“I want to…be with you.”
He froze. Excitement whipped through him. A cry of caution sounded, too, but the roaring pleasure and desire inside him swiftly drowned out the protest. “I want to be with you, too,” he whispered against her mouth. Kissing her deeply, he slid his arms under her, lifted her into his arms, and headed for the door.
Chapter Twenty-One
Claire lifted her head from the muscled pillow of Tye’s shoulder as he strode into the solar. With a nudge of his booted foot, he shut the door.
Her head was still careening from the aphrodisiac in the infusion. And from him . Being in his arms, cradled against his hard body, made her yearnings even more intense. There was such pleasure in just being in his embrace, of feeling safe and protected and desired, if only for one night.
The quietude of the solar settled around them as Tye walked to the hearth. The fire was the solar’s only source of illumination. None other was needed, though, for as her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she clearly saw the carved chair facing the blaze, the cat with a bandaged leg dozing by the hearth—Patch, from the stables—and the massive bed.
When her gaze skimmed the rumpled bedding, a tremor ran through her. She might be a virgin, but she knew what men and women did together in bed; she and Mary had talked about it several times when Claire had expected Henry to ask for her hand in marriage. Claire had no doubt why Tye had brought her here. She’d told him she wanted him, after all. ’Twas no lie; she did desire him. She ached for him, with a hunger that threatened to consume her if ’twas not quenched.
Part of her thrilled at the thought of lying with him, and yet…part of her was uneasy. She’d never expected to lie with anyone but Henry, once they were married. Now, she was going to lie with a man who had promised her naught, a rogue who’d had many lovers and who would most likely cast her aside in a few days.
Stop this foolishness while you still can , the voice of reason cried. Tell Tye the potion made you speak unwisely. Go back to your chamber.
That advice could have come from Lady Brackendale. Yet, Claire craved Tye, as she’d wanted no other man—truth be told, even Henry. The craving enticed her to stay, to seize this offered pleasure because she wanted it. Once she left Wode to live with her aunt, she’d forever be a spinster. Here, now, she had a chance to know what ’twas like to be a woman desired by a man.
Halting near the hearth, Tye turned his head and claimed her mouth in slow, thorough kisses that stirred a heated glow within her. He might be a rogue, but he made her heart soar with his kisses and his smile, and he’d brought excitement and wonder into her life.
Finally breaking the kiss, Tye set her down, releasing her slowly so that her body slid against his. She landed on her feet, glad of his arm around her waist, for she was still lightheaded. A sigh rattled in her throat, and his smoldering stare fixed on her lips, his expression stark with need.
A thrill chased through her, for that need was for her. That a man like him could want her…’Twas astonishing and wonderful.
“Kitten,” he whispered, his voice ragged.
The raw emotion in his eyes touched her like a caress. She burned inside, burned only for him. His mouth descended upon hers, and she kissed him back, taking all of the passion he offered and asking for more. Tye’s kisses grew bolder, claiming her lips, conquering her tongue. She gasped, shuddered, her hands lifting to cradle his face, to touch him as their mouths suckled and nibbled and molded together. The fever inside her flared. She strained against him, yearning for something but not knowing quite what. Her skin felt taut, hot, and—
A groan broke from him, and his hands at her waist slid up. His wet mouth glided against hers, while his thumbs brushed the undersides of her breasts. The light touch sent a fiery jolt running through her. And then, his hands moved again, and his thumbs stroked over her hardened nipples.
“Oh, mercy,” she moaned, pleasure spiraling straight to that secret, private place between her legs.
“Do you like that?” he murmured, his thumbs stroking again. He nuzzled her cheek and his breath fanned across her jaw.
She gasped, her eyes closing, the sensations almost too exquisite to bear. The rational voice inside her shrilled again, insisted she should step away and deny Tye, but the heat inside her licked hotter and hotter. The tiny voice was consumed by a flare of wanting .
