He brought his head up sharply, his eyes intense now.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve angered you. If you find the idea so distasteful, Nicodimus, then please, put it from your mind. I will deal with the ridicule. The Gods know I have before.” She turned away, striding toward the keep, a short distance away.
Nicodimus’s hand on her shoulder brought her to a stop. “No, Arianna. ‘Tis I who am sorry. My anger was with myself for not thinking of this sooner. Already, I’ve given the clan reason to talk, by riding off alone on our wedding night the way I did. I’ll not give them any more.”
She didn’t turn around, for if she did, he would see the tears that burned inexplicably in her eyes. “Thank you, husband.”
“I will say I went riding to give you time to prepare for me,” he said, softly. “And as for your own jaunt tonight, the tale will be. . .” He thought for a moment, and when he spoke again, his voice was different, quieter than before, and slightly coarse. “The tale will be that my passion for my chaste young bride was such that it frightened her. That she ran away, and that I fetched her back home only to ravage her still more.”
As he spoke, his hand on her shoulder moved in what might have been an unintended caress. Soft, his touch. Calloused, his palm on her tender skin, she felt it even through the robe that covered her. The words he spoke brought a foreign longing alive in the pit of her stomach, and made her feel breathless and warm.
‘Tis . . . a good tale,” she whispered. “I . . . I am feelin’ a mite ill, Nicodimus. My stomach is behavin’ quite badly just now. Flutterin’ an’ . . . odd.”
When he said nothing, she chanced a look over her shoulder at him. He offered a strained smile, and swept her hair away from her forehead with a feather-light touch. “You’ll be fine,” he told her gently. “The feeling . . . will pass.”
He didn’t sound certain of that. Nonetheless, he turned her ‘round, and gripping her elbow, walked her to the doors. But when they strode through the great hall, they were greeted by worried questions from a half dozen people. Joseph, Nidaba, and Kenyon and Lud, all while a handful of Joseph’s men looked on with speculative expressions.
Nicodimus met her eyes once, and she saw the silent message in them. His pretense would begin now. Ignoring them all, he scooped Arianna up into his arms, and strode with her to the far end of the room and the stone stairway there. And as he did he spoke, his tone intimate, but loud enough so they could hear. “I’ll be gentle this time, my love. I promise.” And before mounting the first step, he bent and pressed his mouth to hers.
Arianna’s heart nearly beat a hole through her chest. And yet that great emptiness remained. Oh, if only this were real. If only it could someday be . . . real.
* * * *
I ONLY WANTED to protect her. No, that wasn’t entirely true. I wanted her. I knew that. My body craved hers the way any healthy man’s body would crave that of a beautiful woman . . . especially knowing that woman wanted him, too. I had been half convinced Arianna would seduce me into her arms and into her bed, before we’d been married a week. I had told myself I would resist her, but I had already known I could never withstand her charms for very long.
But tonight . . . tonight everything had changed. She had changed. Suddenly so willing to agree to my terms. Vowing to leave me alone, and to have me play the part of the passionate husband only in front of the others. And I had realized then that not having her, not taking her, was again a possibility. Attainable, perhaps with ease.
That knowledge made me want her more than ever, however foolish such a thing may seem. So that when I spoke the tale I would spread among the clan, I saw the images of it in my mind. Fetching my runaway bride home, and carrying her up to our chamber to savor every inch of her, to exercise all of my husbandly rights. I had grown aroused beyond endurance at the thought, and more so when I realized she had as well. Stomach ailment, indeed. My innocent bride did not even recognize raw desire for what it was.
When I scooped her up, held her against me, promised to be gentle, and then tasted her succulent mouth, my desire for her burned still hotter, and for just an instant on that darkened stairway, I allowed myself to savor the fantasy . . . then became lost in it.
Hands tangling in her hair, I pressed her mouth open wide, and licked inside with my tongue. My hands began to caress the parts of her I held, one in perfect reach of a firm, rounded breast, and the other stroking her outer thigh. I felt her nipple harden against my palm, and nearly groaned with the force of the need that rocked through me. And all the while my feet carried her faster to the top of the stairway, then down the corridors. I kicked the chamber door open when I reached it, and strode through to lay her down upon the waiting bed.
