by Nicole Locke
Tears ran down her face and he brushed them away. Kissed her forehead, her cheeks, kissed along her jawline before pulling away.
She put her hand against his face, held it there. The room’s shadows were making it hard to see him fully.
‘It’s dark in here,’ he whispered.
‘Yes.’ She could barely see him. But she felt his gaze all the same. Felt the heat of his skin and knew it flushed his cheeks.
‘I didn’t realise... Is it too much?’ he asked.
She was overwhelmed with what she felt. ‘Yes.’
His hands loosened.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Finding a candle. The dark...’
And then she understood. Even now he thought of her fear; she hadn’t given it a thought. ‘I’m not afraid. I can’t be—not with you here.’
‘Alice.’ He bent his head and kissed her cheek, her temple.
She felt the warmth of his breath, the heat of his body.
‘You told me to see the light in the dark.’ She wrapped her arms around him. Held him tightly. ‘This is the light in our dark.’
She lifted herself to kiss his jaw, his cheek. Felt the scratch of his beard, the heat of his skin. It was Hugh she touched, whom she brushed her kisses against.
‘This moment is for us. This is our light.’
Upon a groan he captured her lips with his. His mouth slanting, parting her lips, tasting her. Brutal. Claiming. Her hand twined around his neck, pulling him closer even as he pulled away. She locked her fingers into his tunic.
‘Alice...’ he said in warning, his breath hot against her skin.
‘Please, Hugh.’
‘Not like this. Not when I know—’
‘This may be all we have.’
A sound choked out of him. ‘There’s a fire over there—let me make the flames higher.’
She didn’t want to let him go. She moved the only thing she could—her lips, her breath. Her heart thumped against his.
‘I don’t need to see you,’ she said.
A sound of disgruntlement or a sound of approval as she continued her kisses, as she caressed and stroked along the cords of his neck, the blades of his shoulders.
‘I want to see you.’ The darkness of the room heightened his voice, heightened the raw emotion there.
She’d let him go and he’d leave. She knew it.
‘Not yet,’ she whispered.
She skimmed her palms along his face, her fingers clumsily caressing the soft wet heat of his lips. When they had pressed against hers they had felt firm with intent, with purpose. She wanted that purpose and intent again, but he was holding himself away from her even as her thumb caressed the fullness of his bottom lip. More touches along his jaw, below the curve of his ears...
‘Don’t make us wait, Hugh. Not any more. I won’t have it.’
She felt the tension in him increase, felt his control burn hotter. ‘But here, Alice? Now? There is so much more for you.’
‘Shh...’ she said, pressing against him until his body shuddered. ‘There’s no more than this.’
‘Is it enough?’ He clenched her tighter, closer, dipped his head. His lips hovering over hers until they shared breath.
She didn’t need her eyes to know that this was real. He was real. Here...holding her. She’d seen him enough in her dreams, but never to touch. Their touch was the truth for her.
‘Is it enough?’ he repeated.
‘This is all that matters.’
He lifted her, and his lips captured hers. Not in desperation, but in a slanting of lips, of effortlessly pressed desire. And she felt everything between them, waiting for them both.
This kiss was what she had dreamed all kisses with him to be. A slow, achingly slumberous heat, with those threads she imagined tethering him to her, weaving throughout her, making some pattern she didn’t recognise, but followed.
Followed the stroke of his hands, the tilt of his head as he kissed along the curve of her jaw, along the downward slope of her neck until he reached the restrictions of her gown.
But he wasn’t deterred. He loosened his hold on her, and she slid slowly down. So similar to that day at Court. When in her hurry, in her fear, she had slammed into him. But this time she wasn’t buried under acres of courtly dress. He wasn’t covered in lethal chainmail.
It was only him, Hugh, who kept his grip against her skirt as she slid, and rucked it to her hips. She felt the cool air, the heat of his hands on her outer thighs.
‘Lean against me,’ he said, his voice roughened.
It sent shivers through her just as much as his bare hands on her thighs.
Holding her still, he let the heat and something else soak deep within her. Something much warmer that spun fast through her body.
Desire. Need. Want.
She leaned against him, his body and his arms fully supporting her. His hands raised her skirts a little more as she dropped and his fingers spread, his hands encircling the backs of her thighs.
He stroked her until she entwined her hands around his neck and he carried her to the bed.
She lay there while he stood. He wasn’t leaving, but he wasn’t satisfied either.
‘Hugh...?’
‘You might not mind the dark any more, but I can barely see you.’
So stubborn. So relentless. But that was what drew her to him. ‘Light a candle, then.’
A low chuckle. ‘It’s dark! And, as much as I have dreamed of being in this room, I don’t know it.’
‘On the table there.’ She pointed.
He turned then, lit the candle. Walked to the fire to increase that as well, until the flames danced light into the room.
Then he stood there, with the fire illuminating him. An errant lock of blond hair across his forehead, his blue eyes dark.
‘You’re still dressed,’ he said.
‘You laid me on this bed fully clothed.’ She threw her hands over her head, watched his body go rigid.
