“The women would blame me.”
Strian followed her gaze to the women who observed them, and he knew she was right. He had heard the hateful things these same women had said when they were barely more than girls and Strian pursued Gressa. He had been moved to action when the five women cornered Gressa, and it had only been Freya’s intervention that kept him from violence towards them. He took her hand and led her to the side of a nearby building where no one could watch them. He was unconvinced that she would return to their longhouse.
“Good thing for you, you have Freya’s protection.”
Gressa snorted at that.
“You heard her. I can’t count on being so lucky a second time.”
“If not her, then Tyra.”
Gressa looked at him as though he were a simpleton.
“You expect to see Tyra any time soon? She will be holed up with Bjorn as they celebrate their honeymoon.”
“Are you making these excuses because you don’t agree with my offer?”
“I’m not making excuses, Strian,” her frustration clear in her tone. “I’m pointing out reality. You didn’t think very far ahead of bedding me again when you forced me to return to a village where no one ever wanted me.”
Strian opened his mouth to counter her, but he would only be lying if he tried to placate her. Her Sami heritage and her father’s rejection had made her a cast off for most of her life. It had only been Freya and Tyra’s friendship then his pursuit that made others accept her. He had not thought of any of this when he found Gressa at the Ross keep in Scotland. When he recognized the eyes he had spent hours gazing into, and then pressed his body against the one he would recognize anywhere, he had only thought of how he had pined for her. When she refused to return, his pride had reared its ugly head and insisted he not give in. When Freya leveraged her position as the jarl’s representative on their mission, he assumed it was only her protectiveness of a lifelong friend. While they were sailing, he had only planned for making her feel welcome in their home. He had failed miserably to consider reality.
“You’re right that I didn’t think clearly, or truly didn’t think at all about how others would respond. I could only think of the life we were supposed to have. The life I have envied all of my friends for having now. They moved on while I continue to cling to the past. I focused on the relief that you were alive. Thoughts of a future with you as my wife filled my mind while conflicting unending love and hurt that you rejected me filled my heart. Pride and need won out, Gressa, and for that I realize I have wronged you. But I can’t bring myself to apologize even if I should. I’m not sorry to have you near me again. It’s all I’ve dreamed of for ten years.”
Gressa tilted her head back and gazed at the twinkling stars. They had spent many nights lying on a blanket looking into the night sky when they were courting. They slept with the window covering open because they would fall asleep in one another’s arms as they watched the stars shine into their chamber. Gressa inhaled, stretching her lungs before looking back at Strian. She knew she was the only person he had ever shared his feelings with. He was confessing emotions he would deny to anyone else. He deserved her honesty, even if she could not tell her entire tale.
“Strian, I dreamed of you every night for the last ten years. The only time I did not was when I exhausted myself training, trying to avoid those dreams. They were a mixture of memories, things we had planned, and what our life might have been.” She swallowed the lump forming in her throat. “I’m trying to bear the guilt of making you think I no longer want you, want to be your wife, but I can’t. The burden is too heavy.”
Gressa’s head was still tilted back, unable to face Strian as she made her own confessions.
“Life has been unkind to us, cheating us of what we deserved, but while time has not made me love you any less, it has changed everything around us. We can’t go back to when we were younger. We can’t pick up where we left off, regardless of whether we both wish we could. Ten years in Wales is nearly as long as I lived here. It changed me. I may live in your house, and I may train with our tribe, but my home is in Wales. That is where I belong now. That is where my heart remains.” She finally looked at Strian and wished she had not. His crushed expression was one she would never forget.
“Why?” he croaked.
“Because I can’t make a life somewhere where only one person accepts me. I can’t depend on you for everything. I will only become a burden to you, and I will be miserable facing each day knowing that everyone in my life hates me and resents my return.”
Strian recognized the truth in her argument even if his heart railed against it.
“Gressa, stay in our home, er, my house for now. I will arrange for us to travel to Wales.”
Gressa was sure she had not heard Strian.
“You’ll let me return?”
“If that is the only place where you’re happy, then that is where we shall be?”
Gressa tilted her head and looked at him sideways as she worked through what he said.
“We?”
“If being here instead of Wales is what keeps you from accepting me, then what’s keeping me here? I have no family left. Ivar has plenty of other warriors to fight for him.” Strian shrugged.
“But your life is here.”
“My life was meant to be with you.”
“You would give up everything you know to live in a land where you don’t speak the language and don’t know a soul besides me?”
“Weren’t you forced to do the exact same thing? Besides, I don’t believe you are any safer there than you are here.”
Gressa’s brow furrowed, but she could not deny this truth either.
“Dafydd sent me to fight for Grímr, and I was the only woman. I suspected the same thing that you did: Dafydd offered me to Grímr for more than my archery skills. I just hadn’t considered Enfys would betray me the way she did. We did not start out as friends, but I thought she had become my closest ally and confidant.”
