A curse, lewd, inventive and rasping with Gaelic, fanned the tendrils of hair at Cate’s temple. The forearm across her neck was released so quickly that air returned to her lungs with a choking, whistling gasp.
“Have you no more sense than to come to a man’s room in the middle of the night?” Ross demanded against her ear.
“I thought,” she began, before swallowing against the dry constriction and trying again. “I thought you would be asleep.”
“So I was, until I heard your kitten scratching. I bid fair to warn you, sweet Cate, if you’ve come to soothe my fevered brow this time, ’tis not what’s needful.”
“And what is?”
She could almost think she felt the same shudder run over him that shook her. Or it could be he shivered with cold. The chamber was chill and damp, with no hint of a fire, and he was quite, quite naked as he held her against him.
“Nothing you would be ready to supply,” he said after a moment.
“How can you say so when you…when you don’t know why I came?”
“If this is a game—”
“No! No, I only want what other women are allowed.”
“And that would be?”
“To be loved.”
“Loved.” That single word sounded strangled in his throat.
“There is so little time before the wedding. You said…” She paused to moisten dry lips. “You said you could, and would.”
“And it must be now, given that you are here? Now, before the wedding?”
Tears drained down the back of her throat and she had to swallow again before she could speak. “So it seems, else it may not be done at all. If you won’t…”
“Oh, I will,” he said, his voice thick as he pressed closer against her so she felt the firm, hot length of him through her skirts. “But you understand this is nothing you can set aside if you change your mind? Once done, why, ’tis done.”
“I know that well,” she said simply. “Do it now, while you can.”
The words had scarce left her lips before he took them. His mouth was warm and questing, slightly open so he tasted her like sipping new wine, taking her flavor, giving her his. He pushed back the hood of her cloak, threaded his fingers into her hair and tilted her head to gain deeper access.
The surfaces of her lips tingled; she caught his sweetness as she inhaled in intense gratification. He swept the inside of her mouth again and again in vital possession, feathering the fine and sensitive inner lining of her cheeks, grazing the edges of her teeth, touching her tongue and retreating. As she advanced to meet him, he shifted so his thigh was between hers, and shoved a hand inside her cloak to draw her closer.
His scent of hot, aroused male surrounded her. The curling hair that mantled his chest was soft and springing under her hands. She flatted her palms against it, enjoying the feel of it between her spread fingers. Her breasts swelled, straining against her gown, while a moan vibrated in her throat.
He slid his mouth away, bent his neck to rest his forehead against hers. “Stop me, Cate,” he said in both plea and warning. “Stop me now, or it will be too late.”
“It was too late when I opened your door.”
“Aye,” he said in gruff acceptance. “Aye.”
He bent to slide one hard arm under her knees and the other behind her back. The darkness swooped and spun behind her closed eyelids as she was lifted against his chest. The effect made her so giddy that it was a moment before she realized he had set her on the edge of his bed and was stripping away her cloak.
His movements were sure even in the dark. A man’s cloak was very like a woman’s, no doubt, yet she could not but wonder how many women he had undressed that he went about it so easily. Her gown, borrowed from Gwynne along with the cloak, was loose and without a girdle. He caught the hem, pushed his hands beneath it. Shoving the fabric upward so it gathered on his forearms, he slid his palms and spread fingers over her knees and then up her thighs. His thumbs met at the juncture, where they tangled in fine curls. He spread delicate folds and played among them.
The sensation was so startling, so exquisite, that she swayed toward him, clinging to his arms. He drew her up with his hands still under her gown, caressed her hips, clasping the rounded flesh like a miser clasping handfuls of gold. Then, in an abrupt move, he shoved the gown up, and her shift with it, stripping both off over her head. Before she could catch her breath or do more than gasp at the cold, he pressed her back onto the bed and followed after her, hot skin against her coolness, stonelike muscle and sinew against her softness, heated hardness against her soft curves and moist hollows. He reached for a coverlet padded with feathers, lofting it so it settled over them. Then he shifted over on the feather mattress and pulled her beneath him.
“Are you cold?” he asked, while nuzzling her neck, dragging handfuls of her hair from under her shoulders so its pull on her scalp was lessened.
“Not…not really.” How could she be, when his heat enclosed her where she was half submerged in the softness of the feather mattress, and his hard body, faintly rough with hair on his chest, thighs and legs, pressed upon her with delicious friction?
“You’re shivering, but never fear. I’ll warm you.”
Oh, yes, she knew he would, as he slid lower in the bed, his head disappearing beneath the coverlet while he tracked a line of moist, hot kisses down her neck, to the hollow between her collarbones, and between the twin hills of her breasts. He made a wet path between them, climbed in a spiral to the peak of one and then down again, began on the other. He flicked her nipples with his tongue, back and forth, while they contracted to near painful tightness, and then, only then, did he take one into the heated suction of his mouth.
She arched beneath him with a shrill cry, pressing her heels into the mattress in the need to be closer. She wanted him inside her, needed him to fill the empty ache there.
He was not ready, not done. It seemed he had only begun.
