by Sandra Hill
“’Tis not their virility that would be hindered, but a woman’s fertility,” Ingrith pointed out.
“Men would not see it that way. Leastways, some men measure their manhood by the number of whelps they can produce.” Breanne had to snip this half-brained talk in the bud.
“Not all men. The master is not like that,” Amicia contended. At the look of skepticism on Breanne’s face, she went on, “I know it looks that way with all the children about, but they are not all his. And he is a good man to care for them.”
“A lot of the children are his,” Breanne argued.
Amicia shrugged. “He is four and thirty. And a man. What would you expect?”
Mary came in then and carefully took the sleeping Piers from her. “I will put him in his cot,” she whispered.
“Back to the serious business at hand. Breanne’s seduction of Caedmon. Dost have any other advice?” Ingrith asked Amicia.
“I think I have had enough advice for one day.” Breanne started to rise. “Methinks ’tis time I fixed that leak in the roof. The puddles are getting larger and larger.”
“Ah, well, I kin tell ya ’bout the candles later, and how they can be used fer teachin’ ya ’bout lovemakin’.”
Breanne plopped back down again with a long sigh of surrender.
“I used ta work in a convent,” Amicia began with a sly grin. “We had a sayin’ there. Lights out at ten. Candles out at eleven.”
Thus Breanne learned more about candles than she ever wanted to know.
CHAPTER NINE
The highs and lows of love…
Caedmon was in a foul mood.
The trip back from the borderlands should have taken less than a day, even with the stop for Rashid and a check on the injured man. To no one’s surprise, the father of the Scottish lass’s bairn-to-be was nowhere to be found. Which meant that Maire traveled back to Larkspur with them. At a sloooow pace. They must have stopped two dozen times for her to relieve her bladder.
“I wish I had never brought her with us,” he muttered more than once.
Rashid told him, “Wishing does not make a poor man rich.”
I am going to kill the man, or cut off his always-blathering tongue.
As they crossed the moat to the lower bailey of his keep, Caedmon’s temper calmed a bit. Peace seemed to have settled over the place, and he could not dispute that it was tidier than it had been on his first arrival home. And, yea, the rosebushes added a nice touch.
Once their horses made their slow plodding way up the incline to the upper bailey, the smell of honey permeated the air.
Wulf sniffed the air and smiled. “Three guesses who is stirring the honey pot.”
“Ingrith does have a way with honey,” Rashid agreed. “No doubt you will have a goodly supply of honey and candle wax from this harvest.”
“And mead, I hope.” This from Wulf.
Well, Caedmon could not argue with that, and, really, he was grateful, but not grateful enough to allow the murderesses to stay here. And he had to thank the stars that Rashid had refrained from one of his irksome proverbs this time.
“Uh-oh!” Wulf said.
“What?” he asked, then lifted his head to gaze where Wulf was staring. And smiling.
Bam, bam, bam!
The red-haired princess witch of the north was up at the top of Larkspur’s roof, pounding at one of the slates. Thank God it was not a high-pitched roof.
Bam, bam, bam!
“Ah, Breanne is fixing your leaky roof,” Rashid told him, as if he had not come to that conclusion himself, as if he could not repair his own roof.
Bam, bam, bam!
“By the cross! I swear, this time I am going to paddle her arse ’til it is black and blue.”
“Oh, good! Can I watch?” Wulf asked.
Bam, bam, bam!
Maire was moaning in that way which he had come to recognize meant that she had to piss again. He ignored her. Instead, Caedmon alighted from his horse in one fluid move and stomped over to the ladder. Within minutes he was atop the roof as well.
Bam, bam, bam!
“You lackwitted, stubborn, outlandish excuse for a woman!” he snarled as he made his way, then balanced himself on the slanted roof.
She jerked backward, having been unaware of his approach from her back, with all her pounding. With a rough snarl, she turned, slipped, and teetered forward, hitting him in the chest.
