by Shari Anton
She sighed. "Do you think the rain might fall for a day or two? And if it does, must we venture out in it?"
Her wistful questions gave him pause and, for a moment, he entertained the idea of halting their journey and staying curled up in the shelter—naked—for another day.
"The earl's patrol is out there somewhere, and I suspect Connor is beginning to watch for us. Rain or not, we must move on."
And Connor wasn't going to be happy if he learned Nicole was no longer a virgin. She wasn't meant for the likes of him, but for a prince, as a means to unify a country, and to bear fruit on the Welsh branch of Pendragon.
Rhodri tried to upbraid himself for taking advantage of the foul weather, and Nicole's state of undress, and the overwhelming temptation he hadn't been able to resist—and couldn't.
Perhaps at some later time he'd feel the need for contrition or atonement. But for tonight, and for several nights yet to come, Nicole was his, and for that Rhodri couldn't summon a wisp of sorrow or regret.
He pushed away the hair from her shoulder and placed a string of kisses along her bare skin, paying particular heed to the curve of her neck.
"Mmmm."
He smiled at her approval. "You like that."
"Oh, aye."
So he continued, his hand moving slightly to cup the swell of her breast, his thumb finding and grazing the nub at the tip.
She laughed lightly. "Now I know why Sister Amelia was always so joyful when Bishop Edward came to visit."
He didn't have to ask why and was rather pleased that Nicole considered their coupling enjoyable.
The notion of a nun servicing a bishop didn't shock Rhodri. He knew of many men of the Church who kept a mistress or a housekeeper. Sons of bishops could be assured of high positions within the Church, and their daughters of good marriages.
"Odd for a bishop to keep his mistress in a nunnery."
"The arrangement suited them. Mother Abbess did not approve, but short of locking Amelia in a cellar, there was naught she could do to keep the lovers apart." She was quiet for a moment before softly asking, "Do you have a mistress?"
The question was fraught with danger if he wasn't careful in answering. But Nicole needed assurance that, for the present, she was his only lover.
"No mistress."
"But you have had other lovers." Before he could form a suitable comment, she continued, "Naturally, you have, or you would not have known so precisely what to do. I suppose I should be grateful that one of us had some knowledge of coupling, because I knew naught."
Rhodri wasn't sure which irked her more—his having had previous lovers, or her lack of knowledge of carnal matters. He could do nothing about his former experience with women, except use his knowledge to add to hers, selfish beast that he was.
"You now know somewhat of the pleasure a man and woman can share, and I would be pleased to teach you all I know."
"Tonight?"
"Not all tonight, but enough so you do not feel so unskilled next time. And truly, Nicole, most of making love to a partner is merely doing what makes the other feel good. Like this."
Rhodri applied himself to the delightful lesson of showing Nicole which parts of her body were most sensitive to his touch, petting and kissing until she again moaned with need.
"This seems unfair," she said. "Surely I should be taking a more active part, pleasuring you, too."
This time she could. This time he would be slower to rouse and better able to maintain control over a cock again readying to do its duty and be blissfully compensated for its efforts.
"Come up atop me," he said and was rewarded with near instant obedience.
On his back, with Nicole half lying, half sitting across his body, he cursed the space constraints that limited their movements, didn't allow them the freedom to enjoy each other to full measure. But there was always tomorrow night, and that would be another new experience.
Nicole's doe-brown eyes were wide and full of the curiosity and eagerness of a new student wanting to know which harp strings to pluck, in which order, to play a pleasant melody. Best to allow her to explore the instrument first.
He placed his hands behind his head. She gave him a questioning look, then smiled in a way he thought a bit too knowledgeable and cunning for a novice.
"I am to touch you as you touched me, am I not?"
It wasn't truly a question, and she didn't wait for an answer before testing her assumption. Lightly, at first, she explored his upper chest, fingers fluttering over his collarbone, palms massaging his breasts. She used her thumbs as he had, teasing his nipples to hard nubs, a normally sweet stimulation that he enjoyed but didn't usually respond to overmuch—until now, when it was Nicole's thumbs grazing his nipples.