She was vaguely aware of moving, of the back of her legs hitting the bed frame. His kisses fierce and deep, Tye eased her down, his broad body coaxing hers to sit on the coverlet and then move backward to lie on the bedding. The bed ropes squeaked as the mattress adjusted to their weight.
He pulled off his boots and crawled onto her. Shifting his weight to one elbow, he lowered himself to her right side, looked down into her face, and brushed stray strands of hair from her cheek with careful fingers.
“Kitten.” The gentleness of his voice brought tears to her eyes.
“I need…” she began, but didn’t know how to convey what she wanted. “I ache for…”
“I know,” he whispered. His lips pressed to hers while his fingers glided from her cheek to her throat, and then spread wide upon her gown. Tingling fire skittered over her skin, following the path of his left hand as he slowly trailed it down to cover her left breast.
A mewl broke past her lips. Her hips tilted up, an instinctive response to his touch as he cupped her breast and teased, caressed. Her chemise and gown rubbing against her sensitized skin would surely drive her mad.
“Tye,” she moaned, her head thrashing. An awful restlessness consumed her. She had to appease it. Now. With him.
His hand lifted from her breast. Missing the heat, desperate for his caress, she opened her eyes. His expression was a heart-wrenching blend of desire and tenderness.
Frustration churned inside her. “Why did you stop touching me?”
He kissed her again.
“Do you not want me?”
He laughed, the sound rough with disbelief. “I want you. More than I can ever say.”
“Then—”
He pressed a finger to her lips. She gazed up at him, silenced but wanting .
Please , she silently cried. How desperately she wanted him to touch her, to show her what to do, to help her satisfy the overwhelming hunger. Naught else mattered, except easing the sensual ache.
He drew in a breath, as if he was going to speak. Nay . Talking wouldn’t ease the fire within her. Parting her lips, she slicked her tongue over his finger. His skin tasted salty. Wonderful.
A hissed oath rushed between his teeth, and he rolled off her and sat up abruptly.
She blinked away tears. He sat with his back to her. She wanted to weep, for she had no idea why he’d drawn away. Her emotions felt bruised, volatile. As he swept his hand over his mouth, she rose up onto her knees behind him, wobbling on a rush of dizziness.
He’d said he wanted her. Mayhap, somehow, she hadn’t proven to him how much she wanted him? A more experienced woman would have made her desires very clear.
She must show Tye that she wished to lie with him, bare skin to bare skin. Maidenly modesty would not achieve what she wanted.
Her hands shaking, Claire reached for the hems of her gown and chemise and tugged the garments up over her legs, thighs, and hips, and higher still. She slipped off her silken hose. Now wearing only firelight, she tossed her wadded clothing aside.
Tye glanced over his shoulder. “Claire—”
He stilled. His eyes widened and then narrowed in a purely predatory, appreciative stare. As his ravenous gaze raked down her naked body, triumph surged through her.
***
Ah, God, she was exquisite. From her flushed face to her elegant neck and high breasts wi
th rosy-pink nipples, to the smooth flatness of her belly and the downy thatch between her thighs, Claire was even more exceptional than he’d imagined. Tye’s desire became an inferno, raging and insistent.
She was his.
He would make her his, here, tonight.
An awed growl rumbled in his throat as he faced her and rose to his knees in front of her, towering over her. He buried a hand into her hair and kissed her upturned face. She sighed against his mouth, kissed him back with equal fervor, and yet, she shivered.
He lifted his lips from hers. “Are you cold, Kitten? This chamber can be drafty—”
“I am not cold.”
She was nervous, then. He kissed her gently. “Do not be afraid.”
“I am not.”
“Why are you shivering, then?”
A shy laugh broke from her. “I do not know. I guess… Mayhap I am uncertain.”
As he’d expected. She was an innocent. He would be her first lover.
