by Sandra Hill
She shook her head and laughed. “That is the biggest crock I have ever heard. Does that line usually work for you, Ensign?”
He shrugged. “I do not know. I ne’er tried it afore.” He could feel his face heat with embarrassment. Flowery words were not his normal style. Usually, he just looked at women, and they came to him.
“What do you want from me?” she asked, not mincing words.
Your mouth … your breasts … your womanparts … your body. “A dance.” Oh, good Lord, even I recognize how pathetic that sounds.
“You want to dance?”
For a start. “Yea.”
“Why in God’s name would I do you a favor when you’ve behaved so badly?”
“I behaved badly? When?”
“Aaarrgh!”
“There are many words and sounds I do not recognize in this land, but aaarrgh! is not one of them. What have I done to make you aaarrgh! except ask you to dance?”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Let’s freakin’ dance.”
Fine. I won that argument. But not really. “Uh, I should tell you something.”
“What now?”
“I cannot dance.”
She rolled her eyes again and added a laugh. “Then why did you ask?”
“I asked before because I did not want another man holding you. I ask now because I need an excuse to get you in my arms and melt that cold shield you have wrapped about yourself. You are mine, and the sooner you recognize that fact, the better.”
“What?” she shrieked. Some women liked a man to be possessive about them; others did not. Apparently, she was one of the latter. And she was as good at shrieking as Madrene. Mayhap it was a talent inherent in all women.
“I am a quick learner, though,” he said, holding his arms open for her to step into his embrace.
“One dance,” she said icily, “and that’s it. If we’re lucky, no one will see us. If not, we are both in big trouble.” She stepped into his arms and put her hands on his shoulders. Through the half-opened doorway, they could clearly hear the music—a song about love and misery, a universal partnership, he supposed.
“I meant no trouble for you,” he started to say.
“Shut up,” she said.
Well, that was certainly blunt. “I love it when you talk rough to me.”
She growled.
Not a good beginning to our love affair, Ragnor thought, but then he got lost in the pleasure of holding Alison and did not think anymore. He looped his arms around her waist as he’d seen other men do on the dancing floor with their partners. But that was not enough. Not nearly enough. He yanked her closer so that her breasts pressed against his chest, her face nestled against his neck, and her groin fitted itself against his groin. The scent of some floral fragrance enveloped him like an aphrodisiac. Not that he needed any passion prodders.
Saints and Valkyries! He almost swooned at the sheer wave of pleasure that rippled through him at that bodily contact.
He groaned.
She groaned.
He smiled against the top of her hair, especially when she shifted from foot to foot to the beat of the music, thus rubbing her breasts across his shert and her womanhood against his most appreciative manhood.
“Dance, dammit,” she ordered. Her voice was shaky, which could be either a good thing or a bad thing. Good, he decided.
He did dance, as best he could, trying to follow her rhythm, which pretty much amounted to swaying from side to side.
“This is such a mistake,” she whispered against his ear.
He wished she would say more because her breath in the whorls of his ear was akin to the most erotic touch, as if she had tongued him there, or somewhere even more provocative. “What?” he asked, even though he’d heard her plainly.
“This is such a mistake,” she repeated.
And he smiled as delicious spirals of pleasure rippled out from her breathy words. “Put your tongue in my ear, sweetling,” he urged.
“What?” she squawked, and tried to pull away.
He held on tight. Bloody hell, I didn’t mean to say that aloud. “Just teasing. Just teasing.” Mayhap later.
They were both silent then as they swayed to the music. He liked this dancing, he discovered. He’d thought that at twenty and seven he’d learned everything there was to know about lovemaking, but he’d been wrong. This was a new, more subtle form of loveplay, and he was enjoying mightily her unwitting tutoring.
She brushed her breasts across his chest.
He followed through on the return brushing.
She undulated her hips against him.
He saw stars, then returned the favor.
She gasped.
He took a deep breath in an attempt to slow down his burgeoning excitement.
She ran her fingertips over the back of his neck and up over his close-clipped skull.
He swept his open palms over her back from her waist to her shoulders, then back to her waist. Over and over, each time creeping lower till—thank you, gods and goddesses—she allowed him to cup her buttocks, to pull her even tighter against him.
The band moved on to a new love-and-misery song, but he barely noticed, so engrossed was he in the marvel of dancing with this woman … his woman.
Finally, when he could bear no more of this exquisite torture, he drew his head back and looked down at her. Her eyes were closed and her lips dreamily parted; he realized that she was only half aware of the emotions overtaking them both.
“Alison,” he whispered. “Open your eyes, dearling.” He wanted her fully aware when he took them to the next step.
Lazily she opened her eyes. Their green color was misty with arousal. “What are you doing to me, sailor?”
“What are you doing to me, siren?” he whispered back.
Then he lowered his lips to hers. And sweet, sweet, sweet was the taste of her mouth. He swept his lips across hers, to and fro, learning how they fit together. When he got it just right, he slanted himself over her parted lips and plunged his tongue inside. A bold thrust to show his hunger for her.
But instead of drawing back from his assault, she opened her mouth wider for him, and she sucked softly on him.
He whimpered his pleasure.