Next she found the jagged scar over his lower ribs and frowned at the result of an old wound. "Dagger?"
"Sword."
"Practice?"
"Battle."
"Did you allow the wretch to live?" she asked fiercely.
He smiled at her ire that someone should dare mark him and not pay the penalty. "No."
"Good!" she declared, then bent down to gently, reverently kiss the scar from end to end, as if to ease any lingering pain.
The brush of her lips sent tendrils of heat straight to his loins, but the veneration of her actions tugged at his heart and brought a lump to his throat. But before he could sort out his peculiar combination of reactions, Nicole discovered that if she raked fingernails across his stomach she could make the muscles twitch.
He sucked in hard, tightening that area too vulnerable to tickling, refusing to double over in laughter under her effort to torment him. She gave up tormenting him quickly enough, only to try her hand at exquisite torture.
A touch so light, so innocent, shouldn't stiffen him to steel so fast. All she'd done was circle the tip before lightly stroking the shaft, and already his cock appreciated the attention as if it had been expertly handled.
This wasn't right. He'd obtained release only a few minutes ago, should be able to withstand hours of lustful fondling without fear of erupting in a woman's hand or worrying about his stamina when it became important to his partner's pleasure.
He feared. He worried.
Rhodri pulled Nicole up for a kiss before she could further damage his threadbare control over his desire to toss her on her back and rut like a wild beast.
Except her kisses fueled the flames, his sanity slipping away with the smoke. From somewhere in the haze he heard his name on her sweet lips.
"Hmmm?"
"So as a man can take a woman, so can a woman take a man."
Oh, blessed be, if only she would just do it.
And then she did. Straddling him, she found the source of his need and slid down, down, down until she fully entrapped him in her slick heat.
He shuddered at her possession, questioning the wisdom of allowing Nicole to become the aggressor and he her willing victim. More fool he, he'd meant to teach and ended up learning.
But he was a bard, and he knew that while a melody played with single notes could be entrancing, the song was always enriched with harmony.
Her hands pressed to the blanket on either side of his head, Nicole hovered over him like a victorious goddess, splendid in her nudity and unbound tresses. And it would be his pleasure to haul the goddess back to this earthly realm.
With deft movements, he latched on to a dark rose nipple and suckled hard, using teeth and tongue to nip and soothe. She remained still, her eyes closing, her breath soon breaking into passionate little pants. Her hips began to move, imitating the stroking rhythm she'd learned when he'd taken her.
Almost, he let her have her way, but for harmony her body must thrum with his. Reluctantly, he released her breast and pushed her upward, pulling her knees forward so she sat upright.
Never had he been so deep within a woman, but while his cock cried for release, he slid a finger between them and played insistently within her moist folds.
She
arched and shattered first, with her head thrown back and a moan in her throat. For the second time on a rainy afternoon, Rhodri enjoyed the bliss of a successful sensual encounter.
The goddess fell, limp and sated, onto his chest. "Sweet heaven above, never tell me there is more to learn."
He chuckled. "No more lessons tonight," he said, wondering which of them would, next time, be the teacher.
* * *
Alone in the shelter, wrapped in the blanket which now bore a small dried bloodstain, staring out at the night's rain turned to morning mist, Nicole marveled at how very alive she felt, and how very tired and sore.
And at how very willing she was to endure another lesson if Rhodri would only allow it.
He would not, however. Even now he was fully dressed and out "taking bearings," or so he'd said. He'd left her here to also dress and begin preparing for a walk in the English mist, and she hadn't yet brought herself to budge.
She shook her head at her foolishness, sitting here like a petulant child, wondering what the devil was wrong with her.
Last night had been a magnificent revelation, and during their lovemaking she'd taken great pleasure in the sensations of touching and being touched. The stirring kisses. The blissful, astounding completion.