The thought filled him with a powerful rush of pleasure. As she smiled up at him, though, so incredibly lovely, he couldn’t dismiss a niggling sense of reluctance. His mind was muzzy from the liqueur and aphrodisiac, but he still had enough wits about him to know her passion was induced by the herbal potion. She wasn’t her true self. If she were in full control of her senses, would she still be naked and begging him to couple with her?
Her hands slid under his tunic, drawing his full attention back to her. His fingers worked their way under his shirt, and he inhaled sharply at the touch of her bare skin on his. Laughing softly, she caught the hems of his garments and tugged them up and over his head.
Throwing the clothes aside, she stared at his naked chest. Despite his many scars, some of them jagged and furrowed, she didn’t seem repulsed by what she saw. Thank God.
“Kiss me,” she whispered, kissing his cheek and trailing little kisses down to his mouth.
“Kitten,” he began, but she claimed his lips, swirled her tongue into his mouth with such uncanny skill, he forgot what he intended to say and kissed her back. Lost again to his hunger, he leaned into her and pressed her down onto her back, nudging her thighs apart so that he settled between them. His chest crushed against her plump, warm bosom. His manhood, as hard as rock and straining against his braies and hose, pressed into the dampness between her legs.
She gasped.
He groaned, his eyes squeezing shut.
He dipped his head to press his forehead to hers, flexed his hips again, the feel of her against his swollen flesh almost his undoing. As she moaned and shifted her hips, he shuddered . Ah, God . Too close.
“Tye,” she whimpered. “Please.”
He groaned again, his breath coming in harsh pants, for he ached to free himself from his clothes, to plunge into her hot, tight slickness. But she wasn’t thinking clearly. In the morning, once the aphrodisiac had faded, she’d be ashamed of lying with him. She might never speak to him again, and he cared too much for her to lose her that way.
His head pounded with the intensity of his thoughts. Did he dare take her virginity, thereby ruining her chances of marrying a rich lord husband? What if she got with child this night? That babe would be a bastard, just like him.
Mayhap ’twas what his mother intended: for Claire to be ruined and to conceive his babe. No doubt his parent was already planning to further her ambitions through Claire’s ruination—a thought that stirred his anger.
Pressing kisses to the side of Claire’s damp neck, he fought a crushing sense of indecision. He wanted Claire, very much. But there was far more to consider than what he selfishly desired.
He met her gaze. Her glazed eyes shadowed with confusion. “What is wrong? What—?”
His body screaming at the injustice, he shifted to break the intimate contact between them. “I cannot give you what you want,” he said softly. “Not like this.”
“Like this?”
“Under the spell of an aphrodisiac.”
Dismay shone in her eyes.
“I am sorry,” he added gently. “I may be a rogue and a bastard…but I will not ruin you.”
“I was right, earlier. You do not want me.” She sounded shaken, lost. She tried to squirm away, but he pushed up to sitting, locked his knees on either side of her thighs, and pinned her down.
“I have wanted you,” he said against her mouth, “from the day you challenged me with the fire iron.”
“But you said—”
“I know what I said.” He grinned. “I will not couple with you, but I can still give you pleasure.” He caressed her cheek. “There are ways, if you will let me.”
“You will take away this unbearable craving?” she whispered.
He nodded.
“Will it…hurt? I have heard…”
“’Twill not hurt at all. I will make you cry out with pleasure.”
“Then…aye.”
His manhood throbbed, anticipation blazing within him like a freshly stoked fire. He kissed her lips and throat, coaxed her anew with his mouth and tongue until she writhed at his lightest touch. Then, moving down her body, he kissed a path between her breasts, down the smooth slope of her belly, until his head settled at the juncture of her thighs.
Rising up on her elbows, she frowned at him, her hair an endearing, tousled mess.
“What…?”
He dipped his head, lazily stroked his tongue over the bud of flesh cocooned in her downy fuzz. She gasped, her body flinching. He licked again and she collapsed back, her eyes closed, another gasp of wonder wrenching from her. He relished each sound. This night, she would know naught but sweet, shattering ecstasy. ’Twould be a night she’d never forget.