Gressa’s heart pinched as she once more had to accept that her best friend was aware, may have even suggested that, her husband give her to Grímr more as a bed slave than as a warrior.
“I don’t understand how you could have become friends with a princess when you arrived as a thrall.”
Gressa shook her head. She once again could not divulge the entire reason, but she could share most of it.
“We had much in common even though we didn’t start off on a good foot.” Gressa bit her bottom lip as she considered her wording. “When I arrived Enfys was pregnant and refused to share her bed with Dafydd. Once my injuries healed, he tried to make me his mistress. I tried everything to make myself unappealing to him, and I suppose he decided I wasn’t worth the effort. I no longer piqued his curiosity. Enfys knew of Dafydd’s lust, and she punished me for it often, but I was there when she delivered her son. It was a difficult birth, and both mother and son nearly died. I had been serving as the midwife’s assistant rather than a servant in their home—Enfys refused to look at me, let alone welcome me into her home. I suggested a mixture of herbs that helped Enfys when she would not stop bleeding right after the delivery. I also was the one who realized something was blocking the infant’s throat, keeping him from breathing. Enfys was grateful for my wherewithal, and I believed she had accepted that I was not trying to lure Dafydd from her and had forgiven me. She insisted that I become her personal attendant. We grew close spending much of our days together, and we confided in one another about many things. I told her of you, and she knew I never moved past being taken. She sympathized and said she wished there were a way for me to return, if only more Norsemen traveled to Wales. I never saw the two slave traders who left me in Wales, so I gave up hope that they might bring me back. It was several years before I accepted that I would never leave Wales. Now I wonder if Enfys ever forgave me or if she manipulated me the entire time.”
Gressa closed her eyes as bitterness and sadness washed over her. She had trie
d to make the best life she could, and no one in Wales knew of or cared about her Sammi lineage. She felt accepted and even wanted there. More than one man had tried to court her, but she had refused all of them. She refused the men who offered her companionship with no strings. While she may have accepted that it now meant she was to spend her life in Wales, she never accepted the idea that distance ended her marriage.
She startled as Strian wrapped her in his embrace. She soaked in Strian’s pine and musk scent, something she remembered so vividly that she could smell it in her dreams. In his arms, she was truly home. Truly safe and welcomed. She was where she most wanted to be. But she could not overcome the truth that she could not live every day in his arms. Their embrace would end, and she would once again be at the mercy of the tribe members.
“Are you serious that you would live in Wales?”
“If that is where you want to be even knowing now what you do about the prince and princess, then that is where I want to be. If you lead, I will follow.”
“It’s that simple?”
“Perhaps between us it is. I expect disagreement and refusal from the others, but Ivar loves Lena more than his own life. He would do anything to protect Leif and Freya. He will understand why I must go with you. He would not keep me again from my wife and the family we might have. He has expressed his guilt and remorse for forcing me to sail away. Many times, in fact.”
Gressa was in awe of Strian’s blind faith in her. He knew nothing of the life he was willing to accept, all for her sake. He trusted her implicitly. He could tell her he loved her every day, all day, for the rest of their lives, and it would not carry the same weight as his promise to her now.
“I love you, Gressa.”
Gressa cupped his jaw and strained on her toes to reach his lips.
“I love you, Strian.”
Their previous kisses had been wrought from passion, grief, need, and comfort. This kiss was different. It was the promise of a new beginning. It held hope and love in its languid caresses. Strian ran his hands up and down Gressa’s back as she tangled her fingers in his hair.
“Take me home, Strian,” she murmured against his lips. “Make love to me as your wife.”
Strian’s heart skipped a beat as he peered into her eyes, looking for any signs of regret or uncertainty. All he saw was the same expression she wore the first time they kissed, and once more the first time they kissed as man and wife. Strian swept her into his arms, much like he had on their wedding day, and she giggled against his throat as she kissed the rough skin all the way to the spot behind his ear that she knew aroused him. She kissed along the prickly jaw that had a day’s worth of stubble. He was one of the few men Gressa knew who shaved daily, and she was thankful for it. Neither said a word as Strian carried her to the door of their longhouse. She leaned to push the handle, and Strian used his foot to open it. He kicked it closed behind him and wasted no time walking to the chamber they once shared. Before placing her back on her feet, he grazed his lips against hers.
Together they undressed. Once they stood bare, Strian moved behind Gressa, but she tried to twist away. She was sure he had glimpsed her scars when they were in the bathhouse, but she was embarrassed to let him see them now.