Afterward she'd slept the sleep of the innocent, warm and safe in Rhodri's arms, beneath the blanket he'd covered them with when insisting their coupling was over for the night and they should sleep.
Truly, she didn't regret having lain with Rhodri, allowing him liberties and taking several of her own. She'd come into her full womanhood willingly, joyfully. The signs of her lost innocence were all there, from the soreness of chafed nipples, to the niggling sensation in her nether regions of having been stretched to accommodate Rhodri's size, to the bloodstain on the blanket they'd frolicked on and then slept in.
So why did she feel somehow incomplete this morn, as if she'd missed something important in Rhodri's lessons last eve?
If she were now fully a woman, shouldn't she feel more than the physical effects of the coupling? Shouldn't she feel older, perhaps wiser and more worldly?
Why the discontent this morn when she'd been utterly content throughout the night?
Would Rhodri know?
Again she shook her head, sure that she wouldn't ask Rhodri about her probably foolish, useless musings. Perhaps all women experienced an emotional bloodletting on the morning after their first coupling, even if the coupling had been a splendid affair. To have him realize she hadn't even known that about coupling wasn't to be borne.
And oh, how she wished to share a private moment with either Gwendolyn or Emma! One of them would surely have an answer to soothe her upset. But her sisters were beyond her current reach, and she wouldn't see them anytime soon, so she would simply have to work this out for herself.
Resolute, she flung off the blanket, yanked on her clothing, and prepared to make ready to leave. From outside she heard a rustle in the brush and, believing Rhodri purposely alerted her to his return, thought nothing of it.
Until a male voice softly called her name, and she froze.
Not Rhodri. Not a spirit.
Her heart beating wildly, she recognized the voice of the beloved mercenary who'd married her sister Emma.
Somehow, he'd found her.
How? Why?
Having no answers, but praying her sister Emma might not be so far away after all, Nicole burst out of the shelter and flew into the arms of Darian of Bruges.
Chapter Thirteen
Rhodri crouched out of sight, sword in his sweating hand, his heart pounding against his ribs.
Somehow, a tall, well-hewn man garbed all in black had slipped past his guard and entered the camp. Nicole must know the man, or she wouldn't be hugging him, smiling. A smile also softened the intruder's otherwise rugged face.
Rhodri's grip on the sword tightened, ready to run the man through for doing no more than embracing Nicole and making her smile. But more, he wanted to punish the man for having entered the camp unseen and unheard, posing a new danger Rhodri didn't know how to deal with as yet.
And he heartily disliked not knowing.
Nicole backed away far enough to look up at the man but not leave his embrace.
"'Tis good to see you, Darian! Is Emma with you?"
"Nay, little one. Emma is at Camelen, with Gwendolyn. Both of your sisters are most concerned for your welfare. You chose a bad time for an adventure, Nicole, with Gwendolyn so close to her babe's birth."
Nicole accepted the scold without rancor. "I did not mean to worry my sisters. 'Tis one of the reasons I have stayed away from Camelen, so not to cause Gwendolyn any hardship. How does she fare?"
"Last I saw, she paced the hall, fretting."
Rhodri saw Nicole's heartrending regret even as he figured out the man's identity. Darian of Bruges, a Flemish mercenary, once a king's trusted assassin, now Emma's husband and pledged to serve Gwendolyn's husband, Alberic.
Damn! He couldn't slice off the hands that dared hold fast to Nicole's upper arms. She would be most wroth with him for injuring a man whom she obviously held in affection.
But 'twas certainly time to interrupt, before Darian convinced Nicole that returning to the bosom of her family was her only course.
Rhodri slid the sword beneath his belt and stepped into the small clearing, making enough noise to alert Darian and Nicole to his presence. Both turned to look at him, Nicole misty-eyed, Darian with a cold, evaluating stare.
Nicole finally stepped away from her brother-by-marriage. "Rhodri ap Dafydd, this is Darian of Bruges, my sister Emma's husband. He means us no harm."