He moved lower, rasping across the flat surface of her belly with his beard stubble, soothing the scrape with mouth and tongue before the sting began. He inhaled her, blew upon her with his hot breath. With his tongue gently lapping, he delved into the fine curls at the juncture of her thighs, then spread her legs wide to lie between them while he concentrated his caresses, feasting, applying suction, endlessly tasting.
She writhed, the breath sobbing in her chest, while he learned her inside and out, or so it seemed. In her extremity, she trailed her fingers through his hair, spanned his shoulders with feverish hands and explored the width of his back. She was captivated by the hard planes of his body, so different from her own, by the sinuous muscles that seemed to enwrap him like a living shield, by the lethal power of him. He was silk over steel, dominant yet supplicating as he whispered commands, guided her movements, placed her as he wanted her. His mastery was complete as the fury of her need burgeoned inside, bursting upon her in pulsing wonder, leaving her panting and breathless.
Rising over her again, he offered his mouth. Mindless, mindless, she took it, drew his tongue into the depths of her own, wanting more of him, all of him, needing something that hovered unrecognized, just beyond her grasp. She was on fire, melting inside, so heated at the very core that it seemed nothing could soothe the burning ache of it.
He could. He did.
At the very zenith of her most virulent need, he pressed into her moist heat, taking yet giving in slow incursions, withdrawing so she could release the breath she held, doing it again and again until she grasped his hips and dragged him to her again, urging him deeper against the burning sting of it. She sobbed aloud as he broke through the deep internal barrier of her maiden-head and filled her, made her whole.
He set a gentle pace then, a slow friction that made her turn her head from side to side, crying out, wanting more, wanting the wonder yet again. The coverlet slipped away unnoticed while they strained together in elemental need. And when she reached for him again, he pressed her knees wide and gave her everyt
hing, sinking so deep that the hardness of bone rubbed against the soft mound of her. He drew back, and then gave himself to her again, and yet again.
It was perfect, a tumultuous pummeling, ever increasing in speed and strength. They moved together with soft thuds that set the bed to rocking on its leather straps, and swayed the bed curtains until they fanned their heated bodies. Every plunge sent waves of pleasure rolling through her, taking away all strain and fear. She met him with stringent effort while seeking for the promise she had been shown, longing for it in simple lust, giving infinitely in order to receive it. And he brought it to her with tireless strength, gave it to her in boundless generosity and sweating effort, as gift and glory.
Afterward, she clung to him with tears sliding from under her eyelids. She tasted the salt of his skin at his neck with a private kiss, pressed her face against his warm skin while she inhaled the raw scent of him, his essential maleness. She absorbed the feel of him into her skin, her bones, the center of her being. She memorized him, this man who had given her such pleasure as she thought never to know again.
She said goodbye.
Ross lay half stunned with satiation, hovering on the edge of an urge for sleep so strong it almost dragged him down into it. The only thing that prevented it was his perplexed amazement. If not for holding Cate’s warm and naked body to his side, he’d have thought the past space of time an unusually fervid dream.
She had come to him.
Against all hope or reason, she had appeared in his chamber with the same thing on her mind that had scarce left his for days on end. She had asked to be loved, and he had obliged her with hardly a coherent thought, because there was nothing else on earth he had ever wanted so much.
Not that it meant anything of great moment. Nay, of course not. They had been thrown into each other’s company, each other’s arms. The prospect of a bedding—the assumption that it would happen—had been there from the first. Some at court were sure it had occurred during the dark and cold of a night spent in the forest. That it had finally come to pass now was a simple matter of two people taking their pleasure, as would soon be their right and duty as husband and wife. No unruly passion came into it, no heart-burning adoration as depicted by poets.
Still, a swift wedding seemed a thing greatly to be wished.
The lady lying so close against him jerked a little as she drew breath. Concern rose inside Ross as he felt wet heat where her cheek rested on his collarbone. Could she be crying? It was not the reaction he usually inspired in the women he took into his bed.
“Are you all right?” He reached to draw up the coverlet as he asked it, covering them and tucking the excess behind her back.
She gave a quick nod but didn’t speak. The conviction grew upon him that she could not without betraying her distress. As carefully as he was able, he brushed tangled strands of hair away from her face. “I never meant to hurt you. I should have gone easier with you this first time.”
“How…how do you know it was my first?” she asked, the words choked as she stiffened in his hold.
“There are ways.” He continued to comb her hair with his fingers. “You were very…tight.”
“I can’t help that!”
“Nay,” he said, his voice grave, though laughter threatened to invade it, “and I’m not complaining, I promise you.”
“Oh.”
“’Twill be easier next time.”
“If there is a next time.”
He paused in his movements while his heart gave a heavy thud. “If?”
“Never mind. I’m sure it will be quite all right.”
It was that damnable curse of the Graces again, he was sure of it. She believed he would not live to see another time. He was not given to auguries and portents, but her certainty made him just a bit uneasy.
Was that why she had come to his chamber—because she meant to have this time with him before he died, because she thought he was due it? The notion was even less welcome.