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ he said, and there was a light in his voice to match the flames behind him.
‘Does this have to do with the room being well lit?’
‘Not lit enough; I need to see more.’ He crossed his arms, leaned a shoulder against the wall. ‘Take off your clothes.’
An order. There was a lightness to his tone, but his voice was low, raspy, as if the very idea of what he’d said burned through him.
It did burn through her. In all the times she had imagined this, she had never imagined them like this. Because being apart meant they’d changed. Grown stronger.
Sitting up, she leaned her weight on one arm and dangled her feet over the edge of the bed.
Like this, she could see the frayed threads in his composure. His need just underneath. From the way each breath looked purposefully drawn to his unflinching gaze as if he’d forgotten to blink.
‘Alice? Your clothes.’
‘I will, if you take yours off as well.’
He arched a brow, as if he was amused, but his fingers flexing restlessly along his crossed arms told another story.
‘Are you...commanding me?’ he said.
The words she’d said to him that day at the market. He had tried to humiliate her, but it hadn’t stayed that way.
‘I don’t know why I said that—’
‘To taunt me.’
She almost smiled. ‘I suppose that’s true.’
‘They had another effect. They haunted me, and it’s all I can do not to show you.’
It hadn’t only been him affected by her words. For many nights afterward she dreamed of Hugh like this. ‘Won’t you?’ she said.
His chest rose and fell suddenly, his lids narrowed. ‘The fire’s lit. I w
ant to see you now. There will be no more waiting, no more stalling, no more longing. And I do long, Alice. Even if I have to wait.’
‘I don’t want to wait.’
He closed his eyes briefly on that. ‘You need me to wait. You need me to even if you don’t know it.’
His words added to the tension between them, like wool being expertly twisted between the distaff and the spindle. Even the low reverberations of laughter and song downstairs tightened the need to be with him. As if they could be caught.
She felt ensnared.
Keeping her gaze on him, she undid each shoe, rolled down each of her hose. Her fingers fumbled as she tossed them aside.
Hugh wasn’t looking at her eyes. Instead his gaze skimmed up from her bare feet along her still covered legs and down again. He bent, his movements swift, sure, as he tossed his boots aside.
She slid off the bed. His haste in removing his boots encouragement enough as she untied the laces at her sides, as she shrugged to let her gown fall to the ground and stepped out of the clinging fabric until she stood in only her chemise.
She waited, but Hugh stood still. ‘Tell me, Alice.’
She licked her dry lips. ‘Tell you what?’
‘What do you want from me?’
She felt as if he was preparing her for something—like wool about to be sorted and cleansed. As if she was being readied to be made into something else.
‘I told you I don’t know why I said that to you that day.’
‘I think you do.’ He paused. ‘I’ve wanted you all my life, and I feel as if I’ve been bound to stay away from you. Now you’ve suddenly given me a way to untie those bonds. But my hands are shaking. I need you to tell me.’
Didn’t he know? He wasn’t bound away from her. He was bound to her. That thread she felt—he felt it, too.
His hands might be shaking, but her whole body quaked at his words, at what he implied. He wanted her to...to command him. Her heart sped, warmth filled low in her belly. He was right, she wanted it, too.
‘Take off your tunic and belt.’
Huffing in a breath as if she jabbed him, he roughly unhooked his leather belt and it fell heavily to the floor. Grabbed the back of his tunic and tugged it over his head. She watched the muscles in his stomach ripple, saw the flexing of his arms as they lifted so light a weight. He threw the fabric as if he wanted never to see it again.
He was bare except for leggings that hid nothing from her. The flames’ light illuminated his tanned skin, the light dusting of hair along his chest and down to his breeches. Tall, lean, corded in ways she hadn’t imagined. Had felt, but didn’t know the full extent of. Magnificent male. A knight. A warrior.
And every glimpse of his skin showed the hours of training, the scars and wounds from past battles.
Some injuries were far more recent. There was a fresh wound surrounded by bruising on his left side. Healing, still red. He’d received that while he’d been in Swaffham. Training or something else?
‘Does it hurt?’ She pointed to his side.
His brow rose, he looked at his side, and shook his head. ‘Worried for me?’
‘Maybe.’
‘It was Eldric. He’s gotten better at wrestling since the last time I saw him.’
She didn’t like that he got hurt. But the longer she gazed, the more she noticed his past injuries. The jagged line across his forearm that matched the identical jaggedness of the thin strip across his stomach.
She hated that. Hated that he’d suffered, that she hadn’t been there to protect him, to help him as she should have. He loved her—he should have stayed here. Hadn’t he realised that when she’d punched him in the nose?
‘I am concerned for you.’
A small smile. ‘I’ll have you know he didn’t get another swipe at me, and I won’t let him.’
Another pause from him. His gaze was waiting. Watching.
The chemise wouldn’t be so easy to remove. It wasn’t only the laces at the side, but the fact that she’d have to lift it over her head. Her arms didn’t feel as if they’d work properly.