Rhodri inwardly scoffed. Not physical harm, perhaps, but this was no chance meeting. Darian had come seeking Nicole, likely intending to take her home, which Rhodri couldn't allow.
And Darian was currently taking Rhodri's measure, just as he'd taken Darian's, deciding on the best way to vanquish a foe if necessary.
Nicole was a precious gem coveted by two greedy men, though the reasons for the men's greed were different.
Nicole stood between them, not more than an arm's span away from both men, physically showing no preference to either.
Rhodri longed to grab hold of Nicole and push her behind him but didn't dare. Darian would be on him in a gnat's breath. The man didn't carry a sword, but from what Rhodri knew of Darian's reputation, the mercenary didn't need a sword to either put up a defense or send a man to his grave.
"You two have caused quite a stir," Darian commented.
Looking a bit sheepish, Nicole tossed a dismissive hand in the air. "Not all is as it may seem, Darian, or as you may have heard."
"The messenger sent to Camelen was most thorough when relating the details of your leaving the abbey and your escape from Oxford. So, too, were the two soldiers who drank overmuch in the inn last eve. Since you are not begging me to save you from this whoreson, I shall assume my original conjecture correct, that you aided Rhodri's escape from Oxford, just as you helped him escape the earl's patrol yester noon."
Nicole's mouth twisted with chagrin. "We have tried to maintain the ruse that Rhodri forced me to go with him. If you discerned the truth, then others might, too."
"But others will not know for certain, as I was not sure, unless they see you together in an unguarded moment."
While Rhodri gave the man his due for a correct conjecture, he was more concerned with Darian's revelation. "I gather the inn is on the road ahead. Are the soldiers still there?"
"They were when I left. Last eve, we overheard them planning to begin a search this morn, so I departed the inn well before they were up and about."
"We?" Nicole asked.
Darian's smile for Nicole was soft. Sympathetic?
"Alberic is here, too. We decided it best that I come find you and bring you to the inn, so you would have time to prepare to see him."
Nicole's expression said she would rather not see Alberic. Why would she need to prepare? Did bad feelings
still exist between the two for her childhood attempt to stab him with a dagger, or because Alberic had then sent Nicole away from Camelen to reside at Bledloe Abbey? Perhaps both, but it didn't matter. If he had his way, they'd not be going to the inn.
Rhodri stepped closer to Nicole, into a better position to push her behind him if he must.
Darian arched an eyebrow, a small sign he understood the shift in stance.
"We cannot risk the inn if the earl's patrol is there. You can tell Alberic, and Nicole's sisters, they need not worry over her well-being. I will see her safely to Wales and her uncle Connor."
Darian crossed his arms. "Aye, well, that is one of the questions for which Alberic would like an answer—for what reason you were at Bledloe Abbey to begin with."
Rhodri opened his mouth to tell the false tale he'd given everyone else; Darian held up a hand to forestall the explanation.
"No sense explaining twice. Besides, the decision over what to do with Nicole is Alberic's, not mine." Darian's eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. "I will take Nicole to Alberic. 'Tis your decision to come with us or no, alive or no."
Rhodri grabbed hold of the sword's hilt. Nicole placed a hand atop his, her fear and anger so apparent he could almost smell it.
"Cease! Both of you! I will not have you two fighting. Rhodri, pray you, I must see Alberic. He is lord of Camelen and so is now patriarch of my family. He and Darian have come all this way to find me and should be granted the courtesy of an explanation. Once done, we can go on."
She was doing it again, turning plea-filled eyes on him, determined to have her way, battering at his resolve.
Her respect for Alberic and Darian was commendable and reasonable—but damn—he didn't want to be reasonable! If they went into that inn, he might not be able to get her back out.
And would that be so bad?
Yes, his heart shouted. Perhaps not, a less selfish part of him contradicted.
Had he only Nicole's best interests at heart, then allowing her to go home to Camelen with Alberic, giving up the task Connor had set him to, letting her go to possibly never see her again, might be best for her.