She whimpered, too, when he began the slow in-out tongue-dance of lovemaking. His hips were following suit below. And then they moved to the wall, where he positioned her with her arms over her head, hands clasped, bodies as close as any two bodies, fully clothed, could be.
He wanted to cup her breasts and suckle her.
He wanted to open her black braies and slide his fingers into her woman-fleece.
He wanted to be inside her, sheathed to the hilt.
All these things he yearned for, in good time. For now, he relished the sheer joy of kissing her, and being kissed back in return.
“I did not realize how hungry I was,” he gasped out once when he came up for air.
“Nor I,” she said, arching up to resume the torturous kiss. This time, her tongue was in his mouth, and she was showing him with expertise that she knew the rhythm of lovemaking, too.
“You are so screwed.”
“Not yet, I’m not,” she murmured with a smile against his panting mouth.
“I didn’t say that,” he told Alison, though he wasn’t sure she heard him.
Chuckling erupted behind them. Male chuckling.
“I told you he’d go half-cocked,” someone said. “Well, maybe not half.”
Then more chuckling.
Awareness seeped into his lust-ridden brain, and he pulled back slightly, bracing his forehead against hers as they both tried to slow their panting breaths.
“Yep, screwed tight and about to be delivered, straight to the brig,” another male voice said behind them.
“I told you he wouldn’t listen to us. Look at that boy carry on,” still another voice said. “Whoo-ee, the chief is gonna have his head on a platter.”
“Go away,” Ragnor growled to his three co
mrades, who were standing in the now fully open doorway, grinning like lackwits.
“Not on your life!” they said as one.
“Oh, God!” Alison exclaimed, her face flaming. In truth, she looked mighty good to Ragnor with her kiss-swollen lips and her eyes still glazed with passion. Her nipples stood out in her disheveled tea-ing shert as testament to the arousal she could not deny, and her shert wasn’t even wet anymore. “What did you do to me?”
“Me?” he said defensively. “What did you do to me?”
“Jerk!” she said, shoving her palms against his chest and stomping toward the doorway, where the three lackwits parted for her. “If any of you say anything about this,” she warned just before she passed through, “I will have all your heads on a platter. You won’t need to rely on my brother for that.”
With those words, she practically ran down the hallway toward the musicians, who were once again wailing out something about love and misery. Isn’t that the truth?
Ragnor’s three comrades gave him their full attention then, shaking their heads at what they must have considered idiocy.
Cage spoke for all of them when he asked, “Was it worth it?”
He grinned, and without hesitation replied, “Oh, yea!”
Chapter Eight
What was she thinking? …
By the time Alison made her way back to the table where Lillian and Abe were still talking up a storm, her heart rate had slowed to about two hundred beats a minute and her blood was only scalding hot. She didn’t know if she was more angry or more aroused.
What was I thinking?
I wasn’t thinking. That’s the problem.
Did I have too much to drink?
Nope. I can’t blame it on beer brain.
Is it the anniversary of David’s death that has put me in this vulnerable state?
A little bit, maybe.
Is it hormone overload?
For sure.
Maybe it’s as simple as loneliness.
Yep, that, too.
Would any man have done for me in my current state?
Hmmm. John was dancing with me moments before, and I wasn’t affected at all.
Merciful heavens! I’ve got the hots for a Viking.
With a sigh of hopelessness, Alison looked from Lillian to Abe and back again. They were talking about the psychiatrist’s favorite hobby, raising prize orchids in a small greenhouse attached to his house. Obviously, they shared a common interest in horticulture. But it was more than that, Alison realized with a smile. These two sizzled, despite their age difference. She saw that in the way they looked at each other, even when discussing floral fertilizers. Not to mention the way they touched each other occasionally … fingertips on a forearm, a pat on the thigh, a not-so-casual arm around a shoulder.
Alison wished them well. Both of them were good people.
“John left,” Lillian informed Alison suddenly, as if just noticing that she had returned. “It was obvious when you were gone so long that … well, you know?”
She nodded, not really concerned. She would call the detective tomorrow and apologize for her rudeness.
“I don’t like to interfere in a colleague’s personal life,” Abe said hesitantly, “but do you think it’s wise to get involved with an ensign … and a SEAL trainee, to boot?”
“I’m not involved with him,” she stated as firmly as she could, as much to convince herself as them, she supposed. “It was just a momentary blip of the brain.”
You are my destiny, he had said. Why his words flickered through her mind just then, she did not know. But what an odd thing for him to say. Not at all like the usual pickup line.
Lillian made a snorting sound of disbelief, her gaze sweeping over her in a way that told Alison she should have stopped off at the ladies room on her way back. Putting the fingertips of one hand to her mouth, she realized that her lips must be bruised and swollen from all their kissing. A hand to her head also disclosed that her side barrettes were dangling and her hair was in disarray. She wasn’t about to look down at her chest area, afraid of what she would see. “Okay, so it was a big blip,” she admitted with a self-deprecating laugh.
Lillian and Abe joined in the laughter, and she took a long swig of her lukewarm beer. If she didn’t laugh at herself, she might just start crying.