Which caused him to totter against her, forcing her backward. He grasped her about the waist.
For several scary moments, they swayed, forward, backward, forward again. Then they both hit the roof at the same time. Hammers and nails slipped downward. They did, too, for a moment before they caught on a metal snow guard.
He lay still atop her. They appeared to be secure, but still he waited. Finally, he lifted his head to look down at her. Her green eyes were wide open with shock.
“Are you all right?”
She blinked several times, then tried to push him off. “You big oaf. You almost killed us both.”
“Be still. We might die yet.”
She stopped moving.
And in that moment, they both realized that he had somehow landed betwixt her widespread thighs, and his favorite body part was planted smack dab up against his favorite woman’s part. And it was growing.
“Oh, good Lord!” she muttered. “Can you not control yourself?”
“Apparently not,” he replied, bracing himself with hands planted on each side of her head, “especially when you insist on squirming about.”
Being stubborn, she just had to squirm against him even more.
“Oh, God!” he said on a husky moan. He felt faint-headed and excruciatingly aroused, tingling in some interesting body parts. “I need to kiss you,” he said, staring down at her tempting, too-generous lips.
“Do not dare,” she replied, even as she ran the tip of her tongue over said lips.
She probably moistened her lips in nervousness.
He preferred to take it as a clear invitation.
He took his time settling his lips over hers, just so. They fitted perfectly. Relishing the tactile sensation of skin on skin, nerve endings on nerve endings, he pressed, moving his mouth from side to side until her lips clung to his. Drawing back, he murmured, “You taste like honey,” licked her lips, and added, “Sweet.”
“You are still a loathsome lout,” she said, even as she raised her head slightly to meet his next kiss.
This time he was not so gentle. “Open for me.”
She refused, muttering, “Mrfpghh.”
So, he nipped her bottom lip, causing her to gasp, which allowed his tongue to slide inside her honey-sweet mouth.
He could tell she was shocked. It was probably the first time any man had tongue-kissed her. If that was so, it was definitely the first time a man had lain atop her with his cock nestled in her crotch.
But then, praise God and all the saints, she relaxed and opened for him even more. Better yet, her arms went up about his shoulders and tugged him closer.
He smiled against her mouth, but did not raise his lips. Thus, a smile-kiss, he thought with a smile.
Now, not only was he kissing her voraciously, but she was responding. Sucking at his tongue when he thrust inside, moving her hips from side to side as if to create a friction in her female parts. In fact, when he put a hand to her sticky breast, she did not resist, or slap him as would be her wont in any other situation.
He used his wet tongue to stab at her ear, then blow dry, over and over. “Your breast is sticky,” he told her, which was a marvel that he could notice such an irrelevant thing when her nipple was budding against his palm.
“Your son,” she said, and licked his ear, then nipped at the lobe.
He felt the lick and nip all the way to his fingertips, toes, and rock-hard staff, all of which were tingling. “What?” he gasped out.
“Your son Piers got my tunic sticky with honey,” she explained.
“H
e is not my son,” he answered with lust-sodden irrelevance. “Not really.”
“Well, he is adorable nonetheless, whoever his father is.”
“Mayhap I am his father after all.”
She took him by the ears and lifted his head. Smiling through kiss-swollen, slick lips, she said, “What are you doing to me?”
“Kissing you?”
“More than that!” she huffed. “I am tingling all over.”
“Breanne, Breanne, Breanne. You should not be telling me that.”
“Why not?”
“I will use it against you.”
She gave him a saucy grin. “You cannot use me unless I allow you to.”
“Oh, you naive wench! There are ways, believe you me.”
He kissed her again, voraciously. He could not seem to get enough of her lush mouth. And her body. Cupping her buttocks, he raised her up so she was forced to brace her feet on the slate roof and bend her knees.
She began to moan.
Or mayhap it was him.
Through a haze of mind-melting arousal, he heard a discordant voice. “KAAAD-mon! KAAAD-mon!”
