Forbidden Entchantment

by Nina Bruhns

  “Jets? You have a spa tub?” Elizabeth demanded of Sully, mocking affront.

  “Doesn’t everyone?” he asked with a grin.

  “No fair.”

  “I got spoiled in physical therapy.” He winked. “I’ll share this one with you.”

  It took them a while to make it all the way up, first halting on the second-floor landing for a lively debate. Sully wanted to stop at her room. She held out for the spa tub. She could see he needed those jets.

  Plus, she had a sinking feeling she knew exactly what would happen if he stayed in her room again. She might be mad as hell at him, but her body still vividly recalled what it was like to lie under him, feeling the full power of his attentions. Resisting that would be next to impossible.

  They continued to the third floor.

  The massive spa tub was raised up in front of a multipaned bow window overlooking the tree-dotted meadow that led down to a tide inlet behind the Inn. In the muted tones of late afternoon, the view was gorgeous, like something out of a Monet landscape. The scent of vanilla and cinnamon candles wafted up from the tub surround, and the cheerful chirping of birds in the trees sifted in through an open casement window, completing the atmosphere of cozy luxury.

  “This’ll feel great on your tired muscles,” she said, turning on the taps for him. “But you should probably soap off the worst grime before filling the tub.”

  “Stay,” he said softly, putting his hand on her arm when she turned to go. “I may need help.”

  “Sully…”

  “It’s not like you haven’t seen me naked before,” he reasoned with a tempting smile.

  She hesitated just long enough for it to be her undoing.

  “I promise to be good,” he said, peeling off his grubby T-shirt. “Hmm, I should probably just throw this away, non?”

  He looked like a coal miner, the black soot standing out in stark contrast to his lighter skin, but it matched the masculine thatch of hair on his chest, which trailed down to —the pants he was unzipping! She let out a small gasp, whirling around to whip open the large plastic bag Mrs. Butterfield had given her along with the bubble bath.

  “Here,” he said.

  Before she could stop him he’d walked around her and dumped his soiled clothes into the bag.

  He was stark naked. And even with dirt and grime covering a good portion of it, his body was tempting as hell.

  Oh, Lord.

  “How do I get in?” he asked.

  She blinked.

  “That monstrosity,” he clarified, pointing at the tub.

  She felt her face go warm. “Oh. Um, just climb over the side.”

  He turned to her and hiked a brow. “A hand, perhaps?”

  She licked her lips, told herself she was being a ninny and went to help.

  This was ridiculous. The man only wanted a bath, for crying out loud.

  Yeah, right. Did they sell swampland in South Carolina?

  Going up the raised platform wasn’t bad, but his knee protested the steep drop down into the tub. She was forced to kick off her sandals and go first, catching him around his waist—his naked waist—as he stepped over.

  Somehow she ended up in his arms. His naked arms. They wrapped around her and held on.

  “I thought you were going to be good,” she said primly, her pulse nevertheless taking off into hyperspace.

  “Just getting my balance,” he murmured, warm water swirling around their feet. And knocked her off hers even more by putting his lips to hers.

  The kiss was short but intense. His tongue swept into her mouth, plundered, then receded, his teeth giving her lower lip a tiny nip as he lifted up. He didn’t protest when she disentangled herself and scrambled out of the tub, sucking at the tiny sting he’d left on her lip.

  “What was that for?”

  He picked up the business end of the six-foot shower hose and fiddled with the tap lever. “To make you think of me.”

  For some primitive, irrational reason, his low-spoken declaration shot through her center, a flash of hot desire.

  A burst of water spurted onto him and immediately rivulets of black started to run down his body. She watched with heated, unwilling fascination as he moved the shower spray over his torso and limbs, black turning to gray, then fading into olive skin scored with intermittent lines and patches of angry red as he scrubbed. Even with the scars from his accident, he was magnificent. Lean and muscular, broad-shouldered and oh, so—

  “There’s no soap,” he said, jerking her attention up from…places it had no business being.

