by Kris Kennedy
“Aye,” she said in a hot whisper. She threw her head back and banged the tree. His thighs were hot on hers, then his erection pressed against her belly. She pushed back urgently, recklessly, one wrist hooked around his neck, her body moving of its own accord, her breath coming out in hard, sharp pants.
“Do ye have a notion now, Senna?” he growled, his voice thumped by the rocking of her hips.
“Aye.”
“Do ye want more?”
“Aye.”
He slid his hands under her buttocks and lifted her, so she was sitting on his hips, her thighs parted, dangling over his.
Trapped between the tree and his hot, sculpted body, she went senseless. Dimly, she heard herself whimper. The long, hard length of him pushed up between them, sliding over everything that throbbed in her body. Her hips pumped forward and he shoved into her, so every inch of them touched from hips to chest. Then he growled in her ear, “Do not move.”
She went still. Every toned muscle of his body was rigid against hers. He shuddered slightly, and they stood absolutely still for half a minute. All she could hear was his ragged breath and the blood thudding inside her skull. Then he bent his head, his mouth by her ear, his words a dark, sensual threat. “I’ll watch ye come, lass.”
Rampant shuddering chills jammed down her body as his mouth claimed hers in a deep and savage kiss. She returned every plunge of his tongue with one of her own, her fingers twisting into his hair. Her tongue, her teeth, her lips, he claimed everything, relentless in his pursuit, drawing senseless gasps and whimpers from her body until he finally came up for air, and dragged his lips along her neck and shoulder, leaving behind an amoral trail of heat.
He yanked down the collar of her tunic, revealing the tops of her breasts. She leaned her shoulders back to allow him access, her fingers in his hair, inviting him to do more, much more.
His eyes held hers, level and unreadable, as he pushed his hand up under her tunic, over her hot skin. Then his thumb brushed roughly over her breast. She closed her eyes, arching up. With a muted curse, he shoved her tunic up as high as he could, bent slightly to the side, and closed his hot mouth over her nipple.
Her breath came exploding out. He locked his hands around her hips, his mouth claiming her breast with confident, damaging skill. Dark hair fell down over his face as he licked her and, gripping her hips with both hands now, holding her immobilized, he tilted his hips, sliding his erection in a long, slow skate against her leggings and the shuddering, quivering, questing flesh beneath.
Her world exploded. Hot, rippling undulations rode through her muscles, fast and greedy. Her head dropped forward, then back, as she cried out, stunned. Nothing like the explosive power of this man had ever entered her life before. Nothing so potent, nothing so vital, not in her fettered life.
When she finally stopped shuddering, he lowered her feet to the ground. But he didn’t step away, and he didn’t let go. He just gave her a moment to gather herself, without allowing her to crumple into a boneless heap on the pine needles and dirt. How chivalrous.
His body was still taut with restraint. His breathing was still ragged, his muscles gilded with sweat, his eyes hard and merciless, which he’d never been before, so she was really rather concerned to find both those things now directed at her.
She pushed away. He stepped back. She stumbled only once, over nothing, then righted herself and gave her tunic hem a sharp tug down.
The world looked much the same as it had a few minutes ago. How peculiar.
Had it even taken minutes? she wondered helplessly. Or had he done that to her in mere seconds? It felt like he’d simply breathed on her and she’d come apart for him.
“Wait by the fire pit,” he said curtly. She was dearly weary of curtness.
If I take off my clothes and let you have me, will you smile at me again? is what she wanted to say, which was so pathetic she almost hated herself for it. How weak she’d become in the face of Finian.
“I’ll not wait by the fire,” she retorted, keeping her eyes slightly averted, her chin slightly aloft. The latter helped to remind her to maintain at least the semblance of dignity. “I’ll be eating some of that game, so I’ll help bring it down. I told you before, I was taught to use a weapon.”
His darkness regarded her. She could feel it. “Ye also told me ye were no good at it.”