She had told Lillian earlier tonight that the Wet and Wild was down and dirty. That was just what she’d gotten. Down and dirty, Viking style.
Just climb behind my shield, baby …
“Listen, buddy, you can’t go over there,” Cage told Ragnor for about the hundredth time.
In fact, Cage and his other two friends held him back forcibly from crossing through the drinking hall to the table where Alison sat with her female companion and Doctor Fine-gold. Fortunately, John the Hair-Losing Policing-Man had departed.
“I just need to talk with her,” he insisted. “No kissing, just talking.”
“Uh-uh-uh,” Flash said. “I think it’s time for us to go back to the base.” The other two nodded.
“Without using any of your cone-domes?” It surprised him that his friends would give up their own bodily pleasures to remove him from the temptation of Alison MacLean. But then, he’d once done the same for his friend Skorri when he’d been drukkin and about to make a fool of himself over a married lady whose husband wielded a broadsword with great expertise.
“Just give me one second to apologize; then I will leave with you,” he promised.
The three of them looked at each other, about to relent.
“You promise to leave then?” Cage asked.
“Unless she invites me to her bed furs. Then I cannot promise that I will leave her side.”
“Man oh man, you are delusional,” Pretty Boy commented, shaking his head.
“I don’t know about that,” Cage said thoughtfully. He and Pretty Boy still had a firm hold on Ragnor’s arms, while Flash was standing in front of him, as if he could block his escape. “Last I saw, he was tickling the good doctor’s tonsils with his tongue. I never thought she would allow that. So I wouldn’t bet against our Viking stud here.”
“Forget the tonsils. He was dry humping a friggin’ lieutenant against the wall,” Flash pointed out with his usual crudity.
“A wall-banging knee-trembler, for sure,” Pretty Boy agreed with an admiring grin.
“That’s it!” Ragnor said, breaking their hold on him with sharp elbow jabs to either side, then stepping around Flash with a quick feint right, then left. He swaggered toward Alison’s table—if naught else, Vikings had swaggering down to an art form—with the three lackwits following behind him like bloody shadows.
“Uh-oh!” Doctor Fine-gold said when he saw Ragnor approach.
The older woman looked his way and said the same, “Uh-oh!”
Alison turned in her seat to see what they were uh-ohing about and snapped, “Go away!”
He had never been good at taking orders from women … from men either, for that matter. So, he sat down next to her at the table. His pestsome shadows stood behind him, not wanting to miss a bit of the spectacle they assumed he was about to make.
“Milady, I offer you my apologies,” he said, donning the most sorrowful face he could manage. In truth, I am not all that sorry. Not for kissing you. Not for your kissing me back. Not for pressing you against the wall. Not for the near-coupling. But I am sorry that you are sorry. Even he recognized what a sorry apology that would make, so he shut his teeth. For once.
“For what? Annoying me? Embarrassing me? Kissing me?”
“He kissed you?” the older woman said, delight ringing in her voice. “Is he the one you mentioned, honey?”
“You mentioned me?” he asked brightly.
“No, he’s not the one,” Alison said, but he could tell she was lying.
“What did she say about me?” he asked the other woman.
She just smiled and reached out a hand in greeting. “Hi, my name is Lillian Kelly, Alison’s landl
ady. This is Abe Feingold. And you are?”
He shook her hand and nodded to Doctor Fine-gold. Before he could speak, Alison spoke up.
“He already knows Dr. Feingold. Lillian, this is Ensign Magnusson. Max. A SEAL trainee. He was just leaving.”
“I was?”
His shadows chortled behind them.
“And these are his fellow trainees, Ensign Frank Floyd, Seaman Justin LeBlanc, and Seaman Travis Gordon. Good-bye, everyone.”
After shaking hands all around, they all just grinned, except Ragnor. When she was about to turn her back to him, he quickly said, “I would like to discuss why I acted the way I did. I probably came on too forcefully, but a man cannot take lightly the destiny thrown his way by the Norns of Fate.”
“Oh, God! Not that destiny crap again.” She put her face in her hands and groaned.
“Destiny?” Doctor Fine-gold said, propping his chin on his elbows on the table. “We never discussed destiny in our sessions together. Were we perchance repressing our innermost dreams?”
We, we, we. This is not about “we,” I assure you. Fortunately, Ragnor didn’t have to respond, because the lady named Lillian responded for him. “Are you saying that Alison is your destiny, sweetheart?” Lillian asked him. When he nodded, she remarked, “How sweet!”
He glanced toward Alison and grinned. No one had ever called him sweet before.
Alison stuck her tongue out at him.
Which was oddly arousing.
His three laughing comrades excused themselves to go off and find their night-mates, probably figuring that he couldn’t do anything too bad with Doctor Fine-gold in attendance. Little did they know!
“Alison, Abe wants me to go over to his house to see this special night-blooming orchid he has cultivated, but I don’t want you going back to the house alone,” Lillian said. “Will you come with us?”
“No, you go ahead without me. I can drive home alone. Don’t you worry about me.”
“Sorry, Abe. I’ll have to pass for tonight. We had an intruder break into our house this week. Plus, Alison has been getting alarming Breather phone calls for some time,” Lillian explained.