  With burning cheeks, she scanned the tub surround. “Here.” She bent to retrieve a pretty turquoise seashell-shaped designer soap from an oyster shell dish.

  He made an incredulous face. “That’s soap?”

  “You doubt me?”

  He leveled her a gaze containing a hint of challenge. “Maybe. Why don’t you prove it?”

  Their eyes met and suddenly she was hard-pressed to remember her name, much less why she shouldn’t strip off her clothes and accept his dare.

  His half-lidded gaze beckoned her to sin, tempted her to forget about the million complications existing between them, and the million more this would engender. Wooed her to accept the blissful pleasure she knew he would gift her with if she gave in.

  What would it hurt? she rationalized. Already knowing her mind was made up. They’d slept together once before. And growing even closer to him could only soften his attitude to her cause—the reason she’d shied away from getting involved with him in the first place. But at this point, she’d abandoned any pretense of fairness or ethics concerning Caleb’s welfare.

  She’d also abandoned any delusions regarding her shameless desire for the man in front of her.

  She wanted him.

  Beyond all reason, she wanted him.

  “I won’t give up,” she said stubbornly. He had to know where she stood.

  “I can’t give in,” he returned, his eyes boring holes through her.

  “All’s fair in love and war,” she stated in warning. That she would use any means to win.

  His cruel mouth softened, curved sensually. “Ah, welcome to my world, mon amour.”

  The world of a pirate, she thought suddenly, irrationally.

  Then shoved that thought aside. His insidious pheromones must be sabotaging her grasp on reality as well as her good sense. The man did not come from the eighteenth century!

  But whether he did or didn’t made little difference in his very male reaction when she unzipped her sundress and let it slither down her hips. It was instant and unambiguous.

  Her heartbeat thundered as he slowly took in every inch of her, from her toes to her nose and everything in between.

  Mostly everything in between.

  She had made a short trip to the village yesterday morning while he was at physical therapy—back before the spit had hit the fan about the whole Sullivan thing—to a small, exclusive boutique she’d spotted earlier. Called Sweet Secrets Lingerie.

  Apparently he approved of her purchases.

  He swallowed heavily, watching her with predatory eyes as she stepped into the tub. But he didn’t touch her.

  “I’m still covered in grime,” he said, low and gravelly. “Come one step closer and you will be, too.”

  She tilted her head seductively. And held up the soap. “We’ll see about that, won’t we? Now, turn around.”

  Sully groaned softly when Elizabeth took the shower nozzle from him and pushed on his shoulder with a single finger. Though it was the last thing he wanted to do, he presented her with his back.

  He thought briefly about the burns and scars that now marred his body. Thank God she didn’t seem to mind them, spraying him and gliding the silly little soap over his skin until the lather flowed white. Was that a soft kiss he felt on his newly mended shoulder blade?

  Her hands and fingers were like heaven on his weary flesh, massaging and coaxing life into body parts that an hour ago had s
eemed all but dead. Very soon he was anything but tired.

  “Sit down,” she ordered, when she had set every inch of his skin blazing with her sweet, soapy touch. She looked so provocative wearing those two tiny bits of transparent blue lace…and ordering him around. Did she not realize he was the captain here?

  He quirked up the corner of his lip. She’d see soon enough who was in command when she surrendered to him. Under him.

  For now he decided to indulge her. He sat.

  She flipped a lever and water started pouring from the taps. Then she added powder from Mrs. Butterfield’s pink box. It smelled like flowers. And the tub was filling with masses of white foam bubbles.

  He frowned. “I won’t be able to see you.”

  “Sight can be overrated,” she said, returning from across the room where she’d gone to fetch one of the small packets that had been among Tyree’s going-away survival kit.

  “That’s a matter of opinion,” he murmured as she slid off her panties and joined him. When she reached for her bra, he stopped her. “Leave it on.” Women’s underthings these days were so different…erotic as hell. Seeing Elizabeth’s lush curves shown off in that gossamer bit of froth made his head spin and his arousal rampant.