It was her hands on my chest that finally made me realize what I was doing to her. My little cat lay breathless, her face flushed, eyes wide and staring up at me. I straightened slowly, pushing a hand through my hair as I turned away. Averting my gaze in shame, I walked to the door, pushed it closed. “I . . . I apologize, Arianna.”
On a breathless sigh, she whispered, “I . . . I’d no idea you could be so . . . convincing. For a moment I thought you meant to . . . to . . .”
I looked back at her, but she clamped her lips tight and said no more. How was I to do this? Spend the night at her side and not touch her? It would surely take a saint to accomplish such a feat. I was no saint.
She tried a smile, though it was confused and tremulous. “Surely every person in the place was convinced as well,” she suggested. Then slowly, she got to her feet. “‘Tis so very warm here, dinna you think? I vow, ‘twas not so when I left earlier.”
She pulled at the ties that held her robe in place, and tossed it aside without a care.
What I saw then . . .
I could only stare for a long moment. “Arianna,” I whispered. I sank to my knees to keep myself from moving any nearer. But I was unable to take my eyes from her body, for it was utterly revealed to me, every part of it, by the sheer fabric she wore. “By the Gods, woman, what do you think I’m made of?”
Blinking, she glanced down at herself, and then went so red the blush was like fire. “Damnation!” she cried, and she spun around, and snatched the coverlet from the bed to hold over her.
But it was too late, for the image of her was burned into my mind. And I knew it would haunt me. Breasts, high and proud, with full, sweet curves, and nipples like pebbles, and dusky rose in color. The pendant she wore resting in between. A belly, flat and tight, and the silken triangle of hair between her slender thighs. Her perfectly rounded buttocks, and the tempting darkness in between. When she’d turned away, she’d aroused me even more.
“Where,” I whispered, my voice barely more than a tormented croak, “did you get that . . . that shift?”
Holding the coverlet tight to her, refusing to face me, she answered, and her voice trembled. “Nidaba. I . . . I thought ‘twould make you want me as I do . . . did you. ‘Twas before I knew, Nicodimus. ‘Twas before I agreed to . . . I dinna mean to . . . I simply forgot what I was wearin’, you see.” She lowered her head. “Sweet heaven, but I’ve never been more ashamed.”
Somehow, though shaking with desire, I managed to get to my feet. Still, I kept my distance. “You’ve nothing to be ashamed of, Arianna.”
“‘Twas an underhanded trick I’d planned to play on you. Indeed, you must think I’ve no shame at all. I dinna intend–”
“I know. It is all right.” But the knowledge was there . . . what she’d been planning. To seduce me in her innocent way. By the Gods, had I come to this chamber tonight instead of racing away on my horse like a fool . . . I closed my eyes against the desire that raged in me like fire in my blood. And still it came. Against my will, I heard myself say the words I all but bit my tongue to prevent.
“Let go the coverlet, Arianna.”
She stiffened, her back to me. “What?”
“Let go the coverlet.”
“But . . . but Nicodimus, y
ou said you dinna want. . .”
“I am your husband, am I not?” I whispered. And I knew better, Gods, I knew better than to go on with this. “You wanted me to see you in this gown, and I find . . . I want to see you.”
“I . . . I dinna ken you.”
“I saved your life. Twice now. Do this for me. Release it, Arianna. Show yourself to me.”
Her head tipping up slightly, she unfolded the coverlet in front and opened her arms, paused for just a heartbeat, and let it fall to the floor. I heard her breath catch in her throat when I whispered, “Good. Now turn ‘round.”
Slowly, she turned. Her chin high, and her eyes alight with too many emotions to name. Pride was there. Desire, too, and perhaps anger at my tone of command. And yet she had obeyed. I knew her too well to think she would have, had she not wanted to.
She stood still as I perused her, more thoroughly this time, slowly, feasting with my eyes on every part of her until her face was red and her breaths shallow and quick. Quicker now, as I moved forward. I was driven by sheer, base desire. My honor, along with any sense of self-preservation, and perhaps any hint of sanity, had fled me now. I only felt need. Hunger. Heat.
