Dark Warrior (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour)

by Julie Shelton

  And she wanted that more than she’d ever wanted anything in her life. She wanted to feel him inside her, taking her with love, vanquishing forever the lingering memories of the brutal assault inflicted upon her by Robert Walford.

  “Love me, Nicholas,” she pleaded, her voice dark and throbbing with an arousal so deep she was trembling from head to toe.

  His heart twisted. “I do love you,” he breathed, his voice raw with the force of that love.

  “Nay, I mean—make love to me.”

  Shaken to his core by her request, he loosened his embrace and drew back his head, looking down at her full, swollen breasts, nipples pink and hard and pebbled like ripe berries. In the flickering light, he could just barely make out the faint bruises and teeth marks still marring her creamy skin. Almost afraid to touch her, he lifted his hand to palm one breast, kneading gently, stroking his thumb across her hard, aching peak.

  She sucked in her breath as pure pleasure zinged straight from her nipple to her womb, clenching and pulsing into a tightening spiral of raw, animal need. Her eyes fluttered shut as she arched into him, thrusting her breast more deeply into his large hand.

  Christ! He loved seeing her like this, so aroused, so responsive to his touch. “Are you certain, beloved? We have not waited the requisite four days.”

  “I am more than certain. Four days is too long. I want you now, Nicholas. I need you. Now.”

  His face was mere inches from hers, hard, masculine, darkly compelling. “God’s teeth, Kathryn, I love you so much. I have not words to tell you how much.”

  Her lips curved slowly upward in an impish smile that sent his heart slamming against his ribs. “Then, mayhap you could just…show me,” she suggested, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. Moisture was leaking from her sex, dripping down her thighs. Preparing her body to receive him. Readying her for his imminent invasion.

  His grin was primal. Wildly primitive. Pure arrogant male. His voice rasped with wicked promise as he said, “Mayhap that could be arranged. But first,” he began quietly, stroking her upper arm with his big, callused hand, “before we merge our bodies, we must discuss what happened to you nine nights ago.”

  She stiffened. A tiny sound of protest escaped from her lips, but she spoke no words.

  “I already know some of the things that bastard Walford did to you. I need to know the rest.”

  She turned her head, burying her face against the bronze column of his neck to hide her shame. High spots of color stained her cheeks. “Nay, Nicholas, ’Tis not meet for me to discuss this with you. ’Tis too shameful.”

  “Sweetheart, ’twas not your fault,” Nicholas went on passionately. “You asked for naught of what happened to you. You deserved naught of it. The burden of shame is not yours to bear, beloved. It is your father’s for making you an unwitting pawn in his ruinous wager. The sin is not yours, but Walford’s. Now…I know he took your maidenhead, but there are things I know not. And I am asking you to trust me enough to tell me. After you do, we need never speak of this again, unless you wish it. But you will never be free of it—nor free from him—until you tell me everything. You must speak of it, beloved. Otherwise it will haunt you—haunt both of us—for the rest of our lives. Is it not better to quit yourself of this burden now?”

  She simply lay there, breath held, waiting, for what, she didn’t know. She felt his arms tighten around her briefly, then loosen again, as he resumed his stroking. Her throat thickened with unshed tears. Suffused with shame, she held herself stiff, unable to move. Unable to speak. Barely able to breathe.

  He kissed her forehead, inhaled the rose-lavender scent of her hair and fresh, clean skin. The feel of her warm, soft curves in his arms sent a hot tide of hunger surging through his veins. It was a hunger that went way beyond just the physical desire for coupling. A hunger that tugged at his very soul. If he didn’t have her to love, to cherish, to care for, his soul would eventually shrivel up and turn to dust. How this was possible after only the span of a few days, he knew not. But he accepted it without question.

  When she didn’t speak, he sighed. “I need to know, beloved, what caused the damage to your throat. I have my suspicions, but I need to know. It will help me protect you when I finally do make love to you.” When she didn’t respond right away, he went on in that low, seductive voice that sent an aching heat pooling between her legs. “You see, Kathryn, I want to love you in every way possible for a man to love a woman. I want to pleasure your entire body with my hands and my mouth and my cock. But some of the things I want to do to you might frighten you. They might trigger bad memories of the things Walford did to you. Things that had naught to do with love, or even sex. Only evil and depravity. I would not have my loving frighten you in any way, beloved—or make you feel shame.”

