The Eden Tree

by Doreen Owens Malek

  Con stripped quickly and returned to her, enfolding her tenderly and stroking her hair, keeping his flooding desire in check with an effort. This was his Aislinn, his vision come to life, his dream come true, and he wanted everything to be perfect for her. He was desperate with the need to take her, but he forced himself to slow down and enhance her pleasure. She had had a bad experience with her husband; Con wanted to erase the unhappy memory and replace it with this one of him. There was no rush, he told himself; he would have her in the end.

  But he felt the rush in his throbbing loins, the surging primal compulsion to bury himself in the woman he loved. When she sighed and pressed herself against him, her hands moving to caress him intimately as she had done once before, he forgot his prior intention. He pushed her down roughly, his awareness of his own strength lost in the tumult of the moment. Con kissed her body feverishly. His mouth was so consuming, so demanding, that Linn writhed beneath his sensuous assault, swept up in a hurricane of feeling. Con half sat, holding her firmly with one arm around her waist. He stroked the damp warmth between her legs until he could no longer contain himself and bent hungrily to put his mouth where his hand had lately been.

  Linn tossed her head from side to side on the cushion of her robe, her fingers tangled in his hair. When he knew that her need was as great, as urgent as his, he knelt and pulled her legs around him. Before she had time to feel the loss of his lips she was awash in a new sensation as he entered her slowly, pausing on the threshold of her womanhood to withdraw slightly. He then eased in a little more, giving her the barest taste of what she wanted.

  “You’re teasing me,” she moaned, clutching the folds of the robe beneath her with one hand. Her eyes locked with his and she watched the waves of pleasure, almost akin to pain, transform his features.

  “I’m loving you,” he answered thickly, rotating his hips, sinking into her further but stopping just as she was arching blissfully to meet him. Linn groaned in frustration.

  “Do you want me?” he gasped.

  “Yes, oh yes.”

  “Say it. I must hear you say it.”

  “I want you, Con. I want you so much.”

  His control gone, Con drove into her wildly, making her cry out softly. He raised his head, searching her face anxiously.

  “I’ve not hurt you?” he said hoarsely.

  Linn kissed his parted lips. “How could you ever hurt me? It’s just ... I never knew it could be like this.”

  Con clasped her close, lifting her off the ground and holding her against his chest. Her head fell back and he rained kisses on her exposed throat.

  “I need you so badly,” he rasped. “I just can’t hold back any longer.”

  “Don’t,” Linn whispered. “Don’t hold back. I want to feel everything with you.”

  This was all he needed to hear. He surged into her repeatedly, catching her up in his rhythm until Linn was panting, clutching him tightly and willing him not to interrupt his intoxicating cadence. Just when she thought she would explode into a thousand tiny particles of light he paused, lowering her to the silken mat of her robe.

  “Don’t stop,” she begged. “Con, please don’t stop.”

  He had no intention of stopping. His eyes gazed into hers as he put his palms flat on the ground on either side of her, pushing himself up to the length of his arms. He thrust into her powerfully, penetrating more deeply than he had earlier. Linn whimpered and lifted her hips to engulf him, seeking to emhance the exquisite sensation.

  “Aislinn,” he said in her ear, “look at me.”

  Linn’s eyes were squeezed shut. She opened them and gazed at her lover.

  Con’s skin was bathed in perspiration, his hair in damp ringlets, his mouth bruised and wet from her kisses. He caught his lower lip between his teeth as she moved slightly beneath him and intensified his pleasure.

  “Promise me that you won’t leave me,” he said.

  “Oh darling, I won’t. I don’t want anyone but you. I would die if I couldn’t have you.”

  Con lowered his head and pressed his hot, flushed face into the soft curve of her shoulder.

  “Then you shall live, my lady,” he murmured, “because you have me now and always will.”