  She gave him a sexy little smile. “Tell me if I hurt you,” she said, and climbed onto his lap.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  He pulled her to him and savored the feel of her breasts as they pillowed into his chest, round and perfect and calling to his mouth to explore them, and her thighs, which slid over his, pressing their lower bodies together intimately. He wanted to lift and impale her. Make her his completely, claim her body as his personal property and dominion of pleasure. Even in his days as a pirate he’d never wanted anything so painfully and exquisitely as he wanted Elizabeth Hamilton to be his. His alone.

  “I want you, too,” she murmured. Had he spoken aloud? “Oh, Andre, I want you, too.”

  The name jerked him from his sexual haze. “Not Andre,” he growled. “Never call me Andre.”

  Her gaze flew up to his. And filled with something indefinable. “All right, how’s this?” she murmured, wrapping her arms about his neck and her knees about his waist. She brushed a kiss over his cheekbone and whispered in his ear, “I want you, too…Sullivan Fouquet.”

  Chapter 10

  S ully froze.

  “What are you saying?” he asked, his voice a barely audible grate against the running water. He didn’t dare to hope the implication was as it seemed—a sentiment so profound, and unexpected, he was taken aback.

  Her hands slipped down to toy with the hair on his chest. “You believe you’re Sullivan Fouquet,” she said—not a question, he noted—and pressed a lingering kiss to his jaw. “I can work with that.”

  She touched his nipples and he nearly lost his train of thought. “But you don’t believe it,” he retorted.

  “Sully, do we have to talk about this now?” she murmured, raking her fingernails down his torso.

  “Aye.” He seized her wrists in one hand and wrenched off the faucets with the other. The sudden silence was deafening. “We do.”

  She nestled closer in his lap. The resulting wave of iridescent bubbles left a trail of suds clinging to the upper swell of her breasts. His lust took a further upswing, but he wouldn’t let it distract him.

  “All right, fine,” she said with a sigh. “Those trick memories you say you have…Do you remember everything? About Sullivan Fouquet’s life, I mean. Or just bits and pieces?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Yes, because if you do remember everything, it would explain…certain things…that otherwise make no sense.”

  “Such as?”

  “Do we really have to get into this now?” She undulated against him. “I can think of better games than twenty questions.”

  So could he, but after.

  She slanted him a glance from under her lashes, and tugged at her captured wrists. “Especially if you really are a pirate…”

  His jaw dropped and he teetered on the razor’s edge of temptation. Elizabeth Hayden had enjoyed that game, too. Pirate and captive. Sacre—

  He whisked her wrists behind her back and held her firmly between his arms, so she couldn’t squirm. She gazed up at him, her smooth skin flushed with excitement, the pretty peaks of her breasts like hard little pebbles against him.

  Slowly, agonizingly slowly, he lifted her, adjusted, then let her glide, inch by torturous inch, onto him. He watched her sky-blue eyes darken to indigo as he filled her. Her mouth leaned forward, seeking his, but he held his lips just out of reach.

  “Sully,” she whispered. “You’re killing me here.”

  “Do you believe, Elizabeth?” he murmured. “Do you believe in the impossible?”

  Indigo eyes turned pleading. “I’m not sure.”

  “Who am I, Elizabeth?” he softly demanded. “Who?”

  “I—I honestly don’t know,” she said, her expression going desperate.

  “Who is the man you’ve let inside you, Elizabeth? What’s my name?” He was torturing her, but he had to know where he stood.

  “You’re Sully.”

  He brought her up, up to the throbbing tip of him, and let her down again. She whimpered. “But which Sully?”

  “I don’t know! Please—”

  He narrowed his eyes at her. “Which one, Lizzie?”

  “You really are Sullivan Fouquet, aren’t you…?” It came out in hushed tones of awe-filled resignation. And for a moment his heart stopped beating. “I don’t know how,” she said, “or why, but somehow…you’ve come back, haven’t you?”

