by Lynsay Sands
“Aye. I found I wanted to help dry yer hair,” he said with a crooked smile, and then nudged her chin to get her to turn away from him so that he could begin doing so. “Now tell me what ye were thinking about.”
“You,” she admitted as he drew the brush through her hair in long slow strokes.
“Oh?” She heard the smile in his voice. “And what were ye thinking about me?”
“That I like you, and I like your kisses and would like for you to kiss me again,” Elysande said boldly, and was surprised when Rory suddenly froze with the brush halfway through a stroke and groaned miserably.
“Ah, lass,” he sighed after a moment, and started brushing again. “Ye ha’e no idea how much ye tempt me with such words. But I canno’.”
“Why?” she asked at once.
“Because ye’re a temptation I find hard to resist, and the last time I kissed ye I lost all control. Had we no’ been interrupted by those snapping branches in the woods, I might verra well have taken yer innocence there up against that tree.” When she didn’t gasp in shock or otherwise react to the comment, he added, “And if I started kissing ye here, I’m quite sure I’d again no’ be able to stop.”
“Then do not stop,” she said simply, and the brush stilled again.
“Lass,” he said in warning.
Elysande turned to peer at him over her shoulder, and then shifted to face him properly and met his gaze. “When I left Kynardersley, I felt sure it would be the last time I would see it. I did not expect to survive to reach Sinclair, or warn the king. The odds were stacked against me, after all. One lass and a couple of young, newly knighted soldiers against up to six armies.”
“Six?” he echoed with a frown. “De Buci has six co-conspirators?”
Elysande nodded, but left the subject behind to continue making her point. “As I say, I did not expect to survive, but you and your men make me feel safer. You even give me a little hope that I might survive or at least that my mother’s messages will make it to Sinclair and the king. But most of me still does not expect to survive this journey.”
Reaching out, she caressed his face gently, enjoying the feel of his newly shaved cheek against her fingers. “If there is even a chance that I might die, I should like very much to first experience your kisses and caresses again, and whatever follows should you lose control.”
Rory caught her hand, stopping her from touching him anymore. “Lass, I ken ye fear ye’ll no’ survive and wish to enjoy what ye can while ye can, but I would no’ do anything that ye might regret later.”
“Why would I regret bedding a man I have come to love?” she asked, and the words were not at all hard to say. There was no hesitation, no blushing confession, no expectation that he should return her feelings and no fear that he would not. It was just a simple statement of fact, and Elysande felt that was as it should be. Love was a gift that should be given freely, and without the expectation of gaining anything in return. It was nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to be afraid of. It just was.
Rory stared at her for a long moment, and Elysande met his gaze unembarrassed, not trying to hide her feelings from him.
“Lass, I—” he began in a voice that rasped along her nerve endings like a caress, and then he fell silent and she could see his honor battling with desire on his face.
Elysande wasn’t interested in his honor, however. This might be her only chance to fully experience the pleasure he had given her a taste of in the woods. She was damned if she was dying without experiencing more of it. Elysande tugged her hand from his and reached up to untuck the plaid she’d wrapped around herself toga-style. Pulling the cloth free, she let the wool drop to pool around her waist and then began to undo the laces that ran down her chest to just above her breasts. Her hands were trembling now, but she managed the task, and then was able to push the wide neck off her shoulders, so that it too fell to pool around her waist. Raising her chin then, she smiled at him unashamed and said, “You introduced me to the innkeeper as your wife. Make love to me like a husband would.”
The last word had barely left her lips when she found herself in Rory’s arms, with his mouth on hers. A sigh of relief slipped from her as she parted her lips to him, welcoming him inside, overwhelmed by passion and need as he claimed what she offered.
By the end of the first kiss, Elysande was on her back on the fur, her arms tight around his shoulders, and her fingers buried in his hair as his hands began to move over her body. His touch was like fire, searing its way from her waist to her breast where it cupped and squeezed briefly before concentrating on the excited nipple there.
Elysande moaned into his mouth when he pinched and rolled the hard nub, her back arching eagerly into the caress. But the next moment she was groaning with disappointment as his hand glided away. But it was only leaving to examine other pastures, gliding over her shoulder, drifting along her collarbone, following her sternum to the valley between her breasts, before sliding left to claim the yet-untried one and palm and caress it now. All the while he was kissing her, his lips firm and demanding, his tongue thrusting and then rasping over hers until she thought she would burst into flames or die of the wanting. Instead, she kissed him back, unsure if she was doing it right, but emulating what he was doing and, if it felt good, doing it again.
Elysande thought she could go on kissing him until the end of time, so was most disappointed when his mouth left hers to sojourn across her cheek. That disappointment died when he reached her ear though. In a hundred years she never would have believed that his licking her ears and sucking the lobes into his mouth would be pleasurable, but it was and she found herself squirming, her hips rising in search of his, before dropping so that she could arch her back and press her breast into his caress.
When his mouth next made its way down her throat, nipping and sucking, she gasped and clutched at his hair. But when it trailed down to the breast he wasn’t caressing, and closed over the hard, tingling nipple, Elysande had to release his hair and clasp her hand over her mouth to stifle the excited cry it brought out. It felt like he was drawing her soul out of her body through that hard nub, and filling her with flames at the same time. She was melting from the inside, liquid heat gathering in her lower stomach and then rolling down to pool between her legs where she suddenly felt swollen and achy with need.