  Linn ran her hands over his strong, muscular back, delighting in his beautiful body. She held him close and listened to his harsh breathing, felt the ragged pounding of his heart and the wonderful fullness as he moved inside her. This is it, she thought, ablaze with emotion and physical hunger. This is the love I’ve searched for all my life. She felt cheated that she’d lived so long without it, grateful that she’d found it at last. She dug her fingers into his hips, moaning helplessly, burying her lips in his hair. Everything about him was a marvel: the hardness of his flesh, the softness of his mouth, the effortless strength and sureness of his movements. He quickened his pace again, then went still.

  “Stay…with me,” he gasped, barely able to talk.

  Always, Linn thought, abandoning herself to the journey and spiraling upward with him. Her mind spun out to blankness as, fused in white heat, they became one.

  * * * *

  Con’s voice broke into Linn’s dreamy lassitude. “Are you all right?” he asked softly.

  Con hadn’t withdrawn but merely shifted to the side so as not to crush her with his weight.

  “Never better,” she replied, “though you are a little heavy.”

  “I didn’t notice any complaints before,” he responded with a wry, very Con-like smile.

  “Pleased with yourself?” she asked.

  “And with you,” he answered, kissing her nose. “I knew from the start you were a Roman candle.”

  Linn groaned. “If you’re referring to our first meeting I’d rather not discuss it. When I had to face you the next morning I was mortified.”

  “I’d love to discuss it. It was the premier experience of my life, until tonight.”

  She punched him lightly on the shoulder. “You’re a beast to tease me about it. You know nothing like that had ever happened to me before and if you’re going to razz me about it, I’m leaving.”

  He grunted as she moved. “You’ll have to take me with you,” he said, holding her down.

  Linn inhaled sharply, feeling him growing inside her. “Again?” she asked.

  “Still,” he muttered as she locked her legs around him once more. “I’ll never get enough of you.”

  The second time he was easier, more gentle, soothing her with soft words and lingering kisses, and when it was over she found that her face was wet with tears.

  “No crying, now,” he said, wiping her cheek with his thumb. “I won’t have it.”

  “It’s just that I’m so happy,” she said, snuggling into him.

  “Don’t get too comfortable, my lady,” he warned. “I’m taking you inside. You’ll get sick from the damp and I’ll be the cause of it.”

  “Oh, can’t we stay? It’s so lovely here.”

  “All right, for a few minutes,” he agreed, lying back with his hands behind his head. Linn settled against his shoulder, gazing up at him. She traced the line of his jaw with her finger.

  “Do you look like your father?” she asked.

  “Not much, nor my mother either. I seem to be a throwback. What about you?”

  “Oh, I’ve seen pictures of my mother; I look like her. My father was dark like you.”

  He smiled. “Think I’m handsome, do you?”

  “I think you’re conceited. As far as your looks go you’ve a bit too much jaw for some people.”

  “But not for you.” He closed his eyes contentedly.

  “And your nose looks like it was once broken.”

  “Twice,” he corrected her without opening his eyes. “I suppose you think it spoils my beauty.”

  Linn kissed his cheek. “Nothing could spoil your beauty for me, Con.”

  He wrapped one arm around her shoulder, hugging her. “Is that so, my lady?”

  “That’s so.”

>   “I wager that means you’ll have to tell Sean he’s out of the running,” he said slyly.

  “Sean was never in the running. I’m ashamed to admit it but I’m afraid I was using him to get to you.”

  “A tactic which met with admirable success,” he admitted ruefully. “Poor Seaneen. I actually like him, if you can believe that, but when I saw him with you it drove me wild.”

  “You said he was a milkman with a typewriter.”

  Con winced.

  “Why do you call him Seaneen?” Linn asked.

  “Oh, it means young Sean, little Sean. His father is Sean as well, you see.”

  “I see. I always thought that was a terrible thing to do to a boy, call him after his father. He’s ‘little somebody’ all his life. He winds up a fifty-year-old man who’s still Little Jim because his father, Big Jim, is still alive.”

  Con laughed. “Is that your charming way of telling me our first son won’t be named Connor?”