  For a split second, her body seemed to grow even more rigid, but then, with a shuddering sigh, she released her pent-up breath, and with it the cascade of horrible memories of the night Robert Walford, the Duke of Pemberton, had come to her bedchamber and tried to destroy her.

  Once she began speaking, in that rough voice that would forevermore be a part of her, the words came pouring out of her like rainwater pouring out of a gargoyle’s mouth, spilling all over themselves in a torrent of pain and ugliness.

  “He—he came to me in my bedchamber the night before we were to be w–wed. I had met him for the first time, not an hour before. I had just arrived from the convent where I’d been living for the past four years. He raped me, over and over.

  “I screamed and screamed, but nobody came.” Tears were coursing silently down her cheeks, thickening her voice. She tried to control her sobs, which were threatening to overwhelm her. “Nobody came,” she repeated after a moment in a voice filled with raw grief. She swiped her face with the heel of her hand.

  Nicholas just held her, his heart aching for her. He nuzzled his cheek against her hair. “I’m sorry, beloved,” he kept murmuring over and over. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It was awful. So awful—” She stopped again. “I–I vomited—all over him. That’s when he started beating and kicking me, screaming at me and calling me horrible names.” She shivered, but was helpless to stop the flow of violent words and images.

  “I finally managed to grab an iron candlestick off the bedside stand. Before he realized what I was up to, I brought it down on top of his head as hard as I could. He yelled and I hit him again, and again.

  “He fell on top of me and—” She sagged against his chest, her strength gone, drained away by the trauma of having to relive her ordeal. Her voice weakened to a whisper so soft he had to strain to hear her. “I thought I was going to suffocate, he was so heavy. It took all the strength I had to get out from under him. He didn’t move. And his head was bleeding all over me and the sheets.

  “I knew not if he was alive or dead. And I cared naught either way, because I knew my life was over. All I could think of was getting away. I knew I was covered with blood and his seed, but I dared not take the time to clean myself up, lest he awaken and attack me again. So I stole some clothes from one of the pages sleeping in the Hall. And some clogs from the stables. And I ran.

  “I had no friends, no relatives, no place to go. Walford already knew about the convent where I’d been living, so I dared not go there. Whatever my personal feelings toward the nuns, I could not put them in that kind of danger. I decided to head for London, thinking to pass myself off as a boy, and disappear into the crowds. I traveled mostly at night. I knew to stay off the roads. But I had to sleep eventually. The first day I slept in a haystack, the second day in a deserted barn. The third day I covered myself with leaves and branches in the forest.”

  With great effort, she sat up straight, reluctantly lifting her body away from the seductive comfort of his embrace. “That’s when your hunting party found me,” she said, looking straight into his eyes. “I thought I was well hidden, but your hounds—found me, and—”

  “And praise God they did,” Nicholas s
aid fervently, lifting her hand and turning it to press a kiss against her palm. “Had they not found you, you most likely would have died that night or the next day. You were burning up with fever. It took every bit of knowledge and skill that Sir Richard and Ellen had to keep you alive.” He gave her hand a gentle squeeze, and with another sigh, he asked, “Who scourged you, beloved?”

  Answering his sigh with one of her own, she looked away from him. “The nuns. For all my sins, real or imagined.” She paused. “They claimed that they had to mortify my body in order to cleanse my soul of hidden sin. I now think they did it because they loved it. I believe it was their one joy in life.” She sighed. “So now you know everything,” she whispered, a weary, desolate little sound.

  “Aye.” He brushed his callused finger across her lower lip. “Thank you, beloved, for being so brave. I can only imagine how difficult it was for you to relive your nightmare for me.”

  “It doesn’t…disgust you? Knowing how soiled I am? Knowing—”

  Stopping her words with his fingers over her lips, Nicholas swore softly beneath his breath. “Never dare think such a thing,” he demanded indignantly, before softening his voice to a low croon. “Naught about you could ever disgust me, my angel. You were attacked and ill-used, but in no way soiled.” He kissed her hand. “I love you, Kathryn. I have never loved anyone more in my entire life.”