Raising his head, disoriented, he tried to clear his fuzzy brain.
“Someone is calling you,” she told him, her voice sounding sex-husky.
“’Tis Wulf,” he said when he recognized that the loud voice came from below.
He could see her slumberous facial expression change as she slowly realized where they were and what they had been doing. Soon, her cheeks and neck were a deep rose color.
“Get off of me, you big lout.”
He rolled over to his side, being careful to keep his balance. He did not even try to hide his enthusiastic erection.
Which she noticed, then quickly glanced away.
“You touched my breast,” she accused him with outrage.
“Oh, was that what it was? I thought it was a roof slate.”
She growled. She honest-to-God growled. “I cannot believe you seduced me on top of a roof.”
“Hey, you were the one who seduced me. If Wulf had not called for me, I would have been swiving you from one end of this roof to the other, and you would have been loving it.”
“Modesty becomes you, braggart.” She rose carefully to her feet and made her way slowly toward the ladder. Glancing down, she gasped, then looked back at him with ill-concealed disgust. “Another baby! There is a woman down there about to pop out another of your whelps, you randy goat.”
He smiled, figuring he could set her straight on that matter later. For now, he was enjoying the sight of her bending over in those tight breeches…and wondering how soon he could get into those breeches.
But then, reality hit him like a hammer to the head, as he recalled the promise he had made himself on the long journey back to Larkspur.
The princesses would be gone by nightfall.
She was going to be nice, dammit!…
Breanne had never been so embarrassed in her entire life. As she climbed down the ladder, it seemed as if everyone in the world was standing below, staring at her bottom in the tight braies, including the loathsome lout who had gone before her, after kissing her senseless.
What was I thinking?
I was not thinking!
“What are you all gaping at?” she snarled. “Have you ne’er seen a woman in braies afore?”
“’Tis not that, m’lady,” Caedmon said, taking her by the waist and lifting her down the last few steps. “’Tis a barefooted woman in braies standing atop a roof that has them stunned.”
She slapped his hands away now that her feet were on the ground. “My feet are shoeless because I have learned from experience that I get better purchase with my bare feet.”
“Do this a lot, do you?”
“Stop smirking, you dolt.”
“That is not a smirk. ’Tis a smile.”
“Well, do not smile then.”
Ingrith sidled up to her and whispered in her ear, “Breanne! You are supposed to be seducing the man, not antagonizing him.”
She turned to look at Caedmon. “Does he look antagonized?”
“Well, nay, now that you mention it, he looks—”
“Hail, all! Did you miss me?” Geoff, the blond god, rode up then on a black stallion fit for a king.
“Nice piece of horseflesh,” Wulf remarked.
“A bride gift.”
Caedmon and Wulf both grinned at their friend.
“Are you already wed, then?” Caedmon asked.
Geoff shook his head. “A sennight from now. You are all invited.” He looked from Caedmon to her, then back to Caedmon, and arched a brow. “Is it possible you are to be wed again, Caedmon?”
“Huh?” Caedmon said. “What would give you that barmy idea?”
“Weeeellll,” Geoff drawled, his golden brown eyes dancing mischievously, “as I rode in, from a distance I could swear I saw two people atop the roof swiv—”
“That will be enough, Geoff,” Caedmon interrupted.
Breanne’s face heated even more, realizing there had been a witness to her insanity.
“My apologies, m’lady. Uh, didst know that your lips look…ripe?”
“Ripe?” she asked on a groan. When she put her fingertips to her mouth, she realized that her lips were puffy, and no doubt abraded with color.
“Yours look ripe, too, Caedmon. Not to fear. No doubt you have both been eating berries.”
A quick glance at Caedmon showed her that his lips were in the same condition as hers. Instead of groaning with dismay, he winked at her.
The man dared to wink at her.