“How is your stomach now?” I asked her, when I stood so close I could feel every breath as she exhaled.
“It feels as if a flock of sparrows were set loose inside,” she whispered.
Lifting my hands, I ran the backs of my fingers over her breasts, over her nipples. She sucked in a breath. So I turned my hands, and used my fingers, caught the distended peaks between them, and squeezed lightly.
“Nicodimus!”
I increased the pressure until I could feel the thrum of the blood pulsing where I pinched her. Until her every breath was a whimper of longing. And then I eased it, pressed once again, eased, pinched hard, and released her.
She was breathing in short, quick little gasps. “I-I-I dinna understand . . .”
“Shh-shh. You will.” I slid my hands down her body, over the whisper-soft nightshift, caressing her belly, her hips, her outer thighs, then slid around to the insides of her legs, and ran my palms slowly upward again. “Part your legs for me, Arianna.”
With a gasp that was half sob, she did as I said. I trailed my fingertips upward, and then over the soft mound of hair between her legs. A light touch that made her tremble. Then I parted her folds, and dragged my fingertips over the moist center of her. She released a sigh that stuttered out of her, and a soft “Oooh. . .” I repeated the stroking, a little harder each time, and then I found the tiny nub, the key to her pleasure, and rubbed it hard beneath my fingertips.
Arianna shuddered, her juices wet my hand. I moved my fingers inside her, dipping and stroking, rolling and pinching that pulsing nub harder and harder between my fingers. And she threw her head back, and clutched my shoulders with her hands, and cried my name aloud. I closed my arm tight ‘round her waist and held her to me when her knees would have buckled. Working her with my fingers while she shuddered in sweet release. I held her longer still, close in my arms while her body trembled, and relaxed, and her breathing eased.
“What did you do to me, husband?” she asked in a whisper.
“Lie down on the bed,” I croaked, my hands on her shoulders, pushing her gently backward as I spoke, for I could not wait. I could not wait to have her. No longer.
She didn’t move. Her feet planted, she lifted her head, narrowed her eyes on me. “Nay, I canna.”
“You . . . ?”
“I’ll nay lie down on the bed for you, Nicodimus. For though you tell me ‘tis what you want, I ken you far better than before. An’ you dinna want this.”
Looking down at her fiery eyes, her moist, succulent lips, I shook my head. “I want it,” I told her. “And so do you.”
“Nay, you’re mistaken there, husband. What you did to me . . . felt like heaven. But if you think mating without any love is what I want, you’re sadly mistaken indeed.” And firmly she closed her hands over mine, where they rested ‘round her tiny waist, and took them away. She turned from me, snatching up the dark robe she’d discarded before, and pulling it around her like armor. Hiding herself from me.
“I cannot love you, Arianna,” I told her, lowering my head. “I know you deserve more—”
“Aye, on that you are correct. I do deserve more. But the fact remains, Nicodimus, that though you vow you canna love me, I could quite easily love you. Even more madly than I already do. An’ this,” she said, waving a hand toward the bed. “This will only make me more likely to do just that. An’ perhaps already has.” She dropped her gaze as she spoke the last words on a hoarse whisper.
Pushing my hands through my hair, I turned and paced away. I couldn’t look at her, look at the bed, without feeling aroused beyond what was sane. I was awash in shame for losing myself to passion and forgetting to protect my fragile little bride’s tender heart. “You’ve the right of it.”
“Aye, I do. Just as you wish to protect your heart from being broken again, Nicodimus, I must look out for my own. I’ll nay surrender it to you knowin’ already that you’ll crush it beneath your boot heel. A fool would I be, did I do such a thing.”
“And I would be a cruel bastard to ask it of you,” I told her softly. “I . . . Arianna, I didn’t mean to be . . .”
“You dinna mean to be cruel, Nicodimus, but ‘tis cruel you were. First you told me you dinna want me, though it cut me to the quick to hear you say it. An’ now, when at last you’ve convinced me ‘tis true, an’ best for us both to accept it, you change entirely. Just when I promise to be your wife in name only, just when I set myself against feelin’ anything for you, you go an’ . . . an’. . .”