Not that he had any right to complain. He had taken her up on her request for reasons that went beyond mere lust. He’d longed for her, longed to prevent a brutal initiation from Trilborn. Ross was glad beyond reason that he had been the first with her. And it had little to do with the feud, though awareness of it was always at the back of his mind. He loathed the thought of Trilborn forcing himself on her, causing her more pain and injury. That the bastard would have was certain; to take his enemy’s bride-to-be would give Trilborn a twisted satisfaction.
How was Ross to explain that to Cate? He could not even try. He would wind up sounding as if excusing his weakness, or worse, accusing Trilborn of intending no more than he had just done himself.
At least he knew a way to take her mind from thoughts of death. It was not entirely selfless, but that could not be helped; he did not pretend to sainthood. She had been so sweetly responsive that his body stirred to the point of pain at the mere thought of his aim. She was every soft and tender thing that had been absent from his life for so long, every honeyed joy he had ever tasted. More than that, she was here beside him, warm under the coverlet, sublimely naked in his arms.
“Ah, well,” he drawled as he turned more fully toward her, nudged his knee between her legs the better to press his heated hardness against her while enjoying her wet softness, “if I am to pass away before—”
“Don’t say that!” she said, her voice thick and her fingers clenching in the springing hair on his chest.
He winced and reached to take her hand, placing it on his flank. With it out of the way, he cupped her breast, bent his head to wet the nipple and then blow upon it, smiling as it budded for him. “If I am to pass away,” he repeated, with his lips brushing the peachlike treasure he held, “I may as well taste again the one pleasure I will most sorely miss.”
11
Cake woke in her own bed, in the chamber she shared with Marguerite. It seemed wrong. Lying there, staring at the ceiling, she could not remember making her way back through the sleeping palace.
Ah, yes. That was because she had not.
In a wash of sudden heat, she recalled Ross sliding from his bed the night before and padding to a basin, returning with a cloth. He had cleansed her with such thorough care that she’d almost moaned with the arousing nature of it except she feared he would think her in pain. Afterward, he had found her shift and straightened it before putting it over her head. That process had taken some time, as he seemed reluctant to actually cover any important portion of her body. He had dressed her completely once, only to strip everything away again and pull her into his arms.
They had slept the sleep of exhaustion afterward, slept until cockcrow. In the gray dawn, he had thrown on his own clothes, then tossed her shift and gown over her head, flung her cloak around her in haste and carried her back to her chamber. He’d kissed her and left her there, left her to slip into bed beside Marguerite where she belonged.
Where she belonged? It did not seem so, not any longer.
Cate stretched in the bed, easing muscles she had not known could become strained. She felt exquisitely tender in myriad places, sore inside yet replete. She should feel some shame for what she had done, or so the nuns would surely tell her, but she could not. She was fiercely glad she had gone to Ross. She knew now what passed between a man and a woman.
Yes, she knew, and the thought that she might never have it again was so painful she turned to her side, drew up her knees and pulled the coverlet over her head. Tears burned behind her nose, but did not seep under her tightly shut eyelids. What prevented them was the sudden realization that she could be with child. As with Isabel, a new life could be quickening inside her.
Ah, no, not like Isabel. In contrast to her sister with Rand Braesford, Cate did not love Ross, nor did he love her. What lay between them was lust of the kind the priests railed against. It was a thing of the flesh rather than the spirit, of bodies aflame and hands touching and grasping; of kisses so deep they were an exchange of life’s breath,
and of purest animal coupling. There was nothing of the distant worship of the knight for his lady as was described in the annals of courtly love.
No, indeed not. They were neither of them in love.
“Are you still abed, Cate?”
Marguerite banged into the chamber as she made that inquiry, bringing with her a rush of cold air that smelled of the fresh outdoors. Cate moaned a little at such rude energy.
Quick footsteps approached the bed, and the curtains were flung open. “The morning is half-gone, and a fine one it is, with promise of sunshine. You will miss it if you don’t bestir yourself. You’ve already neglected to wave farewell to one of your favorites.”
Cate sat up, moving with more speed than grace. She was naked under the coverlet, but Marguerite would not mind, as she slept in the same state of nature. “Which favorite would that be?”
“Trilborn, my dear,” her sister answered with laughing irony. “Are you not pleased?”
Cate sighed with relief as she reached to push a pillow behind her back. For a moment she had feared that Ross…but it was not so. “Dare we hope he will be away for some time?”
“We may, indeed.” Marguerite went on to give the latest palace tittle-tattle, which said Henry had been closeted with the nobleman for some little time the evening before, and his departure was the result.
“What passed between them, I wonder.”
“It’s said Lord Trilborn is to visit every manse and castle between here and the northern marches, letting them know the number of men and arms Henry expects to have supplied to him in the event of rebellion. It’s this business of the pretender. Many claim it’s naught but a farce, while others predict armies upon the roads come summer.”
A shiver feathered down Cate’s spine. “Surely not.”
Her sister looked grave, as well she might after a childhood made terrible by reports of battles where men were slaughtered like cattle, followed by grisly executions of traitors. “I tell you only what I’ve heard. And there is more.”
By Grace Possessed Page 15
