by Laura Parker
sensitivity will keep the reader entranced and wanting
more. Superexcellence in the field of historical romance!
5 stars!”—Affaire de Coeur
EXCERPT
The slender arms that came around him from behind seemed a miracle of grace and benediction to his harried thoughts. The world ceased to exist outside the circle of her arms. “My love, take pity,” he whispered hoarsely.
Meghan rested her brow in the valley between his shoulder blades, her hands splaying over the flat expanse of his abdomen. My love! He had called her his love. He loved her. She felt the rapid rise and fall of his breathing under her hands and it comforted her to know that he was as moved as she. One hand moved up over the wide contours of his chest while the other descended, reaching lower until she found him.
“Mercy’s Grace!” Revelin shut his eyes and arched his back, involuntarily pressing himself into her hand. Her second hand joined the first and she cradled him.
He felt alive, like a dove, warm and throbbing. “Did ye always feel so?” she questioned in a serious voice.
“Always feel…what?”
Meghan considered this as her fingers searched his clothing for the placket that would allow her entrance. “Ye’re like a bull. The sheathing does not tell the whole of it.”
Revelin felt the rumble of laughter first in his belly, the immoderate kind of guffaw that was part amusement and part guilty shame. When he loosed it, the explosion startled the night, set the stillness crackling with human warmth and reality.
* * *
NOW ON SALE
A Rose in Splendor—Book Two of The ROSE Trilogy
EXCERPT
“Shh, acushla, do not weep,” he said softly, drawing her closer until his cheek rested against hers. “I did not mean to make you cry.”
Deirdre drew back from him. “Why, why have you come here?”
He grew very still and suddenly she was frightened. She had asked a question to which she did not want the answer. She looked down. “No, do not tell me.”
He lifted her chin until she was forced to look once again into his eyes and read the answer that she both feared and desired.
She knew that he would kiss her. She drew a quick breath, tried to make her mouth less tremulous than it was…and failed.
She failed, too, to prepare herself for the feel of his mouth on hers, the warm hunger and sweet fire of a kiss unlike any she had ever known.
The kiss deepened and the drum of pain within her was replaced by the thunderous pounding of her heart. He tasted of green grass, and she shivered deep inside to the languorous stroke of his heat-drenched tongue across her lips.
When at last he lifted his head, she could not draw breath and kept her eyes closed against the devastating effect of his kiss.
“What’s this, acushla, have you never been kissed before?”
Deirdre opened her eyes to his gentle laughter and thought of Cousin Claude and the half dozen other young men who had dared press their mouths briefly to hers.
“No, I do not think I have,” she answered with wisdom of her new knowledge of a kiss.
“Good,” he answered and pulled her to him again.
They lay in the grass a long time, his mouth on hers, his hands on her shoulders, one long black-clad leg thrown across hers as though he feared she would flee. But Deirdre had no desire to move an inch, unless it brought her closer to him.
Finally, he rose away from her and lay back on the grass beside her and they both stared at the misty day about them.
“I did not know that kissing could be like this,” Deirdre admitted after a few moments, too timid to turn and look at him.
“Like what, acushla?”
“Like fear and joy, Christmas Day and its anticipation all rolled together.”
“Aye, ’tis like that, acushla.”
She smiled to herself. “Why do you call me ‘darling’?”
From the corner of her eye she saw him roll onto his side to face her. “What could you have me call you? Madilse?”
My love. Deirdre trembled inside. “Kiss me again.”
“No, lass.”
Confused, she turned to him and met his serious look. “You’d nae like it if I kissed you again.”
“Why?” she whispered, already suspecting what his answer would be.
“There comes a price with joy, and though I do not think you’d be sorry now, later you might come to regret the price you’d pay.”
Deirdre closed her eyes against the stark beauty of his face. It was a dangerous moment.
“Aye, dangerous currents tug at your skirts, madilse,” he said quietly, as though she had spoken her thoughts. “Only the bravest venture into the strongest currents. Ladies do not set sail upon strange seas.”
Deirdre opened her eyes and once again met his gaze. She had heard of lands to the south where the sea was a deeper blue than the sky, where green and sapphire currents ran together in a warm flood of beauty. She felt the tug of those currents as she gazed into his eyes and she wanted nothing more than to launch herself upon that sea tide in his eyes and go where he would take her.
“You think me a coward,” she whispered.
He touched a finger to her cheek and then traced the sensitive bow of her upper lip. “Nae, I do not think you a coward. The lass of my dreams would dare anything if her heart ruled that it be so.”
She understood at last what he meant. This was her choice, and her responsibility. Greatly daring, she reached up and touched his face. “Kiss me again, Killian. Please.”
*
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