  She looked up at him without speaking, her body tingling all over with arousal. In her dreams, he had awakened her body to a pleasure beyond her wildest imaginings. And she knew only one thing. She wanted more. Much more. She wanted him. Here. Now. She wanted everything he had to give her. And she would answer in kind, giving him every last scrap of herself. She was his. Wholly, totally his.

  As she sagged back into the featherbed, he pulled her against him and she went with a sigh of deepest contentment. He kissed the top of her head and simply held her.

  He loved holding her. Touching her. He loved the golden silk of her hair, so cool against his skin. He loved her delicate face, that button nose and her pointed little chin. Those wide green eyes, sparkling with humor, framed by thick golden lashes. He loved the shape of her, the size of her, and the way her soft, sweet body melted against him so perfectly. He loved her small, full breasts, the enticing curves of her ass and hips.

  He tightened his arms around her, burying his face against the damp satin skin of her neck, inhaling her scent deeply into his lungs. His. His woman. His…and Rolf’s—if he could only convince the two of them that it was meant to be. But he would have to tread carefully there. One thing, however, was certain. He would give his life before Robert Walford ever touched another hair on her head.

  He looked down at her, his eyes glittering like shards of black ice. Very deliberately he shifted his position, sliding his big muscular body down toward the foot of the bed. When his head was even with her thighs, he rose up and moved between her legs. Hands beneath her thighs, he lifted them and spread them wide, opening up her sex to his incendiary gaze.

  “Nay, Nicholas!” It was little more than a squeak. Scandalized, she tried to push him away. “Wha–what are you doing?”

  “Giving you pleasure, my love.” Leaning forward, he blew on her moist curls, sending a jolt of pure pleasure so deep within her, she gasped in shock at the exquisite sensation. “More pleasure than you ever dreamed possible.”

  She stopped pushing.

  Raising her right leg, he blazed a trail of ravishing kisses up her calf, over the sensitive skin behind her knees, across the tender flesh of her inner thighs. He kissed and licked and nibbled until her muscles were quivering with weakness. “Sweet Jesu, beloved, you smell so delicious.”

  She was whimpering, fisting the bedclothes, wriggling her hips with helpless abandon as her arousal spiked. Her heart was hammering so fast she feared it would burst through her chest.

  He pushed her trembling legs wider apart. Stretching out flat on his belly between them, he propped himself up on his forearms.

  She lifted her head off the pillow to look at him. The sight of his black head between her wide open thighs sent a shaft of excruciating pleasure stabbing through her, straight to her clenching womb. Her womb convulsed with pleasure at the erotic vision. Holy Mary, Mother of God! Never in all her years of watching people engaging in the sex act, had she ever witnessed Peter de Quincy or any of the other knights doing this to any of their paramours. Never in her wildest imaginings had she ever envisioned a lover doing this to her. Just the thought of his mouth on her…down there…Blessed Virgin! The thought was so…so…carnal! She felt like she was going to burst into flames any second. Slick heat moistened the rippling walls of her sheath.

  His nose brushed against her sopping curls as he breathed deeply, drawing her feminine scent into the very bottom of his lungs. She let out a yelp at the exquisite sensation.

  “Christ, love, you smell wonderful,” he rasped, “like lavender and ripe apricots and pure, sensual woman.” He inhaled again, burrowing his nose more deeply into her slit. When he raised his head, the sheen of her pearly juices shone on his nose and mustache. “Look at me, love,” he commanded.

  Breath held, she lifted her gaze to collide with the black diamond glitter of his. The hunger she saw there raced across her skin like wildfire. Her breath hitched almost painfully. She was shaking all over. She stared at him through the haze of an arousal so fierce she was dizzy with it.

  “Do you know what I’m going to do to you?” he asked

  She licked her lips. “Nay.” Her voice was a frayed thread of sound.

  “I am going to put my mouth on you and feast on you until you spend.” His voice sent shivers of anticipation racing up and down her body. Her hips lifted, seeking the pleasure she knew was coming, desperately begging for the scorching heat of his touch.

