busy far into the night. But pure joy brought her to consciousness, and she lay with her eyes closed, savoring this blissful shining moment.
She loved Arnou.
Last night she had declared her intention to make him her consort, and the light of day had only strengthened her determination. She hoped her decision didn’t cause Grandmamma to collapse and die, although that seemed unlikely. Grandmamma was made of stern stuff, and she’d consider such a death a major defeat. Sorcha could almost guarantee that Grandmamma would stay alive to plague her and nag Arnou.
Poor man. He’d have to learn to act like a prince. But he already had the traits she required: generosity, kindness, and, most of all, honesty.
She opened her eyes. Stretching, she worked the aches from her body. She could wait no longer to gaze on the face of her beloved.
He lay quietly. He must be still asleep.
Gingerly she rolled to face him.
The rag that had covered his eye the whole time she’d known him had disappeared.
Seeing his whole face made him look... different. In fact—she propped herself up on her elbow and stared down at him—his eye looked fine. Not scarred and certainly intact. She thought—no, she knew—he’d said his eye socket was empty.
It most definitely wasn’t, because he was awake and looking at her. In fact, the eye was brown and looked as if it functioned quite well. He stared at her with it—with both his eyes—as if he were waiting for something.
Maybe that was because he looked...
She sat all the way up. When she put some distance between them, he looked familiar. Not Arnou-familiar, but out-of-her-past-familiar. But that was impossible. No man of her age out of her past could possibly be—
She gasped so loud the birds, affronted, took wing and flew away.
“No.” She snatched the sheet and held it to her chest. No, it couldn’t be Rainger. Someone had mentioned him yesterday. Now her mind was playing tricks on her.
Slowly he sat up. “Sorcha?”
It sounded like Rainger. She hadn’t noticed that before. How could she not have noticed that before?
“No.” Her side of the bed was against the wall, so she scuttled backward toward the foot. The sheet was tucked in; she abandoned it as unnecessary.
“Sorcha, sweetheart.” That man extended a hand to coax her back.
She looked at the fingers, the palm; they had far too many calluses for a prince. That had to be the hand of a sailor.
She scrambled naked over the footboard. Her feet touched the cold floor. She lunged for the nearest jacket, threw it over her shoulders.
The arms hung over her hands. The hem hung over her thighs. This wasn’t her jacket.
She didn’t want his.
That man rose off the bed. He was very tall, very broad-shouldered, with bulging muscles in his arms and thighs—and he sported a long, sleek, thick erection. Last night his overwhelming strength and masculinity had created a rush of anticipation and excitement.
Now he scared her. Enraged her.
Because he didn’t look like Arnou. He looked like
Rainger.
But it couldn’t be. This man had a scar on his chest. When he leaned over to pick up his breeches, she saw marks on his back. A sailor’s life was notorious for brutality and beatings.
So were a prisoner’s.
The pain and rage almost made her double up in agony.
It was... dear God, it was true. That man... the man she believed in, the man she’d declared she loved, the man she trusted... “You. You are Rainger!” It was not a compliment.
It was an accusation.
“You recognize me at last.” He bowed and smiled, a courtly bow made ludicrous by his nakedness and a smile as intimate as a whisper.
She wanted to slap his smirking face. “Put on your breeches,” she hissed.
Her venom seemed to surprise him. “Sorcha, it’s all right. We’re married.”
“No, we’re not.” In a panic to get out of here, she searched for the clothing the women had left her. “I didn’t marry you. I married a man who was kind and honorable and protective and generous and trustworthy.”
“That was me.”
“No. Believe me. It was not.” She found the clothing: a fine chemise, an old-fashioned skirt and shirt of pale blue wool, petticoats, a dark blue ankle-length cloak, warm black hose, a straw bonnet. Wedding gifts from the village. The best they could collect from women honored to bestow their cast-offs.
Beside them was another outfit: black trousers, a black jacket, a white shirt, underdrawers, a collar, and cuffs. The villagers had been equally generous with Rainger.
For the first time, he looked a little irritated. “Don’t pretend you don’t understand that Arnou and I are the same person.”
“Of course I understand.” She discarded the jacket. “I understand everything now.”
He looked at her naked body. Looked with the beginnings of desire and the remnants of passion.