When she dropped back onto her heels, he held her face in his hands and ran a thumb along her cheek. “You need only tell me if you change your mind.”
Did he not want this as much as she did?
“But I hope to God you won’t,” he said before the uneasy feeling could take hold. Then he scooped her up in his arms and held her across his chest.
Their eyes were locked as he dropped to his knees and lay her down on the makeshift pallet. As his mouth met hers, she felt as though she were still sinking back. The kiss was warm and deep, their tongues moving against each other.
When he broke away, she would have complained—except that the kisses he ran along the side of her face felt so good. A deep sigh escaped her, and she gave herself over to following the course of his lips. He pressed kisses along her jaw and behind her ear. As he moved down her neck, he unfastened her cloak and pushed it off her shoulders.
“I love this spot, right here,” he said and ran his tongue along the hollow above her collarbone.
She forgot she wore her brother’s clothes until she felt the warmth of Stephen’s breath through the cloth at her throat. Wanting to feel his mouth against her skin, she began tugging at the tunic and shirt that were in the way.
“Let me,” he said, taking hold of her hands. “Please.”
Grinning, he rose to his knees, unfastened his cloak, and tossed it in the corner. He lifted her tunic and began to pull her shirt out of her leggings ever so slowly. The smooth linen fabric moved against her skin, followed by a rush of cool air.
She would never have guessed that his lips, his tongue, his loose hair, would feel so good against the bare skin of her belly. As he inched his way slowly upward, exposing more skin as he went, she felt a tightening in her womb.
Oh, my. She shivered with the sensations racing through her body. When he abruptly stopped and pulled her shirt back over her stomach, she opened her eyes wide.
Stephen was on his hands and knees above her, a frown of concern on his face. “You are cold.”
“Nay, I am not,” she said.
The brocade of his tunic felt rough under her fingers as she took hold of it and pulled him down. Despite the deep, lingering kiss she gave him, he held his body away from hers.
“I want to feel you against me,” she whispered.
“Oh, Isobel,” he said, sliding down beside her and burying his face in her neck, “you will undo me.”
He held her tight against him so that she could feel his warmth from her head to her toes. She pressed her face against him, blocking out the faint smell of rotting apples from the orchard and the heavier smell of mildewed thatch. She wanted to breathe in only his scent. Horse and healthy sweat and wool and leather. And just Stephen.
When he kissed her this time, he did not hold back. The passion exploded between them. She wrapped her arms around him and pressed against him until a blade of grass could not have fit between them. And still, she was not close enough.
When he rolled on top of her, he felt so good that she tore her mouth away to tell him. Before she could form the words, he slid down her body, kissing her through the cloth until, again, he found bare skin. His mouth felt as good on her belly as the first time.
As he moved upward, she breathed, “Don’t stop this time.”
He moved so slowly that her breasts were aching for his touch long before he got to them. Hardly aware of what she was doing, she ran her own hands over them. She heard Stephen groan and felt his large, warm hands cover hers.
“Jesus, Isobel,” he whispered, “you cannot expect me to go slowly when you do that.”
“Must you go slowly?”
He gave a half-strangled sound and lifted one of her hands to press his mouth against her palm. When he ran his tongue in a circle over it, she felt her nipple harden through the fabric beneath her other hand. She drew in a sharp breath as he ran his thumb along the underside of her breast.
“Mmmmm,” came from her throat as he dragged his tongue along the line his thumb had just traveled. She arched her back, lifting her breasts to him.
“Aye,” she breathed as his other hand slid under her shirt, and “aye,” again, when it finally covered her breast.
The rough skin of his thumb over her nipple sent ripples of sensation down to the depths of her belly.
She meant to offer another word of encouragement. But then he rolled her nipple between his finger and thumb, and the sounds that came from her lips would not shape themselves into words. She felt the warm wetness of his mouth on her other nipple and was lost in a swirl of sensation.
How did he know how she wanted to be touched before she knew it herself? The more he touched her, the greater was her need. Never, never did she imagine it would be like this.
He pulled her up to a sitting position, and they leaned against each other, both breathing hard.
“Stephen, that felt…” She tried, but she could not find words to describe it.
“Can we take this off?” he asked, fingering the bottom edge of her tunic.
“You first,” she surprised herself by saying.
He rewarded her with a wide grin that lit up his eyes. Before she knew it, he whipped off his tunic and shirt together in one quick movement and sat before her bare-chested.
She drew in a long breath as she ran her eyes over the hard muscles of his chest. How many other women had looked at him like this and found him so beautiful it made them ache? She would not let herself think of those other women now. Today he was hers and no other’s.
She reached out and ran possessive hands over his chest, feeling the roughness of hair over the sinewy muscle and warm skin. This close, she could see that black hairs were interspersed with the curly auburn hair on his chest. She followed the hair down to his flat belly.
Would it feel as good to him as it had to her to kiss him there? When she dropped her head to try, he gripped her shoulders and pulled her up onto his chest. She feared she’d done something wrong—until he smashed his mouth against hers.