  He couldn’t draw breath, and felt himself in imminent danger of perishing from shock and empty lungs. “You truly believe that?” he asked, managing to keep his voice relatively even.

  “It’s impossible,” she murmured. “And yet, here you are, alive. Inside me.”

  He let her wrists go then, and they came together in a fierce hug. “Mon coeur,” he murmured, unable to credit what was happening. He didn’t know what to say, how to thank her in words for her belief in him—in the miracle of his existence.

  So he showed her in the next best way, with his body. And for the first time in his life—either life—he understood what it was to make love. First almost desperately in the luxurious tub, a savage claiming that sent water and bubbles splashing everywhere. Then in his bed—this time a slow, intense joining of flesh and spirit that left him reeling with emotions he’d never before experienced.

  He’d wanted Elizabeth from the first moment he’d seen her. First in mistaken identity, but then for herself, the woman he came to realize was far superior in every way. But even in his admiration and growing attachment, his craving for her was like those of his pirate days, to claim her as a prize, to own her and call her his. A beautiful treasure to be enjoyed in private and shown off in public.

  But now…now his feelings ran fathoms, oceans, deeper. Could this be love? Real love—not infatuation or possessiveness, but the kind of love that turned a man inside out and shook him to his very soul? The kind that could make a man reevaluate his life and everything he’d always believed to be real? He’d never experienced that kind of love before. But he was beginning to think this could be it.

  As he lay there with his woman in his arms, the glow of a new day dawning over the windowsill, he couldn’t help thinking about those things he’d always held sacred in his life above all others. Duty. Honor. Revenge.

  He’d never thought love for a woman would affect any of those things. One had nothing to do with the other. But Elizabeth Hamilton changed all that. What good was honor if it wasn’t given to the woman you loved? And duty—duty to family, or duty to her? But the worst was revenge. To have one, he must surely give up the other.

  But how could he choose? Le Bon Dieu, how the hell could he ever choose?

  Elizabeth woke to the unfamiliar, but wickedly wonderful feeling of a man settling between her thighs and
coming into her.

  Sully.

  “Mmm,” she hummed, and wrapped her arms around him as he blissfully joined their bodies. Any awkwardness that might have arisen because of the mind-blowing intensity of the previous night vanished in the joy of being one again. It had not been a quirk or a fluke, it really did feel this good being together.

  And when it was over and he lingered on top of her, giving her kisses and drawing lazy circles on her naked skin, she wished they could stay like this forever. That the world wouldn’t intrude on their perfect union with its conflicts and deadly diseases and laws of scientific impossibilities.

  “You look so serious,” he said quietly. “What are you thinking about, mon amour?”

  She sent him a smile she hoped covered her inner uncertainties. Should she give him platitudes, or the truth?

  Neither were right for the moment, so she just gave him a kiss instead. “I’m thinking how much I don’t want to get out of bed.”

  His expressive lips curved up. “Then let’s don’t. We can stay here all day. After overdoing it so badly at the fire yesterday, I’m sure my doctor will approve a day of rest.”

  She raised a coquettish eyebrow. “Rest? In that case, never mind.”

  He grinned. “You are being a very bad girl, Elizabeth Hamilton.”

  “Only recently,” she assured him with a kiss. “After getting involved with a very bad boy.”

  “The kind your mother always warned you about?” he teased.

  She made a face. “Actually she encouraged me to stick with you. Of course, I didn’t mention the pirate thing….”

  Above her, Sully tensed. “You told your mother about me?”

  “I tell my mother everything. Well—” she gave a rueful grimace “—nearly everything.”

  “So Gilda Sullivan knows…about us? Our relationship?”

  “Afraid so. Minus the reincarnation stuff. The situation seemed complicated enough without tossing that into the mix.”

  “Transmigration,” he corrected, rolled off her and jetted out a breath, covering his eyes with his hands. Then he said something in French it was probably just as well she couldn’t understand. “Caleb Sullivan knows about me, too?”