  “I am going to fuck you with my tongue.” His eyes were so black no light reflected there. “Do you want that?”

  “Oh, aye! God! Aye!” Her hands gripped the bedclothes. She was writhing, bucking her hips in silent entreaty.

  “Say it, Kathryn. Tell me what you want.”

  “You!” she cried. “I want you to—to fuck me with your tongue!” By now she was sobbing uncontrollably as need ravaged her senses. “Oh, God, I want that. I need that. Do it, Nicholas! Please!” It was a fierce demand for him to put his mouth on her glistening slit.

  “Oh, aye, sweetheart,” he said, satisfaction filling his voice. He gave her a lascivious grin. “I’m going to do it. I’m going to eat you alive. And you’re going to watch me.”

  The breath left her body in a harsh exhale. Pleasure spasmed through her.

  He parted her with his thumbs and bent to place a kiss on the fleshy folds just peeking out from between her wet, swollen lips.

  “Unhhh–h–h–h!” The breathy cry was wrenched from her as she arched violently up off the bed. Blessed Virgin!

  He parted her wet outer folds, slick with her gushing juices, revealing the wet slippery channel with the hard little pleasure nubbin at the top and the beckoning portal of her cunt beneath. He touched the hyper-sensitive little bud with the fluttering tip of his tongue and began to circle it lazily.

  “Hngh! Hngh! Hngh!” Her breathing was harsh, coming in short sharp pants. She opened her mouth to shriek, but jolts of pure pleasure robbed her of the necessary breath, leaving only weak, breathless cries in their wake. Her eyes closed defenselessly. She was going to die from this.

  “Watch me, beloved,” he commanded as he began flicking his tongue rapidly and firmly back and forth across her little kernel of ecstasy. “Know who is pleasuring you.”

  “Hngh–h–h–h!” Her hips erupted off the bed, thrusting against his face as she screamed out her pleasure. She was lost in the wonder of the thrilling sensations coursing through her.

  Chuckling deep in his throat, Nicholas spread her labia wider and pressed the flat of his tongue all the way into her furrow, licking hard up the entire length from her opening to the tiny, thro
bbing button of flesh just above it.

  Another raw scream of mindless pleasure was ripped from her throat. “God, Nicholas! That’s so—that’s so—”

  He reached beneath her and gripped the firm globes of her buttocks, lifting her hips, pushing his face into her creaming, gushing sex. And then he was feasting on her, sucking, licking, slurping noisily as though she were a banquet and he were a starving beggar. He flicked his tongue across her throbbing, pulsating pearl, closing his lips over it, pulling it into his wicked mouth.

  She was sobbing and moaning, pressing her feet flat against the mattress, bucking her hips wildly against him, pressing her slick folds hard against his foraging tongue, reaching for the completion that was just out of reach. She tightened, hurtling blindly toward the fiery abyss.

  And just as she was about to burst into flames, he backed off, wiping his dripping mustache and goatee against her inner thighs. “Nicholas!” she howled, panting in frustration. She tried desperately to grind her hips against him, but he held her still with his hard hands, easing her away from her climax.

  “Nay! Nay! Do not stop! Oh, God, Nicholas, don’t stop!” She was begging, her hands coming up to grab his head, trying to—” Hngh–h–h–h!” A scream locked in her throat as he slid his rasping tongue down her succulent slit. He pushed inside her opening, stabbing her with his tongue, fucking her with it, thrusting it in and out as hot ecstasy pulsed through her.

  The thick, slippery juices of her bottomless lust gushed from deep within her cunt and he lapped them up like a cat lapping up cream, burying his face in the melting honey of her slit. “God, beloved! You taste so good!” he cried against her.

  She could feel the exquisite tension coiling anew. Desperate to come, she sank her fingers into the soft thickness of his inky black hair. Holding his head against her creaming sex, she moaned and writhed violently against his mouth, never wanting this ecstasy to end.

  Abruptly, he pulled out of her fluttering sheath and she screamed in protest. She clutched at him frantically, trying to pull him back in. “Oh, my God, Nicholas,” she moaned, tears flowing down her cheeks. “By all that is holy, don’t stop. Please don’t stop. Please.”