As if sensing that need, Rory’s meandering hand found its way down over her belly, and slid between her legs. His first brush against that most private juncture had her hips jerking, though she wasn’t sure if it was from pleasure or shock, and then his fingers slid between her folds and found a spot she hadn’t even realized existed; a button that swelled eagerly under his caress and began to pulse with shockwaves of mounting pleasure.
Almost frightened by the overwhelming passion now trying to claim her, Elysande gasped his name, and then his mouth left her breast and covered hers again, his tongue thrusting in a rhythm to match his caress. She was strung tight as a bow, her body almost vibrating when she felt something pushing inside of her even as he continued to caress her. The combination merely increased her pleasure and her fear as she became aware that her legs and hips were moving into the caress, wanting it, urging him on as he rimmed her entrance, slid deeper and then eased out to slide in again.
His mouth was still on hers, catching her cries when the dam burst and her body began to vibrate and convulse with the explosion of pleasure he’d brought on. Her legs closed instinctively around his hand, her mouth opening, unable to even pretend to kiss anymore as she lost control of her body.
Elysande thought he would stop then, or simply mount her and thrust into her body claiming her maidenhead, and she would have been perfectly happy to let him. It seemed a fair trade for the bliss he’d shown her. But he didn’t. Rory didn’t even stop caressing and kissing her, and before she could recover from the first wild ride, he was sending her on another.
By the third time he drove her to that pleasure again, Elysande was a mindless mass of trembling
flesh on the furs, clutching at him as the only port in a storm. She hardly noticed when he shifted to rest between her thighs. She was aware though when he began to push into her, and noticed that what was entering her was much, much bigger, but her body stretched to welcome him, muscles she hadn’t even realized she had tugging and pulling eagerly at him.
“Wrap yer legs around me, love.”
Elysande heard that growled order, and automatically obeyed, curling her legs around his hips, her feet pressing eagerly at his bottom. Then Rory’s mouth covered hers again and he thrust into her, breaking through her maidenhead and drawing a startled cry of pain from her before he froze, seeming to wait.
When he lifted his mouth from hers, she blinked her eyes open and peered up at his face in the light from the fireplace as she asked uncertainly, “Is it done?”
“The hard part is, love,” he responded, and then lowered his head to kiss her again. This time it was a slow, sweet kiss that made her body slowly unclench. Once she relaxed, the tone of the kiss changed and he began to demand a response that she was happy to give now that the sharp sting was gone, and the earlier passion was returning.
When he began to move, Elysande was ready for it and moved with him, shifting her hips up into his thrusts even as she dug her heels into his bottom to urge him on. This time when she found her release and cried out into his mouth, he cried out with her, and it seemed the most perfect thing in the world to her that they found those heights together.
“Are ye all right? Does anything hurt?”
Elysande smiled at the question. Rory was on his back with her half on his chest, and his arms around her. One of her legs was thrown over his, and her fingers were skimming lightly over his chest, running through the coarse curls there.
“Nay,” she said after a moment. “Nothing hurts, and I am more than all right. I am wonderful.”
“Aye, ye are,” he assured her, and she could hear the smile in his voice as his arm tightened around her briefly.
Elysande let her fingers drift down over his stomach, and asked, “Is it always like that?”
Rory hesitated, and then asked carefully, “Do ye mean will it always be like that between us? Or are ye asking would it be like that with another maun?”
“Both, I suppose,” she said, rubbing her cheek against his chest. “I cannot believe that ’tis always like this for everyone, else no one would ever get out of bed.”
Rory chuckled, and then said, “I can only tell ye that it has ne’er been like that fer me before. So I do no’ think it would be like that with just any maun. As for whether it will always be like that between us . . . I hope so.”
Elysande was considering that when he asked, “Shall we try again and see if ’tis just as good a second time?”
The question made her still, at least on the outside. But every nerve ending in her body seemed to jump at it. For an answer, she turned her face and pressed her lips to the almost flat nipple that had been resting under her cheek and sucked on it experimentally.
“Mmm,” Rory murmured, his hand sweeping down to clasp her bottom and squeeze firmly. “Ye’ve an adventurous spirit. That’s a good thing, lass. For I ha’e so many things I want to do with ye, I do no’ ken where to start.”
Elysande let his nipple slip from her mouth and glanced to his face with surprise. “There is more than what we already did?”
“Oh, aye,” he growled, suddenly rising up and sliding over her. Holding his weight with his arms, he nestled his hips between her thighs and began to rub against her.
Elysande’s eyes widened at this new caress. Moments ago, his shaft had been deflated and resting peacefully. Now it was hard as he pressed against her. Feeling her own excitement burst back to life within her, Elysande reached for him, wanting to draw him down for a kiss, but he eluded her hands by sliding farther down her body.
“No’ this time, love, there are other lips I’ve a mind to kiss.”