She turned quickly away, but not before I’d seen her squeeze her eyes tight to prevent the tears spilling over. I touched her shoulders, turned her back ‘round to face me again. “I lost myself. You . . . you are a most beautiful woman, Arianna. And if you thought I didn’t desire you, if that was what my words made you believe, you were wrong. It was more that I didn’t want to desire you. But . . . but one look at you . . . in that . . . that scrap, and I simply lost all reason . . . and control. I apologize.”
Her eyes widened, and color crept into her cheeks. She dashed at the drying tears, and smiled tremulously. “Then . . . you’re saying you couldna help yourself.”
“A moment of madness,” I told her. “I have few weaknesses, Arianna. Did you ask me what they were, I’d be hard-pressed to name them. But I’m finding I do have one. And that weakness is you. I’m sorry if my desire confused or frightened you, little cat.”
“Dinna be sorry for that, Nicodimus. That you find me . . . desirable . . . makes my heart swell. An’ my head, as well, I fear.”
“You’ve every reason to be proud. You’re a remarkable woman, in so many ways.”
“Aye.” She lifted her head, met my gaze head on. “That I am.”
Her ready agreement made me smile. I must have been insane. Any other man would have been worshipping at her feet by now, promising her the moon if she’d only love him forever. I, on the other hand, was wishing I could erect barriers to keep her away from my heart, for she seemed to sling arrows at it with every glance, every smile, every word. I knew I had good reason to put up defenses. She was young, far too young to know her own mind, her own heart. Far too young to commit to me in any real way, or be expected to honor that commitment . . . for eternity. Far too young and too beautiful and full of fire to be satisfied by a tired old man such as myself for very long. She’d destroy me if I let myself love her. I would lose her. There was no doubt in my mind of that. It frightened me, right to my bones. Never had I been afraid of any foe. Of any beast or any danger. Never had I doubted my ability to survive.
But I would never survive a war of hearts with Arianna Sinclair. Arianna Lachlan. My bride.
She cleared her throat, and drew my gaze. Innocence personified, with spun gold hair, velvet brown eyes, and satin skin kissed by the sun. She did not look like my poten
tial executioner. A man unafraid to face down a rampaging lion, I thought. Ironic that he trembles in fear of a mere kitten.
“Perhaps ‘twould be best if we dinna share the same chamber after all,” she whispered.
Her words startled me out of my thoughts. “No, Arianna. You’re constantly proving yourself the wiser of the two of us, and you were right about the gossips and the damage they could do. I’ll stay here, and I promise, lady, I’ll not ravish you while you slumber.”
“I never thought you would,” she said softly, but kept her eyes carefully averted.
She should have, I thought. Because it wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility. Sighing deeply, I snatched a tapestry from the wall. Then, drawing my blade, I sliced two lengths of thong from my boot laces, and bound one to each corner. Soon, the tapestry hung suspended in the midst of the room, dividing the portion where she would lie in the bed from the place where I would rest, alone and miserable, upon the floor.
Chapter 12
I TREATED ARIANNA like a princess after that, more careful than I had ever been with anyone, so eager was I to protect her tender heart. I regretted letting my passion grow almost beyond my control, and was determined to offer amends. I was only making matters more difficult for myself, of that I was keenly aware. And yet I could not seem to stop my feet from treading eagerly upon the path to my own destruction.
She . . . mesmerized me. I took such pleasure in her company. Her wit, her laughter, seemed to fill the keep with a spirit which had never lived there before. Or, perhaps, not in a long while. Since the death of Joseph’s own wife. But there was more than just this. Before my eyes, Arianna grew from the frightened, wild and rebellious child still mourning her sister, to a young woman filled with life and confidence. Part of what influenced her was, I believe, the companionship Nidaba and I offered. Two who shared her beliefs and practiced her faith. No longer did she question the legitimacy or even the sanity of it.
Eternal Love: The Immortal Witch Series Page 50