  Linn held her breath. Their first son? But he went on smoothly. “It’s a famous name in the sagas, you know. Conchubor.’‘

  “Yes, I know. ‘Young subtle Conchubor.’ Whose line is that?”

  “Yeats, the nonpareil. He’s my religion, that man.”

  “He’s everybody’s religion over here. I couldn’t believe it when I saw that his picture was on the twenty pound note.”

  “Certainly.”

  Linn giggled. “Only the Irish would put a poet on their money.”

  “And why not? He’s just as important to us as Jefferson or Lincoln or any of those bloody politicians you put on yours.”

  “I wouldn’t call Lincoln a bloody politician,” Linn said, outraged.

  Con waved his hand, dismissing The Great Emancipator. “Shakespeare is on British money,” he pointed out equably.

  “Now there’s a genius,” Linn said, needling him.

  “To be sure.”

  “And an Englishman.”

  “I forgive him.”

  “That’s very generous of you.” Linn pressed his left nipple with her thumb.

  He glanced down at her. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m testing your erogenous zones.”

  “I think we’ve discovered that they all work,” he said. He shook his head. “I’ve created a monster in a single night.”

  She smiled at him. ‘‘That’s what you get for taking on a wild American lady.”

  He cupped her chin in his hand. “The only thing wild about you is your response to me,” he said tenderly.

  Linn dropped her eyes. “That’s not what everybody in town thinks,” she said unhappily. “I made a fool of myself at the Fleadh.”

  He sat up. “You didn’t make a fool of yourself; you just showed how you feel about me and I’m glad you did. It gave me the nerve to try again, to come here and wait for you. And as for what they think, ten of them together might have one brain between them to think anything.”

  Linn chuckled wickedly. “Con, that’s an awful thing to say. I know you don’t mean it.”

  He frowned mulishly. “Perhaps not, but if any of them say a word against you I’ll have their hides.”

  “Oh, come on. You’d have to admit I asked for it. My behavior even gave Terry Cleary ideas.”

  Con glanced at her sharply. “Oh, aye?”

  She saw that she shouldn’t have brought it up. “Well,” she said uncomfortably, “it wasn’t much actually...”

  He waited, eyeing her narrowly.

  “He just said something a little suggestive,” she hedged.

  Con’s jaw tightened. “I may have to give him a clout in the mouth next time I see him,” he said tersely.

  “Con! You can’t be serious. I’m sorry I mentioned it. Terry’s just full of himself, that’s all. He’s sexy and he knows it.” She put her hand placatingly on his arm.

  He shrugged it off. “Oh, he’s sexy, is he?” he inquired archly.

  “Con, you can’t be jealous of a sixteen-year-old boy.”

  “I’m jealous of anybody who looks at you, including a sixteen-year-old boy, especially one you think is sexy.”

  “I think you’re sexier.”

  “That’s comforting.”

  “I think you’re the sexiest man in Bally.”

  He snorted. “That’s not saying much and well you know it.”

  “The sexiest man in Ireland, then, and that’s a significant statement.”

  He tugged on her hair. “I don’t know about that, but I’ve decided that you were right about one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Since you came here if you haven’t been crying, you’ve been rolling about in the grass with me.”

  Linn flung herself on him as he collapsed in laughter. “You’re going to pay for that!” she yelled.

  “Oh, I hope so.” He grinned, pulling her across his body.

  Linn clasped her arms around his waist and rubbed her cheek on his stomach. A cool evening breeze swept across her back and she shivered.

  Con sobered, propping himself on an elbow. “Let’s go in, Aislinn. You’re cold; you’ll have pneumonia by morning.”

  Linn ignored him, trailing her tongue across his navel, darting it along his hipbone down to his thigh. He caught his breath, moving his hand to her hair to massage her scalp. Linn raised her head.

  “What was that you were saying?” she asked innocently.

  “Perhaps we’ll stay a while longer,” he whispered, pushing her down again.