She was just stiffening at the suggestion that he might go find another lass to kiss when he clasped her thighs in hand, spread them and ducked in to press his lips to the center of her excitement. Elysande was reeling in shock from the bold move when he began to lash her with his tongue, showing her a whole other way of kissing. It was the first of many such lessons he taught her that night.
Chapter 16
“You appear to be well over the attack.”
Elysande turned from watching Rory and the other men settle the horses about a third of the way up the Mary Margaret’s empty hold, and peered at Simon with a somewhat weary smile. She hadn’t had much sleep the night before. Rory had kept her up well past the witching hour, showing her different ways of loving, and she had enjoyed every moment of it. But it had seemed to her that they’d barely, finally, drifted off to sleep before he was shaking her awake, kissing her cheek and urging her to dress because it was “time to go.”
“Aye, I am feeling much better, Simon. Thank you,” she murmured now, shifting her gaze back to Rory and the other men. While she was exhausted enough that she suspected she could drift off to sleep standing there on the deck of the cargo hold, leaning against the hull of the ship, Rory looked strong, and fit as ever. There wasn’t even a hint of tiredness showing on his face while she knew she probably had dark circles under her eyes and was no doubt pale with lack of sleep. Life could be so unfair sometimes.
“The Buchanan gave us the impression that you were dying,” Simon said now. “Yet you look fine.”
“Aye. Well, head wounds can be tricky,” she answered vaguely, wishing Rory would hurry and join her. She wasn’t at all comfortable lying to Simon, but there was nothing else she could do.
After getting her up and dressed that morning, Rory had opened the door to the hall to find Alick on a pallet blocking the threshold. It was only then that Elysande had realized he should have been in the room with them. At least, the man had been sleeping in the bed with her and Rory when she’d woken up in the middle of that first night. He’d also spent the day in the room with them, playing cards and other games to help pass the time. It was only when the bath had been ready that he’d left and gone below to sit with the men in the taproom, leaving Rory to guard her alone. She had heard Rory promise to call him back up when she was done with her bath. But Rory had never called him back. Instead, he’d taken a bath after her and then . . .
Elysande bit her lip and switched her gaze to Alick as she wondered what he’d thought when Rory hadn’t arrived to fetch him back to the room. Had he come up to see what was taking so long? If so, why hadn’t he knocked?
The obvious answer seemed to be that he’d stopped at the door and heard something that had made him think an interruption would not be appreciated, so had gone to request a pallet from Angus, the innkeeper, and had settled down to sleep outside the door, probably hearing all their love talk, and her cries of passion. The very possibility of that having happened was enough to make Elysande go scarlet with embarrassment.
Not that Alick had said or done anything to cause her embarrassment when Rory had woken him. The younger man had merely risen, wished them both “good morn” and taken the pallet to wherever he’d got it. He’d then returned to help them gather the bags and carry them down to the stable. The brothers had then quickly saddled the horses, all six of them, before Alick had returned to the dark inn to wake and fetch the men.
While he was gone, Elysande had helped Rory hook the bags over the pommels of hers and Rory’s saddles and then had mounted with no more than a leg up from him. That had been nice, she acknowledged now. It was really quite glorious to be without pain for a change.
Simon had been half-asleep and confused when Alick, Conn and Inan had led him out to the stables. He’d been complaining that it wasn’t even dawn yet, and asking what they were about as he walked. But had fallen into a shocked silence when he’d spotted Elysande astride her mount beside Rory on his. He’d tried to rush to her side, but Rory had moved his horse in front of hers and ordered him to
mount up or be left behind.
Simon had glanced from him to Elysande, but then had mounted. He’d tried several times to move his horse close to hers during the short trot through the dark, empty streets of the city. But Alick had taken up position on one side of her, and Rory on the other, and neither man had made way for him. Simon had started asking questions then, asking when she had woken, and where they were going, but Rory had hushed him and said he would explain all later. That they needed to move quietly did they wish to escape de Buci’s men.
Simon had fallen silent as ordered, but he’d been practically vibrating with the questions he wanted answers to for the rest of the ride to the docks. And frankly, Elysande thought he deserved those answers. But he wasn’t asking them anymore. At least, not ones she could answer. She could hardly tell him that she hadn’t been badly hurt at all, but they had kept that from him because Rory suspected him of being her attacker. Besides, she had been unconscious for days, even if only because of the tincture Rory had given her and that she’d eagerly taken the first three mornings and evenings when she woke with her head pounding so violently she’d wanted to die. And she didn’t regret it at all. The days of sleep had not only given her head a chance to heal so it no longer ached, but it had gone a long way toward healing her ankle and back as well. Other than feeling tired, she had not felt this good in weeks.
“Your head wound is nearly completely healed,” Simon pointed out stiffly, drawing her attention back to him. “There is no swelling and it has scabbed over. It looks like it should have been little trouble at all.”
Elysande reached up and touched her forehead, realizing only then that in their rush to dress and head for the Mary Margaret, they hadn’t thought to replace the bandages on her head that she’d removed before her bath. Actually, they hadn’t thought to replace any of her bandages, although her chest wound really didn’t need it. In truth, none of her injuries needed it anymore. But they might have helped keep Simon from questioning her like an angry father.