Geoff’s face turned serious of a sudden. “Did I mention that Sybil has invited Archbishop Dunstan to officiate at our wedding since he is expected in the vicinity? She sent the invitation afore I realized what she was about.”
Breanne’s sisters exchanged looks of horror.
Caedmon appeared equally horrified.
She wondered how soon he would be packing their bags and shooing them off to parts unknown. Belatedly, she recalled that she was supposed to be seducing Caedmon into an extension of their visit.
Releasing a long exhale, she drew her shoulders back with determination and turned to the loathsome lout. “Wouldst care to meet with me after dinner this evening?”
“Why?” the loathsome lout asked.
She fisted her hands behind her back to keep from punching him. “I would like to talk to you in private.”
“Why?” he repeated.
Biting her bottom lip and counting to ten, she glanced up to the roof, then back at him. In as sultry voice as she could muster, she said, “Unfinished business.”
Then she spun on her heels and rushed back to the keep, not wanting to see if he was laughing.
He was not.
“C’mere, baby,” sayeth the cat to the mouse, “wanna see my cheese?…”
“What is this cat-and-mouse game you are playing?” Geoff asked him that evening.
Ah, that is an appropriate name for this insanity. “I do not know what you mean,” Caedmon replied and continued to eat from a shank of wild boar that was covered with the most delicious sauce.
“They have been doing it all day long,” Wulf spoke across him to Geoff.
“Who?” As if I do not know! Caedmon licked his fingers and frowned. “What is this unusual flavor?”
“’Tis garlic and onion mixed with black pepper and a dash of wine,” Geoff told him.
“You and Breanne,” Wulf said.
“Wine? They are using my wine for cooking?” One more grievance to lay at their door.
“Tell us,” Geoff insisted.
“Tell you what?”
“What is your game plan?” Geoff elaborated.
“Are you demented? I have no game plan. Why do you not go off again to woo your betrothed and leave me alone? I have enough problems without your bedevilment.”
“I have done enough wooing.”
“There is no such thing as too much wooing.�
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“I beg to differ. Any more and her expectations will be set too high.”
“Well said, Geoff,” Wulf said, again speaking across him. “Do as you intend to go on. Excessive wooing will wear your cock to a nub in the end.”
Geoff and Wulf grinned at each other as if they had made some grand jest.
Idiots!
Then they both turned to him.
Knowing they would not cease their questions until he revealed all, Caedmon leaned back in his chair. “Which cat and which mouse?”
“You know very well which,” Geoff said, slapping him on the shoulder. “You and the red-haired thorn-in-your-arse have been changing roles all day. First, you were the cat chasing her about so you could send her and her sisters on their merry way, but she evaded your chase. A milkmaid told Gerard, who told me, that she was hiding…I mean, working in the stable, repairing a stall door or some such. Then, when it was too late to leave this day, she was after you, attempting a meeting, and you hid from her.”
“I ne’er hid from anyone.” Avoided, but not hid.
Wulf raised his eyebrows. “Oh? There was some urgent reason why you needed to inventory the storerooms?”
“Someone needed to do it afore our supplies are depleted.” And that is the truth.
“I saw her under the table in the steward’s room at one point,” Wulf remarked. He, too, was enjoying the wild boar, taking two more slices off the shank.
“She was in my steward’s room?”
“Yea. On the floor. Said she was searching for a lost quill.”
“That is naught,” Geoff told Wulf. “I found Caedmon in the bathing house, having his toenails clipped. In the middle of the day, for saints’ sake!”
“Must be he has some need for clean toes.” Wulf stroked his mustache thoughtfully. “I wonder…oh, please tell me that it is a new perversion you are contemplating?”
“Or mayhap it has something to do with unfinished rooftop business.” Geoff winked at him.
The only activity I am planning of that nature will be a solitary endeavor. Unfortunately. “Enough! Both of you, desist!” Caedmon said, laughing.
Just then, he felt a hand clamp on his shoulder. With humor still twitching at his lips, he turned.