“Don’t hide from me,” Strian whispered before kissing along one shoulder before his lips traveled up her nape and down the other shoulder. His calloused fingertips feathered along her spine before pressing against the scar that ran from just below her left underarm to her right hip. He could tell it had been a deep wound and whoever stitched it had done so to keep her alive without care for appearance. It was jagged, leaving an angry line of puckered skin. Strian took one step back and tilted his head to see the scar that ran across the back of both thighs. The right side had been worse.
“Strian,” she beseeched, trying to remain still rather than twisting away from him.
“Don’t hide from me,” he repeated. “Wear this scar as a testimony to your strength and bravery. Don’t think of it as marring your skin, for your beauty has always been perfect to me. Nothing about that has changed.”
Strian pressed his arousal against her, sliding between the cheeks of her backside. When Gressa moaned and leaned back against him, Strian knew how he would make love to his wife. He moved them closer to the bed and guided Gressa to lean forward, bearing her weight on her forearms as he slipped inside her. His groan matched hers as the pleasure of joining their bodies coursed through them. Strian wrapped his body around Gressa’s, their fingers entwining on the bed. Once more Strian kissed Gressa’s shoulders while rocking his hips into her. He was not ready to thrust yet, and Gressa was content to feel their bodies move as one. Strian released her left hand and leaned back to kiss along the top of her scar while his right hand moved to find the rosebud hidden among her petals.
“Strian, please,” she begged, and Strian knew they both needed something more.
He slid all of his length from her before surging back in, his hips colliding with the flesh of her bottom. He watched the ripple of her skin each time he thrust into her. His need was building faster than his mind could control. He continued to kiss Gressa’s scar as she hung her head, panting from the fire building within her belly.
As erotic as the scene was, Strian felt something was missing. It did not feel complete.
“I need to look at you,” Gressa paused from rocking her hips back to meet each of Strian’s thrusts. Her need was the one thing Strian knew was missing. He pulled out of her before she turned and kissed him. He lifted her, and she wrapped her legs around him. Slipping into her, he returned to the place he most wanted to be as he climbed onto the bed. Gressa marveled at his strength as he maneuvered them on the center of the mattress before easing her down.
Gressa’s eyelids were heavy, and as much as she wanted to gaze at Strian, the sensations overtaking her body were more than her mind could manage. She tilted her head back as her body followed the rhythm Strian’s set. Her nails bit into his shoulders as she lifted her hips to accept Strian’s cock. The passion that had always fired between they quickly replaced the gentleness of their last kiss outside. Strian was the only man Gressa had ever been with, and not once had she wondered about bedding another man. Strian had always been all she wanted. She knew anyone else would be a disappointment.
Strian listened to Gressa’s soft noises as he watched the cords of her throat tighten as she strained against him, her eyes closed in ecstasy. His memory had kept him company over the years. It was images like this that his mind conjured when he relieved his need with his own hand, but nothing compared to the feel of being within the only woman he had ever loved. Once he discovered Gressa as a young woman, no other woman appealed to him. He could have been with any number of women since he last saw Gressa, he had even let others think he had, but there was no one who could outshine his memories of Gressa.
Strian’s chest and shoulders strained as he pistoned his rod into her channel. Gressa forced her eyes open, knowing she was missing a view of Strian that had always been unparalleled in her mind. She watched the muscles ripple through his chest as he held himself over her. The sight of his muscles in his stomach flexing with each tilt of his hips made her need grow.
“Gods, Gressa. What you do to me,” Strian panted.
Gressa pressed on his shoulders, urging him to bring his weight down on her. Strian acquiesced, and they pressed together, noses rubbing for a moment before pleasure coursed through them both. Strian tried to pull away, but Gressa’s nails once more bit into his shoulders.
“Stay.”
It was the one word Strian longed to hear. Gressa was willing to take the chance of getting pregnant. He knew that meant she would not leave him. He kissed her neck as his seed flowed into Gressa, her legs entwined with his and her arms wrapped around him. She clung to him just as he clung to her, and for the first time in ten years, they both felt like they were where they belonged.
Nine
A pounding on the door woke Stri
an. He looked down at Gressa who slept tucked against his chest. They had made love throughout the night until the early rays of dawn greeted them, and they both grew too exhausted to remain awake. Now the sun streamed into the chamber, alerting Strian to the time. It had to be the middle of the morning, well past when he should have been in the training yard.
Gressa shifted and opened her eyes but snapped them shut as the brightness startled her.
“Are you going to get that? It sounds like they don’t plan to leave.”
“I’m willing to wait them out. I have no intention of either of us leaving this bed today.”
Gressa rolled over to look at him. She slid her hand along his belly up his chest to his shoulder. Strian leaned forward and kissed her as she slid her leg over his hip. Both were content to forget whoever continued to hammer on the door. It was only when they heard it slam that they pulled apart. Strian had just covered Gressa in time when Leif burst into their chamber.
Strian (Viking Glory Book 4) Page 6