“Your clothes now. All of them, off,” he gasped against her ear. “I need to feel you naked against me.”
She lifted her arms without a word and let him pull shirt and tunic over her head.
“My God, you are beautiful.”
A small voice in the back of her head asked how a man who’d seen so many women’s breasts could manage to sound awed. When he lifted his gaze to her face, though, he looked as though he meant it. Whatever he might think later, right now he wanted no one but her. It was enough.
When Stephen gathered her into his arms again, she understood. Skin to skin, it had to be. His chest felt so good against her bare breasts she had to close her eyes to bear it. The kiss he gave her was at once so gentle and so full of longing she felt as if he were squeezing her heart in his hands.
Stephen, Stephen, Stephen. No other man could kiss like this, she was sure.
A surge of lust ran through her that had her rubbing herself against him like a cat. Without lifting his mouth from hers, he rolled her until she felt the scratch of the wool blanket beneath her back. She ran her hands over him, reveling in the feel of skin and tight muscle beneath her fingers.
He kissed her throat, then moved down to suckle first one breast and then the other. Sensations tore through her until she was arching against him and begging for she knew not what.
When he began to ease down the top of her leggings, she felt a moment of panic. ’Twas a serious sin she was about to commit. At least she broke no vow, in this brief respite between marriages.
It was possible Stephen could get her with child. But how likely from just one time? Not once did she conceive in all her years of marriage. Surely the risk was small. In any case, she would be married soon enough.
Stephen ran his tongue along her abdomen, wiping all such thoughts and fears from her mind. If she never felt this reckless joy and passion again, she would have it now.
She lifted her hips to help him slide the leggings down.
As he pulled off first one leg, then the other, he paused to kiss her thigh, her knee, her calf. He sucked her toe into his mouth as he ran his hand slowly up the inside of her leg. A shiver ran through her.
He had her completely naked now. She watched his chest rise and fall as he raked his eyes over her. His slow perusal sent her pulse beating so hard she thought he must hear it.
When she shivered again, he lay down beside her and spread the other blanket over them.
“Are you warm enough, sweetheart?” he asked and kissed her shoulder.
She nodded and tried to concentrate on the feel of his callused hand running up and down her side. And not on how easily “sweetheart” and “love” rolled off his tongue.
“What is it, Isobel?”
So much was right, she did not want to ruin it. She rested her hand on his shoulder and met his troubled brown eyes.
“I did not know it would feel as good as this,” she said and felt the taut muscles relax beneath her fingers.
He nuzzled her neck and playfully bit her earlobe. But that was not what she wanted now. She moved his hand from her side to her breast and turned in to him to give him an open-mouthed kiss. His playfulness vanished.
With a fierceness that matched her own, he kissed her back. He gripped her hip, and she liked the strong, possessive feel of his hand there. When he slid his other hand up the inside of her thigh, her whole body tensed with anticipation. Surely it would not be long before they committed the final act of sin.
The thought of having him inside her sent a spasm through her even before his fingers reached her center. Once he touched her, his fingers moved in ways that did magical things to her.
“What are you doing?” she asked, a little breathless.
“If you do not know, then your husband truly was a swine,” he murmured. “Do you wish me to stop?” From the humor in his tone, she could tell he was confident of her answer.
“But… but…,” she tried to speak but could not hold her thought long enough. “I never… this feels so… so… so very…”
She rubbed the back of her hand against his hard stomach. When she brushed against the rough cloth of his leggings, she grabbed his forearm to stop his hand. “Will you not take your leggings off, as well?”
“What is it you want, Isobel?” His voice was soft, but she heard the tension in it.
“I—I—” She fell silent, embarrassed by what she’d been about to say.
“You must feel free to tell me anything, love,” he said, touching her cheek. “Especially when we are in bed.”
If she were going to have only this one time with him, she wanted it just right. She could not have explained why, but she could not bear the thought of him just pulling it out of his leggings to take her.
Though it made her cheeks flush hot, she told him. “I want you as naked as I when we are joined.”
“I can bring you pleasure, sweetheart, without putting my cock inside you.”
The crude directness of his words startled her. ’Twas hard to think past “bring you pleasure” and “cock inside you.”
“If we are to avoid the risk of getting you with child, ’tis best I leave my leggings on.” He ran a finger along the side of her face and said, “Believe me, it will be harder for us to stop in time if they are off.”
She looked into those melting brown eyes and heard herself ask, “Must we stop?”
He coughed, then said in a choked whisper, “I want you to be sure. This is a serious choice we make here.”
From what she heard about him, it was a choice he made all the time. She felt her heart constrict. “Do you not want to?”
His eyes flashed, and he broke into a wolfish grin. “Oh, aye, without a doubt I do,” he said. “In sooth, I can think of nothing but being inside you.”
His words sent a jolt of desire through her.
“ ’Tis all I can do,” he said, tracing her bottom lip with his finger, “to keep myself from employing every argument I have to convince you.”
In a voice just above a whisper, she asked, “What arguments would you make?”