She almost laughed. “I’m not good at so many things, Finian, I cannot let that stop me anymore.” She turned on her heel and walked into the forest. His measured footfalls followed behind.
“In any event, I said I was no good with the bow,” she added, clarifying.
He pointed over her head to the right, where the sunsetting light coming down through the trees was a bit brighter. A clearing must be nearby. He looked down at her. “Meaning?”
“Meaning,” she said, turning to look in his eyes, which she had not done since he made her world explode into the hot, perfect waves of pleasure still shuddering inside her, “I am fairly skilled with a blade.”
He paused. “How do ye get close enough?”
“I don’t.” He stood with his hands at his side, bow light in hand, his eyes unwavering on hers. “I throw it,” she said, and turned away.
“Senna.”
She stopped but didn’t turn.
“I’m sorry.”
Oh, sweet Mother. He must have seen the hurt in her eyes. He was addressing it. Could she be more shamed? Perhaps she should just paint the words in her blood, to show how exposed she was. How on earth had that happened? In a matter of days. For shame. For shame, for grief, and the love of God, what had happened to her?
She nodded, her back still to him, her turn to be curt. There was a small squirrel in the tree before her.
“Did I frighten ye?”
No. I manage that quite well myself. “’Tis naught. We lost our heads.”
“I didn’t lose my head.” His low voice rode through the trees and over her shoulders.
“No?”
“Nay.”
“What was that, then?”
A pause. “That was hardly my head.”
“Indeed.”
She heard him take a deep breath, let it out. “I think we’ve to admit, Senna, that touching is a rash and dangerous thing.”
“Exceedingly.”
“We will not anymore.”
She nodded crisply. “Of course not.”
“And ye’ve to stop…” His voice faded away.
“Stop what?”
Silence.
She raised her eyebrows at the squirrel.
He gave what sounded like a ragged sigh. “Senna, ye have to see, I’m at yer mercy.”
She swallowed thickly. “One could be excused for not seeing it that way. Considering you have a bow and a sword and all sorts of muscles.”
“Aye, well, this is a more difficult matter than swords and bows.”
“Not to you.”
For a moment, he was quiet. “Aye. To me.”
She inhaled deeply, cool evening air. She let her breath out slowly, as he had, in measured degrees. “Not to me,” she said, lifting her chin that extra little bit. It so often helped. It failed so miserably.
“Nay?”
“No. I trow, I can hardly recollect what we were speaking about. Can you?”
The invitation to conspiracy came out sharply. Silence stretched out between them like an open range. Her breath sounded loud in her ears. She looked over. The bow hung from his fingertips as he watched her. She could divine nothing of what went on behind his eyes.
“No,” he agreed slowly. “What were we speaking of?”
“Muscles, itches, I can hardly recall.”
With the casual grace of a predator, he pushed off the tree. She realized she was trembling. Her hands, her legs. He stopped inches away.
“Bows,” he murmured. He swept his palm across her cheek, a swift, gentle touch, then dropped his hand. “We were speaking of being mean with a bow.”
; She sniffed. “Were we?”
A small smile edged up a corner of his mouth. “I am certain of it.”
She met his gaze, his perceptive, ever-blue eyes, and she started to smile back.
“Oh, indeed, I am quite terrible with a bow, Finian. But then, you should see me with a blade.”
Chapter 26
The easy, sense-damaging smile expanded across Finian’s face. He approved. Jésu. She was lost. It was hardly his fault she’d fallen so hard. Was he to be disapproving, so as to call up her instincts for self-preservation? Those were bobbing in the Irish Sea, fifty leagues away.
“A blade, ye say?”
Was that incredulity in his voice? Better than pity, and she did appreciate a challenge. There’d been so few to live up to of late. Despite the constant struggle of keeping the business afloat, the last true, blood-pounding challenge had come when the business had been saved, twice, when she was fifteen.
But best not to think of that rescue just now. Or ever again.