With his tongue and lips, he licked, suckled, and tormented. Her hands fisted into the bedding. Her head thrashed. Using her cries and gasps as his guide, he took her passion higher, higher.
He savored an intense, primal sense of satisfaction as her thrashing quickened. She panted, arched her back, and then tensed. She loosed a helpless, keening moan. He imagined himself buried inside her as she catapulted into pleasure, and a harsh breath tore from his lips.
“Tye! Oh—”
He licked again, swirled his tongue, and suckled. Dragging in a stunned breath, her hips lifted off the bed once more, her mouth open, her body convulsing on yet another peak of pleasure.
He slowed his tender assault, gentled his suckling, and drew away from her.
She lay sprawled on the bedding, breathing hard. How glorious she was in her naked, sated beauty. The desire inside him tightened to a breath away from release. He hadn’t wanted a woman this much since…ever.
Her drowsy eyes opened, and she smiled up at him. Then, she frowned, and her gaze dropped to his swollen manhood, straining against his hose. “What about you?” She pushed up on her elbows again and extended her hand, readying to caress him.
“Nay.” His fingers locked around her wrist. If she touched him, his fraying control would be lost.
“A-all right.”
“Not tonight,” he said, softening his denial with a kiss. When her eyes closed, he urged her to scoot up and rest her head on the pillows. She curled on her left side and he drew the bedding up about her shoulders. No doubt within a few moments she’d be asleep.
“Tye?” she murmured.
“Aye?”
“Thank you.”
A proud smile curved his lips. “Sleep now, Kitten.”
He crossed to the fire, where Patch opened his eyes a fraction but did not stir, unwilling to move from his cozy box. The blankets on the bed rustled, and Tye glanced over his shoulder to see Claire nestled deeper into the bedding, her eyes shut, her hair streaming across
the pillow. His pillow.
She sighed, sounding thoroughly contented.
Tye turned back to the fire and smiled. He had brought her to that contentment. He had pleasured her as no other man ever had.
The relentless ache in his loins reminded him that he hadn’t slaked his own desire. He fought the hunger. He could satisfy the carnal need himself with a few skilled strokes of his hand, but that notion held little appeal; mayhap ’twas his penance to suffer this eve. He pulled his fingers through his sweat-dampened hair that at some point had come loose from its leather binding and laughed softly. The drink and the potion had definitely addled his mind.
The potion .
Fury flared anew, warring with Tye’s lust. That his mother would deceive him so, use him so, without concern for his wishes or feelings, left an ashy taste in his mouth.
He moved to the trestle table and poured more wine. Then, realizing ’twas likely tainted, he tossed what was in his mug as well as the jug into the fire. The flames hissed and smoked as he set the vessels aside and sank into the chair by the hearth.
“Damnation,” he muttered. At least the anger was defeating his lust. His flesh was no longer rock hard, but the desire would never vanish completely. He wanted Claire. He wanted her more than anything.
Except finally slaying his sire.
He rubbed the heel of his hand against his brow. A dull pain had settled in his forehead, likely caused by the aphrodisiac. ’Twould be best to sleep it off, but no way in hellfire was he going to lie next to Claire now, not until his blood had cooled.
His focus shifted to the letters and the journal he’d taken from Claire’s chamber. He’d read some of the letters, but not all. With a brisk tug, he took one from the stack of correspondence she’d received from her young lover. Tye’s grip instinctively tightened on the crisp, cured skin, for the lad had used fine-quality parchment; eager Henry had obviously intended to impress Claire with this proof of his wealth.
Bitter jealousy coiled through Tye. From all he’d seen and heard of Henry, the lad had been a good match for Claire; if he hadn’t died, he’d have given her a life of luxury and respectability—all the things Tye couldn’t offer her. Not now, at least. Not until his right to rule Wode had been validated by the King.
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