“Not the kind you hear with your ears.” He gave her another of those devilish grins that nearly stopped her heart.
He kissed her senseless then. When he guided her hand to the fastening of his leggings, she felt a lurch of awareness as her fingers touched the hardness of his shaft through the cloth. She rubbed her palm down its length, reveling in the moan he made. She sucked on his tongue as she rubbed up and down, pulling new sounds from deep in his throat.
“You will have me spilling my seed like a youth,” he said, grabbing her wrist.
She smiled, pleased at the desperation in his voice. “You said you would take your leggings off.”
He sat bolt upright. After a couple of quick movements under the blanket, he raised his arm aloft with the leggings and threw them across the room. This time when he took her into his arms and kissed her, he was fully naked against her.
And heaven above, he felt good!
The feel of his shaft pushing against her belly sent a thrill through her, right to her core. She bit his shoulder as she ran her hands down the small of his back and over the firm, rounded muscles of his buttocks. He slipped his hand between her legs. As his fingers went round and round, he swallowed her moans in deep liquid kisses.
His breath was hot in her ear. “How does this feel?”
“I—I…” What did he ask? She could concentrate on nothing but what he was doing to her with his hand. “Don’t stop. Please.”
“I won’t,” he said in a husky voice, “not until you cry my name in your pleasure.”
She did not understand what this feeling was welling up inside her.
“Trust me.”
She did trust him. She did.
He lowered himself to pull the tip of her breast into his mouth, his hand never stopping. Tension grew and grew in her. She could feel it in him, too. In the tautness of his muscles, the pulsing shaft against her thigh, the heat vibrating off his skin. As he sucked her breast harder, she pressed herself against his hand, her body wanting still more from him.
When she thought she could bear no more, her body spasmed in wave after wave of pleasure that shook her to her very soul.
Oh God oh God oh God.
After, her limbs felt weak and limp. Stephen’s head rested against her chest; his heart beat wildly against her stomach. With an effort, she lifted one hand and ran her fingers through his hair. She felt a small squeeze inside her when she felt his hard shaft against her leg.
Just when his head began to feel heavy on her chest, he turned with her so that they were on their sides, face to face.
“I never felt that before,” she told him.
He took her face in his hands and gave her a kiss that was slow and deep. When he hooked his leg around her, she ran her hand over the taut muscle of thigh and buttock. All the while, they kissed, tongues sliding against each other.
She wanted to touch him. When she reached down and ran her finger along the length of his shaft, he drew in a sharp breath.
“Could you?” he asked in a tight voice. He wrapped her hand around it and moved their hands together to show her what he wanted.
Even she realized where this was going. She stopped her hand. “You said you wanted to be inside me.”
He drew back to peer into her face. “You have given yourself to no man but your husband.” He paused, then asked, “Why choose me, Isobel? Why me?”
Why did the reason matter to him?
“I’ve come this far in my sin. I want to know all of it,” she said. That was part of it, but far from all.
Was that disappointment in his eyes? Hurt? What did he want her to say? That she knew no other man could make her feel this way?
“You are the only one I would have.” Her pride would let her confess only this much. “The only one I want.”
Feeling uncertain, she kissed his cheek and guided his hand to where he had touched her befo
re. She wondered uneasily if he would jerk his hand away when he felt how wet she was. Instead, he groaned with what sounded like almost painful pleasure.
Soon she was lost in his kisses, his touches, the burning heat between them. She hardly noticed when he rolled her onto her back. When she felt the tip of his shaft against her opening, all she could think was at last, at last, at last. She may have whimpered the words aloud.
They both gasped when he pushed into her. She wrapped her arms and legs tight around him. She clung to him as he moved against her, slowly at first and then faster.
“Sorry. I cannot… last too long… this time,” he gasped, “I… can… not.”
He was ramming into her, harder and faster with each thrust. Harder, harder, harder, she egged him on. A burst of pleasure hit her, even stronger than the one before, and she cried out.
He was trying to pull away from her, but she held on to him with all her strength, refusing to let him go. And then he was moving inside her again and she was weeping and calling his name, over and over. He cried out with her, and she felt his seed empty inside her.
When he finally lay still in her arms, she held him to her, saying his name again and again and kissing his face and hair.
“Jesus,” he said without lifting his head. He rolled to the side, pulling her with him, and tucked her head under his chin. In a fading voice, he said, “Isobel, my love, my…”
She heard his breathing grow steady. Could he possibly have fallen asleep? Nothing short of a wild boar could have gotten her to move, but she was too awash in emotions to sleep. A hundred questions spun through her head as she tried to fathom what had happened between them, and to her.
She leaned back, taking advantage of his dozing to study him in repose. In the shaft of sunlight that fell upon his hair, she saw that what looked auburn from afar was in fact a hundred shades of red and gold.
His face was near perfect, to her mind. She liked his straight dark brows, his strong jaw and cheekbones, the blade nose, the glint of bristles from a day’s growth of beard. His generous mouth. Even at rest, the corners seemed to tip up.
Knight of Pleasure Page 16