“You sound doubtful,” she said instead.
His lips pursed, but his fine eyes contained a smile. An appreciative, if slightly incredulous one. “Not many people can toss a blade, Senna.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Watch,” she said, focusing on the goodness of his smile in this moment, not all the terrible things that could be, that had been, that would, no doubt, be again one day soon.
“Oh, lass. Ye’ve no idea how I watch ye.”
She turned away, her cheeks flushing.
“There’s a meadow ahead,” he said. “Come sunset, it should be filled with—”
“Rabbits.”
She cut wide around the meadow, keeping to the wood, and emerged at the edge of the small clearing. Like a miracle, four or five hares sat in the center. They nibbled at the grass and hopped lightly about in the slanting golden light.
Moving stealthily around a tree trunk, Senna positioned herself in a crouch, squinting against the evening glow. The now-ubiquitous tall grasses hid her as she knelt and pulled the long leather thong from her pouch. Somewhere in the woods, Finian was also fitting his bow. Who would bring down supper first?
She lifted her face and felt the breeze while she pulled out the curved hilt from its sheath, feeling with her fingertips, unconsciously recalling lessons from her youth. Her injured hand healed apace since Finian’s ministrations. And she hardly noticed it now. A long wavy reed brushed against her cheek as she made final adjustments to the curved wood handle in her palm.
Slowly she stood, lifted her arm, elbow bent, blade by her ear. One of the rabbits stopped, his black nose in the air, sniffing madly.
She half closed her eyes, all her attention narrowed into that one small spot. In her mind’s eye, she sighted a line between the blade and her quarry. Her body hummed. The rabbit seemed to freeze. He looked huge. Unmissable.
She snapped her arm forward. The blade hurtled across the clearing, tossing off orange glints as the blade caught and reflected the sunset. Its humming thrummed in her ears, then the rabbit thumped to the ground with nary a sound.
Senna was rather more noisy.
She leapt up and screeched. The remaining rabbits scattered like swarming minnows, and she danced in a wild, high-stepping little circle, laughing. After years of minimal practice, through the turmoil of the past few weeks, and before the uncertain future that was now her life, she could take care of her own needs and survive.
Beholden to no one.
Finian watched from beneath a tree on the opposite side of the clearing. As she floated back into the woods, rosy with pride and clutching the rabbit by the ears, he moved soundlessly to intercept her. Every so often she lifted the rabbit level with her eyes and stared at it with profound satisfaction.
Her grin stretched from ear to ear when he stepped into her path, bow in hand. The sandy yellow haze of sunset lit her in a latticework of golden green dapples.
“Good God, woman,” he said in a husky voice.
She nodded happily. “I know.”
“Ye’re good,” he said. But what he was thinking was, You’re marvelous, magnificent, frightening.
He wanted to pull her to him, make her remember very well what they’d been talking about in the wood, relight the fire in her that would make her body melt for him again. Instead, he simply said, “Very, very good.”
She grinned.
“All I ask is that, next time, ye try to not alert the English garrison in Dublin as to our whereabouts.”
She blushed around her smile. He reached for the rabbit and she passed it over, long ears first.
“That was foolish of me, Finian. I was far too loud. I simply felt so, so…”
“Just so,” Finian echoed, smiling faintly.
She began to reach for the rabbit, but he lifted it into the air, just out of her reach. “Ye brought him down,” he said. “I will clean him up.”
She stood and stared, then her grin grew. “Irishman, I believe you are right.”
He strode back to their camp. “Usually.”
After cleaning and skinning it, he spitted and cooked it over their small fire. Senna leaned so far forward to watch she was practically sitting in his lap. Finian did not ask her to stop.
“Mmm,” she sniffed, her nose in the air. “It smells good.” She pulled her pack close and loosed the leather thong tie. She fumbled inside and extracted a small pouch. “Herbs.”