‘Hugh...’ she said, her voice not indicating any nervousness, but instead a whisper of something else. Desire. Longing. She wanted this. But her hands seemed incapable of completing this strange game they started.
‘I’m right here, Alice.’
She could see that. The flames danced behind him. The tips of his hair curled, the light blond shining in the fire’s light. His eyes a dark murky blue.
‘I don’t understand this.’
‘I know. I don’t either, and it’s not how I imagined I’d react.’
‘You’ve imagined this?’
A laugh, a chuckle—low, pained. ‘Over thousands of nights and hundreds of days.’
‘I don’t think I can do this. Shouldn’t you be here?’ She indicated in front of her. Directly in front of her.
‘I should. Yes, I should. But, just as you can’t seem to lift that material, I can’t seem to move from where I am.’
Something forlorn tugged through her then. Maybe they would always be separate. Maybe they had waited too long.
‘Why are we like this?’ she asked, fearing the answer, but needing it.
‘Because I want you too much. Always have. And it’s like a dream that we are even here.’
Warmth spread through her. ‘But I’m real. I’m here... I want you to kiss me. Like at Lyman’s.’
‘Don’t mention Lyman’s.’ He closed his eyes, shuddered. ‘It makes it worse if you mention that room. What I wanted to do to you. What I’m aching to begin now.’
Was that how it was for him? Did she affect him so much? She could see it in the way his gaze went distant and heated at the memory of what they had done.
And knowing he shuddered simply at the memory made everything easy again. She simply gripped her chemise and ripped it over her head.
His chest suddenly stilled before he shoved himself away from the fireplace and strode towards her.
His eyes didn’t roam over her naked frame. Instead each watchful gaze fell against her skin like his heavy steps across the floorboards. From her feet to her thighs to her hips to the indentation of her waist and breasts. More steps, until his eyes locked on her lips. On her eyes. Until he stood before her as she had commanded him to do.
‘Too long,’ he whispered. ‘Too much. You are more beautiful to me than I could ever dream.’
Warmed by his words, she grew restless and urged, ‘Please, Hugh, touch me. End this.’
‘Lie down,’ he said.
She didn’t hesitate—wouldn’t, since for every step she took back he stepped forward. When she sat he took the final step, but did not sit with her.
She should have felt vulnerable. She’d asked him to take his clothes off, but he’d kept his leggings and braies on. She sat while he stood.
Alice could see the fine sheen of his skin, knew this wait was costing him as much as her. She put out her hand as if he might take it, as if she could pull him to her. They were so close and she wanted this.
‘Not yet. You don’t know what you do to me. How much I want to touch you. Your skin looks so soft...’
‘You’ve touched me,’ she reminded him. ‘At Lyman’s. Here.’ She demonstrated with her hand and fingers along her shoulders, and down her arm. ‘And here.’ Her hand went down her thigh.
He went rigid, watching her hand. She didn’t know where this came from—this strength, this need.
‘Through your clothes,’ he said, his eyes lifting reluctantly from her hand to her eyes again.
There was no relief from Hugh being this close to her. She could feel the heat from his body, smell the scent of leather, of linen, of him. See the curl of his hair against his forehead and that fraying of his control as h
e’d watched her hand.
She was bound to him, bound by a thread, by her feelings, by their love. But still he kept himself away from her when she needed him nearer. Yet all her life if she saw a problem she found a solution. She’d bring him closer.
‘But wouldn’t you like to touch me here?’ She purposefully trailed her fingers from between her breasts up along her collarbone to the arch of her neck. Watched as his eyes absorbed her every stroke.
‘Alice...’
‘Your clothes,’ she said, stopping her hand.
He shucked his leggings and braies as efficiently and roughly as he had the other pieces of his clothing. Then he stood naked before her.
Never had she seen a male before, and never one like this. Magnificent knight. If she was at the mercy of the master spinner who bound them, she wanted it. Needed it. Demanded he twirl the spindle faster to tighten the thread.
His body shot with tension, his breath ragged, Hugh bent his knee on the bed and dipped his head to kiss her neck ever so softly along the path she’d traced with her fingers.
Supported by the bed, she tilted her head for more of his hot kisses, more of his flickering licks as he tasted her.
He lifted his head, his eyes meeting hers. Waiting for her command.
Watching his eyes, she trailed her finger along the shell of her ear to the curve of her jawline and then traced the other ear.
Hugh lips curved more before he bent again. She shivered as she felt his breath, hot and moist. She shuddered as she felt his tongue and lips along the new path she’d created.
He moved further up the bed and so did she, until she was lying down and he was lying over her on straightened arms. A bead of sweat on the side of his face matched the fine sheen on the rest of him. His blond hair, curled like a halo, made him look like an angel. But the shadows and reliefs, the muscles, cords and planes of his body, were wicked.
She’d never seen a man like this—up close, one she could touch. But she lay still, watching his eyes searching everywhere but always ending with hers. Then her lips again.
He wanted to kiss her; she wanted it as well. It was the logical place for her fingers to go. To trace along her lips until he replaced them with his mouth.