  Linn fondled him and then touched him experimentally with her tongue. Con made a guttural sound deep in his throat and closed his fingers around the nape of her neck. When she saw the intensity of his response her courage faltered.

  “Con,” she said, kissing him lightly, “I want to make love to you very much, but I’ve never…I’m not sure . . .”

  He shushed her gently. “You don’t have to be sure. You can’t make a mistake with me. That assurance and your desire to please will teach you what to do.”

  And he was right.

  * * * *

  They didn’t make it back to the gatehouse until three in the morning, by which time Linn was chilled to the bone. Even in midsummer the nights were cool.

  Con grabbed an afghan and draped it about her shoulders once they were inside, rubbing her arms briskly .

  “Scoot over to the bed there and cover up while I light the fire,” he directed. “Cuddle inside that and you’ll be warm soon enough.” He tossed his shirt on a chair and began to shift logs from the brace against the wall onto the hearth.

  Linn drew the blanket around her and watched him work in quiet contentment. Relaxed, replete, she curled up drowsily, admiring the play of muscles across Con’s arms and back as he built the fire. Finally he bent to light it, and then stood by to make sure it caught and drew well. Satisfied, he joined her on the bed.

  “That should do it,” he said, pulling her into his arms.

  “What accounts for the weather here?” Linn asked curiously. It was changeable and damp, misty and often rainy, but never bitterly cold.

  “The Gulf Stream,” Con replied. “It gives us our climate and makes the country green. The current encircles the whole island like a ring of bright water.”

  Linn smiled at his fanciful description; he talked the way he wrote. That reminded her of something.

  “Con, why don’t you have any of your books here?” she asked.

  “Checked, did you?” he replied, a smile in his voice.

  “Yes.”

  “I did have some but I gave them away,” he said. “People always ask me for them.”

  “You’ll never get rich that way, Connor,” Linn stated dryly. “The idea is for people to buy them.”

  “They buy them, never worry,” he answered. “They all did well, except The Eden Tree. That just broke even.”

  “Poetry never sells that well. It has a select but appreciative audience.’‘

  “Just as you say,” he agreed, nuzzling her nec
k.

  “Where did you get the title?” Linn asked.

  “Oh, that. I was trying to get across an idea from the Gaelic which wouldn’t translate literally. The original phrase meant something forbidden, something or someone that you desire passionately to the point of distraction, but can never, ever have. So I called it The Eden Tree because that seemed to sum up the situation.”

  “I see. It sounds like a perfect choice.”

  “I’m glad it meets with your approval.” He pressed Linn closer and ran his hands lightly over her from her shoulders to her hips. “Aislinn,” he breathed. “Nothing, nothing, has ever felt as wonderful to me as your soft warm body in my arms.”

  Linn closed her eyes and melted into him. “Oh, Con, I love you so. I was wretched when I thought you didn’t want me.”

  He hugged her tighter. “Not want you? I’ve been consumed with wanting you, destroyed by it, since I met you. When you sang to me at the Fleadh I was so…hot…I wanted to throw you down and take you right there.”

  Linn giggled. “That would have caused even more of a sensation than my performance did.” She paused thoughtfully. “You don’t suppose anybody saw us tonight in the glen?”

  She felt his mouth form itself into a smile against her skin. “If so, there’ll be more talk about you in Bally tomorrow.”

  Linn burrowed into his chest. “Don’t even suggest it. My reputation is in shreds already. You’d think the locals would have something better to do than revile me.”

  “They don’t,” Con said with a laugh. “And besides, they’re not reviling you. You’re new and interesting, and that’s the truth of it.”

  Linn stroked his soft hair, drying now in the heat of the room. “Con,” she asked softly, “how did you know I would be there tonight?”

  “Oh, that’s simple. I put the come-hither on you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A spell to summon a person to your side. Very effective.”

  “You’re full of baloney.”

  “Blarney,” he corrected piously. “Here we call it blarney.”

  “Whatever you call it, the very idea sounds suspicious to me.”