“Herbs? You’ve got herbs in there?” He tried to peer down into the dark, shapeless leather satchel, but she playfully snatched it away and held it close to her chest, as if to hide the contents. “What else have you got, Senna? I could use a pot, for boiling water.”
“Next time.” She slid the tips of her folded hands into the warmth between her thighs and leaned forward demurely. “For now, you’ll just have to make do.”
With ye? he thought. Make due with her vibrant, spirited, startling self?
This had gone beyond playful flirting; what he was doing with Senna had a rock-hard purpose. He had no idea what it was, but he recognized the feel of it. It was memorable. Like going to war. Like preparing for battle by painting himself for the journey to the afterlife. Like diving off the cliffs near his home into the churning blue sea below when he was fifteen, with his mates, and knew he was invincible.
But still, those moments took decision. The plunge had been intentional. And always, there was no turning back.
He did not want that. He could not swim back up from these depths.
Cutting several slits crosswise along the cooking hare, Finian shoved handfuls of the herb mixture inside the marbled meat, then smeared a thin layer over the outside with his palm. With a flick of his wrist, he turned the hare. A bit of fat dripped off into the fire, where it sizzled and flashed into a brief flame. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Senna lick her lips.
“Ye didn’t seem afraid when the English soldiers came.”
“I wasn’t.” She looked up. “I was terrified.”
He smiled faintly. “But now, now that ye watched me kill them, ye don’t seem too terribly wrought up.”
She didn’t meet his eyes this time. “I raise sheep,” she mumbled. “I’ve hunted rabbits. I’ve seen things die.”
“These weren’t rabbits.”
“I did not learn to throw a knife in order to kill rabbits,” she replied in a clear voice, and looked at him. “But they make good practice targets.”
He turned the rabbit again, very carefully. “Have you killed a man, Senna?” He said it casually, like he might ask if she’d brought the wash in from the line.
There was a long pause. “I’ve done everything once.”
Once? Everything? What on earth did that mean?
He turned the rabbit again, unnecessarily. It would be the most evenly cooked piece of game on earth. He did not ask any more questions.
When it was done, he flipped it onto one of the bordering stones, and when it was cool, they ate with relish, licking their fingers. Then they sa
t in a companionable silence for a while, under the darkening trees.
Soon it would be time to leave the clearing for a few more hours of travel, but for now they sat, the world hung in a bleached transition, timeless and clear. The sky was laced with steel.
“I do believe that was the best meal I’ve ever had, Finian,” she said. He looked over as a deep sigh brought her lush mouth fully into a yawn. She sighed again and slid her hand down her thigh in an unconscious, highly sensuous movement. Finian wrenched his eyes away.
She was alone in the world, and far too easy to take advantage of.
Too stunning in spirit, too comely in form to trust his motives around. He might lose his wits, go mad like his father, let her tromp all over him, rip his heart out one day when she decided someone else had more of whatever it was she wanted.
Women wanted. ’Twas their nature. Their duplicitous, fomenting, desirable nature. He’d learned that the long, hard way. No more lessons, ever again.
Chapter 27
They sat quietly in the growing darkness, Senna sitting with her knees clasped between her arms, Finian flat on his back as twilight took its flat, pale shape.
Shades of pearly gray and pale blue slunk across the bowl overhead, but under the trees, it was darkly shadowed. The birds had stopped chirping. A frog could be heard in the distance, searching for a mate.
An owl swept low over their clearing, his big round eyes reflecting moonlight as he searched for prey. A tiny bat skittered and clicked in a jittery trajectory overhead.
“What made ye come to Éire, Senna?” Finian asked, breaking the silence.
Senna jumped at the sound of his voice, although he’d spoken quietly enough, in that low, resonant voice which did not carry far into the air, but deep into her. Like it was made of earth.
She’d felt it the other night, too—it seemed a year ago—when he’d stood beside her in the bailey, his hand hooked over her shoulder. He’d murmured to her in that soil-voice, and it felt like he was breathing for her.
